İbrahim Kalın was born in 1971 in Istanbul. After his graduation from Istanbul University Department of History, he earned his master’s degree at the International Islamic University Malaysia.  He was conferred the title of Doctor  at the George Washington University in 2002 and Professor  at İbn Haldun University in 2020. He gave lectures  at several universities including Georgetown, Bilkent, and İbn Haldun Universities. He became a member of board of overseers  at Ahmet Yesevi International Turkish-Kazakh University and Turkish-Japanese Science and Technology University. He established and chaired SETA Foundation (Political, Economic, and Social Research Foundation) in 2005. İbrahim Kalın wrote several  papers, articles, and books, which have been translated into several languages and published on international academic media; presented papers at various councils, congresses, conferences, and panels; and contributed in workshops. İbrahim Kalın wrote articles and books in disciplines such as the Turkish foreign policy, politics, philosophy, and history, and contributed to literature in these fields with his  recent works.

Apart from his assignment as Director of the National Intelligence Organization in June 2023, from 2009 onwards İbrahim Kalın also served as Chief Foreign Policy Advisor to the Prime Minister , Coordinator of the Office of Public Diplomacy, of which he was also a founder, Deputy Undersecretary  for Foreign Relations and Public Diplomacy at the Office of the Prime Minister, Deputy Secretary General Responsible for Strategy and International Relations at the Office of the President,  Acting Chairman of the Presidential Council for Security and Foreign Policies, and Chief Advisor  for Security and Foreign Policies at the Office of the President, respectively. In addition to his duties in bureaucracy, he also continued to serve as Presidential Spokesperson, a position he had assumed in 2014 with the title of ambassador, until he was appointed as Director of the National Intelligence Organization. İbrahim Kalın speaks English, Arabic, Farsi, and French.