Open Forum #8 Modern Warfare Timeless Emblems

Summary

This discussion from the Internet Governance Forum in Norway focused on the Digital Emblem Initiative, which aims to create a universally-recognized symbol for protecting digital infrastructure during armed conflicts. The session featured Samit D’Chuna, legal adviser at the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and Chelsea Smethurst, Director for Digital Diplomacy at Microsoft, moderated by Tejas Bharadwaj from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

D’Chuna explained the historical foundation of the Red Cross emblem, tracing its origins to Henri Dunant’s experience at the 1859 Battle of Solferino, which led to the first Geneva Convention in 1864. He emphasized that the physical emblem has been largely successful over 160 years, with violations making headlines precisely because they are exceptional rather than routine. The digital emblem project emerged from the recognition that modern conflicts increasingly involve cyber operations, and medical services and humanitarian organizations now depend heavily on digital infrastructure that currently lacks any form of protection identification.

The technical requirements for the digital emblem include being decentralized, allowing covert inspection without alerting adversaries, and being removable based on security assessments. Three technical approaches are being considered: protected entity flags, digital certificates, and metadata labels. Key challenges include preventing misuse, ensuring accessibility for organizations in developing countries, and achieving global standardization through the Internet Engineering Task Force.

Smethurst highlighted the importance of industry adoption, noting that the Cybersecurity Tech Accords’ 160+ member companies represent over a billion customers globally. Both speakers emphasized that success requires technical standardization, legal integration into international humanitarian law, and widespread multi-stakeholder adoption. The initiative represents a necessary adaptation of timeless humanitarian principles to the realities of modern digital warfare, requiring both technical innovation and diplomatic consensus to protect vulnerable populations who increasingly depend on digital connectivity during conflicts.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Digital Emblem Initiative Overview**: The creation of a universally-recognized digital symbol to protect digital infrastructure during armed conflicts, extending the traditional Red Cross/Red Crescent emblem concept into cyberspace. This initiative aims to identify and protect medical services and humanitarian operations that now depend heavily on digital infrastructure.

– **Technical Implementation Challenges**: Discussion of three main technical approaches (protected entity flags, digital certificates, and metadata labels) and key requirements including decentralization, covert inspection capabilities, and removability. The challenge lies in making the system secure enough to prevent misuse while simple enough for humanitarian organizations in developing countries to implement.

– **Legal Integration and Global Adoption**: The need for diplomatic efforts to integrate the digital emblem into international humanitarian law through various mechanisms (amending existing protocols, creating new protocols, or unilateral declarations) and ensuring adoption by all 196 states party to the Geneva Conventions.

– **Trust and Effectiveness Concerns**: Addressing skepticism about whether a digital emblem will be respected given current violations of physical emblems in conflicts. The speakers emphasized that the vast majority of emblem protections work invisibly and successfully, with violations being the exception that receives media attention.

– **Multi-stakeholder Collaboration**: The importance of bringing together governments, tech companies (like the 160+ members of the Cybersecurity Tech Accords), humanitarian organizations, and international bodies through forums like the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to develop and implement the standard.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to introduce and explain the Digital Emblem Initiative, which seeks to extend traditional humanitarian protections into the digital realm. The session was designed to educate participants about the project’s technical, legal, and diplomatic aspects while addressing concerns about implementation and effectiveness.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a professional, educational tone throughout, with speakers presenting complex legal and technical concepts in accessible terms. The tone was optimistic about the project’s potential while acknowledging realistic challenges. During the Q&A session, the tone became more conversational and defensive when addressing skeptical questions about the emblem’s effectiveness given current conflict violations, but remained respectful and informative. The speakers demonstrated expertise while showing openness to collaboration and feedback from the international community.

Speakers

– **Tejas Bharadwaj**: Senior Research Analyst at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, India; Session moderator

– **Samit D’Chuna**: Legal adviser at the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC); Legal and policy lead for the Digital Emblem Project

– **Chelsea Smethurst**: Director for Digital Diplomacy at Microsoft; Technical lead working on the Digital Emblem Initiative

– **Audience**: Multiple audience members who asked questions during the Q&A session

**Additional speakers:**

– **Jure Bokovoy**: Finnish Green Party member (audience member who asked a question)

– **Mia Kuhlewin**: Works in the Internet Engineering Task Force on transport protocols (audience member who asked a question)

# Digital Emblem Initiative: Extending Humanitarian Protection into Cyberspace

## Discussion Summary from the Internet Governance Forum, Norway

### Introduction and Context

This session at the Internet Governance Forum in Norway examined the Digital Emblem Initiative, a project aimed at creating digital symbols to protect humanitarian and medical infrastructure during armed conflicts. The session was moderated by **Tejas Bharadwaj**, Senior Research Analyst at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, India, and featured **Samit D’Chuna**, Legal Adviser at the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and Legal and Policy Lead for the Digital Emblem Project, and **Chelsea Smethurst**, Director for Digital Diplomacy at Microsoft and Technical Lead working on the Digital Emblem Initiative.

The session followed a structured format with a 20-minute keynote, presentations from both speakers, a 35-minute panel discussion, and a 15-minute Q&A period that included questions from online participants.

### Historical Foundation and Legal Framework

**Samit D’Chuna** established the historical context, noting his role as “legal advisor, not a technical person” while clarifying that the project does have technical leadership. He traced the protective emblem system to Henri Dunant, a businessman who witnessed the 1859 Battle of Solferino and was moved to organize care for wounded soldiers regardless of which side they fought for. This led to the first Geneva Convention in 1864 and the creation of the Red Cross emblem.

D’Chuna explained that the emblem functions “like a stop sign” under international humanitarian law to identify protected persons and objects during armed conflicts. The system has been largely successful over 160 years, with violations making headlines precisely because they are exceptional rather than routine.

### The Digital Challenge

The speakers outlined how modern conflicts increasingly involve cyber operations targeting digital infrastructure. Medical services and humanitarian organizations now depend heavily on digital systems, yet these critical digital assets currently lack protection identification under international humanitarian law.

D’Chuna explained that the digital emblem project emerged from recognizing this gap: the need to protect digital infrastructure used by medical and humanitarian services during conflicts.

### Technical Implementation Approaches

**Chelsea Smethurst** outlined three primary technical approaches being considered:

1. **Protected Entity Flags**: Identifiers attached to website addresses, similar to physical emblems on buildings

2. **Digital Certificates**: Cryptographic verification of protected status, described as “passports for websites”

3. **Metadata Labels**: Embedded within digital files to provide protection that travels with the data

D’Chuna specified three critical technical requirements: the system must be decentralized (no central authority controls usage), support covert inspection (can be checked without alerting the protected entity), and be removable based on security analysis.

### Security and Accessibility Challenges

Smethurst identified three main technical challenges: ensuring security to prevent misuse, maintaining simplicity for developing countries to implement, and achieving standardization across different systems.

A central concern is that marking humanitarian infrastructure might actually increase exposure to malicious actors. The system must allow organizations to remove emblems if security analysis shows risks outweigh benefits.

### Legal Integration and Diplomatic Progress

The project requires integration into international humanitarian law through various mechanisms including amending existing protocols or creating new ones. The goal is adoption by all 196 states party to the Geneva Conventions.

Significant progress has been achieved: the 34th International Conference of Red Cross and Red Crescent (held last October) adopted a consensus resolution encouraging digital emblem work. Additionally, the Cybersecurity Tech Accords, representing 150-160 technology companies globally, adopted a digital emblem pledge.

### Multi-Stakeholder Collaboration

The technical standardization process will occur through the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), with a working group meeting scheduled for July to develop technical standards. The Australian Red Cross will lead work with national societies to integrate the digital emblem into domestic legal systems.

The project extends beyond the Red Cross to include other protective emblems: three orange circles for dangerous forces, civil defense emblems, and Blue Shield/UNESCO cultural property symbols.

### Addressing Effectiveness Concerns

**Tejas Bharadwaj** posed a fundamental challenge: given that physical emblems are sometimes violated in current conflicts, why should anyone believe a digital emblem will be more effective?

**Samit D’Chuna** reframed this concern: “The vast majority of the time the emblem is respected… what we see in the news are violations… it’s important to remember that the vast majority of the time the emblem does in fact work.” He referenced the “Roots of Restraint” study showing that people in conflict-affected areas report international humanitarian law works effectively despite violations receiving disproportionate media attention.

D’Chuna emphasized that international humanitarian law compliance relies on “training, bilateral dialogue, and moral obligation, not just punishment,” noting that the ICRC engages in confidential dialogue with both state and non-state actors, including cyber groups.

### Audience Questions and Concerns

**Jure Bokovoy**, a Finnish Green Party member, questioned trust in the emblem system given recent violations by major Geneva Convention signatories without significant international law enforcement.

**Mia Kuhlewin**, who works in IETF on transport protocols, raised questions about the digital emblem’s relationship to broader cybersecurity protection measures, highlighting the need for clarification on whether these should be integrated or separate initiatives.

Other audience concerns included the role of platform companies in conflict narrative shaping and questions about algorithmic amplification issues, though these topics were only briefly addressed.

### Technical Philosophy

**Chelsea Smethurst** emphasized a key principle: “We’re not driving this as a cyber security initiative, rather it is how do we develop security controls to support the legal requirements.” This ensures technical solutions serve humanitarian law requirements rather than driving them.

### Implementation Timeline and Next Steps

Concrete next steps include:

– IETF working group launching in July for technical standards development

– Continued annual ICRC meetings with states for legal integration

– Australian Red Cross leading domestic integration work

– Ongoing engagement with technology companies beyond current supporters

The ICRC has also published “Eight Rules for Hackers” as part of broader engagement with digital actors.

### Conclusion

The Digital Emblem Initiative represents an attempt to adapt humanitarian principles to digital warfare realities. While the project benefits from diplomatic momentum, industry support, and technical expertise, it faces challenges including technical complexity, global accessibility requirements, and questions about symbolic protection effectiveness in contemporary conflicts.

The discussion revealed broad consensus on the need for digital humanitarian protection and the multi-stakeholder approach required, even as significant implementation challenges remain. Success will depend on building the same trust system that has made physical emblems largely successful while adapting to unique digital domain characteristics.

Tejas Bharadwaj: I think I’ll start again. So good morning and welcome to all the wonderful participants I’ve gathered today. This is day one of the Internet Governance Forum from Norway. A session today titled Modern Warfare, Timeless Emblems, will uncover the progress as well as the prospects of the Digital Emblem Initiative that aims to create a universally-recognized symbol for protecting digital infrastructure during conflicts. We have two wonderful speakers here today to discuss this topic, Samit D’Chuna, the legal adviser of the International Committee on Red Cross, and Chelsea Smethurst, the Director for Digital Diplomacy at Microsoft. I’ll introduce myself, I’m Tejas Bharadwaj, Senior Research Analyst at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, India, and I’ll be moderating this interesting session. A quick note for our participants on the session’s format and some housekeeping rules. The session will start with a 20-minute keynote by Samit, who will offer you the nitty-gritty about the Digital Emblem Project. This will be followed by a series of presentations by Samit, Chelsea, and I, and then we’ll have a Q&A session followed by a 35-minute moderated panel discussion where Samit, Chelsea, and I will explore different aspects of the Digital Emblem Initiative, covering its concepts, the aspects of inclusivity and scale, challenges involving its implementation, its associated risks, and also what to look ahead. Finally, in the end, we’ll open the floor for some questions for about 15 minutes. For the online participants streaming in, add your questions in the chat box. Please start, yeah.

Samit D’Chuna: Tejas, thank you so much for that wonderful introduction. Good morning, everyone. Thank you to the IGF for hosting us for this very important topic, and thank you to all of you. I know there’s some really interesting workshops going on at the same time, so thank you so much for making the time for this one. As Tejas mentioned, my name is Samit Dukuna. I am a legal advisor at the International Committee of the Red Cross, or the ICRC. For those of you that don’t know, the International Committee of the Red Cross, or the ICRC, is the organization mandated by international… and I’m here to talk about the ICRC’s mandate in international law to protect and assist victims of armed conflict and other situations of violence. So through our mandate in international law, the ICRC engages in a host of different activities. We visit persons that are deprived of liberty, persons that are detained, reunite family members that are separated in armed conflict. We contribute to the respect for and development of international humanitarian law, which is really a big part of the ICRC’s work that I’ll talk to you a bit more about today. We, of course, support the medical services in their work and crucially, we engage confidentially and bilaterally with parties to armed conflict when such situations are taking place. So states, when there are parties to armed conflict and also non-state parties, you know, what you might refer to as armed groups, are also a key interlocutor for the ICRC. And so in that role, we’re often referred to as the guardians of international humanitarian law or the guardians of the law of war. And it’s in that position that the ICRC has a role to play in protecting and assisting victims of armed conflict and other situations of violence and other situations of violence that I’ll talk to you a bit more about today. So, I think that’s a really important point that we need to make, and that the ICRC is sort of well-positioned to say, along with a growing number of states and other stakeholders, that today, digital technologies are really shaping the contours of modern conflict. We are very much witnessing a profound shift in the environments where international humanitarian law must operate, and as a result, we do have to think about how international law must adapt to some of these profound changes. And the digital emblem is, the digital emblem project is sort of a small project, but it’s a very large project. And I think that our new digital emblem project is going to be a key part of that. It’s a necessary adaptation, as I hope you’ll see by the end of this workshop, to basically the modern nuances of armed conflict. So what is the digital emblem project? Well, if we start with the Red Cross and the Red Crescent emblem, they have of course long marked the protection of physical persons and objects. And I guess the question then is today, what does that mean in a reality where cyber operations are a key part of armed conflict and digital infrastructure is a key part of that? The key part of the work undertaken by the medical services and humanitarian organizations. But I’m getting a little bit ahead of myself now because I’m already kind of talking about the physical emblem and the digital emblem and modern conflict. I want to take a sort of a step back so that everyone’s kind of on the same page and understanding of what exactly we’re talking about when we talk about an emblem. And we’ll really go to our title for this and try to understand this concept of a timeless emblem. What is a timeless emblem? And that story starts a little bit more than 160 years ago in a city where I live called Geneva, right? Geneva in Switzerland, where a Swiss businessman named Henri Dunant. He had these great business ideas and he was having a bit of an issue with one of his business projects. And to deal with that issue, he was able to organize a meeting with the king of France. He was that influential that he was able to meet the king of France to sort of iron out some of these issues he was having with his business. The problem was that the king of France was not in France. At the time, he was actually in northern Italy with his army because he was fighting, you know, his army and with him at the lead. We’re fighting in something that’s now known as the Second War of Italian Independence, fighting against the Austro-Hungarian Empire. And so Henri Dunant, he’s a businessman, he’s savvy, he’s persevering and stubborn. And he says, no problem. This is a pressing issue. I’m just going to pack my bags and I’m going to go to northern Italy and I’m going to meet the French king there. And so he makes his way to northern Italy and he arrives near a village called Solferino. He actually arrives the day after a horrific battle takes place. And if you put yourself in the shoes of sort of a, you know, a 19th century European, your image of what warfare is, is actually something quite sort of honorable and almost beautiful in a way, right? Like you imagine sort of the honor of the armed forces and the great things that they were doing to protect the state, to protect the nation. And when Henri Dunant arrives on, you know, the aftermath of this horrific battle. Well, he doesn’t actually see any honor. He doesn’t see any beauty. What he sees is carnage, right? So he sees wounded soldiers. He sees sick soldiers. He sees dead soldiers and he sort of what’s left of the medical services of the armed forces really completely overwhelmed by the carnage and the destruction on the, you know, on the battlefield near Solferino. And Alhidruna is completely moved by what he sees and he decides forget about these business ideas. There’s no need to meet with the French King about business. There’s something more important happening right now. And Alhidruna goes to a nearby village called Castiglione and he mobilizes the local population in Castiglione particularly nurses and women and he kind of says to them, you know, there are people in need here. Some of them are French. Some of them are Italian. Some of them are Austro-Hungarian and none of that actually matters because when you’re wounded or when you’re sick, you’re what we now call in French, hors de combat. We are outside of combat and you’re just a person in need and these people need help. And so he mobilizes the population to go to the battlefield and provide assistance to these persons that are wounded and sick. Eventually, he does meet with the French King, decides not to talk about his business ideas at all. And instead what he does is he convinces the French King to release some of the doctors of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that of the army of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that had actually been detained and he convinces them to release those doctors to provide even more assistance to the wounded and the sick. So just a complete paradigm shift for Henri Dunant that really reflected throughout the rest of his life because he returns back to Geneva and he writes a book and he writes a book and it’s called Un Souvenir de Solferino. So a memory of Solferino and in his book, he talks about the suffering that he saw on the battlefield and he basically proposes two sort of key paths forward. The first one is to say that in times of peace. The civilized world, as he called it, needs to set up organizations that have, as their profession, the ability to provide assistance and protection to the wounded and the sick in armed conflict. Because that is not a role that we can entrust solely to the armies of the adversaries. There has to be some sort of neutral and impartial assistance that’s provided on the battlefield and more broadly in situations of armed conflict. And that’s sort of the precursor of the International Committee of the Red Cross, the International Federation of the Red Cross, and the 191 what we call national societies, independent organizations of Red Cross and Red Crescent societies all over the world. So the Norwegian Red Cross or the French Red Cross or the Turkish or Syrian Red Crescent, those are all independent components, independent organizations that are components of the Red Cross and Red Crescent movement. And that was that first idea of Samit D’Chuna. And then the second idea that’s even more crucial to our discussion today was that, you know, he was saying, if we’re going to create all of these different organizations, there has to be a way to make sure that they’re protected on the battlefield. They have to be respected on the battlefield. So we have to make sure that there’s rules in place where parties to conflict. Yeah, of course, they protect the wounded and the sick. They don’t target the wounded and the sick, but they also have to protect the medical services and eventually humanitarian operations as well. And those are two really key words, respect and protect. And there’s a reason that that language is used. And that idea eventually led to the adoption in 1864 of the very first Geneva Convention. The very first Geneva Convention was essentially adopted in the run up to the writing of this book by Samit D’Chuna, the sort of founder of the International Committee of the Red Cross. And so why do I sort of focus and highlight this concept of respect and protect? Well, the idea of not targeting civilians kind of already existed at the time. There was the Liber Code. There was lots of different states that had in their military manuals, you know, civilians should be spared in armed conflict. And that’s actually not the only thing we’re talking about. It’s, we need to make sure because we are part of the reason that carnage is taking place. We need to make sure that the medical services still function. So when people are wounded and when people are sick and when people are in situations of vulnerability, that there is a system in place to protect them. We can’t just eight flout and ignore that, you know, that system. So that, that concept of respect and protect was really essential. And now to be able to respect and protect certain persons and objects, obviously it’s not just about identifying civilians or identifying who’s a combatant. You have to identify this kind of invisible protection. So it was very obvious even before the adoption of that first Geneva Convention, that there had to be, there had to be a way to identify, there had to be a way to identify those specific protections, you know, in complex environments. And that’s really what led to the adoption of the, the emblem, what we call the distinctive emblem of the Geneva Conventions or the Red Cross emblem, the Red Crescent emblem and eventually also the Red Crystal emblem. The purpose of the emblem is to identify a specific protection. The way I like to explain it sometimes is it’s a bit like a stop sign, or it’s a bit like a symbol of highway safety. Because if you have intersections and there’s a law, there’s a rule that says cars have to stop at that intersection, there has to be a way to tell that car that there is this rule. Because cars don’t just, well, I guess now with AI, maybe cars will know, but let’s say before that there had to be a way to say, to tell a driver, hey, you need to stop at this intersection. And the emblem is a little bit like that. It identifies to parties to conflict that this is a specifically protected person or a specifically protected object, and they have to be respected and protected. So it’s not just a question of not targeting them. It’s a question of ensuring that they’re able to undertake their work, despite the fact that a conflict is ongoing. And where does that bring us sort of in the modern world? Well, today, cyber operations have become a reality of armed conflict. And it’s not the first time that the reality kind of changes for the emblem. I mean, when the emblem was created, it was created as an armlet for the medical services. Eventually, it was expanded to ambulances. Then it found its way onto hospital ships or the top of hospitals or on planes. In the 1970s, something called the distinctive signal was created, specific radio and light signals for ships and planes. Because as the medical and humanitarian services expanded into new spaces, there had to be a way to identify those services in new spaces. So cyber operations today are a reality of armed conflict, but perhaps more importantly than that, people depend on digital infrastructure. You know, regular humans depend on digital infrastructure. The medical services then correspondingly also depend on digital infrastructure, and so do humanitarian operations. And when I say depend on digital infrastructure, I mean, of course, there’s an incredible socioeconomic value in, you know, information and communication technologies. But I’m specifically talking here about the most vulnerable, right? People who don’t have the privilege to sit and talk in Lillestrøm, Norway, right? I mean, in the earlier part of my career, I worked directly in situations of armed conflict on the field with persons that were displaced, with persons that had suffered horrific violations of international humanitarian law. And I can tell you that a lot of the time and a lot of the context that I work in, one of the first things people would ask for was not food or shelter or a bed or even water. The first thing people would ask for was connectivity. The first thing people would want was the ability to call their family members or to have some way to tell their family members, hey, I’m okay. Or they wanted to be able to know that their family members were okay. I mean, you can imagine, you know, a situation where suddenly a territory becomes occupied and connectivity is shut down and people outside of that territory have no way to know what’s happening to their families. Are they okay? Did they have to move? You know, are their houses destroyed? You know, all of those things, that connection is brought together with connectivity. So connectivity has become incredibly important for people. And then it’s also become incredibly important for the medical services and humanitarian operations. And the Digital Emblem Project is not about sort of stopping attacks against that, that as with the physical world, emblems are used and people are, you know, the medical services are unfortunately still killed. We have colleagues that are killed every single year, recently this year as well, several instances where our colleagues have been killed despite displaying the emblem. So, you know, it doesn’t stop intentional attacks like that. What it does is it identifies this specific protection because if you don’t wanna stop at a stop sign, you won’t stop. But the reality is, and it’s true for the emblem as well, the vast majority of people do stop at stop signs. And the vast majority of time, even though that’s not what we hear about and we can talk about that a little bit more later, the vast majority of time, the emblem does work. The problem is that people are, you know, in digital infrastructure, there is no way today to identify, well, what is actually protected. So the idea with the digital emblem is not to replace the physical emblem. The physical emblem exists. And as I’ve just said, it works. And we can certainly talk a little bit more about that and the nuances of that, but the physical emblem works. There is no desire to have a digital emblem that identifies what’s physical, because that already exists. If new technologies of warfare are developed, they have to be developed in a way that they can continue to respect the physical emblem. And there’s not going to be a new emblem that’s created to cater to new technologies of warfare. That’s not at all what the project is about. Rather, the project is about accepting the fact that digital infrastructure has become a key part of our work. It’s become a key part of the work of the medical services. And so there has to be a way to identify that digital infrastructure. That doesn’t exist yet. There’s no way to identify that digital infrastructure today. So that’s really sort of the key drive for this project. Now, after significant consultations with states, with the private sector, and within the Red Cross and Red Crescent movement, in spring of last year, and with really the great help of Microsoft and Chelsea, who you’ll hear from really shortly, we brought the digital emblem project to the Internet Engineering Task Force, which surely a lot of you already know, where the work on standards on a digital emblem will begin very soon. So our working group has been established. The very first working group meeting will be in July of this year, so in a few weeks. And of course, the ICRC is actively engaged in those discussions. I’ll just say a few words on some of the technical requirements without going over time. So just a couple more minutes on what we look for in terms of, you know, what are the needs for a digital emblem? And I’ll just preface this by saying, you know, I mentioned at the beginning, I’m a legal advisor. I’m not a technical person. Don’t worry, we do have a technical lead on the project. I’m the legal and policy lead. So I’ll really talk about this in sort of non-technical terms, but surely Chelsea can develop on this a little bit. So really when, you know, through those consultations that we’ve had with really a broad range of stakeholders, what we’ve identified is that the digital emblem should reflect as closely as possible the way the physical emblem works. And what do I mean by that? Well, first of all, the digital emblem needs to be decentralized. So with the physical emblem, all parties to conflict can use the emblem and they don’t have to ask for permission. So if a state has identified within its own structure, the medical services or a medical unit or a medical transport, if it wants to, it applies the emblem then to that unit or that structure or that object. And it doesn’t seek permission. And that’s also true for non-state parties to conflict. If they have medical services, they can of course also use the emblem. They don’t seek permission from anyone. There’s no centralised body that determines, yes, you can use the m emblem or you can’t use the emblem. That is not the role of the ICRC. We use the emblem. But for our own infrastructure, we don’t police anyone else using the emblem. And so, that’s also going to be true. That has to be true with the digital emblem. That it can’t be a sort of centralised body that says, yes, you can use the emblem here and you can’t use it here. And we’ve determined that this is protected and this is not. That’s for parties to conflict to determine. And then after, you know, there are rules on misuse and there are obligations to suppress misuse and potentially misuse, you know, certain misuses of the emblem might be a war crime. So there’s, you know, there’s different structures in place if the emblem is misused. But ultimately, it is decentralised in its use. Next is something that we call covert inspection. It’s not my favourite term because it sounds a lot more complicated than what it really is. The idea is, at least for me, the idea is that, you know, if you have, for example, a physical emblem on the roof of a hospital and you have a reconnaissance mission by an adversary, by a party to a conflict that wants to, you know, verify certain targets and so, and it spots the emblem on the roof of a building, then it knows that this building is protected by international humanitarian law as a specific protection under IHL, so it can attack the building. It also can destroy access to that building. That’s part of that notion of respect and protect. It’s not just about not targeting that thing. It’s about making sure that that thing continues to function despite your military operations. However, it doesn’t inform the adversary that, oh, someone has actually looked at the emblem, right? It doesn’t, because sometimes it might be the medical services of the armed forces. So, an adversary would not want to tell, you know, the enemy, let’s say, ah, yes, we are checking on whether you have an emblem or not, because that might then alert the adversary that an attack is incoming. And so basically the digital emblem needs to function the same way. It needs to be, it can’t tell the adversary that it’s being looked at. That’s the notion of covert inspection. It also has to be removable. So one key thing about the distinctive emblem, the physical emblem, that also has to be true with the digital emblem, is that it has to be something, a tool that you can place and remove based on your own security analysis of what’s useful. There are very rare, and it really is the really, really exceptional circumstances, but there are situations where the ICRC also removes the, you know, doesn’t use the emblem. And that’s also true for the medical services. There are situations where owing to the security, you know, the emblem is not used. And so I’ll just quickly wrap up and then we can explore some of this in broader discussion. But, you know, the digital emblem project is really a multilateral process. It’s seen a lot of success so far in terms of bringing together a lot of stakeholders. At the 34th International Conference of the Red Cross and the Red Crescent that took place last October. So this takes place once every four years, sort of like the Olympics of international humanitarian law. At this international conference that brings together all the states that are party to the Geneva Convention, a resolution was adopted by consensus to, you know, imagine the geopolitical context we’re in today. But a resolution was adopted encouraging the work on the digital emblem and continued work by the ICRC. So that was really helpful. A few weeks after that, the Cybersecurity Tech Accords adopted a digital emblem pledge. The Tech Accords, Chelsea will correct me if I’m wrong, is about 150 or 160 companies among the biggest tech companies in the world. So that was, you know, a really great step forward for us. And now we’re really continuing on the standardization process with the technical standardization of the emblem. And we are also working directly with states on, you know, what we call legal integration or formalization into both domestic and international humanitarian law. Of course, like the distinctive emblem, you know, this technical solution has to be created, but it also has to be integrated into international law. So that’s a big part of our work there. I’ll stop there. I hope that was a good introduction and pass it back over to you, Tejas.

Tejas Bharadwaj: Thanks for this brilliant presentation, Samir. It was really really comprehensive and also kind of answered most of the questions I look forward to, you know, asking But I also have this first question for you, Samit The Red Cross emblem, one of the most universally recognized symbols of protection, is kind of routinely ignored in today’s conflict Why should anyone believe that a digital emblem will fare any better? Is it simply just another idealistic gesture and a world where violations, not protections, dominate the headlines?

Samit D’Chuna: Yeah, yeah, that’s a really good question, Tejas, and I’m glad we sort of addressed that already at the beginning It’s true, and I mentioned it earlier, you know, there are today intentional attacks against the medical services. So against hospitals, against, like I said, colleagues members of the Red Cross and Red Crescent movement have been injured and killed and those are part of, you know, directly targeted operations by parties to armed conflict The distinctive emblem doesn’t make someone a good person And violations do take place. Now, the interesting thing is that what we see in the news are violations of international humanitarian law So when a hospital is attacked or when an ambulance is attacked that shows up in our feed, on our social media You know on the on traditional news and that’s a good thing It’s a good thing that we see that and it’s a good thing that we are irate when something like that happens But it’s important to remember that the vast majority of the time the emblem is respected Okay, so that that is certainly the experience, you know, that’s my personal experience That’s the experience of our colleagues That’s the experience of the last 160 years that the emblem does in fact work the vast majority of the time and when the emblem is not respected and it’s, you know, targeted, we hear about it and that is a violation of international humanitarian law This is a war crime. Directly targeting the medical services or a humanitarian operation is a war crime And so it’s good that that’s heard about but that should not take away from this incredible success story of the distinctive emblem because it was able to make tangible this

Chelsea Smethurst: and 20 global providers, that’s over a billion customers and citizens around the world that could be protected by these entities. So that’s sort of what I see, at least on the Microsoft perspective, is really the next step to scale this project beyond just a couple of core companies, a couple of core non-profits and a couple of international organizations around the globe.

Tejas Bharadwaj: No, that’s interesting. So we definitely need tech companies to be involved in this. Samit, from a legal and diplomatic standpoint, you do need commitments from the governments here, right? So what is ICRC looking to do and how can we kind of make this legally kind of binding kind of initiative? Is there progress there?

Samit D’Chuna: Yeah, you’re absolutely right. And I think you hit the nail on the head, Chelsea, when you said sort of global adoption. That’s also true in the diplomatic world as well. I mean, one of the key things for us is making sure that the emblem, in addition to being technically robust, is something that’s adopted by all states that are party to the Geneva Convention. So we’re talking about 196 states. That would sort of be the ideal. That’s what we’re going to work towards. Because, and I’ve already kind of hinted at it earlier, there are issues related to misuse of the emblem, to who can use the emblem, to how it’s used, that simply have to be integrated into international law because there need to be these common understandings of what the digital emblem is and how it’s respected and what happens when it’s not respected. That system needs to be in place and that’s going to be in place through adoption under international humanitarian law. So there’s various different strategies or means of incorporation into IHL that we’ve been discussing with states. We have an annual meeting with states to sort of update them on the technical development and then also move this conversation forward on integration into international law. So one possible solution is amending the annex. So there’s a technical annex of additional protocol one. So I didn’t talk about this, but there’s four Geneva Conventions and then three additional protocols to the conventions. The first additional protocol. has a technical annex already and that annex can be modified and so one solution is to modify the annex. Not all states are parties, so all states are parties to the Geneva Conventions but not all states are parties to the additional protocol so there need to be some sort of also subsidiary means of ensuring that states that are not party to additional protocol one can then still be included in this process but that’s one solution. Another solution would be to have a new protocol so the latest protocol, that third protocol of the Geneva Conventions was adopted in 2005. It created the red crystal emblem which is also a distinctive emblem now of the Geneva Conventions which is why I mentioned the red cross, the red crescent and the red crystal. So that another solution is to have a fourth protocol so an entirely new diplomatic process specifically on the digital emblem and then there’s also other possible solutions sort of more ad hoc solutions like what we call a unilateral declarations or others to ensure that states do make the digital emblem part of their sort of international legal obligations. Then there’s also you know I’ve talked about international law but it also has to be integrated into domestic systems so you know the Geneva Conventions are also integrated into domestic law and all the states that are party to Geneva Conventions and that work is also you know a lot of that work is assisted by national societies and so it was of course from the beginning important that national societies be on board with the project. There’s the Australian Red Cross that’s taking the lead on sort of working with the different national societies all over the world to be sure that they’re mobilized that once a technical solution is ready that this solution can also be integrated into domestic law because that’s not an expertise that comes from Geneva or elsewhere. I mean that’s an expertise that comes from each individual country and that’s kind of the work of of the national societies to integrate.

Tejas Bharadwaj: So right so you need technical protocols as well as legal protocols to make this possible. Chelsea how are you looking to kind of embed this digital emblem into products and digital infrastructure of countries?

Chelsea Smethurst: Yeah so if we think about the digital emblem as a digital , and we are talking about, instead of being painted on a hospital roof, it’s embedded in the internet infrastructure, let’s say like a hospital’s network, so that we know that it should be protected during armed conflict. To make this work, we really need a way to in sort of layman’s terms mark these systems online, right? And so there’s three technical options that are currently on the table right now. One is what we call a protected entity, right? So this is a protected entity, right? So you can have a flag on your website’s address, this is a protected entity or system during conflict. The second way we’re thinking about doing this as a community, not just Microsoft, right, is digital certificates. So think of these as like passports for websites. So this sort of certifies a certain identification that says, hey, this is a protected entity and provides a certain level of validity for that work. And then the third sort of way we’re considering as a group to do this, so these are essentially like labels that are behind the scenes on digital files, right, that can really sort of be flexible. You can apply certain sort of parameters to these things. And so these are sort of the three, I would say, technical solutions that are on the table to date. And then I think when we think about to answer your question on so what’s the challenges around these technical solutions that we’re considering as an industry, one, you know, is it secure enough to prevent misuse? So is somebody pretending to be a protected entity or not, right? This is a very real risk, technical and legal, that we need to really consider as we think about these technical solutions being deployed. I think the second thing I’ll say in terms of challenges is, and maybe this is even more important, right, is it simple enough for humanitarian organizations in developing countries to use? We really need to think about the lowest common denominator in this. And if it’s got to require a ton of money and a lot of technical resources, we’re not really achieving our goal, right, as what we’re trying to move for for the digital environment. So I think that’s the second sort of technical slash. legal and sort of civil society risk. And then I think third, and this is very true to somebody like myself, who has been very involved in sort of technical projects and policy for cyber for many years, is how do you standardize it, right, so that everyone from governments to tech companies to NGOs or non-profits can both identify it, deploy it, and respect it. And so those are challenges we need to overcome with. Three sort of challenges that are both technical, legal, and sort of civil in terms of like what

Tejas Bharadwaj: Right. Samit, do you have any comments on this?

Samit D’Chuna: Yeah, no, that was a good point about, you know, the lowest common denominator. You know, the interesting thing about the physical emblem is that, you know, there’s a lot of discussion among people who are very passionate about IHL and particularly the emblem about how, you know, where did the idea of having a red emblem come about. If you read the Geneva Convention, Article 38 of the first Geneva Convention essentially says an ode to Switzerland. So it’s basically an inversion of the flag. But there are some pretty important names that have done quite a bit of research on this and say that the reason the color red was chosen was actually because if you’re a wounded soldier, if you’re a war medic, then you actually always have the access to the color red and you always have access to white because soldiers usually carry the flag of surrender, which at the time was already a white flag. So you have a white flag and you have ability to make a red cross. And the idea was that everyone should be able to use the emblem and there shouldn’t be any sort of barriers to the creation of the emblem. So this is something that’s too complex or even that uses colors because we’re thinking about the 1800s colors that are sort of too nuanced or too complex, then it wouldn’t be respected. And so that’s why there’s this like bright red color. Again, there’s different stories about how it came up, but that’s quite a popular one. So, yeah, I think that you’ve raised some really important points that really reflect some of the thinking that was already there in the 1800s about what the emblem needs to be.

Tejas Bharadwaj: Right. So this kind of segues into an important question I wanted to ask. I mean, we don’t want the digital emblem initiative to be an initiative that’s kind of used by a few countries, right? We definitely want to scale it up. So what are the costs associated with its implementation, especially for developing in smaller countries? Is ICRC and the tech companies actively working on that? Chelsea, if you want to go ahead.

Chelsea Smethurst: Yeah, so I think there’s probably two maybe primary risks that we would associate with implementation challenges and hurdles there. I think one is how do you sort of minimize the increased exposure to protected entities? So if you are marking medical and humanitarian digital infrastructure, could you inadvertently make them more exposed to malicious actors? And I think Samit sort of talked about this in the introduction. And this is actually a question that I have personally grappled with on this project, working with us for like the last year and a half is so what do we want to achieve here? Right. And I think the acknowledgement that it’s what you hear in the news is actually what you don’t hear in the news. That is a massive accomplishment in this task is something that we’re really aiming for here. And it’s a really helpful like I think reframing in perspective of the significance that the impact that this product could actually have in the digital infrastructure world. So I think that’s one. I think, too, another risk that we’ve got to think about in terms of hurdles to overcome and costs is, you know, how do you like mitigate the misuse or the abuse of a digital? And I think this is some challenging there’s there’s both like legal and like technical legitimate concerns in this domain. Ultimately, what we’re trying to do, and we’re doing this through the IETF, so the Internet Engineering Task Force, is how do you make a standard that is verifiable, revocable and audible? And this is very true in many cybersecurity domains. But these are three sort of core competencies that you want a standard to have, and that can help really sort of scale it and mitigate that misuse. So great question to ask. I don’t know if Samit you have sort of thoughts, too.

Samit D’Chuna: I think that was a great answer. I mean, I think, you know, on these two sides, as you’ve mentioned. So on the question of sort of increased exposure, you know, this has been since the beginning of the project, really a big part of our conversation with with different stakeholders, including sort of cyber actors. And what we understand is that a lot of times. Cyber Actors don’t know whether certain infrastructure is protected, but if they are looking for certain critical infrastructure, tools already exist today that are quite effective in finding them. So, we moved forward much more quickly on this project when we understood that risk to exposure, it exists, but it’s not very high, and the way to sort of mitigate that is through these technical discussions that take place at the IETF and elsewhere to indeed make sure that that risk is minimized as much as possible. And as I mentioned, the emblem is always revocable, right? So, if at any time there’s an entity that thinks that the use of the emblem poses more risks than benefits, then it can be removed, right? Because as I mentioned, it doesn’t replace other cybersecurity tools, it’s not an antivirus, it’s not a firewall, it identifies something as specifically protected, and in that sense, it’s a tool, and it doesn’t replace those other mechanisms. And then, on the question of misuse, I mean, this is why, of course, integration in international humanitarian law is so important. As I said, what we don’t see, the violations that we don’t hear about, or rather the violations that don’t take place, that’s really the key for us, right? Because when we talk about something that’s been attacked, and now a sort of a criminal justice process that takes place after, or we hear about it in the news, or there’s this frustration, or there’s, you know, as I said, that that’s really important, but that’s already a step too far, because what we want is for those attacks not to take place. And when discussions of the distinctive emblem took place 160 years ago, there was already this discussion of, you know, what if the emblem is misused? What’s going to happen if it starts being used on tanks and on all kinds of other things that are not specifically protected? That concern was already there, but systems were put in place, like the work of the ICRC, the confidential bilateral dialogue, you know, the fact that parties to conflict have to be trained in international humanitarian law. We’ve talked about legal integration, and those things are really all quite important. Maybe one thing I would add to that is that the digital emblem requires trust. I talked about the big success with the physical emblem, the Red Cross, Crescent and Crystal. The reason the emblem works so well is the system of trust that exists. The medical services and humanitarian organizations, certain humanitarian organizations, can trust that if they use the emblem, it’s respected. The parties to armed conflict can, the vast majority of the time, see an emblem and trust that that entity, whatever they’re looking at, personnel or object, they can trust that that is, in fact, a protected entity. As new stakeholders join this process, like technology companies, technology companies can also trust that the emblem is something that works and that’s respected. That’s a big key to this project. If it’s going to be successful, it has to reflect, it has to mimic what’s happened with the physical emblem, which is that it has to be a symbol of trust.

Tejas Bharadwaj: Chelsea, any final remarks?

Chelsea Smethurst: Yeah, so I think I’ll say when I think about success for the digital emblem, right, it’s not any one single milestone. I think it’s probably a layered approach across multiple dimensions. We’ve mentioned this a couple of times, right? So technical standardization, legal recognition. And then finally, what’s that multi-stakeholder global adoption? And so, Simi, you mentioned trust. And I think that underpins any and all things that I sort of say in the next sort of segment. Again, I’m focused more on sort of the technical capabilities and implementations here from the Microsoft side. I think, one, let’s go back to technical standardization. I would say as a cohort, we’ve made significant progress here already. So in July at IETF, so the Internet Engineering Task Force, they’re already going to be launching a working group that will be sort of developing verifiable, interoperable and secure standard right across engineering standards bodies. Second, the legal recognition, right? This is something where we’ve been able to work with closely the ICRC and our other sort of non-profit civil society partners to really understand what are the international sort of legal problems and challenges that we as like a company will need to actually incorporate in this? And this is not our domain expertise, right? And so making sure that we’re supporting from a technical and operations perspective, but then working to sort of move towards that international humanitarian law piece has been really essential and critical. And that’s not something we could have done without the ICRC. And then I think finally, and probably maybe most importantly, is that widespread adoption and deployment of the digital emblem, right? So, you know, the last 12 months to date, you know, it’s been a very heavily sort of core exercise, at least with Microsoft and some smaller industry players. You mentioned the Cybersecurity Tech Accord, which is a large sort of industry body committed to cybersecurity norms of over 160 members. And so I think how do we take this emblem and then move it into sort of a global norm would be a very powerful and significant next step for this work. So thank.

Tejas Bharadwaj: I think we just have around 15 minutes, so I’ll open the floor for some questions from the audience. We also have some online questions, but if the audience here have any questions, please feel free to raise your hand. I will identify you. Can you introduce yourself?

Audience: Jure Bokovoy, Finnish Green Party. My question is mostly to Samit. We’ve talked quite largely today about the trust in the emblem and the malicious actors targeting it. How can we even have trust in the emblem in the end, when over the last three years there have been large signatories to the Geneva Conventions, basically completely disregarding its functions? I mean, Russia has bombed multiple hospitals and humanitarian infrastructure in Ukraine, and Israel has bombed 36 hospitals in Gaza, as well as other humanitarian infrastructure in camps. And there hasn’t really been much actual international law punishment towards it, outside of labels put by the ICJ and other organizations, which are not really respected by either the US or the other superpowers, to actually put out the punishment. So how can we trust in the emblem, and what is being done to, I guess, negate this double standard?

Tejas Bharadwaj: Sure. Samit, do you want to answer that?

Samit D’Chuna: Yeah, I’m happy to say that. So thank you so much for the question. I mean, I think it’s a really important question. I’ll take it a little bit more broader than just the emblem, because I think what your question gets to is really more the heart of international humanitarian law. I mean, there’s this body of law, and as you suggest, there are situations where international humanitarian law is not respected, and it’s not just frustrating, I mean, it’s horrific, because people die as a result. I’ll just preface this by saying, you know, as a legal advisor of the International Committee of the Red Cross, I won’t talk about any specific ongoing conflict. We have a confidential bilateral dialogue with parties to conflict. So the states that you mentioned, the ICRC has dialogue with those states. And these are, you know, the key topics that we talk about. So I won’t talk about any specific context. But, you know, I do want to come back to something you mentioned, which is punishment, right? And what punishment assumes is that a violation has already taken place. And that for us is the key, because, of course, that is important. It is important that, you know, international criminal law functions, that there are that there is punishment when violations take place. But it’s not the be all end all of compliance. And I think that’s where a lot of us go wrong on this question, because we assume that, you know, a crime has taken place. And, yeah, unfortunately, in international law, it’s not always punished. But that doesn’t mean that that’s the only way to ensure compliance. So, for example, under international humanitarian law, there is obligations for training on all levels of the armed forces from the individual soldier to the highest level of a commander. Those obligations teach you that it is a violation of international humanitarian law to respect a manifestly unlawful order. If you are ordered to bomb a hospital, you cannot say I am just following orders. That argument died over 80 years ago in international law. So if you committed if you know that you’re committing a violation of international humanitarian law, you must stop, regardless of the orders that you’ve you’ve got from above. As I mentioned, we have a confidential bilateral dialogue. There are several humanitarian organizations outside of the ICRC that also work with parties to conflict, have different modes of actions, highlight violations that take place, highlight when certain infrastructure is protected, where it is, make noise about where there are population movements and things like that. There’s a whole set of ways that ensure compliance with international humanitarian law. Despite the fact that there are all of these compliance mechanisms, violations still take place. That’s true in domestic law as well. People commit crimes, even though there’s this entire legal system in place. Now, under domestic law, there’s an executive, a singular executive body, usually in each state, that then ensures, you know, punishment for certain crimes. But that doesn’t mean that the vast majority of human beings in a country or on the planet respect the law because they’re afraid of going to jail. The vast majority of people respect the rules because it’s the decent thing to do. And so for the minority that are indecent, well, yeah, there are systems in place. But again, I would say, the vast majority of times, the rules are respected. I’ll just say one really interesting thing. There was a study that was done a few years ago, like five, between five and 10 years ago, called the Roots of Restraint. It was a study that looked at what actually makes individuals respect international humanitarian law and how do people feel about the usefulness of international humanitarian law. And the fascinating thing is that in countries that are affected by armed conflict, significantly affected by armed conflict, countries like the Democratic Republic of the Congo, countries like Colombia and others. If you just polled regular people, they said that IHL was incredibly important and that it works. It works. And then if you polled countries like Western countries, Canada, Western European countries. Again, this was done five, 10 years ago. Maybe the answers would be a little bit different today. But at the time, those countries said, well, international law doesn’t work because they’re hearing about violations. All they hear about are violations, whereas it’s people on the ground that see the vast majority of the time rules being respected. I’ll tell you a personal story. You know, I worked in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. One of the things I worked on is recruitment of children, because unfortunately, a lot of children are recruited into armed groups. I’ve met with commanders of groups and There are a lot of ways that international humanitarian law works, but there are invisible ways. It’s not just a question of punishment, although that’s also very important. Thank you.

Tejas Bharadwaj: Thank you. That was a really interesting answer. So, to the lady on the right here.

Audience: Yeah, hello. My name is Mia Kuhlewin. I’m also working in the Internet Engineering Task Force on transport protocols, so I’m very well aware of the work there. And thank you for this presentation. It was very informative and comprehensive, so I really enjoyed that. And I think it’s really nice to see that in the IETF, also these different communities and different stakeholders come together and we are now taking up the work. So, that’s a success in itself, and it’s nice to see that it’s working. You talked a lot, I’m just curious, during the discussion you talked a lot about the risk of exposure, and we all know that also the risk of cyberattacks is increasing more and more. So, just having, and you said this already, just having the emblem will not protect somebody from attacks. So, are you looking at these two angles together? Like, are you also trying to increase the protection of these digital assets and increase how we handle cyberattacks and so on? Or do you think this is like two separate things that need to be worked on separately?

Tejas Bharadwaj: Chelsea, you want to take that?

Chelsea Smethurst: Samit, do you want to answer first from the legal considerations, and then I’ll approach the cyber angle. I think that’s a really great question, by the way.

Samit D’Chuna: Yeah, no, I completely agree. So, yeah, there’s different aspects, right? So, I mean, as I mentioned, the digital emblem is one part of it, It is so essential to victims of armed conflict, of natural disasters and other situations of violence. So that’s a key aspect. And then another aspect that is kind of new for us as well is working with certain cyber actors that we haven’t worked with before. So, you know, we consider, we look at the concept of, let’s say a party to a conflict quite broadly, right? So you can potentially have cyber actors that are sort of either part of the armed forces or belonging to the armed forces that might also be an interlocutor for the ICRC, but not one that we’ve traditionally had because we’ve traditionally worked with arms, like traditional arms carriers, but we are increasingly trying to work with sort of these more non-traditional, let’s say actors or hacker groups. And last year, the ICRC published something called Eight Rules for Hackers. It got quite a bit of traction. Maybe some of you have heard about it. It was kind of published in the BBC and elsewhere, which was basically rules of international humanitarian law that apply to cyber actors when they are engaging in acts as part of a conflict. So yeah, there’s definitely, you know, there’s this entire gamut of work that we’re doing in this sector and all of it towards the same goal of increasing ultimately the protection for victims of armed conflict and others.

Chelsea Smethurst: Yeah, and so the way I think about this question that you’ve asked, and I’m the cyber person up at the table, and so this is something I’ve grappled with quite a lot in the early stages of this project. And I would say it’s half legal exercises and it’s a half cyber exercises. And what do I mean by that is if you look at the requirements half of them are legal. So how do we marry these technical standards to international? , and they’re based on security requirements. This is the traditional cyber security bread and butter domain where we operate as practitioners. I think the way to think about this is do the security requirements support ultimately what we’re trying to achieve in terms of the legal requirements rather than drive first with the security requirements and then come back on the back end with legal requirements. I think it’s a very important question because we’re not driving this as a cyber security initiative, rather it is how do we develop security controls to support the legal requirements that we really need to meet here. So that’s how I think about that distinction in your question.

Tejas Bharadwaj: Right. So we have exactly about four minutes, 45 seconds. So I would take both these questions together and, you know, let the speakers answer that. So the gentleman on the right first, you can quickly, you know. Yes.

Audience: Thank you. Thank you very much. We have heard a lot about the red cross as a protective sign, but there are a few others such as the three orange dots and the white flag, of course. Are there any particular measures that need to be taken for, like, the different type of protective signs, or can they all be handled in the same way in a digital sphere?

Tejas Bharadwaj: Right. So lady on the left here.

Audience: Thank you very much. I would like to start with you. You mentioned the importance of confidential dialogue with states. However, during armed escalations, non-state actors, particularly platforms like Meta and X, play a significant role in shaping narratives and examination of non-state actors’ lives withward. Consequently, the use of leader-to-leader communication in the rural areas is far from better than the most prevailing modality. So, if we consider other steps taken intervention on behalf of these platforms. We documented those things during the India-Pakistan escalation. My question is, does the ICRC engage in confidential dialogue with those companies during times of conflict? And if so, how do you ensure that their algorithmic amplification does not exacerbate the humanitarian catastrophe?

Tejas Bharadwaj: So Samit, if you can go ahead and then Chelsea can follow, I guess.

Samit D’Chuna: Sure, yeah. Thank you so much for the questions. So great question about the different emblems. So you know, when we started our work, of course, we started on the Red Cross Crescent and Crystal. And in the interest of time, I’ve kind of kept the conversation to that. But you’re right that there’s other IHL emblems that exist, and also part of our work. So even though we’re leading this on the Red Cross Crescent and Crystal, there’s of course, as you mentioned, the three orange dots with the three orange circles, rather, which are the dangerous forces emblem. So it represents a danger. So dangerous forces, if it’s attacked, it would release, you know, certain, you know, yeah, what we call dangerous forces, essentially, that would, you know, cause significant harm to the civilian population. So nuclear generating facilities, dams and dikes. So that’s one emblem. There’s another emblem for civil defense, which is a similar emblem, like maybe some of you have heard of the White Helmets in Syria and elsewhere. I mean, there’s civil defense now in the different conflicts that you see around the world that provide certain services. You know, in the event of an armed conflict, they’re also have a, you know, they also have a specific protection under international humanitarian law, and they have an emblem. And then there’s also, you know, what’s colloquially known as the Blue Shield emblem, or the emblem of UNESCO, the cultural property emblem, which is also an emblem that identifies cultural property and also has a different, you know, special protection under international humanitarian law. The key is that the protections are different for each of the emblems. They’re not exactly the same protection. And of course, they’re not for the same thing. So we do have to think about what that means. We’ve been working quite a bit with UNESCO and what’s called an organization called Blue Shield International They also participate in the IETF discussion. So they also bring that in to the conversation. So that’s quite key So so yes, we have thought about the different emblems on harmful and firm on the question of working with tech companies Yeah, I mean we we try to have a dialogue with everyone when we have a dialogue. It is a confidential dialogue We’re really happy to provide assistance particularly in navigating international humanitarian law, which I know can become quite complex So we do talk about that The thing about IHL is it actually doesn’t turn on whether information is true or not necessarily We have a notion called harmful information where the certain spread of information violates IHL And so of course that’s part of our dialogue as well

Tejas Bharadwaj: Chelsea quickly to wrap up

Chelsea Smethurst: I’ll just say it’s been a pleasure being here and presenting on IGF with my partners to me and Tejas Thank you for joining us today and just really encourage others in the industry and civil society to get involved in this work That’s really where it needs to go is to scale beyond just a couple of small companies So a pleasure to be here today and thank you all for your thoughtful questions

Tejas Bharadwaj: Yeah, thank you very much for the audience and also people who have tuned in online and please feel free to ask the speakers You know after the session ends, you know, yeah, thank you so much You Outro Friday Night Live at Chief Stadium USA Provignment at Leeuwin Basketballruce Friday Night Live at Chief Stadium USA Composition by Brandon Holaria

Agreement points

Digital emblem must balance security with accessibility for global implementation

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Chelsea Smethurst
– Tejas Bharadwaj

Arguments

Digital emblem must be secure enough to prevent misuse while simple enough for developing countries to implement

Need for adoption by all 196 Geneva Convention signatory states for universal recognition

Implementation costs and complexity must be minimized for developing countries and smaller organizations

Summary

All speakers agree that the digital emblem must be technically robust enough to prevent misuse while remaining accessible and affordable for humanitarian organizations in resource-constrained environments globally

Topics

Development | Cybersecurity | Infrastructure

Multi-stakeholder approach essential for digital emblem success

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Chelsea Smethurst

Arguments

Digital emblem requires integration into international humanitarian law through various mechanisms including protocol amendments

Success requires technical standardization, legal recognition, and widespread global adoption across multiple dimensions

Cybersecurity Tech Accords with 160+ companies adopted digital emblem pledge for global industry support

Summary

Both speakers emphasize that success requires coordinated efforts across legal, technical, and industry domains with broad international participation

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic | Cybersecurity

Technical solutions must support legal requirements rather than drive them

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Chelsea Smethurst

Arguments

Digital emblem should mirror physical emblem functionality while adapting to cyber warfare realities

Technical solutions must support legal requirements rather than drive them

Summary

Both speakers agree that the project should be guided primarily by legal and humanitarian requirements, with technical solutions designed to support these goals

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Cybersecurity

Risk mitigation through technical design and legal frameworks

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Chelsea Smethurst

Arguments

Risk of increased exposure to malicious actors must be balanced against protection benefits

Need for verifiable, revocable, and auditable technical standards through IETF working group

Digital emblem requires decentralized use, covert inspection capability, and removability features

Summary

Both speakers acknowledge risks exist but can be mitigated through careful technical design that incorporates security principles and maintains flexibility for users

Topics

Cybersecurity | Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize that trust is fundamental to the emblem system’s effectiveness and that widespread adoption is necessary to replicate the success of the physical emblem

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Chelsea Smethurst

Arguments

Digital emblem success depends on building same system of trust that exists with physical emblem

Project needs to scale beyond core companies to achieve global norm status

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights | Economic

Both express skepticism about the effectiveness of emblem systems given current violations and enforcement challenges in international humanitarian law

Speakers

– Tejas Bharadwaj
– Audience

Arguments

Physical emblem routinely ignored in today’s conflict raises questions about digital emblem’s potential effectiveness

Major Geneva Convention signatories have targeted hospitals and humanitarian infrastructure without meaningful punishment

Topics

Human rights | Legal and regulatory

Both recognize the need to engage with non-traditional actors in the digital space, including tech companies and cyber actors, as part of humanitarian protection efforts

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Audience

Arguments

ICRC engages in confidential bilateral dialogue with both state and non-state actors including cyber groups

Platform companies’ role in conflict narrative shaping requires engagement on algorithmic amplification issues

Topics

Cybersecurity | Legal and regulatory | Human rights

Unexpected consensus

Integration of multiple emblem types beyond Red Cross into digital sphere

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Audience

Arguments

Digital emblem work extends beyond Red Cross to include other IHL emblems like dangerous forces and cultural property symbols

Integration with existing internet protocols and standards presents both opportunities and challenges

Explanation

There was unexpected consensus that the digital emblem project should encompass all types of protective emblems under international humanitarian law, not just medical emblems, showing broader scope than initially apparent

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Infrastructure | Sociocultural

Acknowledgment of emblem system limitations while maintaining support

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Tejas Bharadwaj
– Audience

Arguments

Physical emblem works because vast majority of time it is respected, violations make headlines but represent minority of cases

Physical emblem routinely ignored in today’s conflict raises questions about digital emblem’s potential effectiveness

Double standards in international law enforcement undermine trust in emblem system

Explanation

Despite raising serious concerns about violations and enforcement, there was unexpected consensus that the emblem system still has value and should be extended to digital realm, showing pragmatic acceptance of imperfect but useful tools

Topics

Human rights | Legal and regulatory

Overall assessment

Summary

Strong consensus exists among speakers on technical requirements, multi-stakeholder approach, and need for global accessibility, with shared recognition of both opportunities and challenges

Consensus level

High level of consensus on implementation approach and technical requirements, with constructive skepticism about effectiveness challenges that strengthens rather than undermines the initiative. The agreement spans legal, technical, and practical dimensions, suggesting robust foundation for moving forward despite acknowledged limitations of current international humanitarian law enforcement.

Different viewpoints

Effectiveness of emblem systems given current violations

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Tejas Bharadwaj
– Audience

Arguments

Physical emblem works because vast majority of time it is respected, violations make headlines but represent minority of cases

Physical emblem routinely ignored in today’s conflict raises questions about digital emblem’s potential effectiveness

Major Geneva Convention signatories have targeted hospitals and humanitarian infrastructure without meaningful punishment

Summary

Samit argues the physical emblem is largely successful with violations being exceptional cases that receive disproportionate media attention, while Tejas and audience members express skepticism about effectiveness given high-profile violations and lack of enforcement

Topics

Human rights | Legal and regulatory

Primary mechanisms for ensuring compliance with international humanitarian law

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Audience

Arguments

International humanitarian law compliance relies on training, bilateral dialogue, and moral obligation, not just punishment

Double standards in international law enforcement undermine trust in emblem system

Summary

Samit emphasizes multiple compliance mechanisms beyond punishment including training and dialogue, while audience members focus on the lack of meaningful enforcement and punishment as undermining the entire system

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights

Relationship between digital emblem and cybersecurity measures

Speakers

– Chelsea Smethurst
– Audience

Arguments

Technical solutions must support legal requirements rather than drive them

Digital emblem relationship to broader cybersecurity protection measures needs clarification

Summary

Chelsea argues the digital emblem should be primarily a legal tool with technical solutions supporting legal requirements, while audience members question whether it should be integrated with broader cybersecurity protection measures

Topics

Cybersecurity | Legal and regulatory | Infrastructure

Unexpected differences

Role of platform companies in conflict situations

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Audience

Arguments

ICRC engages in confidential bilateral dialogue with both state and non-state actors including cyber groups

Platform companies’ role in conflict narrative shaping requires engagement on algorithmic amplification issues

Explanation

While both acknowledge the need to engage with tech platforms, there’s an unexpected gap in how they view the scope of engagement – Samit focuses on traditional IHL compliance dialogue, while audience members raise concerns about algorithmic amplification of conflict narratives, which represents a newer dimension of platform responsibility that wasn’t fully addressed

Topics

Sociocultural | Human rights | Legal and regulatory

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion revealed moderate disagreements primarily around the effectiveness and enforcement of international humanitarian law, with speakers generally aligned on goals but differing on implementation approaches and risk assessments

Disagreement level

The disagreements are substantive but not fundamental – all parties support the digital emblem concept but have different perspectives on its likely effectiveness, implementation priorities, and relationship to broader cybersecurity measures. The skepticism from moderator and audience members serves as a healthy counterbalance to the more optimistic views of the project leaders, highlighting real challenges that need to be addressed for successful implementation.

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize that trust is fundamental to the emblem system’s effectiveness and that widespread adoption is necessary to replicate the success of the physical emblem

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Chelsea Smethurst

Arguments

Digital emblem success depends on building same system of trust that exists with physical emblem

Project needs to scale beyond core companies to achieve global norm status

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights | Economic

Both express skepticism about the effectiveness of emblem systems given current violations and enforcement challenges in international humanitarian law

Speakers

– Tejas Bharadwaj
– Audience

Arguments

Physical emblem routinely ignored in today’s conflict raises questions about digital emblem’s potential effectiveness

Major Geneva Convention signatories have targeted hospitals and humanitarian infrastructure without meaningful punishment

Topics

Human rights | Legal and regulatory

Both recognize the need to engage with non-traditional actors in the digital space, including tech companies and cyber actors, as part of humanitarian protection efforts

Speakers

– Samit D’Chuna
– Audience

Arguments

ICRC engages in confidential bilateral dialogue with both state and non-state actors including cyber groups

Platform companies’ role in conflict narrative shaping requires engagement on algorithmic amplification issues

Topics

Cybersecurity | Legal and regulatory | Human rights

Key takeaways

The Digital Emblem Initiative aims to create a universally-recognized symbol for protecting digital infrastructure used by medical and humanitarian services during armed conflicts, mirroring the success of the physical Red Cross emblem

Three technical implementation approaches are being considered: protected entity flags on website addresses, digital certificates as ‘passports for websites’, and metadata labels on digital files

The digital emblem must be decentralized (no central authority controls usage), support covert inspection (can be checked without alerting the protected entity), and be removable based on security analysis

Significant diplomatic progress has been achieved with consensus adoption at the 34th International Conference of Red Cross and Red Crescent, and support from 160+ tech companies through the Cybersecurity Tech Accords

The physical Red Cross emblem has been successful for 160 years because it works the vast majority of the time – violations make headlines but represent a minority of cases

Success requires building a system of trust similar to the physical emblem, with technical standardization through IETF, legal integration into international humanitarian law, and widespread global adoption

The initiative must be simple and cost-effective enough for developing countries and smaller organizations to implement, avoiding creating barriers to access

Digital emblem work extends beyond Red Cross to include other IHL emblems like dangerous forces, civil defense, and cultural property symbols, each requiring tailored protection approaches

Resolutions and action items

IETF working group will launch in July to develop verifiable, interoperable and secure technical standards for the digital emblem

ICRC will continue annual meetings with states to update on technical development and advance integration into international humanitarian law

Legal integration will be pursued through multiple mechanisms including amending Additional Protocol I technical annex, creating a new fourth protocol, or unilateral state declarations

Australian Red Cross will lead work with national societies worldwide to integrate digital emblem into domestic legal systems

Industry scaling beyond core companies is needed to achieve global norm status through broader tech sector engagement

Continued confidential bilateral dialogue with both state and non-state actors, including cyber groups, to ensure compliance and proper implementation

Unresolved issues

How to effectively address skepticism about digital emblem effectiveness given current violations of physical emblem protections in ongoing conflicts

Balancing security requirements to prevent misuse while maintaining simplicity for resource-constrained organizations in developing countries

Managing the risk of increased exposure to malicious actors when marking protected digital infrastructure

Determining the relationship between digital emblem protection and broader cybersecurity measures – whether they should be integrated or remain separate approaches

Addressing the role of social media platforms and their algorithmic amplification in conflict situations and how this relates to digital emblem protection

Ensuring universal adoption across all 196 Geneva Convention signatory states despite varying technical capabilities and political positions

Resolving double standards in international law enforcement that undermine trust in the emblem system

Clarifying how different types of IHL emblems (Red Cross, dangerous forces, cultural property) will be technically implemented and distinguished in the digital sphere

Suggested compromises

Digital emblem designed as a tool that can be removed if security analysis shows risks outweigh benefits, maintaining flexibility for protected entities

Multiple technical implementation pathways being developed simultaneously to accommodate different organizational needs and capabilities

Phased approach starting with core stakeholders and gradually scaling to achieve global adoption rather than requiring universal implementation from the start

Integration into international law through multiple mechanisms to accommodate states that are not party to all Geneva Convention protocols

Balancing security and accessibility by developing standards that are ‘secure enough to prevent misuse’ while ‘simple enough for humanitarian organizations in developing countries to use’

The Red Cross emblem, one of the most universally recognized symbols of protection, is kind of routinely ignored in today’s conflict. Why should anyone believe that a digital emblem will fare any better? Is it simply just another idealistic gesture and a world where violations, not protections, dominate the headlines?

Speaker

Tejas Bharadwaj

Reason

This comment cuts to the heart of the initiative’s credibility by directly challenging the fundamental premise. It forces the discussion beyond technical implementation to address the elephant in the room – whether symbolic protection has any real-world efficacy when violations make headlines daily.

Impact

This question fundamentally shifted the discussion from ‘how’ to implement the digital emblem to ‘why’ it would work at all. It prompted Samit to provide crucial context about the emblem’s actual success rate and introduced the key insight that violations make news precisely because they’re exceptional, not routine. This reframing became central to understanding the project’s value proposition.

The vast majority of the time the emblem is respected… what we see in the news are violations of international humanitarian law… it’s important to remember that the vast majority of the time the emblem does in fact work

Speaker

Samit D’Chuna

Reason

This insight challenges our perception bias by explaining that we hear about violations precisely because they’re newsworthy exceptions, not the norm. It reframes the entire discussion about the emblem’s effectiveness by highlighting the invisible successes versus visible failures.

Impact

This comment provided the foundational justification for the entire digital emblem project. It shifted the conversation from defensive to confident, establishing that the physical emblem’s success model could be replicated digitally. Chelsea later referenced this insight when discussing the project’s goals, showing how it became a cornerstone argument.

How can we even have trust in the emblem in the end, when over the last three years there have been large signatories to the Geneva Conventions, basically completely disregarding its functions? … And there hasn’t really been much actual international law punishment towards it

Speaker

Jure Bokovoy (Audience)

Reason

This comment represents the skeptical voice of many observers who see high-profile violations and question the entire system’s credibility. It forces a deeper examination of how international humanitarian law actually works beyond punishment mechanisms.

Impact

This challenge prompted Samit to provide one of the most profound explanations of how international law actually functions – not primarily through punishment but through training, dialogue, and the fundamental decency of most actors. It led to the powerful personal anecdote about the ‘Roots of Restraint’ study, showing how those actually affected by conflict view IHL’s effectiveness differently than distant observers.

The reason the color red was chosen was actually because if you’re a wounded soldier, if you’re a war medic, then you actually always have the access to the color red and you always have access to white because soldiers usually carry the flag of surrender… everyone should be able to use the emblem and there shouldn’t be any sort of barriers to the creation of the emblem

Speaker

Samit D’Chuna

Reason

This historical insight reveals the profound practical wisdom embedded in the original emblem design – accessibility and universality were built into the system from the beginning. It connects 19th-century thinking to modern digital challenges.

Impact

This comment directly influenced the technical discussion by reinforcing Chelsea’s point about the ‘lowest common denominator’ requirement. It provided historical validation for making the digital emblem accessible to humanitarian organizations in developing countries, showing how practical accessibility has always been central to the emblem’s success.

If you are marking medical and humanitarian digital infrastructure, could you inadvertently make them more exposed to malicious actors?… what you hear in the news is actually what you don’t hear in the news. That is a massive accomplishment

Speaker

Chelsea Smethurst

Reason

This comment acknowledges a genuine technical and strategic dilemma while reframing success metrics. It shows sophisticated thinking about unintended consequences while embracing the counterintuitive idea that ‘not making news’ is the goal.

Impact

This comment bridged the technical and humanitarian perspectives, showing how the technology sector is grappling with the same fundamental questions about visibility and protection. It reinforced Samit’s earlier point about invisible successes and helped establish shared understanding between the legal and technical approaches.

We’re not driving this as a cyber security initiative, rather it is how do we develop security controls to support the legal requirements that we really need to meet here

Speaker

Chelsea Smethurst

Reason

This comment reveals a crucial philosophical approach – subordinating technical capabilities to humanitarian law requirements rather than the reverse. It shows how the project maintains its humanitarian focus despite technical complexity.

Impact

This clarification helped distinguish the digital emblem project from typical cybersecurity initiatives, maintaining focus on humanitarian protection rather than technical security. It reinforced that this is fundamentally a humanitarian law project that happens to use technology, not a tech project with humanitarian applications.

Overall assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by systematically addressing the fundamental challenges to the digital emblem’s credibility and feasibility. The conversation evolved from initial skepticism about symbolic protection in a world of visible violations, through historical and empirical evidence of the physical emblem’s success, to sophisticated technical and legal considerations for digital implementation. The most impactful moments came when speakers reframed common assumptions – that violations make news precisely because they’re exceptional, that international law works primarily through training and dialogue rather than punishment, and that technical solutions must serve humanitarian law rather than drive it. This progression created a compelling narrative arc from doubt to understanding, establishing both the necessity and feasibility of the digital emblem initiative.

How can trust in the digital emblem be maintained when major signatories to the Geneva Conventions are disregarding physical emblems and targeting hospitals and humanitarian infrastructure without meaningful international punishment?

Speaker

Jure Bokovoy (Finnish Green Party audience member)

Explanation

This addresses a fundamental challenge to the entire premise of the digital emblem project – if physical emblems are being ignored by major powers, why would digital emblems be respected?

Should cybersecurity protection measures be developed alongside the digital emblem, or are these separate initiatives that need to be worked on independently?

Speaker

Mia Kuhlewin (IETF transport protocols worker)

Explanation

This explores whether the digital emblem should be part of a broader cybersecurity framework or remain focused solely on identification and legal protection

How should different types of protective emblems (three orange dots, white flag, cultural property emblems) be handled in the digital sphere – can they use the same technical approach or do they need different measures?

Speaker

Unnamed audience member

Explanation

This addresses the scalability and technical requirements for implementing multiple types of protective emblems digitally, each with different legal protections

Does the ICRC engage in confidential dialogue with social media platforms during conflicts, and how do they ensure algorithmic amplification doesn’t exacerbate humanitarian catastrophes?

Speaker

Unnamed audience member

Explanation

This explores the ICRC’s engagement with non-state tech actors and their role in information warfare during conflicts

What are the specific technical implementation details for embedding digital emblems into different types of digital infrastructure across various countries and organizations?

Speaker

Tejas Bharadwaj (moderator)

Explanation

This addresses the practical challenges of global deployment and standardization across diverse technical environments

How will the costs and technical barriers be minimized for developing countries and smaller organizations to implement the digital emblem?

Speaker

Tejas Bharadwaj (moderator)

Explanation

This addresses equity and accessibility concerns to ensure the digital emblem doesn’t create a two-tiered system of protection

What specific legal mechanisms will be used to integrate the digital emblem into international humanitarian law – protocol amendments, new protocols, or other approaches?

Speaker

Tejas Bharadwaj (moderator)

Explanation

This addresses the concrete legal pathways needed to make the digital emblem legally binding and enforceable

How will the digital emblem project scale beyond the current core group of companies and organizations to achieve global adoption?

Speaker

Chelsea Smethurst (Microsoft)

Explanation

This addresses the challenge of moving from a pilot project with a few major tech companies to widespread global implementation