We are pleased to welcome Barbara Jantzen, Communicator at deSEC, to the Nordic Domain Days stage.

Barbara brings a refreshingly different perspective to our Tech! segment. While most of our technical sessions focus on protocols, implementations, and infrastructure, Barbara will tackle something equally important but often overlooked: the stories we tell about those technologies, and how those stories shape whether they succeed or fail.

Her session, "Taking a step aside: how stories and emotions shape the adoption of technical standards, and what you can do to tackle narrative issues," draws from deSEC's two-year project funded by the ICANN Grant Program, "Closing the DNSSEC Maturity Gap through Automation." The project has a technical focus on standardisation work aimed at smooth DNSSEC implementation, but along the way, a second dimension emerged: the community discourse around DNSSEC itself.

Barbara has been listening to how the industry talks about DNSSEC, examining how narratives and emotions have shaped its deployment over the years. In her presentation, she will share what she has found, offer new impulses for a realistic perception of DNSSEC as it stands today, and suggest practical ways to identify and address harmful narrative interference when it appears.

deSEC is a non-profit organisation based in Berlin that provides free, security-focused DNS hosting with DNSSEC signing enabled by default. Built entirely on open-source software, deSEC is also a DNS4EU consortium member and has received support from the NLnet Foundation and RIPE NCC.

If you have ever wondered why a technically sound standard can struggle to gain traction, or what we as an industry can do about it, this is a session you will not want to miss.