The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> MODERATOR: Welcome, everyone, to the open session for the free correlation. The session is called Ensuring an Inclusive and Rights-Respecting Digital Future, and we are looking for various stakeholders and community groups for management of Global Digital Compact and the review.
Without further adieu, I will give the floor to Mr. Norman, investigator of cyber affairs -- (?) for his opening remarks.
>> Thank you very much. And welcome to all the friends of the Freedom of Alliance Coalition and, of course, also our online audience.
Good afternoon, and thank you for joining us today at the open forum significant of the Freedom of Alliance Coalition which will be this year on Ensuring an Inclusive and Rights-Respecting Digital Future.
The Netherlands is a current Freedom of Alliance Coalition partner. They found Freedom of Alliance Coalition and acted in the first year. And it's been an more and more our country to be sharing this ever important coalition this year for the second time.
And I'm delighted to see such a great variety of panelists truly effecting the approach we see as essential for discussions on digital issues. We have experts from the FOC Advisory Network, Civil Society, private sector, the community and the IGF Secretariat present today.
And last but not least, my colleague and friend from Estonia (?), who will be chairing our coalition in 2025.
When I first started my role as a cyber ambassador for the Netherlands, everyone kept on telling me that 2025 would be an extremely important year for International Governance and human rights online. Therefore I must thank Estonia from the bottom of my heart for their willingness to take over our FOC chair next year.
At the same time in 2024, we have not been calmly waiting for Estonians to save us. The adoption of the Global Digital Compact at the summit of the future has been a key milestone in our journey toward the WSIS plus 20 review next year. The events we have been hosting with the efficacies over the course of 2024 have been largely focused on laying the groundwork while preparing our self for these important negotiations.
As most of you are familiar with the WSIS we do not start to review negotiations with the blank slate. I'm going to use the term that most of you will have a lot of hate relationship with, but we do have a great language to work with.
The principles and commitments and acts in the digital come back are closely linked to the existing wizard agreements and the Tunisia and plan of action. The GDC has a corporation built on principles and engrained on sustainable human rights. Both mutually independent and reinforcing. As well as for global internet and AI governance. The GDC also acknowledging the role of the IGF as a primary military stakeholder for discussions on internet issues.
Moreover in April of this year, the self-parliamentary guidelines were adopted at the (?) plus 10 conference. These need to underline and protect meaningful multistakeholder corporation in Internet Governance. And just in week on the initiative of Canada, the FOC will join a statement on the military stakeholder approach at the United Nations. The statemented recognizes that the multistakeholder processes must evolve to addressee merging and complex challenges.
It has this idea of evolving that I would like to address in the remainder of my remarks. A great language is no guarantee in today's world. Characterised by geopolitical dynamics and economic power concentrations and decline in internet freedom world-wide and rapid technological developments.
In order to actually strengthen and then evolve the governments of the internet and digital technologies we will need to have a narrative. A narrative underpinned by commitments and actions that actually do, one, keep discussion on technical issues within the technical domain.
Two, bridge the digital divide without reinforcing existing inequalities. And three, strengthen the protection of human rights worldwide online and offline. Four, govern emerging digital technologies in respecting right while making the existing multistakeholder approach to governments more inclusive.
This is no way an easy task but we as an alliance and the broader coalition believe these commitments resonate around the world and are the best way to work toward a digital future for all of us.
A 20-year review of WSIS is around the corner. And it will be up to us to ensure it will continue to steer digital corporation and governancing to with the implementation of the GDC. I hope today's open forum issue will not only address those issues that are close to our hearts, but we want to defend human rights online, multistakeholder governments and IGF itself, but also those issues that need to evolve to ensure the implementation of the GDC and the WSIS process remain fit for purpose. Also in 2025.
While full confidence in Estonia as the incoming chair of the FOC, it does tell me that today it's a very last event that we are organising as a chair of the freedom online coalition.
Mickey of the USA, most of you know her, asked me last night what the most memorable event for she was during our FOC chairmanship. As this is our last event, I hope this will be the one. So without putting any pressure on all of you I wish all a very fruitful and inspirational discussion. Thank you so much and back to Jacob (?).
(Applause).
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Mr. Norman, for your opening remarks. We will now have a round panelist for the different speakers. Each panelist will have about 5 minutes to answer a question related to their role in the multistakeholder approach to Internet Governance. And after that we will have time for questions from the audience followed by closing remarks from all the speakers.
So without further her adieu and Mr. Speaker Phillipo from the Secretariats office has to leave unfortunately already in half an hour. I will give the floor first to him. And Phillipo, what role can stakeholders play in the implementation of the digital comeback to ensure it and other relevant processes maintain and are in alignment with other international human rights law?
>> SECRETARIAT: Thanks, Jacob. And I would like also to acknowledge the statement from Ambassador Norman, and especially on the role of the Global Digital Compact, the role of the IGF.
I guess all of you would agree that if IGF didn't exist, we would need to invent something like this, and this is also one of the aligning points of the Global Digital Compact where most member states and all stakeholders find an agreement that the role of IGF and its convening role should be strengthened rather than weakened.
Director, we count on the Freedom Online Coalition to work in this coalition building when it comes to the role of this multistakeholder forum. Sorry my body language -- I'm try be to be in an open forum and trying to be as open as possible and not turn my back on everyone.
The Global Digital Compact is refreshing the agreement that member states found in 2005 with the agenda and 2003 with the Geneva principals and introduces some areas that are new. It's comprehensive. It's comprehensive and as a multistakeholder at the center.
And most of you and several member states and even stakeholders asked me -- hold on, there is an Intergovernmental process. How can it be multistakeholder? And that is the tricky question which we will need to answer. Because yes, the Global Digital Compact, it's a digital mentor process.
So something I would like to see is inclusive as possible in bringing all the voices from the state. And even the focus on human rights. And it's on the sustainability of development goals and human rights. If you are going back to Geneva of 2003, the concept was on Article 19 of the declaration of human rights and it' freedom of expression.
20 years, when we are talking about digital technology, the digital space we know the human rights is way more than just freedom of expression. So ideally we want to work together with those stakeholders and start implementing the Global Digital Compact, not in one year's time, not in two year's time, but right now.
There is provisions and the global understanding of what human rights are. There are sections of the Global Digital Compact that is represented at this table, and it would be very good to hear from them and how they plan of acting even further on human rights.
And there is something that the UN is already undertaking. There is the digital advisory service run by the office of the commissioner for human rights, and that we hope it would be another tool to sharpen the accountability of the private sector and of member states when it comes to respecting human rights online.
Coming back on how we can do this in a multistakeholder way, we -- a provision in the Global Digital Compact is to have a call for endorsement. They are talking what they are planning to do with the Global Digital Compact. We understand from the Civil Society organisation sometimes endorsing it can be a tough undertaking, so that's why we wanted to give the option of just specifying areas of act.
There is a generally public report on implementation of the Global Digital Compact, the Implementation Act. And these will consider the way forward and will run in parallel to the WSIS process.
I have to run to the airport, and to address one of the FAQs on how these two processes can go together. And this is just any personal take on having been in the GDC consultations since day one. I don't see this as two different roads that converge but rather as a stack.
WSIS is fit for purpose if we make it fit for purpose. The act lines encompass a lot of the areas that are in the Global Digital Compact but not all of them. And vice versa. So ideally you will have the implementation of the Global Digital Compact, strengthening what is already in WSIS. Because times are changing and we hope over the coming months, in Geneva, with the consultations I understand that co-facilitators for the process will be appointed by the end of March, in New York by the president of the general assembly, and with the Global Digital Compact implementation process.
And again to all of you around this table it is very, very important to hear from you on what you would like to see in the implementation of the Global Digital Compact, because again, multistakeholder processes -- they don't happen by themselves. As the UN we are to keep it as multistakeholder as possible and to keep the dimension, but we need to hear from all of you. And with this, Jacob, back to you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you so much, Phillipo. And thank you for laying out what the Global Digital Compact -- what it entails, and the human rights and how the implementation of the Global Digital Compact can be nurtured and endorsed and how to develop stakeholders in its implementation.
And thank you for touches on that last point, especially the WSIS and the TBC relationship. Because I think that's a question all of us have, and how we can best ensure there is no duplication on that side. And we are not only reviewing technologies but also implementing.
So thank you, Phillipo. And without further adieu, I would like to welcome the doctor general and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Estonia, who is also going to be the chair of the Freedom Online Coalition in 2025.
What role can governments see in the role of the Global Digital Compact, and how can governments, ensuring to with the stakeholders, of course, to make sure that the GDC and other relevant processes including the implementation of the GDC and different aspects of that and analysts in 2020 are in line with the International Human Rights Law.
>> Okay. Good. Thank you very much. And first of all, I should be thankful to Ambassador Norman for his kind keynote. Although I'm a bit conflicted because he put so much pressure on Estonia that I don't know how to feel about this. But nonetheless we are very grateful to the Dutch chairship of the FOC for all they have done and for their kind incorporation in handing the chairship to Estonia.
If you would like, in the very beginning, I would like to talk on the issue of multistakeholderism and the process and the upcoming processes. But definitely we will also say a few words about the possible (?). As a government representative I'm good note that for us fostering the multistakeholder approach is extremely important. And we too have been looking with concern into the situation that many discussions have been gearing towards multilateralism, not so much multistakeholderism. But we will have to see what we can do about it.
Now looking back in the last ten years, tech governance has changed quite a bit, and the recent GDC negotiations have also highlighted how digital issues have gained prominence, and at the same time become much more contested. And meanwhile the UN ecosystem has grown much more complex, and there is an increasing number of agencies competing for their role in different technology related mandates, and also now that the new UN tech office is entering the floor, it will be even more complicated to figure out what is the best way of moving forward.
But despite all of this complexity, we have learned during the many years that everything about it has to be a multistakeholder effort in order for it to be more successful and more inclusive.
There should be absolutely no one single country or entity who is controlling the internet. And we can see very well from the smaller scale when we looking at the national level, where one government is in control of the internet structures, then in the form of internet shutdown, this is something that is happening in the world quite often. And in our future endeavors we should definitely avoid this happening on a global scale.
We also know that there is no way to have a comprehensive approach when some stakeholders are excluded from the discussions. And especially those stakeholders who are marginalized already in other ways.
So ultimately if we don't have a sufficiently inclusive approach are the outcome will be worse for everybody, especially, of course the people.
And there is plenty of room for improvement sin we have millions and billions of people still without proper access to the interne,t, but this is again something that the governments must not have should not do alone but the global community should support this ask also play a part.
Now the digital government apps opposed to the enter Internet Governance is a much broader topic with wider scope and focus where we include E-government and cybersecurity and Artificial Intelligence. But it's important we not do this alone.
It's important in governments each stakeholder plays its role and not only for the sake of inclusion but also because they have specific competencies and they could use them to play their part in those discussions.
And since the digital society is an ecosystem and not an institution. We should not forget about that when we talk about the implementation of the GDC. As I talked about in the beginning during the GDC we talked about a multilateral approach. And this is improving how and why we need to continue showcasing the benefits and support of other stakeholders.
IGF obviously is a great example of this being such a global policy dialogue and bringing all the stakeholders together from technologists to the governments to Civil Society.
And therefore as we approach the WSIS +20 process and discussion the implementation of the GDC we must ensure a strong common approach in ensuring the internet's decentralized model.
Recording digital governance we must include governance and policy making for rights, democracy and the rule of law. And we also need to take into account the government system we already have created and how to use it to its full potential instead of creating new mechanisms that might duplicate the already existing formats.
And with regard now to the role of the FOC and individual governments I will just mention that in Estonia's experience, technology generally is a very powerful tool if it's accompanied with proper change management, which is very important. And we have to focus on how to transform the societies as a whole with the help of technologies.
Now in the FOC as a coalition of like minuted we can amplify and allocate for this message and FOC states can and will protect in principal across different forums. Advocacy is the FOC's strongest tool.
And finally I will mention another important aspect is capacity building. This is one of the priorities for the chairship in the FOC. And we will definitely continue our efforts in this regard. Often there is confusion and sometimes even resistance how exactly how many right can be followed and implement when using and developing technologies. So raising awareness and then capacity building is very important.
And the OHCHR has a crucial role to place in this which the GDC also affirmed and the FOC as well as individual governments will have to continue supporting the OHCHR and its work. And it also means that we have to continue doing it financially.
So I will leave it to that for now, and maybe come back later after some questions. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. And especially thank you also for mentioning the complexities, because indeed digital governance and Internet Governance are a very complex field, but I think you would agree with me if we underline that including as many stakeholders as possible in the conversation.
It's not something that makes it more complex, but actually helps us engage with the complexities of the governance and of the technical and governmental -- yeah, the governing challenges we have with the emerging technologies and the internet. And especially also change management which you mentioned. You mentioned it of course in the context of digital transformation, but I also think for the plus 20 review we need to develop together a very strong and agile change management for the WSIS.
So having said that, we will turn to Anya (?) from the IGA Secretariat. I'm glad you could make it. How can forms and spaces continue to serve as an inclusive space for dialogue amid changes to the exclusive spaces. Anya, I will give you mic too.
>> SECRETARIAT: Thank you very much, Jacob, and greetings to everyone here in Riyadh. Thank you for being patient and wait for me. The Secretariat is extremely busy on the first and last day of the IGF, but it's great for us to join the Freedom Online Coalition in the setup in Riyadh.
We have been collaborating particularly over the last two years very closely, and I use this opportunity to recognize the excellent work that the coalition has been doing, especially during the consultations on the Global Digital Compact leading to its adoption and I used opportunity as well on behalf of the Secretariat to congratulate the chair, Ambassador Norman, on the wonderful facilitation on this work. And we welcome closely working with Estonia and the new leadership in the months to come.
There is indeed a very important question. The IGF as you know has been convened in 2006 by the secretary general as a neutral platform that will allow for facilitator of multistakeholder dialogue on issues pertaining to public digital policy. Indeed some of the terms especially in the recent times are present in our discourse, such as Internet Governance and digital governance. What is the difference? It is an interesting debate. But essentially I think nothing is better to tell us in terms of the description of the digital public policy issues than people.
And through the IGF we really see, because of its bottom-up nature and of course multistakeholder approach, that people really see the digital technologies as something that is more and more integrated in their lives. And therefore speaking indeed about one entity, one discipline that is dealing with this complex topic is really impossible now. It's part of our lives and it's deeply integrated in all spheres.
Therefore in concluding, the UN system various institutions cannot avoid to deal with the digital because it's just there in every sphere of our lives and of our dynamics.
If we are looking back in the past, now 19 years of the IGF, things have been changing and as digital technologies have been evolving, so has the IGF. I always like to start from the numbers, from the metrics, because I think they are a nice indicator of the success or maybe of an alarm where we need do more.
You know always these WSIS plus 20 preparations are reminding me of my beginnings which was around WSIS 2010 when it was hosted in Brazil. And in Brazil we can speak about the 1,000 stakeholders participating in the meeting coming from around 120 to 22 different member states.
The numbers in the past ten years have significantly changed. In, I would say, favour of all of those who are diligently standing to protect the multistakeholder approach to internet. Which is for example in Kyoto last year we could speak about more participating than ten years ago. So more than 9,000 stakeholders who participated from around 178 member states. That's a significant increase in just a 10-year period.
And that also tells us that the multistakeholder approach is being endorsed or adopted or -- let's say more visible in other various part of the world.
Another indicator, which I think is a mere fact of the endorsement of the multistakeholder approach through the IGF model is the growing number of the local IGFs, national regional and sub regional. So for example during the step, the Secretariat has been reporting to the community we work with less than 50 NRIs.
They were really proud to say we work with a very firm robust network of 178 national regional, subregional IGF. In just a 10-year period, we tripled the number. The community tripled the number of the IGF molds that are deployed at the local level through the multistakeholder approach.
So first off the indicators of the success. The IGF has a platform. And certainly can see for the Secretariat who continues to serve people around the world and continues to react on the demand that comes from the people. That's why the agenda every year is changing. Basically being reflexive of the demand that is coming from stakeholders from around the world through the public consultations.
As the digital technologies are changing, as for example the Artificial Intelligence is becoming more and more prominent, or more and more a part of this, so has the agenda or the programme of the IGF.
So 2016 has ban significant shift. Topics that were dominated the agenda by that time such as cybersecurity, safety online, access and connectivity, have slowly been pushed a little bit on into maybe second place by the topics related to new and emerging telling nothings and special artificial intelligence. Just because it's bringing a new wave of challenges to us and bringing an additional layer of responsibilities in front of the multistakeholder community to respond how to govern this very important piece of technology that is more and more accessible to all of us.
So I would say those are the indicators. And I think in terms of the IGF, we will certainly see how the WSIS plus 20 and the preparatory practice will behave. But the Secretariat remains committed to its community to listen. What is the demand and then to respond to the capacity to the best of its ability to adjust the process so it's reflective of the need and hopefully to help us resolve the issues that have been identified by the community for having the digital technologies leading us to the sustainable development of the role. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you, Anya. Thank you for your remarks. If I may try to summarize, you wanted to emphasize mostly that the IGF politics throughout its existence has been a character of IGF has been open and flexible to make sure it can actually stand the test of time and continue to evolving to with the technical, social, political, all the developments that are ongoing. And I think that's also something we want to retain for years to come. So thank you very much for that.
And then we will move to the private sector, because we have different stakeholders around the table. So we will move to the private sector now. Global head of stakeholder and global engagement from Meta. Given the critical role of online platforms in guiding digital corporation. How can industry contribute to the human right and inclusive digital future while ensuring accountability? And what does this look like in practice?
>> Thank you very much for -- it's weird when you hear yourself. Thank you very much for that question. It's tough in the IGF after five days of organisations, but I think as a private sector we have a huge role to play. Second steps or several initiatives to ensure that we know, we contributed respecting an inclusive digital future.
And so it actually aligns with what the director general said and what my colleague also mentioned. I think I will take a stem back a little bit and say for us our approach is stemmed from -- you know our goals. Or our mission as a company is embedded in how we actually approach human right and how we built the product and how we review the policies.
So by that I mean -- I mean it's all good and nice to be here for us to be at the table to discuss all of these issues, but if our foundation is not strong, then you know we might as well just be theorizing everything we are saying here. So for us it's our mission and how we approach inclusivity and human right.
By that I mean in terms of ensuring we have people in our teams that do not -- that actually also represent the people who are using our platforms. As most of you know over 09% of the people that use our platforms are outside of the U.S. and Canada. Of course our stuff has not hit that level, but you know ensuring that people who are working on these issues, particularly in terms of policy, have believed experiences and can speak the languages and can engage and do outreach as we need.
It was the human rights policy team that are experts on these issues. That's one. So having a mission that is actually -- puts inclusivity and inclusion at the heart of everything we do.
Second, the multistakeholder engagements. We are here to be a part of this conversation. One the Internet Governance Forum but also the FOC is -- you know Meta member, I was co-chair of the FOC advisory network for about three years. I think it's an important platform not putting pressure -- as you take on the chairship, but it's also a place where have you single society.
You have governments, very open conversations. And I think that's very, very important. Because you just do not want partners who will tap you on the back to say you are doing well but also who will make sure are you accountable.
The third thing I will also mention is -- you know, other human rights or corporate policy that we launched in 2020, you know, is -- for us ground breaking but not just a policy we packed in a digital shelf and say now we have it. Within that framework, we are ensuring we are training our employees internally for them to be aware of human right principals for them to be aware -- not only to be trained but also aware of the human right principals as they build product -- as they build policies as well.
We also do regulate human right due diligence assessments to identify and mitigate the risks as well.
And the fifth thing I will mention is -- the fourth one is stakeholder engagement, and then I will pass on the mic. With regard to stakeholder engagement, this actually contributes to how inclusive our policies and products are.
So every time we write our community standards we engage externally. But I think that sound nice on paper. But how we do it is ensuring that we identify not only people that identify themselves as experts but also people with lived experiences. We go beyond just geographical inclusion or -- but we include cultural inclusion, who has the cultural compensation to engage in these issues.
But also I wanted to reference what the director general talked about access -- in access I mean infrastructure and also content access. So even if you are reaching out to someone because you want to be inclusive but do they even have internet access to engage with you? You know is engaging virtually something that is -- up know -- is that the right form of engaging? Or should you ensure you meet them where they are.
Content access, can they actually meaningfully engage in the issue? Because for the stakeholder engagement to be inclusive and to be meaningful, then we have to also invest in ensuring that we built a capacity of the people that actually talk to us that ensure to improve our policy. Otherwise then it's not inclusive at all.
And the last thing would be transparency, which we can talk about later on. Once we have done all of this. But if we are not sharing about our decision making to be engaged with. We have the transparency center where you can actually see the changes that goes through our policies. Everything is there.
But I think one criticism would be who has the time to go through that transparency center? And I think I'm sure we have so much more work to do tone sure it's not just there but also it can be used as a mechanism for accountability.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you and for explaining comprehensively how Meta is working for the stakeholders and also towards -- I don't want to repeat this many times, but the advisory network. And we want to include the stakeholders in their work as the online coalition.
We will get to next question which is the same question for both -- (?) so Sebonas, the direction to for of technical initiative ask the member of the FOC advisory network. Sebonas, how can stakeholders have (?) in Civil Society and the technical community and work in collaboration to ensure the voices of the global majority and marginalized groups are shaping and implementing digital frameworks and digital compact and the WSIS plus 20 review
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Taking into account different challenges and local context in the regions?
>> Thanks, everyone for having us here. So at the institute we primarily focus on getting global majority stakeholders across the board whether it's governments, private sector, Civil Society, marginalized community, refugees, into the conversation around what does the internet mean to them, and how do they govern it better?
And I think it's quite fundamental to us that when we see the differences -- not only between the global majority but also even within the global majority, there's a number different equities that are at play. For example, we have gender inequalities that continue to be persistent, even in rooms when there is multistakeholders happening we often time see there are more men than women being represented or certain groups having sort of a -- a more majority role in these conversations than many of the other groups.
So I think to ensure we have a truly multistakeholder model, we have to ensure the multistakeholder model has been very good. And the rock of governance for the last two years is not perfect. And there are many things that exist within the multistakeholder itself which has made communities across globe feel disenfranchised and excluded. And this is not a community that did not have access to the internet as it is but also communities that don't have access to these kinds of spaces, whether it's because of financial capital, because of knowledge, because of networks. There's a number of power symmetries at play. And I think it's very important to acknowledge.
And the other one that the director of Estonia has eluded to. Even when communities are connected because of shutdowns, they are connected and left out of conversations. So there's different layers. And for us to preserve the multistakeholder model and ensure it works for the global majority and for people around the world, it is really important to stop interrogating and make sure it is responding to the needs of the people on ground.
And the second thing is on the capacity piece. Even when we are in these kinds of spaces and that's where the technical community and the private sector, governments have a tremendous role to play in terms of how do we ensure that when groups have access to issue spaces, are sitting around these tables they are actually able to meaningfully contribute sand last one here we have seen with the GDC.
And a number of processes, it's actually quite extraordinary the amount of things happening. And it's a lot of to keep track of. And if you are under the resources in the global majority where have you existential crisis around the -- you know, not just the internet and being online and surviving online, but in terms of food security and climate change, and political GEO politics. So many things at play.
In that kind of environment, keeping track what have is happening in New York and Geneva is really, really difficult. So I think to make the multistakeholder model work it's different in capacity for communities from the very grass-roots up to the very top.
And I think you heard from the IGF Secretariat about NRIs. And oftentimes, in the last 20 years, we have also seen that NRIs are great in this terms of engaging local communities and often types they not officially stakeholders. They oftentimes -- they become politicized or they end up only capturing a majority -- women are left behind. That is at lease my experience in any NRI.
So I think to ensure that if we want multistakeholderism to really work for the global majority, there's a downstream effect that at every step along wait we are very deliberate about one building a capacity to creating intentional spaces and three, are designing those spaces in a way where different voices have equal rights and equal say and are able to contribute to what they want on how the internet to be. And I think that lived experience that think also that Meta also mentioned is really critical.
And the last piece I will say is in terms -- ensuring multilingual -- I think that's quite important. And there's a huge contribution of both the technical community as well as the private sector that, did you know if the internet -- and I think she also talked about 90% are in the U.S. and Canada, but if you see the websites around the world is majority English. And that is also a huge problem in terms of access. And the kind of content we are designing and having the communities properly represented online.
But at the same time, we also have to remember now with AI and other kinds of technologies, building a multilingual internet should not mean that we expect indigenous communities to contribute data for free. So there's also the power dynamic that we have to be quite cognizant.
So I hope as we think about the implementation of the GDC and how the member states are approaching it, that we are very intentional about how we are also thinking about the multistakeholder model, about inclusion and about space building, and about -- you know the inherent power symmetries that are not unique to the multistakeholder, that is structural symmetry that exists but I think we have a real tune as a community to be able to bill those spaces in a way so that everybody has an equal footing and an equal say and has an equal stake in these conversations because the internet -- from where I come from, the internet is the world. And without its access, I think we fundamentally get cut off from the world.
So there's a very real stake here. And I hope as we are thinking about -- and as all the various stakeholders are thinking about that, we are being very deliberate about space building. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much for the question and for your participant contribution in this conversation. I'm (?) for working Africa and represent the global south community as well.
I think the issue around the role of multistakeholderism within the context of global processes such as the WSIS and the GDC is a conversation that has been logged if not flogged. And I think we are at the point where we need to come up with some tangible -- you know recommendations in terms of how to proceed in this conversation.
I think one of the concerns that have been discussed is around the rule of the IGF, for example, in implementation of the GDC, for example, the IGF had a platform to achieve that objective or whether the options have been considered.
And I think one of the criticisms of the IGF has been, IGF is not known to be the tangible outcomes which is a valid argument but I would also arraigning if it doesn't lead to action, who is to blame? Why is it so? It doesn't lead to actionable because it's not settled.
To me, it's common and who will make it to interaction if not the UN, if the not countries. Who decided to make it what it is right now? So I do think if we are talking about multistakeholderism, the reason why a lot of conversations is by us the IGF process it's one of the voices are at least visible. To point out about how invisible non-stakeholders were in the GDC negotiation, for example.
So I do think that it is not enough to say the IGF doesn't lead to actionable outcome. If we believe in -- if we believe IGF believes in, then the question should be for the IGF to be able to achieve or lead to actionable ows.
But I also think one issue from the global perspective is that -- I do think it's about paying a service to some of these issues throughout the years and it does not help us to really advance.
My colleague was talking about a lot of dimensions around marginalized voices, male, female, no dynamics. And I remember being in a room, in a panel where the moderator was introducing a panelist and after he was adding to the format.
We are gender conscious, so we also introduced a woman to join the panel. I said what? So this happens in a lot of processes whereby the issues that people complain about, multistakeholderism and gender balance, our response is opportunistic.
We are not really interested in addressing the issue, and that is the same thing with the multistakeholderism. A lot of platforms we set up to achieve the mull stake objective is in response to the complains. If we are more genuine about how to achieve, it I believe we have what it takes to achieve it and quickly build. I hand over the mic. Give examples of some of the initiatives that help us to achieve multistakeholder outcomes.
I do think the world is challenged with the multistakeholders. It's not just enough you don't have the investment in the room. It's because you don't have equal capacity by diversity -- even when you manage to get diversity equity to the room they cannot negotiate or discuss at the same level because they don't have the capacity.
I work for an organisation where I think we are a bit privileged coming from society where we are privileged to be in rooms where a lot of organisations doing the work that we do don't have. But I think what we need to do at the multilateral is to engage the organisations such as (?).
It's not just about get us in the room. It's about using those links between the government and between the multilateral processes and the diverse commune these we serve. So we don't want to just be there and feel alone.
We want to be there representing a whole lot of communities and people, using our voice to make their opinions heard at the global stage some I do think this advice -- and I know I've been bashing mull national and the UN. But no, this is to speak in rooms like this to realize we are not here to advance ourselves. We here to create a community.
And create a process back home whereby we have platforms and know what is happen telling multilateral level and let them know how we can cop transcribe. So when we come here we not discuss discussing our opinion, we are discussing our communities and those who want to talk about it. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much for your remarks. I think they were especially very useful because you tried to connect local with the global level and tried to especially also bring this input from the local level into the conversation, even though we have some conversations that are multilateral and maybe a bit more closed.
We are trying to open them up. We are also trying to create more opportunities and to create more moments -- momentum also for engagement with broad range of stakeholders at the IGF but also outside of it. And I think that's an example that many others could also follow.
Without further adieu, I will move to the last question to the panelists and also a question for two of our speakers. So I will first introduce them and mention the question. We have (?) executive advisor and spokesperson and a principal for the internet society and for the technical community.
And Fiona Alexander from the university from the advisory network from the Academia. And then to the question, building on what was just mentioned, how can we ensure digital governance is not only inclusive but also unpinned by the expertise, leveraging expertise at the Academia and processes such as the WSIS, but the original WSIS process, and the process we had there? I will give the floor first to you, Olaf. I will give the floor first to you.
>> I will start with, did I promised myself not to mention AI during this whole week, but I failed. If you train a large language model and you provide it with incomplete input, it will start to hallucinate. And I think the multistakeholder mechanisms, if you do not provide all the inputs that have you at the table, the output of the process will be a hallucination.
Therefore we need everybody at the table. Including the technical community, which will help to produce an outcome that is -- that suits reality, so to speak, that is achievable but also, of course, the other stakeholders so we are not hallucinating about rights and about social justify issues.
I'm not going to call myself a representative of the technical community. I am somebody who has a technical community background. I've been contributed to the development of the internet for two and a half decades. I can only speak for my own organisation. And there are many technical community organisations out there.
First, I want to come back to the GDC. We heard how the GDC was developed and we heard that multistakeholderism is front and central as an output of it. However, the process itself was not a leading by example type of process with respect to multistakeholderism.
And therefore the question, whether the process or the outcome should be endorsed is one that we at least at the internet society, and no, we will not endorse it. We were not part of this process. We were at the outside looking in through opaque windows and guessing what was happening. At some point there was consultation but consultation is not multistakeholder engagement. It's not a discussion. It's not sharing what
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Sufficient as the UN at point the doors close and decisions are being made but those should be closing at the last possible moment, not a draft 1, 2 or whatever the draft number was.
We like the outcome of the paper, yeah, the principal division and the objectives that the GDC defines. And as the internet social again, I cannot talk for the whole community. We at least will be working towards some of these objectives, including making sure that the last 2.8 billion people, it is, and probably more still, are going to be connected to the internet. Because that's the basis of being able to -- to reap the benefits of the internet.
And there again, multistakeholderism is important because the initiatives that connection the people in the most difficult places are initiatives that are sort of local, local initiatives, community networks, creative, innovative solutions that people build on the grounding to with stakeholders that are technical and stakeholders that are -- you know interest groups. Actual stakeholders. And I think the role that the IGF structure from local to national to regional to global place a role there.
The IGF in that sense works as a norm entrepreneur shipping they gain inn formal process at the high level and trickle down again so people can act locally while thinking globally. For me that's what multistakeholderism embodies.
With respect to the role of the technical community, I have to say -- now I'm saying we -- we speak a different language too.
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We use different acronyms than the people that are engaged with traditional governance issues. And that makes thing difficult. You don't land a technologist in this forum and except them to be able to navigate.
The NRI doesn't mean anything to. That but if you take a policy maker and you dump them in a technical environment, TCP doesn't mean anything to them.
And I think it's very important to be conscious about that. One of the thing that I do in the context of the ITF, the engineering task force is that we help policy makers understand that environment. We do policy programs. We expose policy makers to those groups.
The ITF itself brings different communities into it to discuss issues that are relevant for society. We have a human rights and protocol research group in which we discuss those things. That doesn't maybe the ITF accessible to everybody from the global south and the global majority and doesn't make it easy to contribute. But it is still an open forum in which people can contribute it should they have the capacity and resources. Which that organisation can unfortunately not offer.
I know I am meandering a few topics here, but I think that is sort of the gist of it. It is important to get together. Only then we can solve complex issues. And the technology is often an aspects of that complexity. So you need the technologists in the room. When we do that we need to have a conscious and purposeful way of engaging that goes two ways. And the IGF I think is a good forum where we exchange ideas and bring thing back home so that we can implement them. Those were the three things. Thank you, Jacob.
>> Apparently I was clocked in earlier as being the fastest speaker at the IGF on Monday, so I will try to actually be much slower today. But who knows. I'm naturally a fast talker, so let me know if I get back up to that high speed again.
But thank you for the invitation, and it's happy -- year for me. It's happy to be here and talk about this important topic. I was sort of struck by not just the questions but intervenes that everyone else has made, and it's a nice problem of being the last person can you get to pull from what everyone else has said.
So I will try to do that with what I'm doing as well. But the question is, how do you actually make sure the conversations are underpinned by all the right expertise? And the only way you do that is by letting people in the room and giving them the capacity to meaningfully participate. Things that have been said here.
And is as I reflect on the last year and all the work the FOC has done with the ambassador and others and what the ANN has done, what I see to share is two processes that touched on digital issues and point to the limits and enable of the New York process he is to actually involve people. So not only do we have the experience of the Global Digital Compact but the cybercrime convention where stakeholders were allowed theoretically to be in the room and give advice and were ignored for two years.
My takeaway from this past year's experience is the New York process is by design and by structure and by bureaucracy and rules are lifted in their way to involve stakeholders. And I don't see a meaningful way to change that. I will keep say saying for it to change and pushing for it to change, but the reality is those systems are set up not to allow that.
So the way to address that going forward is to make sure FOC companies keep forward natures and allow the process and FOC allowing on delegation programs helps address some of that.
But my other takeaway when I look at the final output of the GDC and I trade cavally. And I've been doing this work for 25 years. I was in the U.S. government for 25 years before the last five. There's very little in the GDC that's actually new. Almost nothing, as I read it.
And think about all the other things I've been involved in negotiating in the last 25 years. There's a conversation on data governance that the GDC is doing. Luckily the GDC has processes, so I'm grateful for that, and a panel. But otherwise there's not much in the GDC that is new.
And when we talk about GDC implementation, I think the GDC implementation is well underway. Because the GDC is reinforcing what we are all already doing. While conversations next year in New York are important and clearly the resolution that will likely be adopted about WSIS renewal and plus 20 will be pivotable the conversation around that will be intergovernmental, and the next quarter.
So what do we do the for the nine months of next year? And I think the emphasis we should start taking on is looking at the local and national process. And I'm struck when Anya mentioned 178 national and regional concept for those who weren't around at the beginning it happened because the stakeholders went home in Greece and said we should do one of these at home. There was nothing in the IGF that said go forth and do this. There was nothing that anybody said you should do this.
It was people from the U.K.-- I don't know who it was actually. We could find out at some point. And this came back, and they said we should do this in our country. And that then spurred everyone else to take this on and come around and 20 years later you have 178 NRIs, local, national regional, youth whatever it may be. And that's a pretty inspiring thing to think about 20 years later we got to that.
And again this gets back to my suggestion for going forward. Yes we have to engage in New York and monitor in the way that we can. But GDC implementation is not something that need to star. It's already happened or is ongoing.
And I think if we start thinking of it that way, then we can go back to focusing on what is actually important which is how do we actually involve and participate and solve these problems at local and national levels and environments like this where we have structures to participate.
When I think back to 20 years ago, and even looking at the ITU or UNESCO, those groups are not particularly open and inclusive. And I'm not suggesting they are perfect now, but they have made great strides. So I think the operating agencies of the UN, The executing agencies of the UN, whether it's an IGF which I would include or the WSIS forum or UNESCO or an ITU, whether it's these other IGFs outside the process or an ICAN or an ITF, those processes all have mechanisms, and those processes are making best efforts.
So I think it's time for us to go back and focus on fixing and engaging and not in a performative way, as you suggested in some cases, but actually undertaking that and that's where I think we should shift our focus.
I think the New York exercises and process of this year have reinforced that the New York processes will never solve our problems because by design they will be multilateral.
We can keep pushing and denying access and keep pushing for FOC and others to make things better, but I think we will keep hitting a wall over and over, and I think we really need to focus on the other parts of the ecosystem and the WSIS ecosystem as we know.
It that's my takeaway from this week, especially as I listen to the Secretariat to answer questions -- sorry Phillip -- going forward. But they don't know still. And that speaks to the lack of -- even if then wanted to, that lack of opportunity in the New York environment to do it in a more meaningful way.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you, all of you, for your comments. And I'm very glad that the regional initiatives and the transmission control protocol that you mentioned now. So we can put that in our pocket.
And I'm glad you mentioned New York versus local versus national. And I think when we are engaging with the WSIS process but also broader Internet Governance, that would speak to the point that we have a double sort of -- double engagement where we both try to meaningfully engage with these processes that are in New York or in Geneva and try to make sure they are not too detailed but creating an enabling enforce the locally based and initiative based initiatives.
Because we don't need to have all the details. In New York we have more general principals and more general language but that language has to be enabling for all of those other initiatives and on the other hand we have to make sure. That's the second route that we have to engage with our stakeholders at home. And within our own smaller or bigger service increments, yeah.
So we have a few more minutes. We have I think about 8 minutes for questions, and then another round for all the speakers to give their last takeaway in about one or two sentences.
So let me see. Do we have any questions in the room or online? Okay. There are two comments online, but I don't know if -- if we don't have any questions in the room or online, I think that mean we have more time. We do.
More comments than questions. But very useful. If we don't have any questions online or in the room, I think we are going to go to our speakers for their final word. I'm going to have the same or as we did before. Except that of course Phillipo has left.
That means we will go to Rasmus for your final remarks.
>> Okay. So thank you. Is that the 30 seconds now, or a bit more? Okay. So just to comment on a few things maybe. Just to say that I very much agree that a lot is happening here and there and everywhere. Except for New York in terms of multistakeholderism.
So I think you are quite right that the mindset in New York is very multilateral. It is very difficult to have a different type of access there. So I think the way we have been working in the FOC and in other Fora is the right way to get some input into the government's thinking in order for them to carry it over then to the discussions in New York.
I also think that it is important to work a lot on the national level. Because -- well as it is said all foreign policy is also domestic. So it means that a lot can be done and has to be done on the national level so that the governments will then appear on the international arena already with necessary input and feedback from the Civil Society, and so on, in what they have gotten from their own country.
It's obvious that it's not the same for every country. And it's not even possible in every country. But at least this is the approach that should be tried everywhere by trying to show the governments that where their interests may lie in being inclusive in these processes.
Yeah, and I also wanted to agree very much with the point that actually -- I just omitted in the beginning to make it later -- that we, even as a government we also encourage other governments to exclusively society members in their delegations wherever possible in these discussions in order to make it more easy to have the multistakeholder approach working on the international level. So very much agreed with this point.
And then maybe finally just to say that we very well recognize as a government that multilateral formats are not sufficient to handle all of those questions and cannot deal with everything alone with regard to discussions related to Internet Governance and digital technologies. And therefore we do need an inclusive approach.
And the question is what is the best way of achieving it, and one thing here in the IGF we can say that this is exactly why we believe that IGF needs to be strengthened. It's very important to pay attention to this when the mandate renewal for the IGF will come to discussion.
And we very much support the stronger Internet Governance Forum and its way of working. This is why I also mentioned in the beginning that we should put in more effort in making those existing multistakeholder formats work instead of trying to create new ones that -- you know, might make things more complex. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you Rasmus. You almost stuck to the 30 seconds. Sorry, Anya, the floor is yours.
>> SECRETARIAT: Thank you very much. I certainly would like to say that I do understand that sometimes maybe there is a concern or even frustration that we are slower in terms of our good action and policy with respect to the rapid development of digital technologies, but I also think we should not underestimate everything that has been done in the past 20 years, because it's really remarkable.
And that is this whole ecosystem that we established various mechanisms. I mentioned the local IGFs, because it's closest to us. And I think it's much easier to see the change on the group through the national IGF rather than through global IGF in that capacity.
So in that sense we working with more resources and more mechanisms at our disposal. So that's an encouraging factor. Where we need to focus our attention more, and I agree with Fiona, is the capacity involvement. We are not any more in this narrative where we have four stakeholder groups presented by numbers. We have to look at that in a more nuanced way through a multidisciplinary lens.
We have been seeing that through the IGFs. Our statistics are always a nice navigation in that sense. Are you exactly seeing from which country, for example we have lower park, especially looking for example in the past ten years.
We are also seeing which disciplines are missing in this discourse. Especially as a technologies are being becoming so integrated that it's not any more exclusive for example to the car industry, or the health sector, to be a part of these discussions. They are actually very much needed in these areas so that's what I think now evolving from multistakeholders so multidisciplinary, having all disciplines is very important.
That's why this IGF, for example continued work legislators and working with various ground and the judiciary as the prosecutors and court system overall is come up with decisions that are reflecting all of us, one way or another and that's why it's important to have them understand first of all what are they deciding against before any wrong decisions are made which have long-term consequences on our human rights first of all. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you, Anya. I will give it straight to Emilio.
>> Thank you very much. This was really a good conversation. For me -- you know in terms of closing remarks, the IGF is an important space. But also more importantly the FOC I think is really, really an important space for us. The private sector and I'm sure Civil Society -- in Civil Society before participating the FOC, it was really important then as it is important now. Not only I think for pushing
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Diplomacy or international policy both, but also an engaging space -- a space where
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Where we can --
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Nor change, but relationship building, for trust building, particularly for an industry perspective.
I also think it's important, not only as -- you know as a space for -- you know like writing statements or from a substance perspective, but it's also important as an example of an inclusive process. As we need -- as a process it's important --
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Sorry, the mic -- yeah. But you know also the FOC is important, I think is a process it -- you know an exemplary process that we can all learn from.
And I hope there will still be continued support for the Secretariat, who are also -- you know, who do a lot of the work behind the scenes to support all work that FOC the UN is doing. And we cannot building a digital future without putting our resources where our mouth is. So thank you to everyone.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you. I will go straight to (?) for your closing remarks.
>> Thank you all for your insight for interventions.
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I think for us, I think there were two maintaining ways from last year. I think -- and I see it's being reflected also in this particular conversation.
One is really the power of local networks and whether that is national government, local communities, and really think while we cannot always influence all the processes like in New York, as Fiona said, we do have structures built on the local and national level. And I think that's a real opportunity to engage with those networks for them to influence international processes.
And I agree with Rasmus and -- (?) and ensuring stakeholders whether it's private networks or sectors or communities are able to participate in a meaningful way and bring it up to the international level.
I think the second, as we were participating in the last --
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Particularly the last year I think the issue -- capacity really came up. And I think (?) also eluded to it. Even though we have access to spaces, there's a significant capacity. So we aren't able to negotiate the way we line. Not all of us come from countries and have engagement.
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So that capacity piece is critical. So I hope as we get into the future, particularly next year, there is serious considering about how we are building capacity of various stakeholders, including governments in that global majority to be able to come to these forums with knowledge, information and a collective bargaining power. Because I think that's what is going to make all difference when we think about the future.
>> MODERATOR: We have additional speakers. Please keep it before brief.
>> Thank you. I think it's at a point, the capacity has been made over and over again. But just the opportunity over the last month to spotlight light the work of the FOC. Because I think the FOC has some sort of
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For filling the gap an multistakeholder involvement in capacities. I personally consider the FOC as a very strategic coalition that has provided a platform for work for a lot of expertise that exists outside of government to engage in global processes. I have been an official on that, for example, so I think that's very important. So this is
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And I trust that the leadership -- the leader of Estonia will be the case as we. So the strategy like FOCs like that we should
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For the gaps we have identified in this conversation. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you. And to (?).
>> Much has been said. I would underline the need for bottom-up involvement. And I saw a good example this week Tanzania chapter, the chapter in Tanzania has appropriated this government to organise with the prep meeting. And I think that is the type of initiative that we should see basically everywhere, local community, self-organising, going to their government and basically prepping this stuff.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you, Olaf. And our final speaker, of course, some of us know the last remarks are best remembered, so put pressure on each other. So over to you, Fiona.
>> Slow and conscious of time. And not too much pressure. I think -- just agreeing with all the closing remarks everyone else has said. I will make that slow. And I will just encourage us as we go forward with FOC and FOCAN we really think strategically next year about how to best leverage the capacity that we have.
And, at least from my perspective, I think there's two big priorities for next year. And that's renewal of the IGF, but I think it's really time we think about getting sustained funding for the IGF, so the IGF is not just reliant on the kindness of strangers to give them money and real money in the budget. So those are my two big priority items for WSIS next year.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. And thank you to our speakers and thank you to our audience. And I wish you a very nice day. Thank you very much.
(Applause)