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Summary

This networking session at the Internet Governance Forum focused on mapping digital rights capacities and threats in global majority communities, presented by Oxfam’s Recipe Project in partnership with civil society organizations from multiple countries. The discussion aimed to identify current challenges and foster stronger partnerships to ensure inclusive digital governance that leaves no one behind.

Representatives from Vietnam, Bolivia, Cambodia, Somalia, and Palestine shared findings from comprehensive research involving over 1,000 respondents across nine countries. Common themes emerged across all regions, including significant digital literacy gaps, inadequate legal frameworks for digital rights protection, and widespread experiences of digital violence. In Vietnam, despite rapid digitalization, none of the 63 provincial service portals meet accessibility standards, and 44% of people cannot distinguish between accurate and fake information online. Bolivia reported that 77% of respondents experienced digital security incidents, with 62% facing digital violence, particularly affecting human rights defenders and women activists.

Cambodia highlighted that fewer than 30% of citizens possess adequate digital navigation skills, while lacking comprehensive cybersecurity and data protection laws. Somalia found that while 98% have internet access, only 28% understand risks of sharing personal information, and 42% experienced digital violence. Palestine presented the most severe situation, with systematic surveillance, censorship, and discriminatory infrastructure limiting Palestinian access to advanced networks while Israeli settlers enjoy full connectivity.

The panelists emphasized the importance of bottom-up approaches, multi-stakeholder dialogue, and capacity building for marginalized communities. An audience member from Zambia reinforced the need for balanced approaches to cybersecurity that protect both safety and freedom of expression. The session concluded with calls for continued collaboration between technical communities and civil society to address misinformation while preserving digital rights.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Digital divide and access inequalities**: Multiple speakers highlighted significant gaps in digital access, with rural areas particularly affected (70% in Bolivia, limited infrastructure in Cambodia and Somalia), and the need for meaningful connectivity rather than just basic access.

– **Digital literacy and capacity building challenges**: All countries reported low digital literacy rates (under 30% in Cambodia, widespread gaps in Palestine), emphasizing the need for comprehensive training programs and bottom-up approaches to build digital skills in marginalized communities.

– **Digital violence and security threats**: Speakers documented high rates of digital violence, particularly gender-based (77% in Bolivia experienced digital security incidents, 42% in Somalia faced digital violence), including harassment, hate speech, and threats targeting human rights defenders and activists.

– **Inadequate legal frameworks and governance gaps**: Most countries lack comprehensive digital rights legislation, with laws still in draft form or inadequately protecting citizens from surveillance, data misuse, and online violations, while policy development often excludes marginalized voices.

– **Multi-stakeholder collaboration and advocacy strategies**: Organizations emphasized the importance of building coalitions, creating networks (like Bolivia’s feminist collectives), and engaging in policy dialogue to bridge grassroots communities with policymakers for more inclusive digital governance.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to map current digital rights capacities and threats in Global Majority communities through the RECIPE project, share research findings from nine countries, and foster partnerships between civil society organizations to address digital inequalities and promote human rights in the digital age.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a professional, collaborative, and solution-oriented tone throughout. While speakers acknowledged serious challenges and violations, they balanced concern with optimism by highlighting ongoing efforts and practical solutions. The tone remained constructive and forward-looking, emphasizing collective action and shared learning rather than dwelling on problems alone.

Speakers

– **Mia Marzotto** – Digital Rights Advocacy Lead at Oxfam

– **Online moderator** – (Role/title not specified, appears to be Luan Mendez based on context)

– **Audience** – Enes Mafuta from Zambia, Standards Engineer

– **Khadeja Ibrahim** – International Advocacy Officer at the Palestinian NGO, Miftah

– **Cristian Leon** – Executive Director of Fundacion Internet Bolivia.org

– **Tran Thi Tuyet** – Program Manager for the Institute for Policy Studies and Media Development in Vietnam (also referred to as “Snow”)

– **Mohamed Aded Ali** – Executive Director of Somalia Non-State Actors (SONSA)

– **Theary Luy** – Head of Program at the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia

**Additional speakers:**

– **Luan Mendez** – Project Coordinator of the Centro SOS Digital at Fundacion Internet Bolivia (mentioned as online moderator but appears to be the same as “Online moderator”)

# Comprehensive Report: Mapping Digital Rights Capacities and Threats in Global Majority Communities

## Executive Summary

This networking session at the Internet Governance Forum presented findings from Oxfam’s Recipe Project, a comprehensive initiative examining digital rights capacities and threats across global majority communities. The discussion brought together civil society representatives from Vietnam, Bolivia, Cambodia, Somalia, and Palestine to share research findings from nine countries involving over 1,000 respondents. The session revealed concerning patterns of digital rights violations, infrastructure inequalities, and governance gaps while highlighting innovative community-driven solutions and advocacy strategies.

## Research Methodology and Scope

Mia Marzotto, Digital Rights Advocacy Lead at Oxfam, introduced the Recipe Project as a multi-country research initiative co-funded by the European Union. The project examined four critical dimensions: digital literacy levels, internet access quality, experiences of digital violence, and existing prevention measures. The research methodology emphasized bottom-up approaches, engaging directly with marginalized communities to understand their lived experiences of digital rights challenges.

The comprehensive scope of the research spanned nine countries with over 1,000 respondents, though five countries were presented in detail during this session. This approach enabled the identification of common patterns while respecting regional specificities across diverse geographical and political contexts.

## Country-Specific Findings and Challenges

### Vietnam: Policy Development Gaps

Snow from the Institute for Policy Studies and Media Development in Vietnam presented findings highlighting significant gaps in digital policy development. Despite government-led digitalization efforts, fundamental accessibility problems persist, with none of Vietnam’s 63 provincial public service portals meeting user-friendliness standards.

The research revealed that 44% of Vietnamese respondents cannot distinguish between accurate and fake information online, indicating significant digital literacy gaps. More concerning is the systematic exclusion of marginalized communities from policy development processes. As Snow explained, digital policies remain largely developed through top-down approaches led by state agencies, with consultation processes that are “often formalistic and lack meaningful engagement.”

Snow presented four fundamental lessons from Vietnam’s experience: the need for meaningful participation of marginalized communities in policy development, the importance of addressing digital literacy gaps, the requirement for user-friendly digital infrastructure, and the necessity of moving beyond formalistic consultation to genuine engagement.

### Bolivia: High Rates of Digital Violence

The Bolivian findings, presented by online moderator Luan Mendez, revealed alarming statistics. An overwhelming 77% of respondents experienced digital security incidents, while 62% faced digital violence. Most significantly, 77% of those experiencing digital violence identified a specific relationship between these attacks and their status as human rights defenders.

Bolivia faces severe connectivity challenges, with a 30% digital divide in urban areas expanding to 70% in rural regions. These infrastructure gaps compound the vulnerability of already marginalized communities to digital rights violations.

However, Bolivia also demonstrated innovative civil society responses, including the creation of feminist collective networks providing digital security support through peer-to-peer methodologies. These networks represent a community-driven approach to building digital rights capacity.

### Cambodia: Capacity Building Through Networks

Theary Luy from the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia (CCC) presented findings showing that fewer than 30% of Cambodian citizens possess adequate skills to navigate the digital world safely. This digital literacy gap particularly affects rural youth and grassroots organizations.

CCC represents 200 NGOs and collaborates with over 400 provincial NGOs, providing a broad network for capacity building. Cambodia’s legal framework remains incomplete, lacking comprehensive cybersecurity, cybercrime, and personal data protection laws despite having digital government policies.

The Cambodian response emphasizes peer-to-peer capacity building, with grassroots organizations trained to become trainers themselves. As Theary explained, their multi-stakeholder policy dialogue serves as “not a consultation, but it’s a way to build trust” and ensure genuine community voice consideration in policy development.

### Somalia: Connectivity Without Protection

Mohamed Aded Ali from Somalia Non-State Actors (SONSA) presented a paradoxical situation where 98% of the population has internet connectivity, yet significant protection gaps persist. Only 28% of users understand the risks of sharing personal information online, while 42% experience digital violence, with 37% reporting gender-based incidents.

Somalia’s regulatory landscape includes various bodies such as the Digital Rights Authority (DBA) and National Identification and Registration Authority (NERA), but has limited legislative framework, with policies remaining in draft form or under cabinet review.

The Somali response includes establishing a digital task force committee comprising decision makers, civil society organizations, and technology companies, representing a multi-stakeholder approach to addressing digital rights challenges.

### Palestine: Systematic Digital Discrimination

Khadeja Ibrahim from the Palestinian NGO Miftah presented findings documenting systematic digital rights violations including surveillance, censorship, and discriminatory infrastructure access. Palestinians use 3G networks while Israeli settlers in the West Bank have access to 4G and 5G networks, creating stark technological inequality.

Khadeja mentioned specific AI tools being used including Blue Wolf, Lavender, and Where’s Daddy, as well as the impact of Facebook law and anti-terrorism legislation. Palestinian civil society organizations face additional challenges, with 72% unaware of local digital rights legislation and 75% lacking technological resources.

Despite these constraints, Palestinian organizations participate in the Palestinian Digital Rights Initiative Coalition, maintaining coordination and knowledge sharing to build collective capacity under extremely difficult circumstances.

## Common Challenges and Themes

### Digital Literacy Gaps

All speakers identified digital literacy gaps as a fundamental barrier to digital rights protection. The consistency of this challenge across diverse contexts—from Vietnam’s 44% unable to identify misinformation to Cambodia’s under-30% digital navigation skills—demonstrates this as a universal challenge requiring coordinated responses.

### Widespread Digital Violence

The research documented high rates of digital violence across all regions, with particular targeting of human rights defenders and gender-based violence. Bolivia’s finding that 77% of digital violence victims linked attacks to their human rights defender status demonstrates how digital spaces are weaponized to silence advocacy and activism.

### Inadequate Legal Frameworks

All countries face significant gaps in legal frameworks for digital rights protection. Laws are either missing entirely, remain in draft form, or lack meaningful stakeholder participation in development. This regulatory vacuum leaves citizens without recourse when digital rights violations occur.

### Infrastructure Inequalities

The research revealed how digital infrastructure serves as a mechanism of exclusion. Palestine’s discriminatory network access and Bolivia’s 70% rural digital divide demonstrate how unequal access reinforces existing inequalities.

## Civil Society Responses and Innovation

Despite significant challenges, civil society organizations across all regions developed innovative capacity-building strategies sharing common characteristics: peer-to-peer learning, community ownership of solutions, and network-based approaches.

Bolivia’s feminist collective networks, Cambodia’s train-the-trainer models, and Vietnam’s grassroots consultation advocacy all demonstrate community-driven approaches. These methods recognize that communities possess knowledge about their own needs and can develop contextually appropriate solutions.

Multi-stakeholder collaboration emerged as important but requiring genuine participation rather than tokenistic consultation. Cambodia’s policy dialogue platform and Somalia’s digital task force committee represent attempts to create meaningful engagement across sectors.

## Areas of Consensus and Tension

Strong consensus emerged regarding fundamental challenges: digital literacy gaps, inadequate legal frameworks, high rates of digital violence, and the need for bottom-up approaches. This consensus across diverse contexts suggests these are universal challenges in digital rights implementation.

However, tensions remain around balancing security and rights. Audience member Enes Mafuta from Zambia highlighted how cybersecurity laws enacted without transparency can create public backlash and restrict legitimate activities, reflecting broader challenges in digital governance where security concerns can justify restrictions on rights.

## Key Insights and Future Directions

The research demonstrates that digital rights violations follow systematic patterns reflecting broader inequalities and governance failures. This systemic nature requires comprehensive responses addressing root causes rather than individual incidents.

The success of peer-to-peer capacity building approaches suggests need for sustained investment in these methodologies. Supporting organizations to become trainers and knowledge sharers multiplies impact while building local ownership and sustainable capacity.

The Recipe Project demonstrates the value of sustained collaboration between civil society organizations across different contexts, enabling ongoing learning and mutual support while respecting local autonomy.

## Conclusion

This networking session successfully demonstrated both the universal nature of digital rights challenges and the innovative capacity of civil society organizations to develop contextually appropriate responses. The research findings reveal concerning patterns requiring urgent attention, while also highlighting remarkable innovation in community-driven capacity building and advocacy strategies.

The strong consensus among speakers on both challenges and solutions suggests significant potential for coordinated action and mutual learning. Moving forward, the digital rights community must build on these foundations while addressing ongoing challenges around resources, legal frameworks, and coordination mechanisms.

As Mia concluded, the session emphasized the need for continued collaboration between technical communities and civil society to address challenges like misinformation while preserving digital rights. This collaborative approach, grounded in community knowledge and meaningful participation, offers a promising path toward more inclusive digital governance.

Mia Marzotto: Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us for this networking session titled Mapping and Addressing Digital Rights Capacities and Threats. My name is Mia Marzotto, and I’m the Digital Rights Advocacy Lead at Oxfam. This week at the IGF, we heard many times how the deployment of digital technologies in more areas of our daily lives and the rapid rise of artificial intelligence increases the urgency with which human rights in a digital age must be prioritized. So with this session, we want to focus on what the current landscape looks like in terms of digital rights capacities and threats in global majority communities and encourage new or stronger partnerships and connections between progressive actors in the digital governance space so that we can collectively ensure that we turn the critical commitment of leaving no one behind into reality. With Oxfam, we believe that effective digital governance should advocate for and protect the rights and interests of all people and that their needs and experiences should really determine the future course of the digital age. Our mission is to end inequality, and this includes tackling the issue of digital inequality as we see a growing concerning gap between those who benefit from digital technologies and those who don’t. This is why in mid-2024, we launched Recipe, a multi-year project co-funded by the European Union that aims to promote fundamental rights in the digital age in partnership with with civil society organizations from 10 countries, working with some of the most vulnerable people in society for whom the risks as well as the opportunities related to digital technologies are the greatest. So this session will proceed as follows. First, we’ll hear from five representatives from the civil society organizations involved in the Recipe Project, who will present key information extracted from primary research and analysis recently conducted, providing sort of like a snapshot of the current situation of digital rights capacities and threats in a diverse set of global majority countries. And then we will move into a discussion and of course encourage reflections and questions from the audience, both in the room and online. So without further ado, let me quickly introduce my panel here of distinguished speakers, starting with Mohamed Aded Ali. He’s the Executive Director of Somalia Non-State Actors. To my right here, Tran Thi Tuyet, Program Manager for the Institute for Policy Studies and Media Development in Vietnam. Theary Luy, Head of Program at the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia. And at the end of the table, Christian Leon, Executive Director of Fundacion Internet Bolivia.org. Joining us online, we also have Khadeja Ibrahim, who’s the International Advocacy Officer at the Palestinian NGO, Mifta. And Luan Mendez, Project Coordinator of the Centro SOS Digital at Fundacion Internet Bolivia, who will also be our online moderator. So before focusing on the countries, I just wanna make a quick few remarks on the overall methodology and demographics. and Theary Luy. So, this is a summary of the demographics of the multi-country assessment we conducted under the Recipe Project to map the digital landscape threats and opportunities. So this was an assessment that included a comprehensive set of questions related to four main topics, digital literacy and internet access, digital violence and safety, and current measures to prevent digital violence, as well as perceptions on the further action needed to prevent digital rights violations. We had over a thousand respondents across nine countries, representing a range of groups, including community members, activists, journalists, and members of civil society organizations. And of course, we also looked at existing literature and other relevant studies, and importantly validated the findings through workshops with the groups involved. So I will now pass it on to our panel to present key findings from each country, as well as provide an overview of ongoing efforts and lessons learned in their work to promote digital rights and accountable internet governance in their respective contexts. Snow, would you like to start?

Tran Thi Tuyet: Hello, everyone, and it’s nice to meet you all here. I’m Snow from the Institute for Policy Study and Media Development of Think Tank based in Vietnam, focusing on digital technology policies. And it’s my honor to be here, and thank you so much, MIA and Osmar Malan, for giving us this opportunity to share here. And without further delay, I will start my presentation now. In Vietnam, digital transformation, or truyền đổi sổ, has been a national priority in recent years, with the government recognizing that digitalization is a comprehensive socioeconomic shift. The government leaves no one behind commitment aimed to guarantee that all citizens can benefit from and participate in the digital era. The cornerstone of this vision is to ensure digital rights for everyone. But despite notable progress, the reality for many is still marked by the barrier to digital access and participation. So our challenge and opportunity is to ensure that digital rights are not just a slogan, but a reality for all. In Vietnam, more and more people are using digital services. Each day, between three to six million log into this platform. This is three to four times more than just a year ago. Nearly half of all government services are now fully online. This number reflects the country’s strong push for digitalization. But the real question is, do this positive number actually means everyone can access to these services? While official reports show promising figures, significant challenges remain in digital infrastructure, digital skills, and digital access. According to our research in mid-2024, none of Vietnam’s 63 provincial public service portals fully meet standards for user-friendliness or accessibility, even though these portals are the main gateway for government services. So for marginalized communities, such as the migrant workers, getting access to these services is even more critical, since it is a necessity for them for claiming the entitlement under essential social protection policies. As digital services become a part of daily life in Vietnam, concern about data protection and online safety are growing, and Vietnam has also started building legal frameworks such as the personal data protection decree and a new law, but challenges still remain. Personal data protection leak and the buying and selling of personal info without the identification still happen. And misinformation in the online digital environment is common as 44% of people in our recent research Research also say that they cannot clarify the information they saw was accurate or fake. So this confusion makes it easier for the scammers, especially among people with limited digital skills, like the marginalized community. A survey by the National Cyber Security Association found that one in every 220 smartphone users in Vietnam has fallen victim to online scams. These challenges stem from several core issues that our analysis has identified. Digital policy in Vietnam are still largely developed through a top-down approach led by state agencies with consultation processes that are often formalistic and lack of meaningful engagement. There remains an absence of participation from the marginalized communities and their representative organizations during both the design and implementation of digital policies. Furthermore, there is a lack of robust coordination mechanism between the public sector, the private sector, the civil society, and relevant stakeholders that advocate for digital rights. So from the perspective of a policy research organization, we observe both remarkable and persistent challenges. Hence, our policy recommendations aim to provide a strategic roadmap that integrates both the policy, the technical, and the cooperative dimensions. So we would like to highlight four fundamental lessons. The first one is digital transformation as a multi-component ecosystem requiring synchronization between policy, technology, and people. The second one, inclusive policy design with a tentative participation mechanism and grassroots support institution is necessary. The third one, ensuring digital rights as a prerequisite for greater public participation in the transformation process. especially for marginalised groups. And the fourth one established multi-level, multi-layer and multilateral cooperation mechanism to strengthen the capacity, voice and policy influence of social organisation and disadvantaged community. So before I conclude my presentation, I would like to invite you to explore our research on this topic. Our detailed recommendations are available via the QR code on the screen. And we hope that Vietnam’s experience and lesson learned can contribute to the global conversation on digital rights for all. Thanks for your attention.

Mia Marzotto: Thank you, Snow, very much. From Vietnam to Bolivia. Christian, please.

Cristian Leon: Sure. Thank you, Mia. Good morning to all the wonderful panellists and the friends participating on site and online. So I represent an organisation called Internet Bolivia Foundation that is a digital rights organisation established in 2018. We work to generate digital inclusion, protection of digital rights and the fostering of capacities for the most vulnerable populations, especially in the fight against digital gender violence. We do this in a context in which three things are combined. The first one is a digital divide that still affects 30% of the population in urban areas and almost 70% in the rural areas. So we are really far from achieving a meaningful connectivity. The second thing is a strong perspective from the government and legislators to push forward a digital transformation, but the digital transformation more motivated in digital technosolutionism than in real necessities. And this is exposing people to potential abuses to their rights, such as privacy, freedom of speech, participation, among others, and see a very hostile environment. for Human Rights Defenders, for Women Activists, for LGBTQIA populations, all the vulnerable populations. So they are connected but without any safeguards to their participation. That is why most of our work has been focused on fostering the capacities of these populations and advocating for the respect of our rights. And that is why we are working with the RECIPE group to join forces together with other organizations from the Global South and the Global North for achieving these objectives. So we made a mapping of the current threats. And my colleague Luan, she’s connected. She will explain to you a little more about our results. So Luan, please.

Online moderator: Thank you very much. Hi, everyone in the session. Good morning. Well, about the key findings, we saw that 77% suffered a digital security incident and 62% experienced some type of digital violence in the last year. Another important result was that 77% said that the actions of digital violence affect them may have a specific relationship with their status as human rights defenders. That is a very important result. And another thing that the four main threats identified were harassment, hate speech, physical or sexual threats, and public defamation. So in order to respond to that, one way of responding to the previous result was the creation of a network of feminist collectives. Some of the objectives of this network are to generate support for digital security among and others. The first thing was the methodologies with pedagogical and practical dynamics were identified such as awareness-raising sessions, space for horizontal reflection, and articulation for advocacy in public policies in the political arena. This network seeks to provide support to victims and carry out collective prevention actions. It’s important to mention that this network is composed for a very large feminist collective in Bolivia that now are working in strategies and creating horizontal pedagogical methodologies in order to improve their skills in digital security.

Mia Marzotto: Thank you very much to you both. Theary, do you want to talk to us about Cambodia?

Theary Luy: Yes, thank you, Mia, and good morning all. I’m honored to speak with you on behalf of the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia, CCC. CCC, we are a membership-based organization in Cambodia that works in the inclusive partnership to promote good governance, enabling environment, and sustainability for civil society organizations in Cambodia. Currently, we have 200 NGOs as a member, including the local and international NGOs. Besides that, we also have the collaboration with the provincial-based NGOs that work at the ground level with their members, more than 400 NGOs. And back to the digital context in Cambodia, Cambodia stands as a digital crossroad that over the past… Last decade, we witnessed the rapid growth of the Internet and the transformative power of the social media in how our people communicate, engage, and access to the information. However, this digital growth has not come without challenges. So I would like to highlight the challenges based on the key findings of the research. First is about the digital literacy remain alarmingly low in Cambodia. Based on the research, fewer than 30% of Cambodians, especially rural youth and grassroots civil society organizations, posted the skill needed to navigate the digital world safely and effectively. This digital divide is not just about the access to technology, but it’s about the access to the opportunity to participation and to the protection. And second, our legal framework is still catching up. Cambodians have a digital government policy 2022 to 2035, which focuses on the three pillars that I mentioned about the digital government, digital economy, and the digital citizen. However, Cambodia lacks comprehensive law. Several laws are in the draft form. They are in process. This law includes cybersecurity law, cybercrime law, and personal data protection law. And the last one, the third, the absence of the clear and the right-based legislation make the citizen vulnerable to surveillance, misinformation, and data misuse. This leads to the growing of the stress in the digital platform due to the online scam, online gaming. There are a lot of things that we must urgently reveal. However, there is a hope and there is an action. At CCC, we are working with the provincial NGO network to promote the digital awareness and security. These local organizations are not only receiving training, but they are becoming trainers themselves to transfer the knowledge to their members and also their communities. And we are also engaging the youth and the social influencers to lead the public campaigns that make digital rights relevant. Another thing is about the main importance of our work in the policy dialogue. In Cambodia, we believe in the multi-stakeholder approach and the inclusive dialogue. We are bringing together the government, civil society, development partners, and also the private sector to raise awareness of the digital law and policy and to ensure the voice of the civil society are heard and shaping them. So for us, this multi-stakeholder dialogue is not a consultation, but it’s a way to build trust among key stakeholders. So from this effort, we learned that the local ownership, inclusive dialogue, and the youth engagement are the key building the digital future that is safe and equitable and empowering for the Cambodian citizens and also the world. Thank you.

Mia Marzotto: Thank you, Thierry. Mohamed?

Mohamed Aded Ali: Thank you very much. My name is Mohamed Aded Ali. I’m the Executive Director of Somali Civil Society Network, namely SONSA. SONSA is a multisectoral platform of the civil society organization dedicated to promoting I would like to thank the panelists as well as the IGF community and IGF Norway particular secretariat that organized this significant event. In general context, in Somalia, media oversight and regulatory barriers are limited digital advocacy in human rights, gender, economic, climate justice, and democracy. But the digital access can help drive equitable development, accountability, governance, gender, equality, climate actions, and human rights that empowers citizens to voice needs and hold leaders accountable. Increasing digital capacity, rights, awareness, and security practices to navigate constituents and maximum impact is critical for Somali civil society organizations. In Somalia, we have different stakeholders that engage in the digital and Internet sector, which is institutional sectors, private sectors, and other civil society organizations, mainly human rights defenders. We have Digital Rights Authority, DBA. We have National Identification and Registration Authority, NERA. We have National Communication Authority, NCA. We have Somali National Telecommunication and Technology Institute, as well as we have touch companies as a private sector actors, as well as we have human rights organizations and defenders. In early 2024, SOMSA conducted mapping and assessment addressing digital rights capacity, and that capacity focuses on Internet access, digital literacy, social media, users, digital rights awareness, digital violence, and digital security. The findings that we found during the assessment is, number one, internet access, 98% of the population connected primary networks from their home, workplace, use internet cafes, public services, and friendly networks. In terms of digital literacy, 98% reported that digital literacy is very important, as well as 90% can send messages through their mobiles as well as to receive their emails. In terms of social media users, Facebook and TikTok, 44% of the population, mainly youngest, they are using social media in terms of Facebook and TikTok. As well as there is YouTube, 32% uses YouTube as a user. As well as there is Twitter, which politicians and decision makers use as a professionality and a purpose of their work and displaying their achievement in terms of government institutions. As well as the assessment raises digital rights awareness, 28% understand risks and sharing personal information online. As well as digital violence, 42% experience digital violence, whereby 37% reports gender-based incidents like male harassment and other sexual offensive issues. In terms of digital security, 44% have basic incidents like account thefts and other scams. 69% adopted basic measures, blocking reporting updates, but advanced practices and secure communication and multi-security authorization remain limited. We have As ongoing efforts, as strategies, as lessons learned, strengthen the civil society organizations in digital skills, such to deliver workshops and corruption, privacy-seeking, patient and cyber security attack awareness, security communication and safe device practices, as well as, it is very important, raising public awareness, launch a nationwide campaign on tech-facilitated gender-based violence and online safety through radio, social media, as well as community forums. The other one, engage policymakers, it is very important to convene policy dialogue and roundtable connecting civil society organizations with regulatory decision-makers to align ICT framework with digital rights protection, sustain capacity building, distribute practical toolkits, ag digital safety checklist, incident reports, guides, templates, privacy policies, and provide follow-up support so CSO can apply and update practice over time. So thank you very much, I need to conclude my presentation, over to you.

Mia Marzotto: Thank you, Mohamed. We’ll now go to Khadeja, who’s online, thank you.

Khadeja Ibrahim: Hello, everyone, thank you for having me, and thank you, Mia. Just a second. Yeah, so I’m calling in from the West Bank, I work with the organization called Muftah, we work domestically on promoting good governance and democracy, and highlighting how Israeli violations affect women and girls in gender-specific ways. So to give a quick background, when we talk about digital rights violations, they’re unfortunately non-existent, the digital rights are non-existent. We face a variety of violations. To give a quick overview, Israel’s use of advanced surveillance, including biometric data. We’ve seen the development of AI tools such as Blue Wolf and Lavender and Where’s Daddy, which are deployed to monitor and control Palestinian movement, often without legal oversight. We also have a lot of social media censorship. Palestinian content is subject to arbitrary censorship, account suspensions and surveillance on platforms like Facebook and Instagram. The Facebook law and vague anti-terrorism legislation are weaponized to criminalize online dissent and restrict freedom of expression. There’s also repressive technology infrastructure in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip, so discriminatory practice limit Palestinian access to ICT infrastructure. For example, Palestinians still use 3G Internet network, while Israeli settlers who are illegally living in the West Bank have full access to 4G and 5G networks. We’re also seeing a huge shrink in civic space, so civil society actors, journalists, and activists face intimidation, arrest and spyware targeting through Israeli technologies. So, to speak of the mapping assessment that we’ve done at Muftah, we collected questionnaires from 55 Palestinian organizations based in the West Bank, including Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. Some of the key findings from that mapping assessment. First, we see a widespread gap in digital awareness and security capacity. So, 23% of CSOs lack basic knowledge of digital rights. Only 14.5 of them raise their awareness of digital threats as high. 52% have no digital rights protection policies. We also see that after October 2023, there’s been severe challenges. 40% of institutions face direct digital violations. We also see institutional vulnerability due to limited resources, so nearly 75% of CSOs lack technological resources, 55% lack digital knowledge, and 36% lack legal support, and small or medium-sized institutions are more vulnerable. Nearly 86% of CSOs received no technological or legal support post-October 2023, when the risks were more high. There’s also a lack of legal and policy frameworks, so 72% of CSOs are unaware of local digital rights legislation. Over half of them believe that existing cybercrime laws may be ineffective or unsure of their effectiveness. Nearly 62% of CSOs believe that the Palestinian government is not doing enough to protect digital rights. And we see an overwhelming majority of them need urgent, there’s an urgent need for capacity building and international support. And this means many of them seek security training, and they want training on digital rights to raise awareness. So, to speak of the main activities that we’ve been doing at Muftah, we’ve had two rounds of trainings on digital rights for CSOs and CBOs from marginalized communities across the West Bank. We’ve had a policy meeting with CSOs on the cybercrimes draft law. We’ve hosted a diplomatic briefing with diplomats based in Palestine on our digital rights report. We also are continuing to produce social media content based on the evidence-based research. We also plan to start a podcast series based on it as well. And we have participated at the Palestinian Digital Activism Forum back in March, which is hosted by the organization Hemna. And we will continue doing the work that we have been doing for the past year. So that’s it from my end. Thank you.

Mia Marzotto: Thank you very much Khadeja and thank you all so much for the presentations. I just would like to underline how clear it is every time I hear you guys speak that as much as there are clear differences between the various countries you come from and the communities you work with. There are some common digital rights threats and issues and also some important work from civil society organizations like the ones you represent, which shows that a better, more rights respecting digital ecosystem is possible. So we want to open it up to any questions or reflections from the audience to any of the speakers or in general. We have a few questions that we came up that we would like to hear from you. But of course, any and all questions are welcome also from those listening in online. So there are mics to the side of the room in case anybody wants to ask any questions. Otherwise, I know I have questions for our panel here. Any questions? Okay, maybe I can break the ice with a question to you all and then I’ll also monitor online if there are any questions. One question to all any of you who want to answer. Can you share a little bit more what you have done in terms of sharing these important research findings and analyses with stakeholders and duty bearers at the national level? International level and if there have been any reactions or actions taken on their part and then how have you communicated about those actions back to the groups involved in the research to establish meaningful two-way accountability in digital governance. Anybody would like to start?

Theary Luy: Yeah, from Cambodia actually, based on the finding that we conducted research in Cambodia, we organized a workshop that disseminated the finding to the civil society and other stakeholders on that, and based on that, we validated the request. Like I mentioned about the action that we conduct at the ground level in terms of the training to the grassroots organization and also the community there. And for that, not only the awareness raising on the digital, but also about the policy implementation at the national level that need the voice of the community, voice of the civil society that work there to consideration in the policy framework. So the policy dialogue that I mentioned is very important. Actually, we plan in 3rd July and also the end of this year for the policy dialogue that allow the audience, the community, and the civil society at the ground level and their representative to meet with the policy maker to raise all the challenges. So that’s why the multi-stakeholder dialogue is very important. That’s not for the consultation, but it’s the platform that change and consider the demand of the community. Yes, thank you.

Cristian Leon: Yeah, as Luan mentioned in Bolivia, we are creating this network of grassroots women organizations that they want to work together in these issues, but from a bottom-up perspective with the idea of not only creating tools, digital security tools or others, but also to carry out advocacy actions together. And this is really important because in Bolivia we are in a moment of elections, and you know these moments really normally open the windows to create new policies and to discuss things with politicians. So I think this is a very key moment in order to organize, to create coalitions and to do advocacy together. So this is one of the actions that we are doing with Internet Bolivia Foundation.

Mia Marzotto: Thank you. Mohamed?

Mohamed Aded Ali: Yeah, thank you very much. In our context, in terms of digital arena is a new ecosystem because mostly the civil society organizations and other individuals have a challenge in terms of capacity, you know, knowledge in the digital. Mostly in Somalia, the private sector as well as the civil society organizations are concentrated in terms of digitalization and as well as using other technologies. But mostly the population of the community still didn’t have much knowledge on digital. After we started this RECIPI project, we engaged different stakeholders. The decision makers are, for example, the government institutions. In terms of legislative, some of them still they are drafting and some of the policies are on the disk of cabinet and still not passed yet. So that’s the way we are, our context. But in terms of our engagement, we make coordination with different stakeholders. We established a digital platform organization as a digital task force committee, which comprises decision makers, civil society organizations, and tech companies to work together, considering digitalization is a part of basic rights of individuals. Thank you.

Mia Marzotto: Thanks, Mohamed. Perhaps, Khadija, would you like to come in on this? I know you mentioned the Palestine Digital Activism Forum, but maybe there’s more.

Khadeja Ibrahim: Yes, so we’re actually part of the Palestinian Digital Rights Initiative Coalition, which is a group of CSOs who work in the realm of digital rights within Palestine. So we contribute with them on a monthly basis, share findings, insights, and kind of just learn from each other, also learn about upcoming opportunities from one another as well. So it was through this coalition that we were actually encouraged also to apply to PDAF, to the Palestinian Digital Rights Activism Forum. This was a two-day forum of speakers, panels, workshops, teaching about digital rights in Palestine. So we participated in that and we were able to reach, you know, an audience within Palestine, like students, other organizations, other activists. So that was a really great opportunity for us as well. In addition to that, we just continue to share our content online through social media. We find that social media is a very effective tool to reach people, not only internationally, We have students at universities in Palestine who have reached out to us because of our content asking more questions, maybe they were doing research on the topic, so we were able to help them in that capacity. Thank you.

Mia Marzotto: Snow, yeah?

Tran Thi Tuyet: Yeah, actually, for IPS in Vietnam, we act as a bridge and facilitator for this process. Usually we follow a bottom-up approach, which means that we’re starting from the grassroots level through survey, consultation, and other, like, participatory activities to collect inputs from all relevant stakeholders. Once we have gathered sufficient perspective, we organize in-depth discussion with policymakers to share the findings, and through that, these findings are always accompanied with clear and actionable recommendations, so that we can work alongside with policymakers to drive positive change. For example, over the last three years, we have been heavily involved in the issue related to digital governance and online public service delivery, and once the concrete recommendations – we have the recommendation about consolidating our own 63 provincial portal into a single national portal, as I have mentioned in my presentation, then it was adopted by the policymaker. And additionally, our user experiences assessment are now being adopted as part of the national standards, and we continue to work closely with the policymaker and other government authorities to refine these standards. And when recommendations are taken on board, it’s become much easier to bring the policymaker, government agencies representative, and other civil society organizations together for direct dialogue, and I think that’s all.

Mia Marzotto: Thank you. Any brave souls in the room with questions, reflections? No? Okay. Then I do have a final, oh yeah, please. Would you like to come up to the mic? Thank you. Hello.

Audience: Thank you, everyone. I don’t know if you can hear me. Yes. Yes. So my name is Enes Mafuta. I’m from Zambia. I’m coming from the technical background. I’m a standards engineer. So I’ll just talk briefly on, I think, question three on digital rights and how international governance community should prioritize more respecting. So I’ve seen all your amazing presentation and how you’ve highlighted. One thing that I’ve noticed is that they are more interlinked with the issues that we’re facing in different regions. You talk of Asia, South America, Africa. There’s one common denominator, and that is digital literacy, which has been a challenge in terms of accessing the rights. So with regards to that question, one of the things that I would like to see the international community to work on is, you see, access is a right. We’ve said it, access is a right. But there’s something that will always block access. When it comes to the government, they’ll say they are safeguarding platforms from misinformation, deepfakes, and everything. So there’s need to balance this cybersecurity resilience by while upholding freedom of expression and also access. One of the example that I would give you is under a few minutes is how my country has enact, has amended the cybersecurity crime and law of 2025. And this bill was assented in a private manner. So when this bill was assented in a private manner, then the society came to learn about it It created a perception out there to say this is a bad law They are trying to curtail our freedom of speech and access and everything So it was a situation where now people started throwing memes, insults and everything So there was those types of arrests and stuff like that. In a nutshell I wouldn’t blame the government because there were some cyber Crime offenders, but on the other hand, there were some people who were ignorant about this law So there were not much awareness and everything. So I would encourage the civil society space at least to advocate for Algorithm detection that can tackle misinformation and also this deepfakes because Once an information which is wrong is sent out there It is weaponized and once it is weaponized It creates a perception in the minds of users and when it creates that perception in the mind of users The users themselves they are going to be limited by that information. They are going to accept it So in short, they are going to accept that definition And when you accept that definition it will end up limiting you and when you are limited by that information you believe it So you live with it because it’s a lie. So this is just my observation about this So let’s work together technical community civil society. Let’s find ways on how we can tackle these Misinformation and defects. Thank you very much

Mia Marzotto: Thank you very much. I’m aware. We have only one minute left I’m sure like there’s lots of thoughts around me on this I think this is definitely something that we the reason why spaces like the IGF are really important in the multi-stakeholder Approach is very important, right? And and I think that in in that Balancing exercise which you mentioned having a diversity of voices and experiences participate is is really important to find the right balance because because it is a balancing act indeed. Like I mentioned, this is the start of the conversation, hopefully, although I know that it may be the last day of this IGF, but we do want to continue the conversation. There are some resources at the back, and of course you can come up to us to have our contact details. I want to thank you all, panelists, and also to those online, and those in the room, and the technical team making this hybrid session possible. Again, thank you, and have safe travels back home, and let’s continue the discussion. Thanks again. Thank you.

Agreement points

Digital literacy gaps as fundamental barrier to digital rights

Speakers

– Tran Thi Tuyet
– Theary Luy
– Mohamed Aded Ali
– Audience

Arguments

Vietnam lacks meaningful participation from marginalized communities in top-down digital policy development

In Cambodia, fewer than 30% of citizens possess skills to navigate digital world safely, with particular gaps among rural youth and grassroots organizations

Somalia shows 98% internet connectivity but limited advanced security practices and digital literacy gaps

Need for balanced approach between cybersecurity resilience and freedom of expression, with civil society advocacy for algorithm detection to tackle misinformation

Summary

All speakers identified digital literacy as a critical challenge affecting their populations’ ability to safely and effectively participate in digital spaces, with particular impact on marginalized communities

Topics

Development | Human rights

High prevalence of digital violence and security incidents

Speakers

– Online moderator
– Khadeja Ibrahim
– Mohamed Aded Ali

Arguments

77% of respondents in Bolivia suffered digital security incidents and 62% experienced digital violence, with 77% linking attacks to their human rights defender status

Palestinian organizations face widespread digital rights violations including surveillance, censorship, and discriminatory infrastructure access

In Somalia, 42% experience digital violence with 37% reporting gender-based incidents, while 44% face basic security incidents like account theft and scams

Summary

Multiple countries report extremely high rates of digital violence and security incidents, with particular targeting of human rights defenders and gender-based violence

Topics

Human rights | Cybersecurity

Inadequate legal and policy frameworks for digital rights protection

Speakers

– Tran Thi Tuyet
– Theary Luy
– Mohamed Aded Ali
– Khadeja Ibrahim

Arguments

Vietnam lacks meaningful participation from marginalized communities in top-down digital policy development

Cambodia lacks comprehensive cybersecurity, cybercrime, and personal data protection laws despite having digital government policy

Somalia has various regulatory bodies but limited legislative framework with policies still in draft or cabinet review

72% of Palestinian CSOs are unaware of local digital rights legislation and believe government efforts are insufficient

Summary

All countries face significant gaps in legal frameworks for digital rights protection, with laws either missing, in draft form, or lacking meaningful stakeholder participation in development

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights

Similar viewpoints

All speakers emphasized bottom-up, community-driven approaches to building digital rights capacity, with focus on training local organizations to become trainers and creating multi-stakeholder platforms for collaboration

Speakers

– Cristian Leon
– Tran Thi Tuyet
– Theary Luy
– Mohamed Aded Ali

Arguments

Creation of feminist collective networks in Bolivia to provide digital security support and advocacy through horizontal pedagogical methodologies

Vietnam’s bottom-up approach involves grassroots consultation followed by policymaker engagement with actionable recommendations

Training grassroots organizations in Cambodia to become trainers themselves, transferring knowledge to communities

Establishment of digital task force committee in Somalia comprising decision makers, CSOs, and tech companies

Topics

Development | Human rights

Strong consensus on the importance of meaningful multi-stakeholder engagement that goes beyond consultation to genuine participation in policy development and implementation

Speakers

– Tran Thi Tuyet
– Theary Luy
– Mia Marzotto
– Audience

Arguments

Vietnam’s bottom-up approach involves grassroots consultation followed by policymaker engagement with actionable recommendations

Policy dialogue in Cambodia serves as platform for community voice consideration rather than mere consultation

Importance of multi-stakeholder approach in IGF spaces for finding right balance in digital governance

Need for balanced approach between cybersecurity resilience and freedom of expression, with civil society advocacy for algorithm detection to tackle misinformation

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights

Unexpected consensus

Infrastructure disparities as tool of discrimination and control

Speakers

– Khadeja Ibrahim
– Cristian Leon

Arguments

Palestinians use 3G networks while Israeli settlers access 4G/5G, demonstrating discriminatory technology infrastructure

Bolivia faces 30% digital divide in urban areas and 70% in rural areas, far from meaningful connectivity

Explanation

Both speakers highlighted how infrastructure access disparities serve as mechanisms of exclusion and control, whether through deliberate discrimination (Palestine) or systemic neglect (Bolivia rural areas)

Topics

Development | Human rights | Infrastructure

Gender-specific targeting in digital violence across different contexts

Speakers

– Online moderator
– Mohamed Aded Ali
– Cristian Leon

Arguments

77% of respondents in Bolivia suffered digital security incidents and 62% experienced digital violence, with 77% linking attacks to their human rights defender status

In Somalia, 42% experience digital violence with 37% reporting gender-based incidents, while 44% face basic security incidents like account theft and scams

Creation of feminist collective networks in Bolivia to provide digital security support and advocacy through horizontal pedagogical methodologies

Explanation

Unexpected consensus emerged on the gendered nature of digital violence across very different political and social contexts, leading to similar feminist organizing responses

Topics

Human rights | Cybersecurity

Overall assessment

Summary

Strong consensus exists among speakers on fundamental challenges including digital literacy gaps, inadequate legal frameworks, high rates of digital violence, and the need for bottom-up, multi-stakeholder approaches to digital rights protection

Consensus level

High level of consensus despite diverse geographical and political contexts, suggesting these are universal challenges in digital rights implementation. The agreement on solutions – particularly community-driven capacity building and meaningful stakeholder engagement – indicates potential for coordinated global action and shared learning across regions

Different viewpoints

Approach to policy development – top-down versus bottom-up methodologies

Speakers

– Tran Thi Tuyet
– Theary Luy

Arguments

Vietnam lacks meaningful participation from marginalized communities in top-down digital policy development

Policy dialogue in Cambodia serves as platform for community voice consideration rather than mere consultation

Summary

Vietnam’s speaker critiques top-down policy approaches as formalistic, while Cambodia’s speaker presents their multi-stakeholder dialogue as genuinely inclusive, suggesting different views on what constitutes meaningful participation

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights | Development

Balance between cybersecurity measures and freedom of expression

Speakers

– Audience
– Mia Marzotto

Arguments

Need for balanced approach between cybersecurity resilience and freedom of expression, with civil society advocacy for algorithm detection to tackle misinformation

Importance of multi-stakeholder approach in IGF spaces for finding right balance in digital governance

Summary

The audience member emphasizes technical solutions like algorithm detection for misinformation, while the moderator focuses on multi-stakeholder processes for balance, representing different approaches to the same challenge

Topics

Human rights | Cybersecurity | Legal and regulatory

Unexpected differences

No significant unexpected disagreements identified

Speakers

Arguments

Explanation

The session was structured as a collaborative sharing of experiences rather than a debate, with speakers presenting complementary rather than conflicting perspectives on digital rights challenges

Topics

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion showed minimal direct disagreement, with most differences arising from varying national contexts and implementation approaches rather than fundamental philosophical disagreements about digital rights

Disagreement level

Low level of disagreement with high consensus on core issues. The main tensions were around implementation methodologies rather than goals, which suggests strong potential for collaborative solutions and knowledge sharing across different contexts

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

All speakers emphasized bottom-up, community-driven approaches to building digital rights capacity, with focus on training local organizations to become trainers and creating multi-stakeholder platforms for collaboration

Speakers

– Cristian Leon
– Tran Thi Tuyet
– Theary Luy
– Mohamed Aded Ali

Arguments

Creation of feminist collective networks in Bolivia to provide digital security support and advocacy through horizontal pedagogical methodologies

Vietnam’s bottom-up approach involves grassroots consultation followed by policymaker engagement with actionable recommendations

Training grassroots organizations in Cambodia to become trainers themselves, transferring knowledge to communities

Establishment of digital task force committee in Somalia comprising decision makers, CSOs, and tech companies

Topics

Development | Human rights

Strong consensus on the importance of meaningful multi-stakeholder engagement that goes beyond consultation to genuine participation in policy development and implementation

Speakers

– Tran Thi Tuyet
– Theary Luy
– Mia Marzotto
– Audience

Arguments

Vietnam’s bottom-up approach involves grassroots consultation followed by policymaker engagement with actionable recommendations

Policy dialogue in Cambodia serves as platform for community voice consideration rather than mere consultation

Importance of multi-stakeholder approach in IGF spaces for finding right balance in digital governance

Need for balanced approach between cybersecurity resilience and freedom of expression, with civil society advocacy for algorithm detection to tackle misinformation

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights

Key takeaways

Digital rights violations are widespread across Global South countries, with common patterns including low digital literacy (under 30% in Cambodia), high rates of digital violence (77% in Bolivia experienced security incidents), and inadequate legal frameworks

Marginalized communities face the greatest digital risks, particularly women, human rights defenders, rural populations, and migrant workers who lack access to protective measures and digital skills

Top-down policy approaches without meaningful community participation are ineffective – successful digital governance requires bottom-up engagement and multi-stakeholder dialogue

Civil society organizations are developing innovative capacity-building strategies including peer-to-peer training models, feminist collective networks, and horizontal pedagogical methodologies

Infrastructure discrimination exists even within countries (Palestinians have 3G while Israeli settlers have 4G/5G access), highlighting how digital divides can be tools of oppression

Digital transformation initiatives often prioritize techno-solutionism over addressing real community needs and protecting fundamental rights

Resolutions and action items

Continue multi-country collaboration through the Recipe Project to strengthen civil society digital rights advocacy

Establish and maintain regular coordination mechanisms like Cambodia’s multi-stakeholder policy dialogues and Palestine’s Digital Rights Initiative Coalition

Develop practical toolkits and resources for digital security training that can be adapted across different contexts

Create networks of grassroots organizations (like Bolivia’s feminist collectives) to provide peer support and collective advocacy

Engage with upcoming political opportunities like Bolivia’s elections to advocate for digital rights policy reforms

Maintain ongoing capacity building programs where trained organizations become trainers for their communities

Unresolved issues

How to balance cybersecurity measures with freedom of expression and access rights without government overreach

Lack of comprehensive legal frameworks in most countries (cybersecurity, data protection, and cybercrime laws still in draft stages)

Limited resources for civil society organizations – 75% of Palestinian CSOs lack technological resources and 55% lack digital knowledge

Misinformation and deepfakes detection while preserving legitimate discourse and avoiding censorship

Meaningful participation mechanisms for marginalized communities in digital policy development processes

Coordination between public sector, private sector, and civil society remains weak across all countries presented

Suggested compromises

Multi-stakeholder dialogue platforms that serve as genuine policy consideration forums rather than mere consultation exercises

Algorithm detection systems for misinformation that involve civil society advocacy to ensure they don’t restrict legitimate expression

Gradual policy implementation with community feedback loops, as demonstrated by Vietnam’s approach of grassroots consultation followed by policymaker engagement

Hybrid approaches combining government digitalization initiatives with civil society-led capacity building for vulnerable populations

International support frameworks that respect local ownership while providing technical and legal assistance to under-resourced organizations

Digital policy in Vietnam are still largely developed through a top-down approach led by state agencies with consultation processes that are often formalistic and lack of meaningful engagement. There remains an absence of participation from the marginalized communities and their representative organizations during both the design and implementation of digital policies.

Speaker

Tran Thi Tuyet (Snow)

Reason

This comment is insightful because it identifies a fundamental structural problem in digital governance – the disconnect between policy creation and the communities most affected by these policies. It moves beyond surface-level issues to examine the root cause of digital inequality: exclusionary policymaking processes.

Impact

This observation established a critical framework that other panelists built upon throughout the discussion. It shifted the conversation from merely cataloging digital rights violations to examining the systemic governance failures that enable these violations, setting the tone for deeper structural analysis.

77% said that the actions of digital violence affect them may have a specific relationship with their status as human rights defenders.

Speaker

Luan Mendez

Reason

This statistic is particularly thought-provoking because it reveals how digital violence is not random but strategically targeted at those working for social change. It demonstrates how digital spaces are being weaponized to silence advocacy and activism, making it a tool of oppression rather than liberation.

Impact

This finding elevated the discussion from general digital safety concerns to understanding digital violence as a deliberate tactic to suppress civil society. It helped frame subsequent discussions around the need for protective measures specifically for vulnerable groups and activists.

Palestinians still use 3G Internet network, while Israeli settlers who are illegally living in the West Bank have full access to 4G and 5G networks.

Speaker

Khadeja Ibrahim

Reason

This comment is profoundly insightful because it illustrates how digital infrastructure itself can be a tool of discrimination and control. It shows how seemingly technical decisions about network access are actually political choices that reinforce existing power imbalances and human rights violations.

Impact

This stark example of digital apartheid provided concrete evidence of how digital rights violations intersect with broader systems of oppression. It challenged participants to think beyond individual privacy concerns to consider how digital infrastructure can institutionalize inequality.

There’s need to balance this cybersecurity resilience by while upholding freedom of expression and also access… when this bill was assented in a private manner, then the society came to learn about it. It created a perception out there to say this is a bad law… So there were those types of arrests and stuff like that.

Speaker

Enes Mafuta (audience member)

Reason

This comment is thought-provoking because it highlights the complex tension between legitimate security concerns and rights protection, while also demonstrating how lack of transparency and participation in lawmaking can undermine both security and rights objectives. It shows how process matters as much as content in digital governance.

Impact

This intervention shifted the discussion toward the practical challenges of implementing digital governance, moving from problem identification to the nuanced realities of balancing competing interests. It prompted reflection on the importance of inclusive, transparent policymaking processes.

Digital transformation as a multi-component ecosystem requiring synchronization between policy, technology, and people… ensuring digital rights as a prerequisite for greater public participation in the transformation process.

Speaker

Tran Thi Tuyet (Snow)

Reason

This insight reframes digital transformation from a purely technological process to a holistic social transformation that requires careful coordination of multiple elements. It positions digital rights not as an add-on consideration but as foundational to successful digital transformation.

Impact

This systems thinking approach influenced how other panelists framed their recommendations, moving the conversation toward comprehensive, coordinated responses rather than piecemeal solutions. It helped establish digital rights as central rather than peripheral to development goals.

Overall assessment

These key comments fundamentally shaped the discussion by elevating it from a simple catalog of digital rights violations to a sophisticated analysis of systemic governance failures and structural inequalities. The conversation evolved from problem identification to root cause analysis, with participants building on each other’s insights to develop a comprehensive understanding of how digital rights violations are embedded in broader systems of power and exclusion. The comments collectively demonstrated that digital rights issues cannot be addressed through technical solutions alone but require fundamental changes to governance processes, power structures, and approaches to development. The discussion successfully connected local experiences to global patterns, showing how similar exclusionary processes manifest across different contexts while respecting the unique circumstances of each region represented.

How can algorithm detection be developed and implemented to tackle misinformation and deepfakes while maintaining freedom of expression?

Speaker

Enes Mafuta (audience member from Zambia)

Explanation

This addresses the critical balance between cybersecurity resilience and upholding freedom of expression and access rights, particularly important given how misinformation can be weaponized and create limiting perceptions in users’ minds

How can the technical community and civil society work together more effectively to find solutions for tackling misinformation and deepfakes?

Speaker

Enes Mafuta (audience member from Zambia)

Explanation

This collaborative approach is essential for addressing the common challenges of digital literacy and misinformation that appear across different regions (Asia, South America, Africa)

How can governments better balance cybersecurity measures with protecting citizens’ rights to access and freedom of expression?

Speaker

Enes Mafuta (audience member from Zambia)

Explanation

This question arose from the example of Zambia’s cybersecurity law amendment that was enacted privately, leading to public backlash and arrests, highlighting the need for transparent processes and public awareness

What are the most effective methods for raising public awareness about new digital laws and policies to prevent ignorance-based violations?

Speaker

Enes Mafuta (audience member from Zambia)

Explanation

This addresses the gap between policy implementation and public understanding, which can lead to unintentional violations and subsequent arrests or restrictions

How can meaningful two-way accountability in digital governance be better established between research findings and the communities involved?

Speaker

Mia Marzotto

Explanation

This question seeks to understand how organizations can ensure that research findings lead to actionable changes and that communities are kept informed about the impact of their participation in research

Summary

This discussion focused on bridging the connectivity gap for excluded communities, examining innovative solutions and policies to achieve meaningful, affordable, and inclusive internet access for all. The panel, moderated by Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu from Paradigm Initiative, brought together experts from the Internet Society, Global Digital Inclusion Partnership, and Internet Bolivia to address last-mile connectivity challenges.

Christopher Locke from the Internet Society emphasized that while emerging technologies like low-earth orbit satellites show promise for connecting remote areas, sustainability remains a challenge due to pricing instability and regulatory issues. He stressed the importance of community readiness and building local capacity for network management, noting that successful community networks require both technical training and business model development. Onika Makwakwa from the Global Digital Inclusion Partnership advocated for treating connectivity as a human right and reforming universal service funds to address demand-side issues like digital skills and device affordability. She highlighted the need for gender-disaggregated data and moving beyond basic connectivity metrics to measure meaningful access.

Leon Cristian from Internet Bolivia presented a more sobering perspective, outlining four key complexities: emerging technologies creating new problems around data sovereignty, regulatory power imbalances between states and big tech companies, the breakdown of cooperative governance models, and the emergence of a new digital divide around advanced computing capabilities. The discussion revealed that despite 20 years since the World Summit on the Information Society, similar connectivity gaps persist, requiring context-informed, people-focused solutions that go beyond traditional market-driven approaches to embrace community-centered models and multi-stakeholder collaboration.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Last-mile connectivity challenges and innovative solutions**: The panel explored how emerging technologies like low-Earth orbit satellites (LEO) and 5G can bridge connectivity gaps, particularly in remote and underserved communities. However, sustainability issues around pricing, regulatory frameworks, and infrastructure capacity remain significant barriers.

– **Moving beyond basic connectivity to meaningful access**: Panelists emphasized the need to shift from simply providing internet access to ensuring meaningful connectivity that includes digital literacy, local content in native languages, affordable devices, and daily reliable access rather than the current standard of usage “once every three months.”

– **Community-centered networks and sustainability models**: Extensive discussion on community networks as viable alternatives to traditional telecom models, with emphasis on local ownership, management, and diverse business models including cooperatives. The Internet Society’s community readiness toolkit and grant programs were highlighted as examples of supporting sustainable community-led initiatives.

– **Policy and regulatory reform needs**: Strong calls for reforming Universal Service and Access Funds, opening spectrum for community networks, treating connectivity as a public good and human right, and creating enabling regulatory environments that support diverse stakeholders rather than just large telecommunications companies.

– **Growing complexity of the digital divide**: Recognition that the digital divide is becoming more complex with new challenges including data sovereignty, regulatory power imbalances between states and big tech companies, and emerging technology gaps (AI, quantum computing) that create additional layers of exclusion for developing countries.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to generate actionable insights for bridging the connectivity gap for excluded communities, focusing on innovative solutions, policies, and business models to achieve meaningful, affordable, and inclusive connectivity for all by 2030, particularly in the Global South.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a professional but increasingly urgent tone throughout. It began optimistically with solution-focused presentations but became more sobering as panelists acknowledged the persistent challenges and growing complexities. The tone shifted from technical problem-solving to more critical assessments of systemic failures, with speakers expressing frustration about the lack of progress 20 years after initial digital divide discussions. Despite the challenges highlighted, the conversation concluded on a constructive note with concrete recommendations and examples of successful community-led initiatives.

Speakers

**Speakers from the provided list:**

– **Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu** – Chief Operating Officer at Paradigm Initiative (nonprofit dedicated to promotion of digital inclusion and digital rights in Africa and the Global South); Session moderator

– **Christopher Locke** – Works with Internet Society, involved in community-led connectivity programs and ISOC Foundation

– **Thobekile Matimbe** – Senior Manager Partnerships and Engagements for Paradigm Initiative; Expert in human rights-based advocacy

– **Onica Makwakwa** – Executive Director Global Digital Inclusion Partnership; Has worked for 25 years driving gender and equity-focused policy

– **Leon Cristian** – Executive Director of Internet Bolivia; Advisor to governments on digital rights

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

**Additional speakers:**

– **Sani Suleiman** – Colleague of Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu, mentioned as online moderator gathering questions and comments (though did not speak in the transcript)

– **Bara Kotieno** – Chair of the Association of Community Networks in Kenya

– **Leo** – Representative from United Republic of Tanzania

– **Lee McKnight** – Professor at Syracuse University in the United States

– **Lisa Dakanay** – From the Institute for Social Entrepreneurship in Asia

# Bridging the Connectivity Gap for Excluded Communities: A Comprehensive Discussion Report

## Introduction and Context

This panel discussion, moderated by Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu, Chief Operating Officer at Paradigm Initiative, brought together leading experts to examine innovative solutions and policies for achieving meaningful, affordable, and inclusive internet access for excluded communities. The conversation addressed the persistent challenge that 2.6 billion people remain unconnected globally, indicating that current approaches require fundamental reassessment.

The panel featured Christopher Locke from the Internet Society, who focuses on community-led connectivity programmes; Onica Makwakwa, Executive Director of the Global Digital Inclusion Partnership with extensive experience in gender and equity-focused policy; Leon Cristian, Executive Director of Internet Bolivia and government advisor on digital rights; and Thobekile Matimbe, Senior Manager for Partnerships and Engagements at Paradigm Initiative. The discussion also included valuable contributions from audience members, including Bara Kotieno from Kenya’s Association of Community Networks and other participants from across the global digital inclusion community.

## Emerging Technologies: Opportunities and Challenges

### Low Earth Orbit Satellites: Promise and Limitations

Christopher Locke examined the potential of Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites to bridge connectivity gaps in remote areas, while highlighting significant challenges that complicate their deployment. “We’re still in the very early stages of Leo Internet,” Locke explained, “and not only is the price initially expensive, but also we’re increasingly seeing that as the networks become clogged, the prices sometimes are quite dynamic based on demand.” He cited examples from African cities where Starlink services are “pretty much booked out,” illustrating how capacity constraints create new barriers to access.

Locke emphasized that while LEO satellites offer solutions for remote connectivity, sustainability remains problematic due to pricing instability and regulatory frameworks that haven’t kept pace with technological development. The infrastructure requires significant investment in ground stations and local capacity building, making it unsuitable as a standalone solution for underserved communities.

### Regulatory and Sovereignty Challenges

Leon Cristian provided a critical perspective on how emerging technologies create new regulatory challenges. His most striking example concerned data sovereignty: “Starlink is operating in my country without permission,” he revealed, explaining how the company told Bolivian authorities, “I don’t need that, I don’t need to put an office in your country. I can operate and I can provide my services even if I don’t fulfil all their requirements.”

This example illustrates broader challenges where technological solutions can undermine national sovereignty and regulatory frameworks. Cristian identified emerging complexities including problems related to data sovereignty and spectrum allocation, regulatory power imbalances between states and technology companies, and what he termed an evolving “digital divide.”

### The Expanding Digital Divide

Cristian introduced the concept of an evolving digital divide that extends beyond basic connectivity. “Now the digital divide is not only about having or not meaningful connectivity,” he explained, “it’s also about having enough capacity to run AIs, quantum computation, blockchains, cryptos… So there is another connectivity divide, there is another digital divide that is happening right now.”

This observation challenges current approaches to digital inclusion by suggesting that while efforts focus on basic connectivity, new technological requirements are creating additional layers of exclusion that countries in the Global South must navigate simultaneously.

## Community Networks: Alternative Connectivity Models

### Beyond Traditional Telecommunications

Christopher Locke presented community networks as viable alternatives to traditional telecommunications models, emphasizing the need to move beyond conventional thinking. “We need to understand there are many business models to providing connectivity,” he argued. “Mimicking a small version of being a telco isn’t the way to build a sustainable community network. There are co-op models, there are many other models that allow us to develop that.”

The Internet Society’s approach focuses on community readiness evaluation that encompasses technology solutions alongside business and governance training. Locke stressed that community networks are “not mini-telcos but community organisations providing vital services in ways that make sense for local communities.”

### Real-World Implementation and Success Stories

Bara Kotieno from Kenya provided concrete examples of progress, noting that Kenya has established 20 community networks with a target of 100. This demonstrates the viability of the model while highlighting the ongoing need to focus on sustainability components beyond initial establishment.

The discussion revealed that successful community networks require comprehensive approaches that include technical training, business model development, and governance structures. Locke emphasized that the Internet Society’s community readiness toolkit and grant programmes support sustainable community-led initiatives, but the ultimate goal is local self-sufficiency rather than continued dependence on external funding.

### Sustainability and Local Ownership

The sustainability of community networks emerged as a central concern. Locke emphasized that successful community networks must develop sustainable business models that can cover costs through local pricing systems rather than depending on continuous grants. This requires innovative approaches that balance community service with financial viability.

Leon Cristian reinforced the importance of community participation, arguing that “including local communities brings diversity and indigenous perspectives essential for building technology for the future.” This emphasis reflects a shift away from top-down technology deployment towards participatory approaches that center community needs and capabilities.

## Policy Reform and Regulatory Innovation

### Universal Service Funds: Untapped Potential

Onica Makwakwa highlighted significant problems with Universal Service and Access Funds, revealing that these potentially transformative resources are largely underutilized and lack transparency. Thobekile Matimbe reported that “less than four out of 27 African countries are transparent about Universal Service Fund resources and initiatives,” highlighting the scale of the accountability deficit.

Makwakwa argued for comprehensive reform of these funds, emphasizing the need for “public reporting and openness to addressing demand-side issues like digital skills and devices.” Current approaches focus primarily on infrastructure deployment while neglecting the broader ecosystem of digital inclusion, including digital literacy, local content development, and device affordability.

### Enabling Regulatory Frameworks

The need for enabling regulatory frameworks emerged as critical for scaling community networks. Thobekile Matimbe emphasized that “enabling regulatory frameworks are essential for community-centred connectivity initiatives to thrive with multi-stakeholder approaches.”

Christopher Locke argued that “governments should support different connectivity solutions through affordable spectrum licensing rather than viewing it as income stream.” This represents a fundamental shift in how spectrum is conceptualized – from a revenue-generating asset to a development tool that can enable community-led connectivity initiatives.

### Connectivity as a Human Right

Strong consensus emerged around treating connectivity as a fundamental human right rather than a market commodity. Onica Makwakwa argued that “universal affordable access should be prioritised as a right, embedded in development policies and rights frameworks.”

Leon Cristian reinforced this perspective by arguing that “market failures require public investment and public-private alliances with greater community participation.” This represents a significant departure from market-led approaches that have dominated connectivity policy, acknowledging that market mechanisms alone cannot deliver universal access.

## Redefining Meaningful Connectivity and Addressing Barriers

### Beyond Basic Access Metrics

Onica Makwakwa delivered a powerful critique of current connectivity measurement standards, arguing that “defining a connected person as someone who uses internet once every three months is underwhelming.” This highlights how inadequate measurement standards mask the reality of digital exclusion and prevent effective policy responses.

The discussion revealed that meaningful connectivity requires regular access with adequate speeds, not the basic connectivity measured by national averages that currently dominate policy discussions. Makwakwa emphasized that current data collection lacks gender and income level disaggregation, making it difficult to measure true impact on underserved populations.

### The Device Affordability Crisis

Device affordability emerged as a critical barrier that receives insufficient attention in connectivity discussions. Makwakwa revealed that people often spend significant portions of household income on purchasing devices, with high taxation on devices creating additional barriers. These costs create insurmountable barriers for low-income populations, even where network infrastructure is available.

The discussion challenged conventional approaches to device affordability that focus on financing schemes rather than addressing root causes of high costs. Makwakwa argued for “actually lowering initial device costs through local assembly and right to repair” rather than simply making expensive devices more accessible through credit arrangements.

“We need to stop having poor policies for poor people,” Makwakwa declared. “Poor phones for poor people… There’s a big difference between you can afford a phone over three months and you can afford a phone now.” This reframing challenges approaches to digital inclusion by demanding dignity and equity rather than accepting second-class solutions.

### Digital Literacy and Holistic Approaches

The discussion emphasized that connectivity without digital literacy and relevant local content fails to deliver meaningful benefits. Investment is needed in digital literacy programmes, local content development in local languages, and online safety education to ensure that connectivity translates into empowerment rather than mere access.

This holistic approach recognizes that technical connectivity is only the foundation for digital participation. Without complementary investments in skills, content, and safety, connectivity provision may fail to deliver transformative benefits.

## Economic Models and Alternative Approaches

### Moving Beyond Profit-Centric Models

The discussion revealed strong consensus that traditional profit-centric telecommunications models are insufficient for achieving universal connectivity. Christopher Locke advocated for “multiple business models beyond profit-centric telco models, including co-op models for sustainable community networks.”

Leon Cristian reinforced this perspective by arguing that market failures require public investment and public-private alliances with greater community participation. This acknowledgement of market limitations opens space for alternative approaches that combine public investment, community ownership, and social enterprise models.

### Spectrum as a Development Tool

Christopher Locke’s argument that governments should use “spectrum licensing as a development tool rather than primarily as government revenue generation” represents a significant policy shift. This approach recognizes spectrum as a public resource that should be managed to maximize social benefit rather than simply generate government income.

By making spectrum more accessible and affordable for community-serving organizations, governments can enable local solutions that complement commercial telecommunications infrastructure while serving communities that are not commercially viable for traditional operators.

## Challenges and Political Realities

### Political Understanding and Support

Thobekile Matimbe provided a revealing illustration of political resistance to digital inclusion through an anecdote about engaging with government officials: “I have been in one engagement with one government on the African continent where we are discussing digital inclusion for underserved communities and the feedback was from one member of parliament that look, do you really think my grandmother needs a smartphone?”

This example reveals the fundamental disconnect between policymakers and the reality of digital inclusion needs. It illustrates how basic assumptions about who deserves connectivity access still need to be challenged at the highest levels of government, highlighting that technical and policy solutions require political will and understanding to achieve scale and impact.

### Implementation Complexities

The discussion revealed various implementation challenges, from regulatory power imbalances with global technology companies to the need for new governance frameworks that can accommodate diverse stakeholders and business models. These challenges require nuanced approaches that balance the benefits of global connectivity solutions with legitimate concerns about sovereignty and local control.

## Areas of Consensus and Future Directions

### Community-Centered Approaches

Despite different perspectives on specific solutions, all speakers demonstrated strong consensus around the need for community-centered approaches to connectivity. This consensus spans technical implementation, business model development, and policy design, reflecting recognition that top-down approaches have failed to deliver universal access.

The community-centered consensus includes meaningful community participation in solution design, local ownership and management of connectivity infrastructure, and business models that serve community needs rather than simply maximizing profits.

### Rights-Based Framework

Strong consensus emerged around treating connectivity as a fundamental right that requires government intervention and public investment. This rights-based approach provides a foundation for arguing that market failures justify public intervention and that universal access is a legitimate government responsibility.

### Need for Systemic Change

Perhaps most significantly, speakers demonstrated consensus that current approaches to digital inclusion have fundamentally failed to deliver results. The persistence of massive connectivity gaps indicates that incremental improvements to existing approaches are insufficient, creating space for more transformative alternatives including community networks, public investment, and regulatory reform.

## Conclusion

This comprehensive discussion revealed that bridging the connectivity gap for excluded communities requires fundamental changes to current approaches rather than incremental improvements. The persistence of massive digital divides indicates that alternative approaches centered on community needs, human rights, and public investment are essential.

The conversation highlighted both the promise and complexity of emerging solutions, from LEO satellites to community networks, while emphasizing that technology alone cannot solve connectivity challenges without appropriate social, economic, and political frameworks. The emerging consensus around community-centered approaches, rights-based frameworks, and the need for systemic change provides a foundation for more transformative interventions.

However, significant challenges remain, including developing sustainable business models for community networks, addressing regulatory power imbalances with global technology companies, and creating measurement frameworks for meaningful connectivity. Addressing these challenges will require continued collaboration, innovation, and political commitment to digital inclusion as a fundamental development priority.

The discussion ultimately demonstrated that bridging the connectivity gap is not simply a technical challenge but a comprehensive development undertaking that requires coordinated action across multiple sectors and stakeholders. The path forward demands both urgency to address the immediate needs of unconnected populations and patience to build sustainable, community-centered solutions that can deliver lasting transformation.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Hello. And welcome to this session titled Bridging the Connectivity Gap for Excluded Communities. My name is Nnena Polugochukwu, and I’m the Chief Operating Officer at Paradigm Initiative, which is a nonprofit dedicated to the promotion of digital inclusion and digital rights in Africa and the Global South. I’m honored today to guide today’s conversation on a challenge that sits at the intersection of infrastructure, equity, and human rights, asking the question, how do we ensure meaningful, affordable, and inclusive connectivity for all? While Internet access has significantly expanded globally, millions remain unconnected, particularly in rural, remote, and underserved regions. Bridging the last-mile connectivity gap is crucial for ensuring digital inclusion and achieving meaningful connectivity and access for all. Today’s conversation will explore innovative solutions, policies, and business models aimed at addressing last-mile challenges, including community networks, public-private partnerships, emerging technologies like low-Earth orbit satellites, 5G expansion, and alternative spectrum management approaches. So this session aims to generate actionable insights to inform global Internet governance discussions, ensuring that unserved and underserved populations’ equity and Senior Manager Partnerships and Engagements for Paradigm Initiative and also an expert in human rights-based advocacy. I also have with me Onika Makwakwa, Executive Director Global Digital Inclusion Partnership. She has worked for 25 years driving gender and equity-focused policy. And I also have with me Leon Cristian, the Executive Director of Internet Bolivia. So today online, I also have my colleague Sani Suleiman who will be moderating and will be gathering questions and comments during plenary at the end of the panel discussion. So welcome once again, and I think we will dive right in and go for it as my colleague always says. So I’ll start the conversation today with Chris. So drawing from your leadership and your background in building digital economies, how can emerging technologies like I mentioned, low earth orbit satellites and 5G be leveraged to bridge the connectivity gap in a sustainable way?

Christopher Locke: Thank you and thank you for inviting me to the panel. It’s lovely to be here. We are relatively agnostic at the Internet Society about what connectivity platforms people use to connect. and the work we do with our community-led connectivity program. We have programs around the world that use a wide variety of platforms, whether it’s Fiber, whether it’s Leos, whether it’s mobile. But what we have seen increasingly in the work that we do is how Leos in particular can really help bridge remote communities for blindingly obvious reasons, in that, you know, having satellites allows us to get connectivity to communities that otherwise would not be covered by Fiber platforms or not be covered by mobile platforms. And we’re seeing that increasingly, particularly in some island states. There’s a very strong focus in the new Fiber strategy for the Internet Society on connecting small island states. And what we’ve seen particularly in the Pacific region is that satellite is increasingly becoming the norm for connectivity and is helping connect remote islands in exciting new ways. So indeed, in some cases, we’re seeing communities and islands where Starlink is becoming the largest ISP in the island. And actually, the majority of Internet is coming over satellite platforms. So there are huge opportunities for the way that Leos can work. And as more are launched and the prices come down, it becomes more affordable. Sustainability, though, we think is still an issue. And sustainability comes from two different areas. Firstly, obviously, is price. We’re still in the very early stages of Leo Internet. And not only is the price initially expensive, but also we’re increasingly seeing that as the networks become clogged, the prices sometimes are quite dynamic based on demand. So having coverage from a Leo constellation, having coverage from a Leo provider, can absolutely provide connectivity to a remote area. But if the pricing is again unstable, and if, as we are seeing at the moment in some African cities with Starlink, where they’re pretty much booked out. Mike Jensen, Leon Cristian, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Leon Cristian, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Leon Cristian, Mike Jensen, Leon Cristian, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Mike Jensen, Leon Cristian, Mike Jensen, But at the moment, we’re really still in the early stages and the pricing issues and the regulatory issues are still to be solved

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Chris, and I love that you’ve touched on some of the lessons. I think that you’re already learning in implementing these solutions and talking about sustainability and the regulatory frameworks So with ISOC foundation, how do you evaluate? Talking about sustainability, how do you evaluate the impact and are there specific examples you can give with some of the lessons that you have shared that can show how they can be replicated across these local communities because you specifically mentioned communities in Africa. Are there any specific examples? How are you evaluating? What are the lessons and then how can those be replicated?

Christopher Locke: Yeah, the evaluation for us starts before the program begins So we have a very good community readiness toolkit that we use when we’re working on a potential project And what we do with that toolkit is not only evaluate the technological solution But as is implied in the title, we evaluate the community. We’re trying to understand who is going to be leading this for the community What is the governance structure and the support structure within the community for? Is it a school? Is it a local organization? You know who is going to be owning and maintaining the network and then you know How can we provide training to support them not only just in the crimping of the wires But also then in understanding what sustainability looks like. On a panel I was on yesterday when we were looking at kind of innovative financing in this space We were talking about the need when we develop community networks to develop them with business training as well as with technology training and what we want to be able to do is provide Our grant capital and our capacity building support to get local communities off the ground with their community centered connectivity solutions The next phase after that shouldn’t be another grant. The next phase should be that there is real sustainability and the community network because they’re able to build a pricing model that allows them to kind of cover the costs of the community. Often with schools, that’s where schools can sell connectivity to the local community via voucher systems or whatever system works and support that out. But what we like to see in our community readiness toolkit is that the technology solution is there that’s fit for that particular need, whatever the geographic need of that community is, but then from a business model perspective that you’re building a community network that is sustainable because it actually meets the needs of the community, can be managed by the community and is economically sustainable as well.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Chris. My takeaways from there is to be creative around regulation, around licensing and focusing also on building capacities of the community networks, ensuring that they are ready to manage these networks themselves and keep them sustainable. Thank you very much. So moving from connectivity and more to meaningful access, I’ll come to you, Onika. So drawing from your leadership of the GDIP, what evidence-based policy and regulatory frameworks can best improve affordability and inclusion and support last mile community initiatives such as the ones that Chris has given us examples of?

Onica Makwakwa: Great. Thank you so much for that question and thanks for inviting us to this panel. It’s always wonderful when we come to IGF and talk about these things to also have a partner like Internet Society that’s actually on the implementation side of making sure that some of these ideas have an opportunity to be tested out in communities. So in terms of, you know, focusing on this last mile connectivity initiatives that are affordable and accessible to everyone, it’s really important for us to. continue to support policy frameworks that are people-centered at first and that are designed through a lens of equity, human rights, and accountability. Because when we look at who is not connected at the moment, those tend to be the population that tends to benefit the most out of being connected when we talk about transformative qualities of connectivity. So the first thing that I would say is that we need to prioritize universal affordable access as a right. You know we need governments to embed digital access in development policies and frameworks and in the rights framework as well. Treating connectivity as a public good and not just nice to have a luxurious thing. This includes setting very ambitious universal service goals and enshrining them in the right to meaningful connectivity that focuses on regular access, reliable access that is high quality, as well as affordable internet and devices for people to be able to benefit from digital technologies. The other item is we need to reform universal service and access funds. I think we’ve been talking about this for a really long time. It is quite evident and we’ve done quite an audit a few years ago looking at universal service and access fund, how they’re deployed, how effective they are, and you know it’s quite clear that regulators should open, you know, that countries should continue to utilize universal service access funds in a lot better way. Perhaps even being open to addressing some of the demand side issues of connectivity like digital skills and affordable devices. So it’s not all just about infrastructure but beginning to address I’m here with the CEO of the World Bank, and I’m here to talk about the importance of public reporting. We need public reporting because we can’t continue to have gatherings like this where we keep talking about how we don’t really know the impact of universal services and access funds or that there are funds that are not utilized. And enabling community networks and innovative models, regulators need to open up spectrum, and that’s beginning to happen as we see with some of the work that internet society organizations have been doing around community networks and funding connectivity, community-based initiatives. And one of the things that’s really key that Chris mentioned in training for business and for technical skills, we need to be open to different financial models for connecting everyone. I think that the pure commercial model alone is not going to be a size that fits all communities, so we need to be open to the fact that, you know, in a continent like Africa, for example, where so many people live on less than $2 per day, we might, even if a country reaches the affordability level, remember that’s based on averages. We have to be willing to think about subsidies to certain communities or co-op model connectivity that allows those who may never be able to afford connectivity to be able to still have access as a public good and as a right for them to be connected, you know, mandating inclusive infrastructure sharing. And open access is something we’ve talked about, I think, at literally every IGF and gathering of this kind, and we need to see more and more efforts to prevent monopolies so that we’re truly building connectivity strategies that focus on everyone being included. And lastly, integrating digital inclusion in broader economic and social policies. Connectivity policies need to be linked with the investments in digital literacy, local content devices, and online safety issues, because those issues also drive the experience of people online. So I often say that we want everyone to go online to do what exactly, read English, be on Facebook? I don’t think so. I think there’s a lot more, if we’re talking about digital and transformation, we need to invest more in some of the other things that ensure people are able to fully benefit meaningfully from being online, including relevant local content in local languages that people are able to consume. And lastly, I’ll just summarize by saying that policy and regulatory frameworks need to work for the last mile, and they need to focus on being inclusive by design, accountable in delivery. Accountability is just one of those things that I’m pained by. I feel like we’re just not seeing enough of that. And transformative in the impact, we are not just connecting people for access. It has to be beyond access. What is it that they’re able to do to improve and change their lives by being connected? So we need to put that at the center, so that it’s all grounded in equity, actively dismantling structural barriers, and lastly, not leaving women behind. We’ve done a lot of work on connected resilience, which is a study that looks at gendered experiences of women. I invite you to read that report and just really see what the lived experiences of women is through meaningful connectivity and you will really get a picture of how we’ve barely scraped the surface in terms of being inclusive in our connectivity efforts. Thank you.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Anika. I had a follow-up question that I believe you already started to answer and that was around how we can move frameworks beyond just connectivity to ensure, like you said, meaningful access through digital literacy, cultural relevance, developing local content. Maybe touch a bit more on that and also share what do you think are the metrics that we should adopt to be able to measure? You’ve given us some things that, you know, inclusive design, accountability and delivery, very specific mandates as well. How would we know that we have gotten there? What are the metrics? How would we measure that?

Onica Makwakwa: Yes, great question, actually. So it’s really important that we measure what we want to see impact in, right? You know, so we are still struggling at just having data that’s segregated even by gender, believe it or not. In 2025, we are not collecting gender desegregated data. We are not collecting data that’s desegregated by income levels. And we learned this when we used to do the affordability index report because, you know, a lot of these indices rely on national averages. So if you take a country, for example, like South Africa, and you measure it on affordability based on the one gig for no more than 2% of household income, the country actually comes out as being quite affordable, right? However, when you take the population, because South Africa is a country where more than 50% of the population lives on less than half the average GNI. So when you take the population and you splice it by income quantiles, We’ve got these incredible instruments like your National Broadband Plan that can be mute. In fact, if you take a lot of National Broadband Plans and just do a web search of women, you’ll maybe find one or two, but no real measurement of how are we going to know we’ve actually succeeded. Is it 10% of the women, 30% of the women? We just have not been clear. So we’ve got an opportunity to make sure that our instruments that we measure our connectivity, our gaps with, are very clear and articulate on what the target and that goal is. Is it 40% of the unconnected? What percentage of that is women and what percentage is rural? Women are also not a monolithic group. So really getting into all those intersections of how we are connecting people is really important, but also moving away from measuring on basic connectivity. I’m a big advocate of us raising the standards. At the global level, the standard of a connected person is someone who uses the internet once every three months is so underwhelming that we need to just really, I think those of us who are going to WSIS need to really talk a lot about how that standard needs to improve. Meaningful connectivity is about daily access, especially when we are talking about the age of artificial intelligence and the things that… Thank you so much for joining us. We have a lot of things that we want to do, you know, we want to do in terms of digitization of public services, daily access and limited access, 4G speed at minimum, if we truly want people to do the kinds of things that, you know, we are promising them for transformation, because the truth is, we need to stop having poor policies for poor people. You know, poor phones for poor people. We need to do a lot of things, so let’s work on real device affordability strategies, not device financing. There’s a big difference between you can afford a phone over three months and you can afford a phone now, you know? So we need to, I feel like we really have not started to do the work in terms of driving affordability, in terms of making sure that there’s rich and relevant content, that there’s a way to make sure that all of the services that we’re providing are accessible for all of the people, and that’s really what we’re doing, and we’re doing this very much in English, which is not a majority language for most of our population.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: So, yeah, I mean, I think, you know, looking at all of the instruments that we have, including our digital development policies in general, to see how they are explicit about, you know, the kind of vision that we’ve set for the world, the kind of, you know, white kind of work that we’ve done on the kind of connectivity goals to achieve a high- quality and affordable access. And a lot of what you just said about the kind of work that we’ve done on the kind of connectivity goals to achieve a high- quality and affordable accessibility, and our partnership-building efforts. So in what role do you do public-private partnerships And community driven models play in ensuring access to the Internet.

Thobekile Matimbe: Thank you so much, Nnenna, for talking about public private partnerships and obviously access to the Internet for our communities. I think we’ve already begun to, you know, unpack community centred initiatives, connectivity initiatives and how they are important. And when we’re looking at it from the perspective of those initiatives, it is clear that it’s a multistakeholder approach. It’s all hands on deck in terms of laying out what is important, what should be there for meaningful connectivity. I need to highlight the importance of, you know, obviously a relevant and appropriate regulatory environment that ensures that, you know, connectivity and meaningful connectivity is reached and attained, especially for excluded communities. And this is something at the heart of our work at Paradigm Initiative, focusing on, you know, those who are underserved in rural communities and research from ITU last year, you know, presented that at least 38% of Africans of the African population is online. The digital divide is not something that has, you know, been eradicated at this point. Even as we look at attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals, we still have a big gap that is there. And we are now even moving away from just connectivity, but saying there should be meaningful connectivity. And what does that mean for collaboration and, you know, putting all hands on deck in terms of ensuring that this is a reality for our communities. So I think in that vein, it’s clear that, you know, in addressing that gap, you know, there’s need for that regulatory framework that ensures that, you know, community-centered community connectivity initiatives can thrive. and also that even the private sector is also able to come on board. I think Onyeka touched on the Universal Service Fund and it’s something that we’ve done research on at Paradigm Initiative through our State of Digital Rights and Inclusion in Africa report, LONDA, and looking at the 2024 report, it shows that, you know, from the 27 reported countries, we have less than four countries that really are transparent about those resources and what they’re doing with them, what they’re collecting and how they’re gathering those resources through the support of the private sector. There’s also not transparency about the initiatives that are even being rolled out and there’s not enough support even for whatever, you know, community centers for connectivity, how they’re being run and how they’re being sustained so that they’re not just something that’s put up in communities and as hubs, but it’s something that is sustained. And I like the fact that as well there’s, you know, a lot of support from a lot of civil society actors that are, you know, running other initiatives as well to support this and I think Paradigm Initiative has done a lot of work on life legacy, ensuring that they bring digital literacy to communities and putting their hands on deck and also engaging the government as well as a key partner to say, here we are, we can collaborate and ensure we expand, you know, the reach of digital literacy in communities that are underserved. And I think one of the key important things as we also talk about some of the work that we’ve done under the Local Networks Initiative together with AEPC, I think it’s been key to highlight the importance of social impact when these community-centered connectivity initiatives are being rolled out, ensuring that communities also are on board at the table of describing or rather articulating the vision of this initiative so that there’s tangible, meaningful, you know, benefit for the communities as well when we’re looking at even inclusion as a whole, bringing voices on board, what are the key things they want to see, what they want to benefit from these initiatives and how they can also be a critical stakeholder in ensuring that they are sustainable. I think it is something that is important. I will highlight of course as we are discussing the world summit on information society and looking at how far we have come 20 years later. I think it is really concerning that where we are right now. We are at a place where 20 years later we are still discussing the digital divide and articulating similar gaps that we articulated as far back as 2002, 2003 where we still need to see enabling policies that are ensuring that this happens. We still need to see great cooperation across diverse stakeholders to ensure that there is meaningful connectivity. We still see a really broad digital divide and how can we as we engage in these conversations be able to speak truth to ourselves and say do we really want to see this change? Do we really want to see the needle move? Because where we are, we are still where we were and we want to be able to ensure that we prioritize this. Even in national budgeting processes we have actually governments making sure that they prioritize this. I have been in one engagement with one government on the African continent where we are discussing digital inclusion for underserved communities and the feedback was from one member of parliament that look, do you really think my grandmother needs a smartphone? And you are like okay, at this day and age we are still debating the importance of access to digital technologies for our communities. So how far can we move? I think we need to be at a place where we speak truth to ourselves and say look, we cannot leave anyone behind and this is not an educated elitist conversation but it is a conversation that really ensures that. especially the Universal Services Fund and community initiatives

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: because I believe also that transparency fosters trust, it makes building of this public-private partnerships even stronger. So thank you, Tobekele. I’ll come to you now, Cristian. Thank you for being here today. So looking ahead to 2030, now we’ve been saying set goals, what do we want to see, what do we want to achieve? And having, you know, advised governments on digital rights, what innovation, be it technological or policy-based, has the potential to make today’s digital divide obsolete and how can we prepare for that future now?

Leon Cristian: All right, thank you, Nnena. Good morning to all the wonderful panelists and the friends participating online and on-site. I want to talk more about the complexities of this debate right now, not perhaps in a very positive way because actually we are seeing a lot of complexities in the world. You know, 2030 looks so in the future right now that let’s expect to reach 2026 first. All right, from what I have been hearing these days at the IGF, There are, I think, four challenges that we have to address. Let’s don’t expect that these things actually make things more complex to to, you know, close the digital divide. The first one I want to talk about, I think Christopher also mentioned it, is the emerging of new technologies such as low-orbit satellites, which are, of course, rapidly solving connectivity problems, especially in the most remote areas. For countries with very big digital divides and low resources, such as my country, Bolivia, these kind of connections seem actually an interesting solution, so we should take them into into account, but at the same time, also these technologies are generating new problems, problems that perhaps we didn’t have before, related to data sovereignty, spectrum allocation, national security, among others. And the second thing, the second challenge, is the regulatory power imbalances that now are growing between states and big tech companies. Countries of the global majority have today a minimum capacity to demand the fulfillment of guarantees and rights of these companies. This is something that we all know, but going back to the first complexity that I mentioned, for example, Starlink is operating in my country without permission. How this happened? Because my government asked Starlink to have a complaints office in order to operate in Bolivia, but since Starlink is so powerful and such a big company, they said, I don’t need that, I don’t need to put an office in your country. I can operate and I can provide my services even if I don’t fulfill all their requirements. So that is happening. And how we can do accountability to these companies if they don’t even want to invest in one office in one country like Bolivia. The third complexity is about the disappearance of a governance model based on cooperation. In a world in international crisis it is becoming increasingly difficult to think of models of internet governance because particular interests are becoming more important than the needs of the most vulnerable populations. And that is something that we also have to address and the spaces like the IGF are so important because they allow us to speak about these kind of issues. And fourth, the increasingly complex technologies that today require an infrastructure and a computing capacity that our countries don’t have. Now the digital divide is not only about having or not meaningful connectivity, it’s also about having enough capacity to run AI’s, quantum computation, blockchains, cryptos and all those technologies. So there is another connectivity divide, there is another digital divide that is happening right now. And we also have to address that digital divide for these countries because we are lagging behind and we will not have access to these technologies because we don’t have this capacity to run them, right? So we don’t even have the energy infrastructure to power it. That is why our countries are in a double digital divide. So these are real big complexities that we also I think we have to address. Of course, I’m being really negative in relation to what can happen in the future, but I think after hearing all these things in the IGF, I think we also have to, you know, speak about them.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you. Thank you, Cristian. Thank you for highlighting the increasing complexity in how the, you know, the digital divide is growing as well. And maybe just to bring some balance, because you’re right, looking at these complexities and challenges, it looks bleak because we’re just trying to, you know, solve one. And then, you know, we have these increasing complexities and challenges being thrown at us. How would you or what would you prefer as a balance? How would you balance this? I like the example you gave about Starlink and Bolivia and also about how it’s new problems are coming up in terms of national security, data sovereignty, other digital rights issues. So how can we balance investment in infrastructure and ensuring that we have connectivity with the necessary investments in rights protection mechanisms for communities and for countries as well?

Leon Cristian: Okay. I agree with everything that Onika said. I think that is the way. So I also think that the answer depends on the context, the needs of the specific countries or regions. In the case of Bolivia, I think, for example, that the last mile problem is purely a market issue. Why? Because the invisible hand of the market failed here to solve the connectivity needed by remote areas and populations. Either because these are very small communities and nobody wants to invest in these communities, or because the state is receiving lobby of these very big companies. ICTs, ICPs, and they don’t allow these communities, for example, to have the regulation that they need for community networks. There are so many cases in Latin America and in my country of community networks that are actually functioning and resolving some of the connectivity problems. But as Christopher mentioned, there is a difficulty here to sustain these community networks. The government is not helping at all because the government are creating legislations and regulatory frameworks only from the perspective of these big companies, what these big companies need in order to operate, but they are not facilitating things for small companies that also have these issues and they are doing what they can in order to resolve their own connectivity problems. I have a lot of cases in which communities, they said, I want to invest in my own infrastructure, but the government don’t allow me to invest because the government says that only the government or a big company can invest in this community. Why? This is something really, I don’t know how to explain it because it’s really hard to understand. So what should be done, in my opinion, and in my context, we need to stop seeing connectivity as something to be solved only by the market or only by big companies and more as a basic need that should be solved through public investments, public-private alliances with a greater participation of the communities that are affected, of course, and I think that the work that is being done by internet society, global digital inclusion partnership and civil society in general is really important and we have to strengthen that work. Also, of course, with the inclusion of the local communities.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you. Thank you, Cristian. My takeaway from your preferred solutions is they should be context-informed and people-focused. I have lost connectivity online to Zoom, but just to say to the audience online and on site, I hope you’re getting your questions ready and I hope that this has been an engaging conversation for you with some key takeaways and focus areas. So before we go to Q&A, I think I have one last question and this is for all my panelists. What practical steps can civil society, ISPs, mobile operators, all the stakeholders, we’ve talked about businesses, start-ups, what can they do together to de-risk investments in last mile infrastructure and promote inclusive access based on everything that you’ve spoken about today? I think I’ll start from Chris and then we can go down.

Christopher Locke: I’ll actually repeat something that was said earlier on. We need to understand there are many business models to providing connectivity. We need to understand that the dominant model of profit-centric, telco, satellite provider, etc., whilst fundamentally important in providing the possibility of access for last mile access for communities, isn’t necessarily the sustainable way. Mimicking a small version of being a telco isn’t the way to build a sustainable community network. There are co-op models, there are many other models that allow us to develop that. So I think really being innovative and creative in the way we think about what sustainable business models look like, and then as has been said, getting governments to support that, making spectrum licensing for local usage affordable and available. to those networks In a way that doesn’t just look at spectrum licensing as a nice income stream for for the government You know understanding the GDP impact of giving people connectivity, you know, the astonishing changes to their lives you get through connectivity Massively outweigh the small amount of money you can earn from selling Community spectrum licenses to network. So we really do need as was said earlier particularly by Anika to drive Governments to support very different types of connectivity solutions and business models and and put the regulation in place to support those

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Chris

Thobekile Matimbe: Thank you. I will echo the importance of an enabling regulatory framework and and and the importance of inclusion as a matter of importance and in line with human rights not as a privilege, but something that is really critical and necessary as well as Also highlighting the importance of multi-stakeholder approaches not just between the government and the private sector but also civil society because of some of the meaningful steps that CSOs are taking to bridge the connectivity gap

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you

Onica Makwakwa: Okay, so I will I would say for me it’s advocating for policy incentives together And it’s really great that we are all here as government actors private sector actors and civil society We need to focus this advocacy strongly on you know, access to our universal service funds for multi-stakeholder projects text waivers or import duty reductions on equipment for last mile connectivity and license fee exemptions or flexible spectrum access for small-scale operations community networks or other rural development initiatives And on the data, we need to collaborate, you know, to guide investment and share and combine disaggregated data on coverage gaps, on affordability and digital use to better identify and understand, you know, what’s viable for less small investment areas. And civil society can help gather real-time community feedback while operators and ISPs can share infrastructure maps or usage data with appropriate safeguards. I know there’s a lot of protectionism that happens around this particular issue. And, you know, lastly, we need to develop and support local digital ecosystems, you know, by collaborating to incubate local startups and encourage local device repair and distribution networks. It really baffles me that we are also talking about climate issues and e-waste and sustainability of the planet. But we still have so many countries where the right to repair is not practical and a reality for these devices. And that’s one of the things that can help drive the affordability of devices down, especially for me in a continent like Africa, that’s a huge reuse market. It really baffles me that we have not looked at this issue of the right to repair as one of the solutions towards beginning to lower the cost of devices. Thank you.

Leon Cristian: Yeah, for me, it can be repetitive because this was already mentioned that meaningful connectivity should be a right and should be embedded in all the international policy framework, not only the one related to digital policy. Because this is something really transversal to almost anything right now. And as I mentioned, connectivity should not be left only for the market or the companies to solve. This is something that is really all the stakeholders need to be involved in this. Civil society, companies, government, and of course the local communities. Because connectivity is not a privilege, it’s a necessity.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you. Thank you to all the panelists. I already see a question coming up online, so I will take that as a cue to open the floor for questions. So the first question we have, talking of sustainability as a private sector looking at deploying community networks, what renewal incentives are available from Internet Society Foundation and how many years does the grant cover? So I believe this is for you, Chris.

Christopher Locke: Absolutely. So we provide a range of different support for community networks. We provide grants by reconnecting the unconnected program. Usually these are done on an annual basis. We have annual granting windows, so there is the opportunity to continue grants going forward. But as I said, what we like to do is, if we get into a relationship with a community network, is build them towards the point where they are sustainable without the need for grants. Now what that sometimes means is someone can come initially for a grant to support the initiation of a community network, and then at a later stage they are looking to spread it out to a larger area, so the follow-on grant allows them to increase their coverage. And then later on, maybe it’s something else. We are increasingly seeing power supply as something that people are wanting support with. So we don’t like to just continually fund something to stay as it is, or to get to a situation where it’s not possible to sustain without grant support. But what we do want to do is see actually if there is growth, how can we help those community networks overcome the next phase of their growth, and how can we get them on a path to sustainability, and how can we meet.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Chris, and I hope that answered the question. We have one in the room.

Audience: Thank you very much. My name is Bara Kotieno. I hope I can be heard. I chair the Association of Community Networks in Kenya. I’m here with my colleague James sitting at the back. Thank you very much, Chris, and the rest of the panelists for the very interesting interventions which are very relevant. Actually, I consider this a very pertinent and relevant topic. I wanted to just share some thoughts to affirm the comments that have been made by the panelists. First, Kenya now has about 20 community networks. We have a target by the Communications Authority of Kenya to build 100 community networks. It is based on realization of the fact that after 20 years of investment in GSM, we only have 30% of the country having meaningful connectivity. Therefore, there is a need to accelerate connection of the 70% that are remaining, and community networks have been found to be viable alternatives. Thanks to the Internet Society, we have received seed funding that has actually established 90% of the community networks that I have mentioned. We do have support from APC that has also contributed, which we really appreciate. But we have a letter of commitment or we have commitment from the Internet Society to work with us in achieving our target of 100 community networks. Of course, I cannot forget to thank the Communications Authority of Kenya, which has worked with the community to ensure that we have a community network service provider license. We also have further systemic enhancements to create a Tier 4 license. we have demonstrated that community networks are actually a viable alternative but the challenge now is to actually prove that there are sustainable means of providing affordable connectivity to the community and maybe that’s a challenge I will throw back to the panel to help us now figure out the sustainability component. Thank you very much. Thank you

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Barak. Any reflections to Barak? I mean I’d just like to give the respect back

Christopher Locke: and respect the work that Barak and the organization does you know it’s very nice of him to mention ourselves on APC as supporters but the work that they do in Kenya is astonishing and I think most importantly can be a case study for what country level coordination of community networks, training, development can actually do to achieve really immense results. Yeah thank you, thank you Chris.

Audience: Hello, you can hear me? Yes we can. Okay, my name is Leo from United Republic of Tanzania. I want to ask one issue. We all acknowledge that accessibility is still a big challenge especially in global south despite of the improvement of mobile coverage. We understand 8% plus of coverage is achievable against the accessibility of 38% of in Africa. It shows that the pricing and device affordability. It’s still a big problem Apart from the solution you have mentioned Please can you share more experience you have to solve the issue of the accessibility especially in the device affordability. Thank you

Onica Makwakwa: Okay, that’s a bit of a tough one so, you know device affordability one of the Research that we had done Specifically looking at Africa. We actually learned that device affordability is still a very huge challenge in addition to you know, the affordability of the Internet itself and that when you look at How much people are actually spending on? access to on accessing these devices We were able to to find that some Community some countries you find that people are spending anywhere from 20 to 60 percent of average household income on Just purchasing one device There’s a lot of work that’s currently happening around device affordability including a lot of resistance against Subsidies of Devices and we’ll pack that for a little bit for now. So looking at affordability specifically one of the things that we’ve done successfully in a couple of countries is looking at taxation of devices and found we found that there’s anywhere from 20 to 40 percent of Taxation that is on devices whether it’s an import duty tax your VAT Or you know sales tax or what have you but there’s anywhere from 20 to 45 percent And we’ve been able to demonstrate actually that if governments could just roll back some of those taxes It actually increases uptake of digital technologies within the country and I’ll give you just a quick example between Nigeria and Ghana where we found that people in Ghana would actually buy their devices in Nigeria and activate them in Ghana including Those who live on the border in terms of their DSTV Subscription they would live in one country and do their subscription in another country because those taxes are so high that they actually make a difference in affordability and so but I think what has been An area I will criticize of our all our multi-stakeholder community is that our focus when it comes to device affordability has predominantly been on Affording the devices over time Instead of really tackling the issue of how do we lower that initial cost of devices? To a point where more people can afford to be able to get them. The repair issue is one of them No one wants to talk about local assembly I’m not sure why because local assembly can also enable Gives an opportunity to also enable and retool The workforce in that country, especially in a continent like Africa where majority of our population is young people We need retooling and reskilling so bringing some of these devices to be partially or fully assembled within the continent Would make a huge difference including the content that’s uploaded, right? So why must this device arrive in my country with everything including the plastic that gets peeled off and all the software Already installed could not couldn’t some of those Happen local and we’ve seen this model with the motorbikes that are imported into the continent for delivery of food They literally come in parts and therefore their text differently Compared to if they arrived as a fully assembled motorbike to service the community the mobile operators have predominantly been working on the device affordability around financing schemes and Different models for that and that’s really great and wonderful but I really would love to see a commitment from civil society from government especially and some private sector around And developing this phone that we were promised, I don’t know how many years ago, the $10 phone is not here yet, but maybe it’s not going to be $10, you know, but we need to really, I would not give us a good grade on device affordability. We haven’t done a good job. We need to regulate for both the market and for consumer protection. And pricing is a consumer protection issue.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Onika. And I believe, Tobekili, you wanted to chime in?

Thobekile Matimbe: Thank you. I wanted to chime in, I think, in response to the comment, great comment from the second speaker. Just to highlight, I think, the importance of what actions are being taken in other spaces. I know in Tanzania, for example, there’s been, you know, great work as well by community networks. And, you know, I think annually they prioritize the School of Community Networks. And we’ve been part of that process as well to be able to convene this School of Community Networks where I think we unpack how to improve skills in designing, administration and management of the community-based telecommunications networks, as well as developing skills as well to create a sustainable business model for those community networks. I think that would be very key in terms of sustainability of the ongoing community networks.

Audience: Thank you. Thank you. I’m Lee McKnight, Syracuse University professor in the United States. First, I wanted to share some possible good news or challenge the perspective that blockchain and other technologies are not reachable or accessible in the global south. We are working with Brazilian and Peruvian professors right now with open source software that we would be bringing and co-creating with indigenous and local communities in the Brazilian and Peruvian Amazon later this year. So this is not… And secondly, on AI, not AI if you believe Google and it takes a giant… , the first comment I wanted to make is that there is no trillion-dollar data center, it doesn’t, there’s smaller range of options also at the edge that can be reached and be accessible elsewhere. So that’s the first comment. Second, I wanted to note, I have something on my back, which is with, I’m just kind of making an announcement, Anika knows what I’m going to say, but I’m going to say that we are launching a new Internet program, or a SIP, as in a SIP of Internet, meaning not first-class Internet, but Internet accessible anywhere, and also thanks to the Internet Society Foundation’s support a couple years earlier in Costa Rica, we are now launching the program in cooperation with the government of Ghana and with the African Parliamentary Network, for real, to bring these, what’s called the SIPs, the SIPs, to a community network, and we’re launching just now, and I’m going to say that there are libraries, also a solar panel, you can set up, you can create a community network everywhere except the North and South Pole, starting now, and we will be bringing this forward, again, in cooperation with Internet Society chapters in many countries, with Parliament, across Africa, Central America, and elsewhere, so this is not a magic solution, there are limitations still, but there is really no reason with support of librarians, they can’t access the Internet either when they go out there, they’re your natural allies to bring and change the reform, the legislation, to bring community networks everywhere, because we’ve tapped out under WSIS, we’ve let 2.6 billion in 2022, 2023, 24, 25, it’s still 2.6 billion unconnected, it’s not working, this is the only approach that’s going to work is community networks, and I thank you for everyone’s attention.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you. Thank you for that answer. Congratulations.

Audience: I’m Lisa Dakanay from the Institute for Social Entrepreneurship in Asia. I just wanted to ask the panel in terms of experiences and perspectives of integrating community-centered connectivity initiatives with social entrepreneurship, social enterprise development, and social and solidarity economy, because in the Asia-Pacific region and the Philippines where I come from, that integration has been a critical factor, I think, in addressing sustainability and social impact issues of community-centered connectivity initiatives. Thank you.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you. I think we can start with Chris.

Christopher Locke: It’s late on Friday. I’m running very low on brain and energy at the moment. We discussed on the panel yesterday, and the excellent work in measuring the social impact of community networks that was presented, that being able, and again it goes back to the business model question, being able to understand what the impact of a community network is, not just in profit and sustainability, not just in a very simple calculation of contribution to the economy, but to a very broad social impact network of what is the implications on health, on education, on a very broad range of factors that was presented at our session we were both on yesterday, I think gives us a much better sense of assessing the success of a community network and being able to point to what is possible by investments in community networks. These are not, and I can’t say this enough, these are not mini telcos. These are community organisations providing a vital service to a local community in a way that makes sense for that community. And I think the better we can have the kind of granularity that was offered in the social impact assessment work that you were showing yesterday. Gives us that opportunity to not only measure ourselves the impact better and obviously measuring the impact of the community networks is something We do a lot within our granting program at ISOC and something I want to look to see if we can adopt the things that were Presented yesterday in the other session to do But far more importantly and again going back to the previous question from the previous speaker in the way We talked to governments and parliamentarians about why this is important and why is essential You know talking about success in as broad a spectrum as possible of social and economic indicators Allows us to make an incredibly strong case for the investment in community networks the right policies for community networks and the support of the kind of Organizations that Barack and many people in the room are running

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Chris. Thank you. I Don’t know anyone else wanted to speak to the question on the social

Onica Makwakwa: Yes It’s really important for us as we you know, I always feel uncomfortable Sort of seeing myself as this Advocate for connectivity and the question is always so what you want people to connect to do what exactly so, you know social enterprises are a real great opportunity for us to actually also support the use case of This connectivity and why we want people to be connected and I think the best example that I have so far And I’m just this is gonna just truly be a plug-in So we did this study that was actually also funded by Internet Society on connected resilience looking at how women are staying connected through meaningful connectivity specifically and one of the organizations that we continue to we Discovered in this process and continue to support and work with is an organization called women in digital that’s based in Bangladesh and You know, I Nila basically started this organization with the excitement and aim of Teaching women how to code now. We all know about all these programs about teaching women how to code, you know There’s all kinds of goals we’re gonna get a million girls coding and all of that and the question always becomes so after all of this and and then what? What are these girls doing with this coding? It’s really important, I think, what women in digital have been able to do is create an ecosystem for them after they are trained to be able to begin to change the content ecosystem within Bangladesh, right? So one of the things that they are doing that I actually just got mine this week is creating smart cards for people. So I’m coming all the way from South Africa, I ordered my digital smart card from Bangladesh because I want to support this project that’s led by women where they are creating these smart cards and, you know, just really incredible, and someone kind from Bangladesh was able to bring it to me to this session. So it’s not for me, I think it’s really important that it’s not good enough for us to, like, get people devices, get people digital skills. How are they utilizing them? How are we creating content that’s relevant and usable for them? But how are we also giving them an opportunity to truly transform their lives and be able to utilize these resources? How is government supporting social enterprises and creating an enabling environment for them to be successful and to ease registration? Because right now, most countries, registration is really for profit or non-profit. Social entrepreneurship has huge opportunities, especially in digital space, but it’s not recognized as, you know, formal business in quite a lot of communities so far.

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: Thank you, Anika. We’re about time, so maybe I’ll give a minute to Tobe Kili and Sir Christian, so some final remarks before we close.

Thobekile Matimbe: Thank you so much, Nnena, and thanks for everything you’ve done in the room and all the amazing contributions. I think what is key here from today’s conversation is the importance of ensuring that those who are in underserved communities are not left behind and that we ensure that there’s meaningful connectivity. Thank you. and how we can do that through, you know, effective regulatory frameworks and also relevant support as well, not just for establishing community networks, but also for their sustainability. And that’s very critical and very important.

Leon Cristian: Thank you. I would like to highlight and congratulate the initiative that they are doing with local population in Brazil. I think that is really important. And I think that is one of the cases we should replicate all. I believe that open source is really a technology that is a game changer and it has the capacity to empower local communities and reduce the dependence that countries like the one that I represent, we have with these very big tech companies. So including local communities is not only something about inclusion, it’s also about diversity. And we want to create an internet for the future that has diversity, that has indigenous languages, that has the perspective of these communities in how we are constructing, building technology. Thank you. Thank you, Cristian. I want to thank

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu: my panel today, the esteemed panelists. Thank you for sharing your experiences. Thank you for the fantastic insights, the interventions. We’ve gotten some great examples today from the panel and from the audience on what we can replicate in our communities going forward. Some key takeaways today, I think what’s reverberated a few things, connectivity as a right, because connectivity is foundational, but also seeing that the digital divide is increasingly becoming more complex with new challenges such as, like you mentioned, data sovereignty and national security. But we also have the opportunity with some of the recommendations that have been emphasized today, inclusivity in design, accountability. Thank you all for your time, for making time to be here. Thank you for your attention, thank you for your contributions and for the interventions. And I hope you have a great rest of the conference and enjoy the closing ceremony. Thank you.

Agreement points

Community networks require sustainability beyond continuous grants through local business models

Speakers

– Christopher Locke
– Onica Makwakwa
– Thobekile Matimbe

Arguments

Community networks should be developed as sustainable business models that can cover costs through local pricing systems rather than continuous grants

Universal service and access funds need reform with public reporting and openness to addressing demand-side issues like digital skills and devices

Enabling regulatory frameworks are essential for community-centered connectivity initiatives to thrive with multi-stakeholder approaches

Summary

All speakers agree that community networks must move beyond dependency on grants to achieve long-term sustainability through local revenue generation, proper business models, and supportive regulatory frameworks

Topics

Economic | Development | Legal and regulatory

Connectivity should be treated as a fundamental right requiring government support and policy reform

Speakers

– Onica Makwakwa
– Leon Cristian
– Thobekile Matimbe

Arguments

Universal affordable access should be prioritized as a right, embedded in development policies and rights frameworks

Market failures require public investment and public-private alliances with greater community participation

Enabling regulatory frameworks are essential for community-centered connectivity initiatives to thrive with multi-stakeholder approaches

Summary

Speakers consensus that connectivity is a fundamental right that requires active government intervention, policy reform, and public investment rather than relying solely on market forces

Topics

Human rights | Legal and regulatory | Development

Current approaches to measuring and achieving connectivity are inadequate and need fundamental reform

Speakers

– Onica Makwakwa
– Thobekile Matimbe
– Audience

Arguments

Current connectivity standards are inadequate – defining a connected person as someone who uses internet once every three months is underwhelming

Less than four out of 27 African countries are transparent about Universal Service Fund resources and initiatives

After 20 years since WSIS, similar gaps persist with 2.6 billion people still unconnected, indicating current approaches aren’t working

Summary

Strong agreement that existing measurement standards, funding mechanisms, and approaches to connectivity have failed to deliver meaningful results over the past 20 years

Topics

Development | Legal and regulatory

Community participation and local context are essential for successful connectivity initiatives

Speakers

– Christopher Locke
– Leon Cristian
– Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu

Arguments

Community readiness evaluation must include technology solutions, governance structures, and business training alongside technical training

Including local communities brings diversity and indigenous perspectives essential for building technology for the future

Solutions should be context-informed and people-focused to effectively address connectivity challenges

Summary

All speakers emphasize that successful connectivity solutions must be designed with meaningful community participation, local context consideration, and indigenous perspectives

Topics

Development | Sociocultural

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers acknowledge that while LEO satellites offer connectivity solutions for remote areas, they simultaneously create new challenges around pricing, regulation, data sovereignty, and national security that need to be addressed

Speakers

– Christopher Locke
– Leon Cristian

Arguments

Low Earth Orbit satellites can bridge remote communities but face sustainability challenges due to pricing instability and regulatory issues

New technologies like LEO satellites create problems related to data sovereignty, spectrum allocation, and national security that didn’t exist before

Topics

Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Both speakers recognize that the digital divide has evolved beyond basic connectivity to include the infrastructure and capacity needed for advanced technologies, creating multiple layers of digital exclusion

Speakers

– Onica Makwakwa
– Leon Cristian

Arguments

Countries face double digital divide – lacking both meaningful connectivity and infrastructure to power advanced technologies

The digital divide now includes not just connectivity but capacity to run AI, quantum computation, and blockchain technologies

Topics

Infrastructure | Development

Both speakers advocate for moving away from traditional profit-centric business models toward more innovative, community-centered approaches that address affordability through structural changes rather than financing schemes

Speakers

– Christopher Locke
– Onica Makwakwa

Arguments

Multiple business models beyond profit-centric telco models are needed, including co-op models for sustainable community networks

Focus should shift from device financing schemes to actually lowering initial device costs through local assembly and right to repair

Topics

Economic | Development

Unexpected consensus

Regulatory power imbalances between governments and big tech companies

Speakers

– Leon Cristian
– Onica Makwakwa

Arguments

Starlink operates in Bolivia without permission, demonstrating regulatory power imbalances between states and big tech companies

Universal service and access funds need reform with public reporting and openness to addressing demand-side issues like digital skills and devices

Explanation

Unexpected consensus emerged around the challenge of big tech companies operating beyond national regulatory control, with speakers from different regions (Latin America and Africa) identifying similar patterns of corporate power superseding government authority in connectivity provision

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Human rights

The failure of traditional market-based approaches to connectivity after 20 years

Speakers

– Leon Cristian
– Audience
– Thobekile Matimbe

Arguments

Market failures require public investment and public-private alliances with greater community participation

After 20 years since WSIS, similar gaps persist with 2.6 billion people still unconnected, indicating current approaches aren’t working

Less than four out of 27 African countries are transparent about Universal Service Fund resources and initiatives

Explanation

Surprising level of agreement across speakers from different sectors that market-based approaches have fundamentally failed to deliver connectivity goals, requiring a complete rethinking of approaches rather than incremental improvements

Topics

Economic | Development | Legal and regulatory

Overall assessment

Summary

Strong consensus emerged around four main areas: the need for sustainable community-driven connectivity models, treating connectivity as a fundamental right requiring government intervention, the inadequacy of current measurement and funding approaches, and the essential role of community participation in solution design

Consensus level

High level of consensus with significant implications for policy reform. The agreement spans technical, economic, regulatory, and social dimensions, suggesting a comprehensive framework for addressing connectivity challenges. The consensus indicates a shift away from market-only solutions toward rights-based, community-centered approaches with strong government support and reformed international frameworks.

Different viewpoints

Optimism vs. Pessimism about technological solutions and future prospects

Speakers

– Christopher Locke
– Leon Cristian

Arguments

Low Earth Orbit satellites can bridge remote communities but face sustainability challenges due to pricing instability and regulatory issues

New technologies like LEO satellites create problems related to data sovereignty, spectrum allocation, and national security that didn’t exist before

Summary

Christopher Locke presents a cautiously optimistic view of LEO satellites as solutions for remote connectivity despite challenges, while Leon Cristian emphasizes how these same technologies create new problems and complexities that didn’t exist before, taking a more pessimistic stance on technological solutions.

Topics

Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Scope and complexity of the digital divide

Speakers

– Onica Makwakwa
– Leon Cristian

Arguments

Current connectivity standards are inadequate – defining a connected person as someone who uses internet once every three months is underwhelming

The digital divide now includes not just connectivity but capacity to run AI, quantum computation, and blockchain technologies

Summary

Onica focuses on improving current connectivity standards and meaningful access for existing technologies, while Leon Cristian argues the digital divide has expanded to include advanced technologies like AI and quantum computing, representing different views on prioritization.

Topics

Development | Infrastructure

Unexpected differences

Technology accessibility for developing countries

Speakers

– Leon Cristian
– Audience (Lee McKnight)

Arguments

Countries face double digital divide – lacking both meaningful connectivity and infrastructure to power advanced technologies

After 20 years since WSIS, similar gaps persist with 2.6 billion people still unconnected, indicating current approaches aren’t working

Explanation

Leon Cristian argued that advanced technologies like AI and blockchain are inaccessible to developing countries, but an audience member (Lee McKnight) directly challenged this by announcing open source solutions for bringing these technologies to indigenous communities in the Amazon, creating an unexpected disagreement about technological accessibility.

Topics

Infrastructure | Development

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion showed relatively low levels of fundamental disagreement, with most speakers aligned on core goals of digital inclusion and community-centered approaches. Main disagreements centered on optimism levels about technological solutions and the scope of digital divide challenges.

Disagreement level

Low to moderate disagreement level. Speakers generally agreed on problems and goals but differed on emphasis, approaches, and outlook. The disagreements were more about perspective and prioritization rather than fundamental opposition, which suggests productive potential for collaborative solutions despite different viewpoints on implementation strategies.

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers acknowledge that while LEO satellites offer connectivity solutions for remote areas, they simultaneously create new challenges around pricing, regulation, data sovereignty, and national security that need to be addressed

Speakers

– Christopher Locke
– Leon Cristian

Arguments

Low Earth Orbit satellites can bridge remote communities but face sustainability challenges due to pricing instability and regulatory issues

New technologies like LEO satellites create problems related to data sovereignty, spectrum allocation, and national security that didn’t exist before

Topics

Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Both speakers recognize that the digital divide has evolved beyond basic connectivity to include the infrastructure and capacity needed for advanced technologies, creating multiple layers of digital exclusion

Speakers

– Onica Makwakwa
– Leon Cristian

Arguments

Countries face double digital divide – lacking both meaningful connectivity and infrastructure to power advanced technologies

The digital divide now includes not just connectivity but capacity to run AI, quantum computation, and blockchain technologies

Topics

Infrastructure | Development

Both speakers advocate for moving away from traditional profit-centric business models toward more innovative, community-centered approaches that address affordability through structural changes rather than financing schemes

Speakers

– Christopher Locke
– Onica Makwakwa

Arguments

Multiple business models beyond profit-centric telco models are needed, including co-op models for sustainable community networks

Focus should shift from device financing schemes to actually lowering initial device costs through local assembly and right to repair

Topics

Economic | Development

Key takeaways

Connectivity should be treated as a fundamental right, not a privilege, and embedded in development policies and human rights frameworks

The digital divide is becoming increasingly complex, extending beyond basic connectivity to include capacity for advanced technologies like AI and quantum computing

Community networks are viable alternatives to traditional telco models but require sustainable business models, not continuous grant dependency

Current measurement standards for connectivity are inadequate – meaningful connectivity requires daily access with minimum 4G speeds, not the current standard of internet use once every three months

Device affordability remains a critical barrier, with people spending 20-60% of household income on devices, exacerbated by 20-45% taxation rates

Universal Service and Access Funds are underutilized and lack transparency, with less than four out of 27 African countries being transparent about their use

Regulatory frameworks must enable community-centered initiatives through affordable spectrum licensing and support for diverse business models

Multi-stakeholder approaches involving government, private sector, civil society, and local communities are essential for sustainable solutions

Social impact measurement and integration with social entrepreneurship are critical for demonstrating value beyond simple connectivity metrics

Resolutions and action items

Advocate collectively for policy incentives including access to universal service funds for multi-stakeholder projects

Collaborate to share disaggregated data on coverage gaps, affordability, and digital use to guide investment decisions

Develop local digital ecosystems by incubating local startups and encouraging device repair networks

Reform universal service and access funds to address demand-side issues like digital skills and affordable devices

Create enabling regulatory environments that support community networks through flexible spectrum access and license fee exemptions

Integrate digital inclusion in broader economic and social policies linking connectivity with digital literacy and local content

Establish public reporting requirements for universal service fund utilization and impact

Support development of local assembly and right to repair initiatives to reduce device costs

Unresolved issues

How to address regulatory power imbalances between states and big tech companies, particularly when companies like Starlink operate without local permissions

Specific mechanisms for ensuring long-term sustainability of community networks beyond initial grant funding

How to balance investment in infrastructure with necessary investments in rights protection mechanisms

Concrete strategies for reducing device costs beyond taxation reform, particularly achieving the promised affordable devices

How to address the emerging ‘double digital divide’ where countries lack both connectivity and infrastructure for advanced technologies

Specific metrics and standards for measuring meaningful connectivity impact across different contexts and communities

How to scale successful community network models like Kenya’s approach to other countries with different regulatory environments

Addressing the governance challenges in international crisis contexts where cooperation models are disappearing

Suggested compromises

Adopt multiple business models for connectivity including co-op models and community-centered approaches rather than relying solely on profit-centric telco models

Balance market-based solutions with public investment and public-private partnerships that include greater community participation

Use spectrum licensing as a development tool rather than primarily as government revenue generation

Combine infrastructure investment with capacity building in business training alongside technical training for community networks

Integrate device financing schemes with efforts to reduce initial device costs through local assembly and repair networks

Develop context-informed and people-focused solutions that adapt to specific country and regional needs rather than one-size-fits-all approaches

We’re still in the very early stages of Leo Internet. And not only is the price initially expensive, but also we’re increasingly seeing that as the networks become clogged, the prices sometimes are quite dynamic based on demand… in some African cities with Starlink, where they’re pretty much booked out.

Speaker

Christopher Locke

Reason

This comment was insightful because it challenged the common assumption that new technologies like LEO satellites are straightforward solutions to connectivity gaps. Locke introduced the complexity of dynamic pricing and capacity constraints that aren’t often discussed in connectivity debates.

Impact

This shifted the conversation from viewing LEO satellites as a panacea to understanding them as part of a complex ecosystem with their own limitations. It set the stage for discussing sustainability challenges and prepared the ground for later discussions about regulatory frameworks needed to manage these new technologies.

We need to stop having poor policies for poor people. You know, poor phones for poor people… There’s a big difference between you can afford a phone over three months and you can afford a phone now.

Speaker

Onica Makwakwa

Reason

This was a powerful reframing that challenged the entire approach to digital inclusion. Instead of accepting substandard solutions for underserved populations, Makwakwa argued for raising standards and addressing root causes of affordability rather than just financing schemes.

Impact

This comment fundamentally shifted the discussion from incremental improvements to systemic change. It influenced subsequent speakers to think more critically about business models and policy approaches, moving beyond technical solutions to address equity and dignity in connectivity provision.

Starlink is operating in my country without permission… they said, I don’t need that, I don’t need to put an office in your country. I can operate and I can provide my services even if I don’t fulfill all their requirements.

Speaker

Leon Cristian

Reason

This concrete example exposed the power imbalances between global tech companies and national governments, particularly in the Global South. It illustrated how technological solutions can undermine sovereignty and regulatory frameworks.

Impact

This comment introduced a critical dimension to the discussion – the tension between connectivity solutions and national sovereignty. It deepened the conversation by showing how the digital divide isn’t just about access, but about who controls that access and under what terms.

I have been in one engagement with one government on the African continent where we are discussing digital inclusion for underserved communities and the feedback was from one member of parliament that look, do you really think my grandmother needs a smartphone?

Speaker

Thobekile Matimbe

Reason

This anecdote powerfully illustrated the fundamental disconnect between policymakers and the reality of digital inclusion needs. It revealed how basic assumptions about who deserves connectivity access still need to be challenged at the highest levels of government.

Impact

This comment brought the discussion back to ground-level realities and highlighted that technical and policy solutions mean nothing without political will and understanding. It emphasized the need for advocacy and education at the political level, not just technical implementation.

Now the digital divide is not only about having or not meaningful connectivity, it’s also about having enough capacity to run AI’s, quantum computation, blockchains, cryptos… So there is another connectivity divide, there is another digital divide that is happening right now.

Speaker

Leon Cristian

Reason

This observation was profound because it revealed how the digital divide is not static but evolving and potentially widening. While efforts focus on basic connectivity, new technological requirements are creating additional layers of exclusion.

Impact

This comment expanded the scope of the entire discussion, forcing participants to think beyond current connectivity challenges to future technological requirements. It added urgency to the conversation and highlighted the risk of countries falling further behind even as they work to address current gaps.

We need to understand there are many business models to providing connectivity… Mimicking a small version of being a telco isn’t the way to build a sustainable community network. There are co-op models, there are many other models that allow us to develop that.

Speaker

Christopher Locke

Reason

This insight challenged conventional thinking about how connectivity services should be structured and funded. It opened up possibilities for community-centered approaches that don’t rely on traditional profit-driven models.

Impact

This comment redirected the conversation toward innovative governance and business models, influencing other speakers to discuss community ownership, social enterprises, and alternative sustainability approaches. It helped frame community networks as fundamentally different from commercial operations.

Overall assessment

These key comments collectively transformed what could have been a technical discussion about connectivity solutions into a nuanced examination of power, equity, and systemic change. The speakers didn’t just present problems and solutions, but challenged fundamental assumptions about how digital inclusion should be approached. Cristian’s observations about regulatory power imbalances and evolving digital divides added critical complexity, while Makwakwa’s call to stop accepting substandard solutions for poor communities reframed the entire equity discussion. Locke’s insights about LEO satellite limitations and alternative business models grounded the conversation in practical realities while opening up new possibilities. Matimbe’s anecdote about political resistance brought the discussion back to the human and political dimensions that often determine success or failure of technical solutions. Together, these comments elevated the discussion from a typical policy panel to a critical examination of how power, technology, and equity intersect in the digital inclusion space.

How can we evaluate the impact of community networks and what specific metrics should be used to measure meaningful connectivity beyond basic access?

Speaker

Nnenna Paul-Ugochukwu

Explanation

This is crucial for demonstrating the value of community networks to governments and funders, and for moving beyond simple connectivity statistics to measure transformative impact on communities

What are the specific business training components needed alongside technology training for sustainable community networks?

Speaker

Christopher Locke

Explanation

Understanding the business model aspects is essential for creating self-sustaining community networks that don’t require continuous grant funding

How can universal service and access funds be reformed to be more effective and transparent in supporting last-mile connectivity?

Speaker

Onica Makwakwa

Explanation

Current universal service funds are underutilized and lack transparency, representing a significant missed opportunity for bridging connectivity gaps

What specific policy incentives and regulatory frameworks are needed to support community networks and alternative connectivity models?

Speaker

Multiple speakers (Christopher Locke, Onica Makwakwa, Thobekile Matimbe)

Explanation

Regulatory barriers are preventing community networks from scaling and becoming sustainable, requiring specific policy reforms

How can device affordability be addressed through local assembly, taxation reform, and right-to-repair initiatives?

Speaker

Onica Makwakwa

Explanation

Device costs remain a major barrier to access, and current approaches focusing on financing rather than reducing actual costs are insufficient

How can countries in the Global South address the emerging ‘double digital divide’ related to AI, quantum computing, and advanced technologies?

Speaker

Leon Cristian

Explanation

A new layer of digital divide is emerging where countries lack the infrastructure and computing capacity to access advanced technologies

How can accountability mechanisms be established for large tech companies operating in countries without local presence or compliance with national requirements?

Speaker

Leon Cristian

Explanation

Power imbalances between states and big tech companies are creating governance challenges, as illustrated by Starlink operating in Bolivia without permission

What are the best practices for integrating community-centered connectivity initiatives with social entrepreneurship and social enterprise development?

Speaker

Lisa Dakanay

Explanation

Understanding how to combine connectivity initiatives with social entrepreneurship could improve sustainability and social impact

How can we develop better data collection methods that are disaggregated by gender, income levels, and other demographic factors?

Speaker

Onica Makwakwa

Explanation

Current data collection relies on national averages that mask inequalities and prevent targeted interventions for excluded populations

What are the sustainability models for community networks beyond the initial grant funding phase?

Speaker

Bara Kotieno

Explanation

While community networks can be established with seed funding, long-term sustainability remains a challenge that needs to be addressed

How can open source technologies and edge computing be leveraged to make advanced technologies accessible in remote and underserved areas?

Speaker

Lee McKnight

Explanation

Exploring alternatives to centralized, expensive technology infrastructure could democratize access to advanced digital tools

What social impact assessment methodologies should be adopted to measure the broader effects of community networks on health, education, and economic development?

Speaker

Christopher Locke

Explanation

Better measurement tools are needed to demonstrate the full value of community networks beyond simple connectivity metrics

Summary

This discussion was a 20th anniversary reunion of the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG), celebrating the group’s contributions to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) process and examining the current state of internet governance. The session was organized into three segments: the nature of internet governance, the relationship between multilateral and multistakeholder approaches, and the future of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF).

Participants emphasized that WGIG played a crucial role in legitimizing multistakeholder cooperation within the United Nations system, demonstrating that diverse stakeholders could work together effectively on complex technical and policy issues. The group developed a broad definition of internet governance that has stood the test of time, encompassing not just technical infrastructure but also the broader use of the internet and related policy issues. Several speakers shared anecdotes about how the process fostered unprecedented collaboration between stakeholders who had previously been antagonistic, such as government representatives, civil society, business, and technical communities.

The discussion revealed that the false dichotomy between multilateral and multistakeholder approaches has evolved, with recognition that both models must coexist and complement each other. Participants noted that while the IGF has successfully served as a global forum for dialogue and capacity building, it faces challenges including limited bottom-up participation, difficulty addressing controversial topics, and questions about its long-term sustainability and funding.

Looking forward, speakers identified the need for the IGF to mature in handling contentious issues, improve its methodology for generating meaningful outcomes, and potentially establish a new working group to address the relationship between internet governance, data governance, AI governance, and broader digital governance challenges. The discussion concluded with recognition that despite the passage of 20 years, the fundamental principles and collaborative spirit established by WGIG remain relevant and necessary for addressing contemporary digital governance challenges.

Keypoints

## Overall Purpose/Goal

This discussion was a 20th anniversary reunion of the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG), bringing together original members to reflect on their impact, assess the current state of internet governance, and discuss the future of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). The session aimed to evaluate whether the multi-stakeholder approach they pioneered has lived up to expectations and what changes might be needed going forward.

## Major Discussion Points

– **WGIG’s Historical Impact and Methodology**: Participants reflected on how WGIG successfully demonstrated multi-stakeholder cooperation within the UN system, created the first comprehensive definition of internet governance, and established innovative processes like public consultations and transparent documentation. The methodology of allowing diverse viewpoints while finding workable compromises was highlighted as a key achievement.

– **Multi-stakeholder vs. Multilateral Governance Models**: A central debate focused on whether these two approaches should be seen as competing or complementary. Speakers argued against treating this as a false dichotomy, emphasizing that both models need to coexist and work together, with the Tunis compromise representing a successful marriage of both approaches under the UN umbrella.

– **IGF’s Evolution and Current Challenges**: Discussion covered whether the IGF has fulfilled its original mandate as a forum for open dialogue. While praised for capacity building and providing a neutral space for discussion, concerns were raised about its limited decision-making power, funding sustainability, and whether it has become too insular or controlled from the top-down rather than truly bottom-up.

– **Contemporary Governance Challenges**: Participants grappled with how internet governance has evolved to encompass AI governance, data governance, and digital rights issues. There was debate about whether the IGF is mature enough to handle controversial topics and whether the original broad definition of internet governance remains relevant for today’s challenges.

– **Future Directions and Institutional Reform**: The conversation explored whether a new WGIG-style working group might be needed to address current governance gaps, how to better engage governments and decision-makers, and whether the IGF’s mandate needs updating to remain relevant in the current digital landscape.

## Overall Tone

The discussion began with a celebratory, nostalgic tone as participants shared anecdotes and reflected positively on their collaborative achievements 20 years ago. However, the tone gradually became more critical and forward-looking, with speakers raising challenging questions about current limitations and future needs. While maintaining collegiality and mutual respect, participants weren’t afraid to voice controversies and disagreements, particularly around issues of bottom-up governance, the role of governments, and whether current multi-stakeholder models are sufficient for today’s challenges. The session ended on a pragmatic note, acknowledging both successes and the need for continued evolution.

Speakers

**Speakers from the provided list:**

– **Markus Kummer** – Session moderator/chair, former diplomatic service of Switzerland, celebrating 20-year anniversary of Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG)

– **William J. Drake** – WGIG member, session organizer, edited books on WGIG in 2005 and 2015

– **Ayesha Hassan** – Former WGIG member representing ICC (International Chamber of Commerce)/global business community

– **Raul Echeberria** – Former WGIG member representing technical community

– **Wolfgang Kleinwachter** – Former WGIG member representing civil society and academic community

– **Avri Doria** – Former WGIG member, came in as a techie, past MAG member and MAG chair

– **Jovan Kurbalija** – Former WGIG member, Executive Director of the UN High-Level Panel, author of “Introduction to Internet Governance”

– **Alejandro Pisanty** – Former WGIG member, participating remotely from Mexico City

– **Carlos Afonso** – Former WGIG member, participating remotely from Rio

– **Baher Esmat** – Works for ICANN, participating remotely

– **Vittorio Bertola** – Former youngest member of WGIG, described as least diplomatic member

– **Charles Shaban** – Remote moderation coordinator, intellectual property practitioner

– **Bertrand de la Chapelle** – Executive Director of the Internet and Jurisdiction Policy Network

– **Ariette Esterhuisen** – Past MAG member and past MAG chair

– **Israel Rosas** – Internet Society representative

– **Jimson Olufuye** – Africa ICT Alliance

– **Hadi Alminyawi** –

– **Sébastien Bachelet** – Isaac Frantz and Uralo representative

– **Participant** – Government representative (specific identity not disclosed)

– **Audience** – Nandini from IT4Change India, part of Civil Society Coalition Global Digital Justice Forum

**Additional speakers:**

– **Shaima Akhtar** – Chairperson, Bangladesh Women IGF (participated via online question)

# 20th Anniversary Reunion of the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG): A Comprehensive Assessment of Past Achievements and Future Challenges

## Executive Summary

This discussion marked the 20th anniversary reunion of the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG), bringing together original members to reflect on their groundbreaking contributions to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) process and examine the current state of internet governance. The session, moderated by Markus Kummer and organised by William J. Drake, opened with a lighthearted moment when Kummer shared that he had asked AI “does WGIG matter?” and received an affirmative response highlighting WGIG’s lasting contributions to multistakeholder governance.

Despite technical difficulties that set an informal, reunion-like atmosphere, the discussion evolved into a substantive examination of three key themes: the nature and enduring relevance of internet governance, the relationship between multilateral and multistakeholder approaches, and the future of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). The conversation balanced celebration of WGIG’s achievements with frank assessment of contemporary challenges, revealing both pride in past accomplishments and concern about current governance limitations.

## Historical Impact and Methodology of WGIG

### Foundational Achievements

William J. Drake outlined seven ways that WGIG made a lasting impact, which participants consistently endorsed throughout the discussion. These contributions included demonstrating that multistakeholder cooperation could work effectively within the UN system, helping facilitate WSIS negotiations by systematically mapping issues and positions, promoting broader public engagement through innovative consultation processes, demystifying internet governance by establishing that governance does not mean government control, developing a working definition of internet governance that has proven remarkably durable, proposing the creation of the IGF as a forum for continued dialogue without negotiation pressure, and creating methodological innovations for consensus-building.

Markus Kummer emphasised that the WGIG report found its way into the final WSIS outcome and significantly impacted the process. Raul Echeberria noted that WGIG strengthened the concept of multistakeholderism and consolidated the idea that participation from all stakeholders is crucial, sharing an anecdote about how discussions of root server A brought together diverse perspectives. Wolfgang Kleinwächter highlighted how WGIG created a unique culture of collaboration where every stakeholder brought different expertise to the table, transforming previously antagonistic relationships into productive cooperation.

### Methodological Innovation and the Role of Frank March

A particularly poignant aspect of the discussion focused on WGIG’s innovative methodology and the crucial role of Frank March, the secretary who has since passed away. Avri Doria provided detailed insights about March’s approach, describing how he would write while listening and incorporating real-time feedback from participants. She explained: “Frank March wrote while listening. And he would write and then he would read back what he wrote and people would say, no, that’s not what I meant. And he would change it. And he would read it back again.”

This methodological innovation proved particularly significant when contrasted with current governance processes. Jovan Kurbalija observed that contemporary processes often suffer from what he termed a “governance Bermuda Triangle” where stakeholder contributions disappear without clear traceability to final documents. This observation sparked broader reflection on how governance processes have evolved away from the transparent, participatory model that made WGIG successful.

## Evolution and Enduring Relevance of Internet Governance Definition

### Definitional Durability and Universal Applicability

There was remarkable consensus among participants that WGIG’s definition of internet governance has stood the test of time and remains applicable to contemporary challenges. Wolfgang Kleinwächter provided detailed analysis of the definition’s three key elements: multistakeholder approaches (involving all stakeholders in their respective roles), collaborative approaches (working together), and holistic approaches (covering all relevant issues). He argued that these elements make the definition universal and applicable to emerging governance challenges including AI governance.

Ayesha Hassan noted that the definition has adapted to new technologies, sharing an anecdote about how even Cuba and global business representatives found common ground in supporting the multistakeholder approach. Carlos Afonso reinforced the definition’s enduring relevance by noting that the WGIG report identified key public policy areas and fundamental issues that remain valid today.

### Contemporary Applications and Conceptual Clarity

The discussion revealed how internet governance has naturally expanded to encompass new technologies while maintaining its core framework. However, this expansion also raised questions about conceptual clarity. William J. Drake suggested the need for new work to address the relationship between internet governance, data governance, AI governance, and broader digital governance to reduce conceptual confusion and provide clearer guidance for policy-makers.

## Multistakeholder versus Multilateral Governance Models

### Moving Beyond False Dichotomies

One of the most significant areas of discussion concerned the relationship between multistakeholder and multilateral governance approaches. There was strong consensus that treating these as competing models represents a false dichotomy, with multiple speakers arguing that both approaches must coexist and complement each other.

Avri Doria emphasised that both models must work together rather than in opposition, while Markus Kummer noted that multilateralism protects smaller countries and should not exclude multistakeholderism. Jimson Olufuye added that multistakeholderism helps governments fulfil their responsibilities to citizens rather than taking over government work.

### Provocative Perspectives and Real-World Tensions

However, Alejandro Pisanty provided a more provocative view, arguing that all internet governance problems are better solved by multistakeholder mechanisms and suggesting that countries pushing for multilateral approaches are also pushing against internet freedom. He framed this as an “acid test” that challenged the diplomatic tendency to treat both approaches as equally valid.

Charles Shaban emphasised the need to find ways for multilateral and multistakeholder mechanisms to work together effectively, suggesting that the challenge lies not in choosing between models but in designing effective interfaces between them.

## Assessment of the Internet Governance Forum

### Achievements and Evolution

The discussion of the IGF revealed both appreciation for its achievements and frank acknowledgement of its limitations. Baher Esmat highlighted the IGF’s role as the primary global multistakeholder forum providing space for open discussion and capacity building, noting that it has continuously evolved in topics and outcomes while maintaining its non-decision-making nature as a strength.

Jovan Kurbalija praised the IGF’s value for capacity building and creating incremental development of new methodologies. Raul Echeberria noted the IGF’s evolution, mentioning how the 2013 IGF he organized addressed surveillance issues that became highly relevant. These positive assessments emphasised the IGF’s success in creating a neutral space for dialogue and its role in developing governance capacity globally.

### Critical Assessments and Uncomfortable Truths

However, the discussion also featured sharp critiques of the IGF’s performance and limitations. Vittorio Bertola, identified as the former youngest member of WGIG, provided perhaps the most damning assessment, arguing that the IGF failed to address economic and social questions due to lack of enforcement mechanisms against private sector actors. He observed: “the people that could make money out of breaking down the internet and turning it into walled gardens, they just went on and made money. And nobody could stop them because we had no stick.”

Most strikingly, Bertola cited a UK survey showing that half of young people believe they would be better off if the internet didn’t exist, serving as a devastating indictment of how far the internet has diverged from its original promise.

Avri Doria challenged one of the IGF’s core mythologies by stating bluntly: “Any notion we have that IGF has bottomed up is something that we should quit pretending. It is not. It hasn’t been.” This critique of the IGF’s democratic legitimacy sparked discussion about the gap between rhetoric and reality in multistakeholder governance.

### Capacity for Controversial Topics

A significant portion of the IGF discussion focused on its capacity to handle controversial topics. Jovan Kurbalija argued that enhanced cooperation should be brought as a track on the first day of IGF, questioning why such topics are avoided. Alejandro Pisanty contended that the IGF is mature enough to handle controversial issues but that some stakeholders are not ready for such discussions.

## Contemporary Challenges and Future Directions

### Institutional Reform Needs

The discussion revealed growing recognition that significant institutional reforms may be necessary to address contemporary digital governance challenges. William J. Drake suggested the need for new work to address the relationship between different forms of digital governance. Bertrand de la Chapelle proposed a new multistakeholder working group to address the IGF’s future after the WSIS+20 process.

Jovan Kurbalija presented three key questions for the IGF’s future: whether it should continue as a discussion forum or gain decision-making capacity, how to improve national and regional IGF processes, and how to ensure financial sustainability. He also suggested revisiting the Tunis compromise formula that balanced multistakeholder participation with the UN umbrella.

### Addressing Democratic Deficits and Inclusion

A recurring theme throughout the discussion was concern about democratic deficits in current governance processes. Nandini from IT4Change India raised concerns about digital governance issues being moved to closed-door trade negotiations, undermining democratic governance.

Charles Shaban emphasised the need for intersectional and rights-based approaches to digital governance centring marginalised communities, while Shaima Akhtar asked whether governance frameworks should evolve to be more inclusive of women, youth, and marginalised communities.

### Technical Innovation in Governance Processes

The discussion highlighted potential for innovation in governance processes themselves. Jovan Kurbalija noted that AI tools could now help trace contributions to final documents, though he emphasised that human approaches remain preferable. This observation highlighted how technological advances might support more transparent and participatory governance processes, potentially addressing the “governance Bermuda Triangle” problem he identified.

## Unresolved Tensions and Future Challenges

### Enforcement versus Dialogue

One of the most significant unresolved issues was how to balance multistakeholder governance with the need for enforcement mechanisms against powerful private sector actors. Bertola’s observation that governance without enforcement mechanisms allowed harmful actors to fragment the internet into commercial silos highlighted a fundamental challenge that remains unaddressed.

### Democratic Legitimacy and Genuine Participation

Despite broad agreement on many issues, the discussion revealed significant disagreements about the IGF’s democratic legitimacy and bottom-up nature. The tension between multistakeholder rhetoric and reality emerged as a critical concern requiring attention.

### Scope and Effectiveness

Participants disagreed about the IGF’s effectiveness in addressing broader internet governance issues beyond technical coordination. This disagreement reflected fundamental tensions about the appropriate scope and ambition of internet governance institutions, and whether dialogue-focused forums can be effective in addressing structural economic and social problems.

## Conclusion: Legacy and Future Prospects

The 20th anniversary reunion of WGIG demonstrated both the enduring relevance of the group’s achievements and the significant challenges facing contemporary internet governance. The informal, reunion-like atmosphere, punctuated by technical difficulties and fond memories of Frank March, provided an appropriate setting for both celebration and critical self-reflection.

The discussion revealed that WGIG’s core contributions—legitimising multistakeholder cooperation within the UN system, developing a durable and universal definition of internet governance, and creating innovative consensus-building methodologies—remain valuable and applicable to current challenges. The definition’s three elements of multistakeholder, collaborative, and holistic approaches have proven remarkably adaptable to new technologies and governance challenges.

However, the conversation also revealed significant tensions and unresolved issues. The gap between multistakeholder rhetoric and reality, the challenge of addressing economic and social problems without enforcement mechanisms, and questions about democratic legitimacy and genuine participation all emerged as critical concerns. Perhaps most sobering was the recognition that despite technical successes in internet governance, broader social outcomes may not have lived up to the original promise of the internet.

The frank and sometimes uncomfortable nature of the discussion—exemplified by Bertola’s harsh assessments and Doria’s challenge to IGF mythology—demonstrated the intellectual maturity of the internet governance community and its willingness to confront difficult truths. This honest assessment, balanced with recognition of genuine achievements, provides a solid foundation for addressing the significant challenges that lie ahead.

The session ultimately affirmed that while WGIG’s foundational work remains relevant, new approaches and potentially new institutions may be needed to address contemporary challenges effectively. The collaborative spirit and methodological innovations that made WGIG successful—particularly the transparent, participatory approach exemplified by Frank March’s real-time writing and feedback process—offer valuable lessons for future governance efforts in an increasingly complex and contested digital landscape.

Markus Kummer: I don’t understand, he gives me signs. Look at all those people, with that many people, they probably have enough time for a sentence each. Yeah, no, we can’t see that, we have to turn around. You guys are sitting in the right place, because those are too far away. I cannot touch the Zoom. Okay. Can you hear me? Yes. I can still hear music in my… Okay, good morning everyone. It’s all a bit complicated here, we have to put our headsets on, and we are on channel 4. 5. Oh, sorry, channel 5. Yes, we are in room 5. Anyway, welcome everyone. And to the technician, can you stop the background music, please? I don’t know what’s… Background music is on 4. Got it? Okay, I was on the wrong channel. Well, it’s very complicated, yes. And we’re not young people anymore, we’re celebrating the 20-year anniversary of the Working Group on Internet Governance. And whatever you say, you can hear it because the microphones are on permanently, so if you have any side conversations, we can hear it. Anyway, it’s a great pleasure to have you all here. So it’s a class reunion to celebrate the 20th anniversary. We’re all still walking, we’re not in a wheelchair yet. And as somebody said, maybe… We have to ask for a doctor to be in the room just in case. Be that as it may, I took the liberty of using my AI assistant I have on my phone to ask, does WGIG matter? And I say, it’s a difficult question, and the answers are yes and no. But in conclusion, it says that WGIG plays a role in the development and promotion of internet governance and may have less impact than some would have desired. This is sort of a kind of wishy-washy intelligence, I would have thought. We were part of the process. We actually thought we had a tremendous impact. It was a bit of a game changer in the WSIS process, which before was very much government only, and we really opened the doors to a multi-stakeholder participation. And we thought, OK, let’s look back a bit and also look forward a bit. And we decided to have it in three segments. And when I say we, it was mainly Bill who put it together. Have one segment on the nature of internet governance, one segment on multi-stakeholder and multilateral, which is seen by some as an antagonistic situation, and then the last segment, the IGF, looking forward to the future of the IGF. Does the IGF live up to expectation? What should change? What not? And with that, I hand over to Bill, who provides some framing of the session. Please, Bill.

William J. Drake: OK. Thank you very much, Marcus, and hello, everybody. I’m going to take my headphones off so I don’t hear myself. Well, I thank you all for coming, first of all, because there’s a lot going on at the same time. We’re here not because we think that the WGIG report that was put out was a source of Talmudic wisdom for the ages, that we solved all the problems of the universe or anything like that. It was a negotiated document under very intense conditions, et cetera. However, there was. a lot of impact, I think, on the process, and that it’s been lasting, and I think it’s worth taking note of that, since this is the 20th anniversary of the WSIS, how could we not talk about the 20th anniversary of the WGIG, which played an important role in bringing the WSIS to a successful conclusion. So that’s why I thought it would be useful to get the band back together again and do this. So I’m just going to make a few points about the impact of the WSIS, and that’s based in part on, we did two books together, aside from the reports that were put out, members of the group got together and contributed chapters to two books that I edited, one in 2005 and the other in 2015 on the 10th anniversary, and in those books I had chapters about why WGIG mattered, and I’m going to kind of just run through a couple of points to try to level set us to get everybody on the same page, because frankly at this point, I don’t know how many people even remember the WGIG. I talked to people at the party last night, and a lot of people were like, you know, I come to IGF, I don’t really know where the IGF came from, I don’t know what, you know, I mean a lot of this history has just gone dark as we’ve all gotten older and new people have cycled in, et cetera. So I think it’s good to try to level set us by getting us on the same page and say, what was this thing, et cetera. So I’m just going to make three points about the procedural and institutional contributions, and then a couple of points about the substantive contributions, and then we’ll go to inclusive discussion with all the people that are here as well as the ones who are online. So I would start by saying that the WGIG demonstrated the benefits of multistakeholder cooperation in the United Nations in a way that really hadn’t been seen before in the Internet governance space for those who are old and were around during the WSIS process. You may remember in the early stages of the process, stakeholders were being locked out of rooms, thrown out of rooms, told not to speak. The whole thing was a kind of a mess. For a long time, it took a while for the whole multistakeholder thing, ethos, to start to kick in. The WGIG contributed, I think, substantially to legitimating that and showing that, in fact, multistakeholder collaboration could be effective, problem-solving, and that indeed stakeholders could make real contributions to the kind of procedural and substantive learning that everybody was doing as we came together and groped towards some shared of things. Secondly, I’d say that the WCIS, the WGIG facilitated the WCIS negotiations. For those of you, again, who are around, you might remember that for the first couple of years in the Geneva cycle, people were saying the conversations all over the place, we don’t know what’s going on, it’s not cumulative, we’re going nowhere, etc., etc. The WGIG actually did a kind of systematic mapping and brought order to the discussion, worked through issues in a kind of structured and deliberate and methodical basis that kind of laid out the main issues at stake in a way that everybody could understand. The WGIG promoted public engagement. We did a lot of innovative things that now we take for granted, but back then were new in terms of having public comments, having open transparent processes, having everything on the web, having simultaneous translation in the sessions, etc., etc. All of that stuff that IGF now does, back then it was all new in the United Nations context. In terms of substantive contributions, the WGIG played a major role, I think, in demystifying the nature and scope of Internet governance. There was a lot of debate, you might remember back then, about is there such a thing as Internet governance, does the term even make sense, or else you had people who said, well, if there is Internet governance, it just meant what ICANN does, or it just means what intergovernmental agencies like the ITU should be doing, etc. And we were able to sort of work through this concept and sort of demonstrate that governance does not mean government, right? That we needed a holistic, broad approach to Internet governance that took into account not just the underlying infrastructure, but also the use of the Internet and the rule systems that apply to privacy, digital trade, intellectual property, and so on, on transactions going over the Internet, etc. We developed a working definition, which was drawn from the political science literature on international regimes as it happens, that set out who does Internet governance, what does Internet governance consist of, and where is it done, etc. All that was important. And we kind of took the attention off the whole debate that was going on at the time about how the ITU might take over ICANN and so on. In fact, we kind of de-centered the ITU and that controversy completely by taking this broad kind of approach, which I think was good. Fifth, we began the holistic analysis of a broad range of issues. In light of that broad definition, we mapped out all the different issues that are part of the Internet governance ecosystem and galaxy and clustered them and made them a little bit more tractable in terms of discussions. We had a process where colleagues put out different visions for oversight of Internet governance of critical Internet resources. This is the first chance for people to put forward alternatives to the ITU as an intergovernmental solution. Various government members came up with proposals for a global Internet council, an intergovernmental global Internet policy council, all kinds of new types of things. None of these were agreed as a group, but they were simply listed for people’s information and that helped shape the discussion going forward about enhanced cooperation and things like that. So that was, I think, probably useful in advancing the discussion. And of course, most importantly from the standpoint of this group, the WGIG proposed the creation of an Internet governance forum to continue the dialogue, to help to solve the deadlocks that were occurring around Internet governance to say, let’s have a permanent space attached to the United Nations where we can continue to have open discussion without the pressure of negotiating outcomes and so on. So those were seven ways in which the WGIG, I think, made a meaningful, impactful contribution to the conclusion of the WSIS process, but also helped laid the foundation for everything that’s gone on in the years subsequent. So that’s just a little background to refresh us for those who haven’t thought about the WGIG in 20 years. And now what we’re going to do is go through three forward-looking questions. I think it’s important to think about how we can do that. I think it’s important to think about how we can do that. I think it’s important to think about how we can do that. I’m also asking colleagues to think about how we think about some of the contemporary problems from the perspective of what we did together 20 years ago. So, thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you, Bill, and at a more basic level, I would say the WGIC report found its way into the final outcome of the WSIS, which was a very, very good report. I think it was a very good report, and I think a significant impact of the WGIC that we actually managed to feed into the process, and also, for those who attended the summits, there was a significant difference between the Geneva phase and the Tunis phase. The Tunis phase was by far more open in terms of procedure. The Tunis phase was more open in terms of procedure. The WGIC report was more open in terms of procedure. There was a discussion group and some government said, hey, this guy is not government. He needs to be taken out. Whereas, in Tunis, their ICANN community was present, the chair of ICANN was sometimes, or the CEO was sometimes asked for his comments or opinion on some of the items, and that was also an implementation of political science and the way in which those groups were discussed. And were we present. You will, and I have three members of the old WGIC group listed as contributors, but others feel free to chime in, and we will also open to the other participants to come in after the first segment, but we will invite Tita for us to come in after the cursor section has opened up a little bit. Here are three members of the old WGIC group listed as contributors, so to speak. You were a representative of ICC and people listened to what you had to say. Over to you, Aisha.

Ayesha Hassan: Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you. I think it has come a long way, but I think that the definition has stood the test of time. I think it’s still valid. I think that it has been nicely shaped so that it has adapted. In terms of the nature of Internet governance today, I think that it has expanded in the sense that many emerging countries are using the Internet as a means of communication. I think that it has also expanded in the sense that many of the issues that we are talking about now, in terms of Internet governance, whether it’s AI governance or other technologies, so I think that the discussion that we started 20 years ago is now at a place where we want to keep looking to having adaptable ways to address these issues, and one of the things that I think is really important is the idea of partnerships, and the idea of cooperating and discussing things across the stakeholder groups, which really didn’t exist before, and I just want to take a moment to share one little anecdote. At the time I was global business, and at one point our esteemed chairman, Nitin Desai, laughed and he said, oh my god, do I hear Cuba and global business agreeing? And here’s my comrade next to me today. Yes, we learned to talk to each other, and I think that that has lasted over the years and been fostered by the IGF itself, giving everybody an opportunity to talk with people that they may not have the chance to have a coffee and truly exchange with. And I purposely am emphasizing this because that is an asset, and I think that’s part of what the WGIG started and the IGF has continued to foster. So I’ll stop with that at this point.

Markus Kummer: Thank you, Aisha, for that, and I think anecdotes are always good to enliven the debate a bit or the discussion, and it’s great history. Raul, can you come in?

Raul Echeberria: Yes, thank you very much, Marcus. It’s very nice to be here with all of you today, 20 years later. I don’t know why the rest of the people look 20 years older, not myself. I don’t know what happened with the rest of the people. WGIG was a really innovative experience, an innovative way to address the difficulties that have presented during the first phase of the summit. As Marcus said, it was very different. The first and the second phases of the summit were very different. It was an achievement itself. The WGIG, as Aisha also pointed out, all of us learned about how to work better with other stakeholders. And it was very helpful to have an informal discussion in Tunis. I remember also… bringing an anecdote that there were a lot of discussions in the wiki about who managed the root server A and some of us were trying to explain to the rest of to other people that the root server A was not important. That’s so I said no because why you question what we are our positions. No, I’m not questioning your positions What we are saying here is that the problem is not root server A. The problem is more complex. So that’s the is the the discussion the level of discussion in 2005 was very different than 2003. I think that the one of the things that one of the important outcomes of the wiki was also that we strengthen the the concept of multi-holderism and this is when we look nowadays the the organizations and the forums that are involved in in different ways on in the governance of Internet. Not all of them are pure multi-stakeholder models, but they all of them or most of them are open to the participation of all stakeholders and this is important because we consolidated the idea that the participation of all stakeholders is crucial. It’s important and it’s a very important still today and though things that sometimes we take us for granted are not. And they all the with all the political changes that we are seeing around the world. That’s the things that that we assume that that were discussions of from the past probably will come back to the table in the in the in the near future and so it is important that we continue as reinforcing that idea that the participation of all stakeholders is crucial and that we need in a very changing world. We need to be more efficient in the development of digital policies to be more efficient, to have the right policies on time is we need the participation of everybody from the inception of the processes, from the origin of the discussions. So I think those lessons that we learned 20 years ago remain very important, valid. I wouldn’t say just valid, that’s crucial for the future of the digital governance in general. Thank you very much.

Markus Kummer: Thank you, Raul. And over to Wolfgang.

Wolfgang Kleinwachter: Thank you very much. I was a member of the WIKIG on behalf of civil society and the academic community and Juan was from the government, Aisha from the business and Raul from the technical community, as demonstrates already, that there was a unique culture of collaboration by trying to promote the understanding, because I also will start with an anecdote, because originally internet governance was not an issue for the WSIS in the mandate from the UN General Assembly in 2001. So in the process of the second PREP-COM, some people raised the issue of internet and then we had an inter-sessional meeting in Paris and this was in a night meeting in the cellar and it was unclear whether non-governmental people can join this Working Group 5. Now we are in the Workshop Room 5. So it was a new Working Group 5 because we had four different working groups and there was no control on the entrance, so that means a lot of non-state actors moved into the room and then a debate started and somebody talked about IP addresses and then the ambassador from a country, I will not name the country, said, what is this an IP address? Because there was only little knowledge about governments at this time and then Paul Wilson from APNIC stepped in and explained, you know, how how IP addresses and domain names are functioning. And then the ambassador, oh, this was very helpful. Thank you very much. And I think this was the start of the mutual recognition that every stakeholder can bring a different expertise to the table. But from Paris, it was in July 2003 to December 2003, to December 2003, the understanding of the complexity was still on a low level. So that means even people did not understand what we are talking about. That’s why the Wiki got the mandate to define what internet governance is. So it had not only the mandate to work on recommendations, but also to give a definition. And I think this definition is, the discussion around this definition is really crucial. And Bill mentioned that already. When we worked on the definition, we had two options at the end of the day. And narrow definition, just to concentrate on the critical internet resources, names and numbers, or a broad definition. And confronted with the complexity of the mandate also of the WSIS, we decided in favor of the broad definition. And this is what Bill said also on who and what and how. So, and these are the three elements which are defined in these three lines of the paragraph in the Tunis agenda, which says, okay, it has to be all stakeholder has to be involved in their respective roles. I was fighting until the very last moment to add on equal footing. But Anita said, okay, respective roles include in a certain way that everybody is equal in their respective role. So, but anyhow, this was the first element. all stakeholders has to be involved, the second was sharing, sharing on norms, principles and even decision-making procedures, that is the collaborative approach, and the third part was that we differentiated between the evolution and the use of the internet, so the technical and the political layer, and this was the holistic approach. And if I take these three basic elements of the definition, the multi-stakeholder approach, the collaborative approach and the holistic approach, then I think this definition is really universal and can be used for all governance aspects which we are discussing today, 20 years later, because 20 years ago internet governance was the term that covered all the things, but since that we have seen, you know, a lot of new language appearing around governance, we have digital governance, ICT governance, cyber governance, then governance of the internet of things, IoT governance, and now we are talking about AI governance, and I’m asking myself, you know, what is the difference between AI governance and internet and the broad definition of internet governance, if you just take these three approaches. So AI governance has to be multi-stakeholder, AI governance has to be collaborative, and, you know, without a holistic approach, you will fail to find any sustainable solutions for AI, that means you have to take into consideration also in AI governance the technical elements and the public policy implications, and in so far, you know, the confusion we had 20 years ago around internet governance sometimes reappear as confusion about AI governance, but it’s rather simple, go back to what we have produced 20 years ago. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you for that, Wolfgang, and yes, we also, the Tunis agenda has a whole chapter on internet governance with some explanatory paragraphs, and they make it clear that anything related to the use and abuse of the internet is part of internet governance, and also… these applications you mentioned, AI and whatever, they rely on the internet. Without the internet, digital without the internet, it’s not just about the standalone computer, it’s about connecting the computers. But I would like to invite other WGIC members, old WGIC members, if they would like to add anything, but also open the floor to other participants if you have comments or questions. Juan, you would like to come in, please?

Participant: Yes, well, good morning. I don’t want to, I’m not going to talk about the substantial achievements of the IGF, of the WGIC, because it was just mentioned, you know, the working definition and the rest of the mandate. I want to talk about some achievement of the methodology, because to ask a group of persons, intelligent group of persons, that have different viewpoints, to agree in a very contentious subject, it seems like being crazy, you know, because, well, if you have people that have similar opinions, that’s okay, but to have 30 people with different opinions to get to the results, it is a challenge. And it was done, and I’m going to share with you how methodology, it was done, because I think it’s useful for many discussions that are being carried out now, and also it has been applied in some other forums in which I participated. The first thing is that throughout the year that we were working, we had a lot of opinions. I think Bill mentioned all that opinions, and it was all collected in a very big document, and then at the end, because we had to have a report, we were placed into a… and they throw out the key, and you don’t get out until you have a report. But we have very, very large material that will be very impossible to collate. So the first decision is that we will have two reports. We will have a big report in which all the opinions will be collected. It necessarily is not a consensus report. It’s a sort of compendium, and it was mentioned that that was being very useful because many interesting ideas were there, and then people can take it out and materialize it later, and then to concentrate in the actual report. And, of course, then we have a lot of things in which we had consensus, and we put it there. We discussed the definition, as Wolfgang just said, with some tweaks there. But in the end, there were the recommendations of the arrangements for the government. There was no consensus in the final one. And so we decided that we would try to narrow down the different proposals to the bare basics, and we finally ended with four different ones. And I think this is a contribution of this report, and it’s a methodology that can be used in some discussions that we’re going to have now, for instance, in data governance and some other, that whenever we don’t get, we don’t have to get to one final consensus because maybe that’s impossible. But if we can narrow down and put the basic alternatives as part of the final report, that is a result, because otherwise you can say, okay, we don’t have consensus, so we don’t have result, and that’s zero. And so I think that this opens the way. to very contentious issues that it’s been discussed today to open the way to have results that could be actionable and that can really contribute. So I think Marcus and Bill and my colleagues, I think that that’s what’s one of the contribution that we made. And I think we had no choice because otherwise we’ll still be in the Chateau 20 years after trying to get the one only answer. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. It was very good wine. Yeah. Yeah. Marcus. Marcus. OK, Jovan.

Jovan Kurbalija: Thank you. Just a quick note on this point, which I think Bill and Juan brought. At that time, you had a feeling that your input was taken care of. It was not accepted verbatim, but you had a feeling that it was provided. What is the major problem today is that we have so many processes which call you to have your say, make contribution. And your contribution disappears in some sort of a governance Bermuda Triangle. And you just come with some document and say, OK. It’s fine if somebody says, OK, we disagree. We cannot accept that. There is a consensus. But this is a huge problem. Some good news is, ideally, we should be locked in some sort of secluded place and negotiate, as Marcus did, really, as a big master of diplomacy. But nowadays, we have also AI that can help us. AI can trace our contribution to the final document. Is your contribution reflected in final document or completely ignored? It’s not ideal. I prefer human approach. But this is one great lesson, I would say, from WGIG and overall IGF process. When somebody asks you to have your say, to contribute, there is some sort of reflection. Roger, this. agree, agree, let’s discuss it, whatever. I’m afraid that this is missing now in global governance in general, and I would say also in AI and digital governance.

Markus Kummer: Thank you, Jovan, and I think in the interest of time we have to move on, and I encourage the next speakers to be as concise and compact as possible. So we go to the multilateral versus multistakeholder, and the first speaker is Alejandro Pisanti. He’s joining us remotely. Alejandro, are you on?

Alejandro Pisanty: Yes, I am on. Can you hear me?

Markus Kummer: Excellent. We can hear you. Welcome.

Alejandro Pisanty: Hi. It’s 3 a.m. in Mexico City. Cheers, everybody. Thanks for the invitation and for the first round. It’s very useful. One of the things that happens with, and it’s a bit of a paradox, as Jovan has said, we had the years of the governments and decision makers at the UN structurally because this was the outcome, and we was part of the process to produce an outcome for WSIS, the World Summit of Information Society, which had been agreed to take place by an agreement of the UN General Assembly. So that’s something that we’re not having as often now, and processes like the GDC seem to have been – Global Digital Compact – seem to have been designed in order to make it much harder for voices like who would have been the wiki to make even a dent on decisions that have already been made by the Secretary General and his adjuncts and a few influential governments. Multilateral versus multi-stakeholder, we have to – I’m confused. convinced that all problems of Internet governance and many others are much better solved by multi-stakeholder mechanisms. The weights of the stakeholders have to be different. Institutional and organizational design are key. We have to be able to, let’s say, involve governments decisively when things are involving law enforcement, for example. So even if the involvement is informal, it has to be very enabling, as happens in the anti-phishing working group or as it’s happening in the upcoming global anti-scam alliance. And in other places, the governments really have themselves decided to sit in the second row. That happened to us when we were doing the ICAN reform process around 2001, 2003. Governments were offered seats to study, at least seats at the table on the board, and they had very good reasons not to do that. One of them was legal, that they would have to join the liabilities of the corporation as governments, and the other ones that they would never come together to decide who were five representatives or even three representatives as one vote. What we have learned from these multi-stakeholder processes also is how different stakeholders perceive what is important, what is decisive, and what’s actually pretty standard. As you know, I have a scheme for translating things, like, for example, using identity, the mass scale of the internet, cross jurisdictions, lowering barriers, lowering friction, and managing memory and forgetting to understand what problems are actually not a problem created by the internet, but modified or disrupted if you want. And in some of these cases, you actually do need a more multilateral layer in the solution of a fully multi-stakeholder problem. Consequences of choosing multi-stakeholder or multilateral, well, it’s… the internet more free in the countries that propose multilateral? That’s probably the acid test of why we actually need to keep pushing for multi-stakeholder because every single country that pushes for more multilateral is also pushing against internet freedom. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you for that Alejandro and thank you for joining us at the ungodly hour in your country. That’s very much appreciated.

Alejandro Pisanty: Love you so much Mansoor.

Markus Kummer: And we have Avri as a speaker on these issues. Please Avri.

Avri Doria: Okay thank you. I actually very much like this subject of multi-stakeholder and multilateral as opposed to multi-stakeholder versus. I think at the moment in this point history they both have to coexist and in fact we’ve seen that. We see that with examples of like the ICAN example. We see that with examples like the the Sao Paulo guidelines which basically finally talk about how we can bring the two together. Now there was a wonderful part of WGIG where we were actually I think it’s the last time we actually participated as equals and that’s one of the things that I’ve looked for since then. WGIG truly was I was able to sit there and argue for hours against some of the roles and responsibilities as believed by governments and until Neaton got tired of it, it was allowed to go on and that is important. That is something that does not happen at the moment because even in our multi-stakeholder models even in something as vaunted as the IGF that grew out of WGIG, it’s a top down. There is an authority that we all answer to in some way. We all appeal to. We all have to go to. So the multi-stakeholder is there. I would never say that IGF isn’t multi-stakeholder. but not completely, not fully. It has a ways to develop. And Wigig does give an example, does sort of point a way of it can work. And we’ve seen other examples where it can work. It was an interesting example to me. I came in as a techie, knew nothing about internet governance, knew a little bit about philosophy, didn’t know what ICANN, I knew what ICANN was, but nothing about it. And I learned a lot through that process and found it really quite, quite valuable. And it obviously changed my life. One of the other things, and I wanna point out, and I’m not sure it even fits in this thing, but there was one feature of the working group on internet governance that we’ve lost. We had Frank March, our secretary, our main writer, sitting in the room with us while he was writing, talking to us, asking about this paragraph or that paragraph. That goes even further on the notion that now we sort of contribute our comments into a bucket somewhere and somebody may look at them, may not look at them, may include a word or two, but not. We actually sat there irritating this poor, lovely man, saying, no, no, no, no, you gotta change that word. No, I need this paragraph. No, and he actually bore with it. And so while we’re all talking about the wonder of Wigig, I really wanted to bring up the wonderful example of Frank. So I think that for the foreseeable future, we have to work on a way to combine the two because governments are not gonna give up their multilateral insofar as they can get beyond unilateral but they’re not gonna give it up in any time. And we can’t afford to give up a multi-stakeholder model so the two of them have to work either in contention, which is not that useful. or figure out how to operate together. And I think we’ve got some motion in that direction. I think WIEGIG started it. I think it’s always good to go back to reading, not only the report, but as several people said, the background report. There’s so much in there to play with. And I recommend it to any student. So hopefully that answered my part of the question.

Markus Kummer: Thank you for that, Avri, and also thank you for mentioning Frank. Frank March played a very important role. I think without him, we wouldn’t have been able to produce the report. I invite you to share a thought on him because he passed away, sadly, a couple of years back. That was very sad to learn. It was really an important help for us to produce the report. And the last speaker on this segment, and thank you also, Avri, for moving away from the dichotomy, multi-stakeholder versus multilateral. No, I think it was the Brazilians who always make the point there is no false dichotomy between the two. They have to work together. And thank you also for underlying that. Charles, you also put your name down for that. And can you also say if there’s anything to report on what’s happening in the Zoom room? Please, Charles.

Charles Shaban: Thank you. Thank you very much, Marcos. In fact, I think what I will say is I will start by saying that I was still young in the internet governance sphere, not in age, I’m still young in age. Anyway, so, but it was really a wonderful experience to sit, as my colleagues mentioned, with the different stakeholders. And to give an example, maybe different of what my colleague mentioned, I mean, a specific example. Let’s go to my current practice. The intellectual property was somehow problematic, you can say. I think we need to make sure that we have a policy that is not based on the UDRP, for example. I think without the multi-stakeholderism, we couldn’t have this uniform resolution policy on the Internet. Why? Because as everybody knows, it started with ICANN, WIPO, WIPO government, ICANN, different technical body, we can say, private sector, lawyers, and the civil society. So we need to make sure that we have a policy that is not based on the UDRP, for example, and we need to find these different solutions for the disputes on the Internet domain names in specific. So I would like to mention this to have some additional of what my colleagues already covered, I think, in general. So I agree, maybe the last sentence, I will say, I will not talk a lot, I will concentrate on remote moderation today. What Avery mentioned, I think multilateralism is a very important issue, and I think we need to find a way to work with the multilateralism, which is very important, bottom-up and so on, and to be able to find a way to work with the different multilateral mechanisms. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you very much. And I think there was a time when there was a real antagonism between multi-stakeholder, multilateral, and the technical community in particular said, oh, we need to work together, and as working for a small country for the diplomatic service of Switzerland, we always believe in multilateralism because it protects the smaller countries. Multilateralism is always better than unilateralism, and I think in this current global situation, we really all need to feel, we feel strengthened through multilateralism, which does not include unilateralism. And with that, can we move on to the last segment, which is essentially looking to the IGF. Has the IGF delivered what we had hoped for, and it really built very much on WGIG. We had, it was mentioned before, we had our closed session on the Chatham House rule, but we always opened up in between, and the day before, we had an open consultation, and we thought that could be the model also for the IGF, and the IGF very much built on that model. So has the IGF actually lived up to our expectations, and what should we do to move forward? And we have two remote speakers here, Baher Esmat, who works for ICANN, and Carlos, they’re all remotely, they’re both remotely, and then we have Jovan and Vittoria, who are here in the room. Can we move to Baher? Baher, are you online?

Baher Esmat: I am. I hope you can hear me.

Markus Kummer: We can hear you loud and clear. Excellent.

Baher Esmat: All right. Thank you, Marcus, and hello, everyone. I’m pleased to take part in this session and to contribute to the discussion. alongside my WGIG colleagues, the IGF, and today we’re almost 19 years into this global forum, and I think the IGF has been, you know, the primary global multi-stakeholder forum for discussing internet governance issues. It kind of, you know, filled a gap that was identified by the WGIG members 20 years ago. It provided a space for discussion, for open discussion among all stakeholders, from governments, private sector, civil society, technical community, and academia, all on equal footing. It has also contributed to a very important element, especially to those coming from the developing world, which is the capacity building aspect. And I think today, with the numerous, you know, regional, national IGFs and other similar platforms from, you know, school and internet governance and so forth, this, you know, shows the impact of the IGF over the years. Another point I’d like to point to very quickly, and I think some of the previous speakers have touched on, which is how the IGF has evolved over time. I think the IGF has been, you know, continuously evolving over the past years. We’ve seen this in many aspects from, you know, trying to improve its outcomes in the forms of, you know, whether messages or reports and so on, but also in the form of topics and issues being addressed during the meetings. And as someone noted earlier, you know, this debate between, you know, internet governance, digital governance, and those definitions, I think because of the way the WGIG approach the issue of defining internet governance. And, you know, we’ve seen the definition itself is broad enough to sort of encompass, you know, a lot of issues, most of which were not even foreseen, they did not exist 20 years ago. So the IJF over the years has evolved in its agenda. And we’ve seen many topics that were not in, you know, the WGIG radar in 2004-2005. AI is, you know, the most popular, but there are many, many others. And I think this evolution is one of the key characteristics of the IJF. The other characteristics that has been debated over the years is the non-decision making nature of the IJF. And while some, you know, have debated that this is one of the weaknesses of the IJF, personally, I believe it’s one of the strengths. And I think it was not a bug in the system. I think it was intentionally by design to be made as a, again, an open and non-decision making forum to allow everyone to contribute and to participate on equal footing. Now looking to the future, and this is my last point, I think, you know, as we continue to consider how to evolve the IJF, how to improve and strengthen the IJF, I believe that the financial stability and sustainability of the IGF is key. And for the IGF to continue to serve as the global internet governance forum, I think we need the minds of all the participants and the contributors to the IGF to come together and to consider more innovative ideas to sort of guarantee or at least offer or put forward a sustainable model for funding and supporting the IGF to continue its role at the global level. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: And the next speaker is Carlos Afonso. Are you joining us from Rio?

Carlos Afonso: Yes, I am joining from Rio. Let me turn the camera on. Yes, I am there.

Markus Kummer: It’s great to see you, Carlos.

Carlos Afonso: So I find it a bit complicated to find new things related to the report that we did in 2005. I already mentioned a very important thing that Frank Marsh did a beautiful work of patience, of listening to us and trying to synthesize everything. It was really great and the report is much, much more than the definition. I think we did a definition that was to stand the test of time, simple enough to stand the test of time, but it’s still very simple in relation to… to all the complex issues we are facing. But the report was so important because it identified four key public policy areas, which are still the main public policy areas, whatever the development of internet and, you know, and these four policy areas we managed to detail in 13, issues, fundamental issues, which are valid until today. So I think that more than the definition, or the report is a very good reference, which the report itself is studying the test of time. And this is great. I think this is what’s the main contribution we could do in that group at the time. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you very much, Carlos. Great to see you. Now back to the room and we have Jovan and Vittoria who also address this issue. Jovan first.

Jovan Kurbalija: Thank you, Markus. Well, it’s a party time in a way, and I don’t know if it is good to bring some controversies, but since we will have four days to chat in the corridors and during the coffee break, I will propose three points about the future of IGF, which may require the great contribution for all people in the room and the former members of the working. The first one, and thank you for parking it, is the false dichotomy, multi-stakeholder versus multilateral. If you look carefully in the Tunis compromise, you will see that IGF is masterpiece of compromise by putting the multi-stakeholder body under the UN umbrella. Both camps got something. Pro-governmental camp got for the first time IG issues in the UN context. Multi-stakeholder camp got multi-stakeholder participation. That formula, unfortunately, will have to be revisited, and that cannot stay as fixed in the stone. As Executive Director of the UN High-Level Panel, I try to argue for IGF Plus. And one point, and I will now open controversies, is that I argued that the famous, very controversial, big elephant in the room question of enhanced cooperation should be brought as one of the track on the first day of IGF together with governments, civil society, businesses discussing. We may not call it enhanced cooperation, we may call it enhanced coordination, just to have it smoother consumption, but I never understood why it wasn’t possible. I understand political positioning elements of it more diplomatic, but in its core it was very simple solution to put that last bit from the Tunis formula, bit of salt, which I think British diplomat on the 18th of November during the negotiation brought as a solution to find the package. That’s controversial and I’m sure there will be many questions. The second point is capacity building, and that was a great achievement. And here is a personal story. When I started doing IG, my friends asked me, what are you doing? And then when I told them what I was doing, they were calling me to fix their printer, to install their software and these things. I usually did it. It’s great to help people, but then it inspired me to write a book, Introduction to Internet Governance. And fast forward, few months ago, I wrote the last book eight years ago, and I said there is no need anymore, but people convinced me and I’m preparing eight edition, which will be presented on Wednesday. And the question was, should I call it Internet Governance? And you will see if you come to that discussion, there is a reason to keep it as Internet Governance. Issues are the same. They’re not asking me anymore to install their printer. They’re now asking me about where their knowledge is, who is basically monopolizing their knowledge. Discussion moved on. And that sort of dynamics, by me writing the book every year and now revisiting this book, is a great sort of diary of the Internet Governance Forum and its achievement. And third point, which Bill mentioned, is extremely important. It is modus operandi of the IGF. Sometimes. And. estimate that. And I’ll give you one point, again, personal story. 15 years ago, I went to the IGF, I think, well, you will find the date, but it was, and you know how it goes. You come the first day and you have a big ambitions, great speakers, great workshops, you want to follow it all. And after the first morning, you realize that you cannot do it and you end up in the cafeteria meeting friends, chatting. And there is always that feeling of the missed opportunities, or I missed something. This is how deep loss reporting started. First with humans, our former students, interns, and now it’s now help with the AI. And that incremental development of new methodologies, now when everything is now and here, we have AI, let’s install AI agents. But that incremental in all aspects of IGF work, capacity building, bringing consensus, involving other people from our side, this reporting, I think it’s a great legacy of the IGF. And on that legacy, we should build the future of IGF. There were three points. First, revisit Tunis formula. We need to do it. Second, continue capacity building. That’s one of the great achievements of IGF. And third one, talk more about the way of modus operandi of the IGF. It’s completely, I would say, we are too shy about it. And this is untold story of high relevance for the broader governance and other communities. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you, Jovan. And last speaker is Vittorio.

Vittorio Bertola: Thank you. So as the former youngest member of the WIG, again, the least diplomat, I think I will have to also start some controversy. But I think we’re really at the point in time where we need to think of the future of the IGF. So we need also to look at what worked and what didn’t work. I’d start from the first half of the problem, which is the practical way of working on the IGF. And I think in the overall, we like this event, so we continue coming. So I think everybody finds value in the IGF. I think it should continue. I think it could be better. I mean, especially this year, I only meet people that are disappointed because they’ve been trying to propose a panel or workshop for several years now, and they never get accepted even if they meet all the criteria, because there’s, I guess, a sheer lack of space. I mean, there’s a limit to how many you can have. But we have to find a better way of mobilizing these energies, because otherwise there’s people, especially outside of the existing, I mean, regular participants that come, try several years. They get disappointed. They go away and say, oh, the IGF is just a smoke, just for the insiders, just whatever. And the other thing is, I think that will also solve this problem, is a much better working of the national IGF specialists. I mean, our experience with the Italian IGF is terrible. I mean, six years ago, six, seven years ago, it was captured by the then government, and it was used by a politician for self-promotion. There were no meeting anymore. I mean, it didn’t even happen for several years. And then now it’s still in the hands of the government, and it’s a new government. You know, in six years, we have had like seven governments of multiple colors. But still, every government is keeping it, and now they’re organizing maybe one this year. Again, it’s multi-stakeholder in the sense that there’s multiple ministries involved. So I think that we need to address these kinds of things, because it could make the credibility, I mean, especially the bottom-up process much better. But then the other part of the question is about the role of the IGF, and I mean, the question in the program is, I mean, did it meet the purpose that we thought it will meet? And to be honest, I think that while the narrow part of the definition worked well, and I think that nobody’s really unhappy with the governance of the technical resources, that the broadest part of the definition didn’t work very well. So we are now at a state, I mean, 20 years ago, we believed the Internet would bring democracy and wealth, and it was an instrument for progress. And nowadays, I mean, I already quoted this. One month ago, there was a survey in the UK, and they asked the young people, I mean, would you live better off if the Internet didn’t exist? And half of them said yes. So half of them think that the world would be better without the Internet. And this is really, really terrible for us that, I mean, work to create it and make it. a mass instrument. And I think what failed is, I mean, we were naive. We thought that by putting everyone together, we would be able to address the economic and social questions, and this didn’t happen, just especially because of the private sector, I have to say, I mean, we’re part of the private sector. The people that could make money out of breaking down the internet and turning it into walled gardens, they just went on and made money. And nobody could stop them because we had no stick. We had carrots, I mean, to come in, but we had no stick to force them. And this is exactly what caused now the transition of countries and regions like the European Union that have always been in favor of multistakeholderism and open governance and whatever, to a new, I mean, like a hard jurisdiction, hard law approach. And this is why I think we were getting now also pressure from multilateralism. And to be honest, I don’t like the idea of more multilateralism, but I also don’t like the idea of continuing with a few very big companies that are doing whatever they want over the internet. And so maybe the national level will be more important. I don’t have an answer on how to build a new balance between all these stakeholders, but indeed there needs to be a reflection which I think includes the IGF as a continuing entity, but also takes into account that by now, I mean, governments really have the need to put some hard rules over global businesses and that this is the tension that is not going away. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Well, thank you, Vittorio, and also thank you for asking tough questions. I see there are already reactions. Charles, do you have?

Charles Shaban: Maybe Aisha first, but there is a question online.

Markus Kummer: Well, why don’t you go ahead with the question?

Charles Shaban: Okay. In fact, there was some discussions and Bill already answered some of them, but I think one of the questions still online without a response maybe, from Shaima Akhtar, Chairperson, Bangladesh Women IGF. Given the rise of AI, surveillance technologies and the dominance of platform monopolies, should we now push for a more intersectional and right-based approach in defining digital governance? that generally center the live realities of women, youth, and marginalized communities.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. And there were hands up, Aisha and Avri, yes.

Ayesha Hassan: Just briefly, I wanted to build a bit on what has been said by other members here. I think that the IGF is a unique, Marcus, you’ve said this, a watering hole. And I really think that the way it is, it has evolved over 20 years. There are many ways in which each year it’s a different experience. And I think that the range of stakeholders has expanded in all of the different stakeholder groups. So as we look forward, I think it’s encouraging the topics that are important to people to be taken up here, whether in the workshops or in the main sessions. And I was very pleased this year to see resilience being there, because I believe that resilience is a challenge of the future. And it’s not just about how to survive one shock. It’s about how do you build the capacity across the layers, and how is this worked on across stakeholder groups to raise awareness about it. Now that, unfortunately, for the young people who wish that the internet didn’t exist, it does. And our economies, our political systems, social, everything, we depend on this wonderful thing called the internet. So I just wanted to say that now I think an issue for everyone to come around together on is also resilience. How do we keep this being as reliable and secure as possible? And lastly, a shout out to you, Jovan. I’m still waiting for the new edition of the puzzle. Do you remember your puzzle?

Jovan Kurbalija: It’s coming. It’s even more complicated.

Markus Kummer: Thank you, Aisha and Avri.

Avri Doria: Thanks. First of all, I want to thank the comment that came in. And one of the things I want to remind us all is there was a time in the IEGF where we couldn’t even mention the word or the number. notion of rights of people, that we had long, long battles about, my God, rights belongs to some other department within the UN. You can’t talk about rights. And fortunately, we’ve gotten, we’re not doing a lot of it. And so the questioner is right. When can we start talking about them more? Any notion we have that IGF has bottomed up is something that we should quit pretending. It is not. It hasn’t been. And I’d love to see it bottom up, but it isn’t. So and others, you don’t get to be bottom up by having an occasional consultation that you ignore. So that is, we are a tribe of groups. We come here, we come here in our tribes, and we argue for our points. But we’ve been told what points we’re going to be able to argue from by those who control it. So I love the IGF, I love to see it continue, and I’d really like to see it become bottom up.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. Charles?

Charles Shaban: Not from me. Alejandro, raise his hand.

Markus Kummer: Alejandro, want to come in?

Alejandro Pisanty: Yes. Thank you. Complementing what Avery has just said, we’ve been looking to the future of the IGF. Another type of feedback I get is that we must make sure that it doesn’t become like rights come winter. We have to make sure that we engage in these discussions substantively, the people that are decision makers and not only commercial representatives of businesses and higher level officials that don’t stay apart in their own corrals. But we really get to have this conversation substantively. It has to be bottom up, but it has to reach whoever else is in the geometry. I wouldn’t say they are on the top, but they are at the center in effective. political decision-making and we have to make sure that there’s an engagement with them, otherwise it’s too much corridor and too little really multi-stakeholder engagement. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you and I would also like to open the discussion to the floor. There are microphones on the side so the easiest way will be if those who have a comment or a question just align themselves behind one of the microphones. Yes, Raul, please. Okay, please. Okay, thank you.

Jimson Olufuye: Good morning, everybody. Can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you. Okay, first and foremost, my name is Jimson Olufuye, Africa ICT Alliance, been in the ecosystem for quite a while. I want to salute all our forerunners. Great job you’ve done and we are still at it. First and foremost, I want to talk about the last point made about bottom-up. Actually, we need to understand that it has always been top-down, always been top-down, so it’s going to take a while before it becomes a bottom-up, not as with ICANN. No, ICANN by design is bottom-up and so we need patience, we need perseverance, and we need to continuously engage and talk about it. And that brings me to the second point about multilateralism and multi-stakeholderism. I favor, I love multi-stakeholderism. I love it. It makes life easy. Everybody claims ownership, have ownership, you know, for the common issue for the society, so it’s the way to go. But I have an experience, too, that I will just share briefly. During the wicket that is working group on the arts corporation, a representative accused us in the private sector that we wanted to take over the work of government. So I had to make an explanation that indeed, no, we are helping the government to fulfill their objective. objective, the responsibility to the citizens. So, and after that explanation, I think the accusation stopped. I never heard about it anymore. So I think we need to continuously engage and explain clearly our intention. Our intention is a better society, information society where nobody’s left behind. And when we all work together, we will achieve together, and the government will achieve their purposes. Then thirdly, this is a question now, with regard to Yohan. Yohan made a very important, at least, comment about the issue of consensus. Look, I recall the conclusion of WGATE in 2018, 2018, January 2018. We could not have consensus because we’re expecting 100% consensus. But if what is said now is what we adopted, that is rough consensus, okay, or near consensus, 99% consensus, maybe we’ll have had a kind of firm report that says this is the outcome of this group. So the question is, if we had had that report based on what you have said, do you think the follow-up summit of the future will still have happened? Because by July, the Secretary General set up the high-level panel on digital cooperation, and that led us to this because the WGATE failed. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. Shall we go to the microphone behind, and please introduce yourself?

Israel Rosas: Yeah, thank you. Israel Rosas with the Internet Society. Just a brief question, and Yohan hinted at it a little bit. If you were to give a single piece of advice to the WGATE facilitators on how to reach or generate consensus for this process, for the outcome document they are drafting, what would it be that you recommend to them? That’s the only question that I have.

Markus Kummer: Okay, that’s a short question, and I’ll take it back to our panellists. And now, Ariette.

Ariette Esterhuisen: Thanks, Markus. Ariette Esterhuisen, past MAG member and past MAG chair. Do you think the IGF is ready to actually handle controversial issues? I think we’ve spent so many times, I support what Yohan is saying, this fear of putting enhanced cooperation on the agenda. Surely the IGF is mature enough now to be able to do that? This fear of putting issues that are controversial, such as fair tax payment on the agenda by big tech companies, do you feel the IGF is mature enough to be able to do that? And I say that having worked, for example, as someone said, it took years before we could actually talk about human rights at the IGF. It took years. we could talk about LGBT issues at the IGF. Is the IGF finally mature enough to have a strategy which is including and facilitating debate on controversy as opposed to a strategy which is based on avoiding any kind of risk or controversial topic?

Markus Kummer: All important questions and again back to the second microphone, please, yes.

Audience: Hi, I’m Nandini. I’m from IT4Change India and part of the Civil Society Coalition Global Digital Justice Forum. So the panel made a lot of very insightful observations about how the relationship between multilateralism and multi-stakeholderism should not be seen as antagonistic when we want the democratic governance bottom line. My question is in recent years we have seen a lot of digital governance issues, data governance issues in particular, being taken out of a democratic space and into very closed-door multilateral spaces such as digital trade negotiations. So how does the panel think that, you know, we could use the digital cooperation mechanisms available to us to counter the view because even as the GDC processes for data governance are ongoing, we still see those issues and many new bottom lines being sealed in trade deals and sometimes even regional closed-door plurilateral deals. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you for the question and Bertrand, please.

Bertrand de la Chapelle: Good morning, my name is Bertrand de la Chapelle. I’m the Executive Director of the Internet and Jurisdiction Policy Network. Two comments. One, I’m very happy that both Juan and Jovan and others make a reference to the methodology and the way to work. What was striking from everything I understood from the working of the WGIG was this interaction between people, and Avri was mentioning it as well, and indeed the role of the Secretary had the capacity to make a summary and to present not only a one version that is watered down to get consensus, but something that says there are different options. That was extremely important. The methodology was important and it could be taken into account for the IGL. itself, because as Jordan Carter was saying in another session earlier, the IGF is not supposed to make decisions. It is, in my view, to help frame the issues, to bring the different actors around one topic so that instead of having different sessions addressing the different point of views on the same topic, the different actors can have the kind of interaction that you had within the WGIC. And second, a very quick question. The WGIC was a way out of some sort of roadblock at the end of the first phase of the WSIS. It created what all of you have said and what I believe is still today the most multi-stakeholder process that has taken place in 20 years. We are now stuck with the question of what is going to be the future of the IGF and I personally do not believe that the WSIS plus 20 process until December is going to solve the question of what are the next stages. So my question is, do you think that there would be a benefit in having a sort of new exercise of that sort, a new WGIC after December, or call it, as we were discussing yesterday, a CSTD working group, whatever multi-stakeholder discussion on revision of the mandate of the IGF after 20 years and institutionalization of this organization that now should become a mature organization with funding and processes?

Markus Kummer: Thank you. Food for thought. And I see there are various colleagues who put their hand up. I think Raul was first, then Jovan. Alejandro. Oh, sorry, Alejandro was already in the waiting room. Yes. Alejandro, please.

Alejandro Pisanty: Thank you. Quick replies to Israel. and to Andrea, and part of it has already been given by Bertrand. Consensus is not necessarily an objective of the IGF. It’s more like conveying of different views, reminding ourselves also that it has to be non-duplicative. So if there’s a forum, like satellites and the ITU or what have you, then it’s better to continue the discussion there, but after framing and bringing in new stakeholders that would be otherwise excluded. And to Andrea, and I think you’ll agree, the IGF is mature for lots of much more controversial issues. The ones that are not mature enough are some of the stakeholders. I would say particularly some governments that would prefer to continue power games in closed venues, or let’s say government-only venues where the politics is more like, you know, I’ll trade you some internal governance for some oil or some water rights. So we have to make sure that they are as mature as the forum. Thanks.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. Now we have Raul.

Raul Echeberria: Yes, thank you, Marcus. I cannot address all the points that were brought, so I will pick a couple of them. With regard to the maturity of IGF, I think that’s aligned with what Alejandro said. I think, yes, the IGF is mature enough, and I remember that in 2013 IGF was the first place in the world where we had an open discussion about surveillance after Snowden revelation, and it was a high-level panel, very, I think that it was very good. Yeah, and I organized it.

Jovan Kurbalija: It was one of the most difficult moderations. Yeah. I thought you were my friend.

Raul Echeberria: So the point is, I think that’s the the challenge is that it’s the commitment of the stakeholders to have those discussions. So I think that the tool is good and it’s mature enough, but I think that the point of failure is that it’s the commitment of stakeholders to come and engage and to be honest, and I think that’s all of us agree on this point, this is not the best moment for international cooperation. So I don’t think that we can be very optimistic, at least in the short term. With regard to the call that Israel asked about, what we would suggest to the facilitators, I’m not sure if you were talking about the work toward the December recommendations or the implementation or the recommendation themselves, but I think that the solution is exactly, the point is exactly the same and it’s what Bertram mentioned. I think with regard to the work toward the WSIS plus 20 evaluation, I think that the process has not been participative enough and it would have been good to have an exercise like WGIG to evaluate and make the recommendations, but we still have time to include that as part of the recommendation for the future. So I think that the idea could be the same. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you, and Wolfgang and Avri as well. I also. Okay, well let’s just take a round pan and start with Wolfgang.

Wolfgang Kleinwachter: Okay, yeah, the short answer to Bertram’s question is yes, certainly, because we will see in December a situation where there is no consensus. And always, you know, the best thing in such a situation, you know, delegate the open questions to a working group. So in Germany we say, if you’re not further informed, then start a working group. So that means if you are in a helpless situation, establish a working group and wait for the future, because this is not the time to reach an agreement. That’s my pessimistic preview for December. But I want to comment on another issue. When we discussed the IGF and the mandate, there was really the intention not to give the IGF a decision-making capacity. To give it only for discussion. Because this has opened the mind, opened the ears, opened the eyes for everybody. On equal footing, everybody can talk to everybody. But you need, at least in the multi-stakeholder context, four for a tango. And that means, if we didn’t want to have a governmental controlled internet, but we are also rejecting a business controlled internet. That’s why the academic, the civil society community, the technical community, was seen as an important part to bring all perspectives. What we see now is indeed that we are coming in a situation where we have either the tech oligarchs or the governments who want to manage this. When Mark Zuckerberg made the announcement in early January that he will stop content moderation, my first reaction was, Mark Zuckerberg should come to the IGF and to explain his decision to the pro-internet community. So I think this is what we need. We have to have the decision-makers on the table for discussions. And then they can go home and can make the decisions where they have a mandate in their own corporation. But it’s part of the accountability system also for the rulers of the internet of today. And this meets exactly what Vittorio has said. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. We have one participant behind the microphone. Are you queuing behind the microphone? Two behind the microphone and then we go around here. But can you be very short? One minute?

Hadi Alminyawi: Yes, sure. This is Hadi Alminyawi. Following up with some of the controversial questions and following up and hearing this discussion, So the IGF, as been discussed, is a forum to discuss issues and, like, frame the issues in order to be discussed in a more formal way and come up with decisions and recommendations in the ITU. And that brings a question. So why would governments actually participate or take a role or be interested even in the discussions taking place in the Internet Governance Forum? And so I’ve heard others saying, well, governments would like to manage the IGF. Why would they be even interested in managing the IGF if all what we do here is, like, discussing the issues, framing them, and then moving them to the ITU in order to be discussed in a multilateral form? And there the decisions are made. So yeah, this is my question. Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Sébastien?

Sébastien Bachelet: Usually I come to a microphone and I speak in French, but it seems that it’s not possible here. Sébastien Bachelet, Isaac Frantz and Uralo. I just wanted to ask two questions. The first one, how many government representatives are in the room? Because they will learn a lot. The second question, do you want already that we book the castle for you for the next discussion? Thank you.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. French castle. Okay, now we go back to the panel. And we have five minutes left. So okay, we start with Avri.

Avri Doria: Thank you. Yeah, I have a couple of questions. I had actually, Sébastien, that same question. I was wondering, looking around, trying to figure out how many might be government and such. I won’t ask for a raise of hands, though I’d love to be able to ask for a raise of hands. But yeah, we have a couple at the table. But anyway, I wanted to also come back to people talking about the models. And I think one of the things that happened is with Working Group on Internet Governance, to get back to that, the whole discussion about multi-stakeholder and multi-stakeholderism and multi-stakeholder models really began in earnest. There were certainly examples of it before then, but the model discussion. And at this point, we’ve gotten where we really have to recognize that the model that we have at the IGF is really just one example of a way to do it. We now have many other models. We have to do more work. And it could even be a good thing to do at the IGF of understanding the pervasive number of models. The other thing we have to understand is one of the things that was talked about was IGF does not make a decision. There are multi-stakeholder models that do make decisions. For example, ICANN was brought up. But there you have a case of marrying sort of a multi-stakeholder, bottom-up policymaking with a top-down corporation doing its thing. And that marriage itself is really quite a fascinating thing that needs studying. So there are an immense number of models. And my last thing was on advice. It’s patient perseverance.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. Juan?

Participant: Yes. I didn’t want to talk, but I want to react to what you said, because maybe I’m the only government representative in the room. And I can say that why there’s no interest of government to come to IGF. And one of the things that we discuss in WGI, the roles and responsibilities of stakeholders, we need to define the roles and responsibilities of the processes that are surrounding WSIS. And that is not very well understood. I found out by experience, that the IGF is fantastic as an agenda setter, as framing the issues. And maybe I’m not agreeing with Avri, I think we have still, it can be improved the bottom up, but still there’s some bottom up because the workshops are proposed from the bottom, and also now we have the NRI, the National and Regional IGF. So the IGF is good to bring to the table problems and issues that may not be aware, not even by the governments of their own countries themselves, because of the candor in which it’s presented during the IGF, especially if you’ve been in the IGF that has been held in developing countries, the two where there were in Brazil, the one in Mexico, the one in Kenya. So I think that’s a good thing. So I think that what we need, Bertrand, after this process of the WSIS plus 20, is to really define what is the role of the IGF. The IGF has to be the agenda setter, that’s the role of the IGF, and the WSIS forum, the action, and that’s it.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. There may be others, a very last word.

Jovan Kurbalija: Maybe a quick comment from Jameson. Jameson, why governments are not coming? They are not finding answers to their questions. That’s it. 193 member states, easier than a few thousand members of the IGF. Now, we should not do government bashing. As Jameson said, we should explain why they can benefit. Bottom up, let’s use it with AI. This is now a crucial battle. Can we preserve our knowledge through bottom up AI? Not even Internet governance. This is a critical battle which is happening now and here. Are we ready to start these discussions?

Markus Kummer: Last 50 seconds.

Jovan Kurbalija: That’s it.

Markus Kummer: Bill?

William J. Drake: All right. Well, obviously, not enough time to say anything. On controversial questions, Henrietta. I would just say, remember how much time it took to talk about so-called critical Internet resources. The first couple of years of IGF, everybody was so stressed, we couldn’t even begin to have the conversation. One way to strengthen the ability of the IGF to actually take on these issues is to give us a permanent mandate. If we could, if everybody would stop worrying that somehow the mandate would be snatched back from us if we do anything wrong, then maybe we could get into things more. I also want to just say quickly, the woman who mentioned the trade questions, trade has been brought up in the IGF. It’s been very hard to talk about trade issues in the IGF because trade people don’t understand this space or care much about it, and often it’s hard for people in this space to get their head around how things work in trade. Last point on the new group thing. I think less than a new group to talk about the IGF’s future, narrowly, we need a group that thinks about the relationship between Internet governance, data governance, AI governance, and so on, digital governance. There’s a lot of confusion. There’s just an enormous amount of conceptual gunk out there, and this translates into proposals to do things like changing the name of the IGF and so on, and I think we need to get these issues sorted out and take into account what’s already been discussed and learned by people out there in the field who do these things professionally, among other things. By the way, I can’t think of one thing the ITU has done on Internet governance. I don’t see the IGF as just making inputs to the ITU.

Markus Kummer: Thank you. Well, thank you all for contributing, the participants and the panelists, and what you could see is that 20 years after, we still talk to each other and we’re still friends, so that is a lasting legacy. Please join me in giving all the panelists a big hand, and thank you all.

Agreement points

WGIG’s lasting impact and successful methodology

Speakers

– William J. Drake
– Markus Kummer
– Raul Echeberria
– Wolfgang Kleinwachter
– Participant
– Avri Doria
– Jovan Kurbalija

Arguments

WGIG demonstrated benefits of multistakeholder cooperation in UN context and legitimated this approach

WGIG facilitated WSIS negotiations by providing systematic mapping and structured discussion of issues

WGIG report found its way into final WSIS outcome and significantly impacted the process

WGIG strengthened concept of multistakeholderism and consolidated idea that all stakeholder participation is crucial

WGIG created unique culture of collaboration where every stakeholder brought different expertise to the table

WGIG’s methodology successfully brought together 30 people with different viewpoints to agree on contentious subjects

WGIG provided example of true participation as equals, which is missing in current governance models

Summary

Multiple speakers agree that WGIG was a groundbreaking success that legitimated multistakeholder cooperation in the UN context, created innovative methodology for consensus-building, and had lasting impact on internet governance processes.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Internet governance definition’s enduring relevance and broad applicability

Speakers

– William J. Drake
– Ayesha Hassan
– Wolfgang Kleinwachter
– Carlos Afonso

Arguments

WGIG demystified internet governance by establishing that governance does not mean government

Internet governance definition has stood test of time and adapted to new technologies like AI governance

WGIG definition with multistakeholder, collaborative, and holistic approaches is universal and applicable to AI governance

WGIG report identified four key public policy areas and 13 fundamental issues that remain valid today

Summary

Speakers consistently agree that the WGIG definition of internet governance has proven durable and remains applicable to contemporary challenges including AI governance and other emerging technologies.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Need for multistakeholder and multilateral approaches to coexist rather than compete

Speakers

– Markus Kummer
– Alejandro Pisanty
– Avri Doria
– Charles Shaban
– Jimson Olufuye

Arguments

Multilateralism protects smaller countries and should not exclude multistakeholderism

All internet governance problems are better solved by multistakeholder mechanisms with different stakeholder weights

Both multistakeholder and multilateral models must coexist and work together rather than in opposition

Multistakeholderism helps governments fulfill their responsibilities to citizens rather than taking over government work

Summary

There is strong consensus that the dichotomy between multistakeholder and multilateral approaches is false, and both models need to work together complementarily rather than in opposition.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

IGF’s value as discussion forum while acknowledging limitations

Speakers

– Baher Esmat
– Vittorio Bertola
– Participant
– Jovan Kurbalija

Arguments

IGF has been primary global multistakeholder forum providing space for open discussion and capacity building

IGF should continue but needs better mobilization of energies and improved national IGF processes

IGF serves as effective agenda setter and issue framer but needs clearer role definition

IGF has been valuable for capacity building and creating incremental development of new methodologies

Summary

Speakers agree that IGF provides valuable space for multistakeholder dialogue and capacity building, but acknowledge it needs improvements in process, participation, and role clarity.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development

Similar viewpoints

These speakers share concern about the loss of transparent, participatory methodology that characterized WGIG, where contributions were clearly reflected and participants could see their input being incorporated in real-time.

Speakers

– Jovan Kurbalija
– Avri Doria
– Bertrand de la Chapelle

Arguments

Current processes lack transparency in how contributions are reflected in final documents

Frank March’s role as secretary who wrote while listening and incorporating real-time feedback was crucial innovation

WGIG’s methodology of presenting different options rather than watered-down consensus should be adopted by IGF

Topics

Legal and regulatory

These speakers believe IGF has the capacity to address controversial issues but is held back by stakeholder reluctance and lack of enforcement mechanisms, particularly regarding private sector accountability.

Speakers

– Alejandro Pisanty
– Ariette Esterhuizen
– Vittorio Bertola

Arguments

IGF is mature enough to handle controversial issues but some stakeholders are not ready for such discussions

IGF should facilitate debate on controversial topics like fair taxation of big tech companies

IGF failed to address economic and social questions due to lack of enforcement mechanisms against private sector

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

These speakers emphasize IGF’s evolutionary capacity and its strength in building resilience and capacity across the internet governance ecosystem through continuous adaptation and learning.

Speakers

– Ayesha Hassan
– Baher Esmat
– Jovan Kurbalija

Arguments

Resilience across internet layers should be priority for future stakeholder collaboration

IGF has continuously evolved in topics and outcomes while maintaining non-decision making nature as strength

IGF has been valuable for capacity building and creating incremental development of new methodologies

Topics

Infrastructure | Development | Legal and regulatory

Unexpected consensus

Enhanced cooperation should be brought into IGF discussions

Speakers

– Jovan Kurbalija
– Ariette Esterhuizen

Arguments

Enhanced cooperation discussions should be brought into IGF as regular track rather than avoided

IGF should facilitate debate on controversial topics like fair taxation of big tech companies

Explanation

This represents unexpected consensus because enhanced cooperation has traditionally been seen as too controversial for IGF. The agreement that IGF should tackle this ‘elephant in the room’ issue directly challenges the forum’s historical avoidance of contentious topics.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Need for new working group or process to address contemporary governance challenges

Speakers

– William J. Drake
– Bertrand de la Chapelle
– Wolfgang Kleinwachter

Arguments

New working group needed to address relationship between internet governance, data governance, and AI governance

Need for new multistakeholder working group to address IGF’s future after WSIS+20 process

Need to have the decision-makers on the table for discussions

Explanation

Unexpected because these speakers, who were part of the original WGIG success, are calling for essentially recreating that model to address current challenges, suggesting the original approach was so effective it should be replicated.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion reveals strong consensus on WGIG’s historical importance and methodology, the enduring relevance of its internet governance definition, the need for multistakeholder-multilateral cooperation, and IGF’s value as a discussion forum. There is also agreement on the need for better transparency in governance processes and the importance of capacity building.

Consensus level

High level of consensus among speakers, particularly on foundational principles and historical assessment. The strong agreement suggests that WGIG’s core contributions remain relevant and that its methodology could inform current governance challenges. However, there are also shared concerns about current limitations and the need for evolution in internet governance processes.

Different viewpoints

IGF’s bottom-up nature and democratic participation

Speakers

– Avri Doria
– Participant
– Jimson Olufuye

Arguments

Any notion we have that IGF has bottomed up is something that we should quit pretending. It is not. It hasn’t been. And I’d love to see it bottom up, but it isn’t.

IGF serves as effective agenda setter and issue framer but needs clearer role definition

Need to understand that it has always been top-down, always been top-down, so it’s going to take a while before it becomes a bottom-up, not as with ICANN

Summary

Avri Doria argues that IGF is not truly bottom-up and never has been, while the government participant defends IGF as having some bottom-up elements through workshops and National/Regional IGFs. Jimson Olufuye acknowledges it’s always been top-down but argues for patience in the transition.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

IGF’s effectiveness in addressing broader internet governance issues

Speakers

– Vittorio Bertola
– Baher Esmat
– Ayesha Hassan

Arguments

IGF failed to address economic and social questions due to lack of enforcement mechanisms against private sector

IGF has continuously evolved in topics and outcomes while maintaining non-decision making nature as strength

Internet governance has expanded to include emerging countries and new technologies while maintaining core discussion framework

Summary

Bertola argues that IGF failed in its broader mandate because it lacked enforcement mechanisms against private sector actors who broke the internet into walled gardens. Esmat and Hassan view IGF’s evolution and non-decision making nature as strengths that have allowed it to adapt and remain relevant.

Topics

Economic | Legal and regulatory

Approach to handling controversial topics in IGF

Speakers

– Jovan Kurbalija
– Ariette Esterhuisen
– Alejandro Pisanty

Arguments

Enhanced cooperation discussions should be brought into IGF as regular track rather than avoided

IGF should facilitate debate on controversial topics like fair taxation of big tech companies

IGF is mature enough to handle controversial issues but some stakeholders are not ready for such discussions

Summary

While all agree IGF should handle controversial topics, they disagree on the approach. Kurbalija wants to directly address enhanced cooperation, Esterhuizen focuses on economic issues like taxation, and Pisanty blames stakeholder immaturity rather than IGF’s capacity.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

Future governance structure needs

Speakers

– William J. Drake
– Bertrand de la Chapelle
– Jovan Kurbalija

Arguments

New working group needed to address relationship between internet governance, data governance, and AI governance

Need for new multistakeholder working group to address IGF’s future after WSIS+20 process

Need to revisit Tunis compromise formula that balanced multistakeholder participation with UN umbrella

Summary

Drake wants a conceptual working group to clarify relationships between different governance areas, de la Chapelle wants a group focused on IGF’s institutional future, while Kurbalija wants to fundamentally revisit the Tunis compromise that created IGF.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Unexpected differences

Assessment of IGF’s success in fulfilling WGIG’s vision

Speakers

– Vittorio Bertola
– Baher Esmat
– Carlos Afonso

Arguments

IGF failed to address economic and social questions due to lack of enforcement mechanisms against private sector

IGF has been primary global multistakeholder forum providing space for open discussion and capacity building

WGIG report identified four key public policy areas and 13 fundamental issues that remain valid today

Explanation

This disagreement is unexpected because all speakers were involved in or supportive of WGIG’s work, yet they have fundamentally different assessments of whether IGF achieved WGIG’s goals. Bertola’s harsh critique contrasts sharply with Esmat’s positive assessment and Afonso’s emphasis on enduring relevance.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

Role of Frank March and methodology importance

Speakers

– Avri Doria
– Jovan Kurbalija
– Bertrand de la Chapelle

Arguments

Frank March’s role as secretary who wrote while listening and incorporating real-time feedback was crucial innovation

Current processes lack transparency in how contributions are reflected in final documents

WGIG’s methodology of presenting different options rather than watered-down consensus should be adopted by IGF

Explanation

While all speakers praise WGIG’s methodology, they unexpectedly focus on different aspects as most important – Doria emphasizes the human element and real-time interaction, Kurbalija focuses on transparency and traceability, while de la Chapelle emphasizes the option-presentation approach. This suggests different understandings of what made WGIG successful.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Overall assessment

Summary

The main areas of disagreement center on IGF’s democratic legitimacy and bottom-up nature, its effectiveness in addressing broader governance challenges beyond technical issues, approaches to handling controversial topics, and what type of institutional reforms are needed for the future.

Disagreement level

Moderate disagreement with significant implications. While speakers share common values about multistakeholder governance and IGF’s importance, they have fundamentally different assessments of IGF’s performance and different visions for its future. These disagreements reflect deeper tensions in internet governance between idealistic multistakeholder principles and practical governance challenges, particularly regarding enforcement mechanisms and democratic participation. The disagreements suggest the internet governance community faces critical decisions about IGF’s evolution and role in addressing contemporary digital governance challenges.

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

These speakers share concern about the loss of transparent, participatory methodology that characterized WGIG, where contributions were clearly reflected and participants could see their input being incorporated in real-time.

Speakers

– Jovan Kurbalija
– Avri Doria
– Bertrand de la Chapelle

Arguments

Current processes lack transparency in how contributions are reflected in final documents

Frank March’s role as secretary who wrote while listening and incorporating real-time feedback was crucial innovation

WGIG’s methodology of presenting different options rather than watered-down consensus should be adopted by IGF

Topics

Legal and regulatory

These speakers believe IGF has the capacity to address controversial issues but is held back by stakeholder reluctance and lack of enforcement mechanisms, particularly regarding private sector accountability.

Speakers

– Alejandro Pisanty
– Ariette Esterhuizen
– Vittorio Bertola

Arguments

IGF is mature enough to handle controversial issues but some stakeholders are not ready for such discussions

IGF should facilitate debate on controversial topics like fair taxation of big tech companies

IGF failed to address economic and social questions due to lack of enforcement mechanisms against private sector

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

These speakers emphasize IGF’s evolutionary capacity and its strength in building resilience and capacity across the internet governance ecosystem through continuous adaptation and learning.

Speakers

– Ayesha Hassan
– Baher Esmat
– Jovan Kurbalija

Arguments

Resilience across internet layers should be priority for future stakeholder collaboration

IGF has continuously evolved in topics and outcomes while maintaining non-decision making nature as strength

IGF has been valuable for capacity building and creating incremental development of new methodologies

Topics

Infrastructure | Development | Legal and regulatory

Key takeaways

WGIG’s 20-year legacy demonstrates that multistakeholder cooperation in UN context can be effective and legitimating

The WGIG definition of internet governance has stood the test of time and remains applicable to emerging technologies like AI governance

Multistakeholder and multilateral governance models should coexist and complement each other rather than being viewed as antagonistic

The IGF has successfully served as a global forum for capacity building and agenda setting, but faces challenges in handling controversial topics and ensuring bottom-up participation

Current governance processes often lack transparency in how stakeholder contributions are reflected in final outcomes

The methodology used by WGIG – collecting all opinions while focusing on consensus areas and narrowing disagreements to basic alternatives – remains relevant for contemporary governance challenges

Financial sustainability and clearer role definition are critical for the IGF’s future effectiveness

There is growing tension between the need for multistakeholder governance and the reality of platform monopolies and government regulation

Resolutions and action items

Jovan Kurbalija will present the 8th edition of ‘Introduction to Internet Governance’ book on Wednesday

Suggestion to use AI tools to help trace stakeholder contributions to final governance documents

Proposal to include enhanced cooperation discussions as a regular track in IGF rather than avoiding the topic

Call for more innovative funding models to ensure IGF’s financial stability and sustainability

Unresolved issues

How to balance multistakeholder governance with the need for enforcement mechanisms against powerful private sector actors

Whether the IGF should transition from discussion-only forum to having some decision-making capacity

How to improve national and regional IGF processes that have been captured by governments or become ineffective

How to make governance processes truly bottom-up rather than top-down with occasional consultations

How to engage decision-makers and governments more effectively in IGF discussions

How to address digital governance issues being moved to closed-door trade negotiations

Whether a new working group is needed to address the relationship between internet governance, data governance, and AI governance

How to handle controversial topics like fair taxation of big tech companies and rights-based approaches to digital governance

Suggested compromises

Establishing a new multistakeholder working group after December 2024 to address IGF’s future mandate and institutionalization

Adopting ‘rough consensus’ or ‘near consensus’ (99%) rather than requiring 100% consensus in governance processes

Creating hybrid models that combine multistakeholder policy-making with multilateral implementation mechanisms

Using the IGF as an agenda-setter and issue-framer while allowing other forums to make formal decisions

Implementing the Sao Paulo guidelines approach to bring multistakeholder and multilateral mechanisms together

Allowing the IGF to handle controversial topics while maintaining its non-decision making nature

Developing clearer roles and responsibilities for different stakeholders in various governance processes

We had Frank March, our secretary, our main writer, sitting in the room with us while he was writing, talking to us, asking about this paragraph or that paragraph… What is the major problem today is that we have so many processes which call you to have your say, make contribution. And your contribution disappears in some sort of a governance Bermuda Triangle.

Speaker

Avri Doria and Jovan Kurbalija

Reason

This observation brilliantly captures a fundamental shift in governance processes from genuine collaborative writing to performative consultation. The metaphor of a ‘governance Bermuda Triangle’ where contributions vanish is particularly powerful in highlighting the erosion of meaningful participation.

Impact

This comment shifted the discussion from celebrating past achievements to critically examining current governance failures. It introduced the concept that procedural innovation (having the writer in the room) was as important as substantive outcomes, influencing later speakers to focus more on methodology and process design.

I’m convinced that all problems of Internet governance and many others are much better solved by multi-stakeholder mechanisms… every single country that pushes for more multilateral is also pushing against internet freedom. That’s probably the acid test.

Speaker

Alejandro Pisanty

Reason

This comment provides a provocative litmus test for evaluating governance approaches by linking multilateralism to internet freedom restrictions. It cuts through diplomatic niceties to suggest a clear correlation between governance preference and freedom outcomes.

Impact

This stark framing challenged the prevailing diplomatic tendency to treat multilateral and multistakeholder approaches as equally valid. It pushed subsequent speakers to move beyond the ‘false dichotomy’ language and grapple with real tensions between these approaches.

We thought that by putting everyone together, we would be able to address the economic and social questions, and this didn’t happen… we were naive… The people that could make money out of breaking down the internet and turning it into walled gardens, they just went on and made money. And nobody could stop them because we had no stick.

Speaker

Vittorio Bertola

Reason

This is a brutally honest assessment that challenges the fundamental assumptions underlying the WGIG’s approach. It acknowledges that multistakeholder governance failed to prevent the internet’s fragmentation into commercial silos, introducing the crucial concept that effective governance requires enforcement mechanisms (‘sticks’), not just dialogue.

Impact

This comment created the most significant turning point in the discussion, forcing participants to confront the limitations of their achievements. It shifted the conversation from celebration to critical self-reflection and sparked responses about the need for harder regulatory approaches and the tension between openness and control.

Any notion we have that IGF has bottomed up is something that we should quit pretending. It is not. It hasn’t been… So I love the IGF, I love to see it continue, and I’d really like to see it become bottom up.

Speaker

Avri Doria

Reason

This comment directly challenges one of the core mythologies of the IGF – that it represents genuine bottom-up governance. Coming from a WGIG veteran, this critique carries particular weight and forces honest examination of the gap between rhetoric and reality.

Impact

This blunt assessment validated concerns raised by other speakers and shifted the discussion toward more realistic appraisals of current governance structures. It influenced subsequent speakers to acknowledge the IGF’s limitations more openly and discuss concrete reforms rather than defensive justifications.

The famous, very controversial, big elephant in the room question of enhanced cooperation should be brought as one of the track on the first day of IGF… I never understood why it wasn’t possible.

Speaker

Jovan Kurbalija

Reason

This comment directly addresses the political taboos that have constrained IGF discussions. By naming the ‘elephant in the room’ and questioning why controversial topics are avoided, it challenges the forum’s risk-averse culture and suggests that maturity requires engaging with difficult issues.

Impact

This observation opened space for other participants to discuss controversial topics and the IGF’s capacity to handle them. It led to a broader conversation about whether the forum is mature enough to tackle divisive issues like taxation of big tech companies and enhanced cooperation.

One month ago, there was a survey in the UK, and they asked the young people… would you live better off if the Internet didn’t exist? And half of them said yes… this is really, really terrible for us that work to create it and make it a mass instrument.

Speaker

Vittorio Bertola

Reason

This statistic serves as a devastating indictment of how far the internet has diverged from its original promise. It provides concrete evidence that the internet governance community has failed in its broader mission, moving beyond technical governance to fundamental questions about the internet’s social value.

Impact

This shocking statistic reframed the entire discussion by introducing the perspective of those who feel harmed rather than helped by the internet. It forced participants to confront the possibility that their work, while technically successful, may have contributed to broader social problems.

Overall assessment

These key comments fundamentally transformed what began as a celebratory reunion into a critical examination of both achievements and failures. The discussion evolved through three distinct phases: initial celebration of WGIG’s procedural innovations and definitional work, honest acknowledgment of governance limitations and the gap between rhetoric and reality, and finally a sobering confrontation with the internet’s current social problems. The most impactful comments challenged core assumptions about multistakeholder governance effectiveness, forced recognition of enforcement gaps, and introduced uncomfortable evidence about the internet’s social impact. Rather than defensive responses, these provocative observations generally prompted deeper reflection and more nuanced analysis from other participants, demonstrating the intellectual maturity of this community even when confronting difficult truths about their life’s work.

Should we now push for a more intersectional and rights-based approach in defining digital governance that generally centers the lived realities of women, youth, and marginalized communities?

Speaker

Shaima Akhtar (via online question)

Explanation

This question addresses the need to evolve digital governance frameworks to be more inclusive and representative of marginalized groups, particularly given technological advances like AI and surveillance technologies.

If you were to give a single piece of advice to the WGATE facilitators on how to reach or generate consensus for this process, for the outcome document they are drafting, what would it be?

Speaker

Israel Rosas

Explanation

This seeks practical guidance from experienced WGIG members on consensus-building methodologies that could be applied to current digital governance processes.

Do you think the IGF is ready to actually handle controversial issues? Is the IGF mature enough now to be able to put enhanced cooperation, fair tax payment by big tech companies, and other controversial topics on the agenda?

Speaker

Ariette Esterhuisen

Explanation

This questions whether the IGF has evolved sufficiently to tackle difficult and politically sensitive topics rather than avoiding controversial discussions.

How could we use digital cooperation mechanisms available to us to counter the trend of digital governance issues being taken out of democratic spaces and into closed-door multilateral spaces such as digital trade negotiations?

Speaker

Nandini (IT4Change India)

Explanation

This addresses the challenge of maintaining democratic governance of digital issues when they are increasingly being decided in exclusive trade negotiation forums.

Do you think there would be a benefit in having a sort of new exercise like WGIG after December, or a CSTD working group on revision of the mandate of the IGF after 20 years?

Speaker

Bertrand de la Chapelle

Explanation

This proposes the need for a new structured multi-stakeholder process to address the future of the IGF and resolve current institutional challenges.

Why would governments actually participate or take a role in the IGF if all it does is discuss issues and frame them for decision-making in other forums like the ITU?

Speaker

Hadi Alminyawi

Explanation

This questions the value proposition of the IGF for government participation given its non-decision-making nature.

How many government representatives are in the room?

Speaker

Sébastien Bachelet

Explanation

This highlights the ongoing challenge of government engagement in IGF processes and the need to understand participation patterns.

Should we revisit the Tunis formula that established the IGF as a multi-stakeholder body under UN umbrella?

Speaker

Jovan Kurbalija

Explanation

This suggests that the foundational compromise that created the IGF may need to be reconsidered given current challenges and changing circumstances.

How can we better define the relationship between Internet governance, data governance, AI governance, and digital governance to reduce conceptual confusion?

Speaker

William J. Drake

Explanation

This addresses the need for conceptual clarity as new forms of governance emerge and overlap with traditional internet governance frameworks.

How can we improve the national and regional IGF processes to make them more effective and truly multi-stakeholder?

Speaker

Vittorio Bertola

Explanation

This addresses practical challenges in implementing the IGF model at national and regional levels, using the Italian IGF as a problematic example.

How can we ensure financial stability and sustainability of the IGF to guarantee its continued role at the global level?

Speaker

Baher Esmat

Explanation

This addresses a fundamental operational challenge that could affect the IGF’s ability to continue serving as the global internet governance forum.

Summary

This discussion focused on the relevance of Digital Public Goods (DPGs) for advancing regional Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) approaches, featuring perspectives from Africa, India, Europe, and Latin America. The session was hosted by the Digital Public Goods Alliance and explored how different regions are implementing DPI using open-source solutions to achieve digital transformation and inclusion.

From the African perspective, Desire Kachenje highlighted that DPI development is government-driven but ecosystem-enabled, with countries like Tanzania building interoperable systems using DPGs like X-Road while engaging private sector partners. She emphasized the importance of challenge-driven approaches that ensure citizen adoption and the need for local capacity building, citing Rwanda’s DPI center as an example. However, she noted significant challenges around data governance frameworks and policy harmonization across borders.

Rahul Matthan from India explained that the “India Stack” approach focuses on creating modular, interoperable, and open systems that can be layered in any order, not necessarily following the identity-payments-data sequence. He emphasized that DPI enables countries to leapfrog development, achieving in 10 years what might otherwise take 50 years, and advocated for embedding governance directly into digital architecture rather than relying solely on traditional regulatory approaches.

Henri Verdier discussed Europe’s approach to digital sovereignty, noting strong political alignment with DPI principles due to Europe’s tradition of public services and open standards. He highlighted the challenge of coordinating 27 different national solutions while building interoperability, emphasizing that the EU stack should be a “cloud of solutions” rather than a single system. He stressed the importance of maintaining democratic control over digital infrastructure to prevent corporate capture of governance functions.

Renata Avila presented Latin America’s community-driven approach, noting that seven countries have legislation supporting open source and open content. She highlighted successful examples like Brazil’s PIX payment system, which has expanded internationally, and emphasized the region’s strength in building active communities around digital public goods. The discussion revealed common challenges including ensuring interoperability, addressing local capacity needs, and maintaining data privacy and security, while funding was surprisingly deprioritized by participants who recognized that DPI offers cost-effective alternatives to proprietary solutions.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Regional Approaches to Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) Development**: Speakers from Africa, India, Europe, and Latin America shared distinct regional strategies – Africa focusing on government-driven but ecosystem-enabled approaches, India’s modular “stack” methodology, Europe’s emphasis on digital sovereignty and interoperability, and Latin America’s community-driven open source initiatives.

– **The Role of Digital Public Goods (DPGs) in Scaling DPI**: Discussion centered on how open source software, open data, and open content can enable countries to build sustainable, interoperable digital infrastructure while maintaining local control and reducing dependencies on proprietary solutions.

– **Cross-Border Interoperability and Cooperation**: Emphasis on the importance of building DPI systems that can work across national boundaries, with examples like Brazil’s PIX payment system being used in Europe and regional cooperation initiatives in Africa and the Caribbean for financial inclusion and data sharing.

– **Challenges in Implementation**: Key barriers identified include lack of local capacity and technical expertise, data privacy and security concerns, ensuring inclusive access (especially for the 2.6 billion people without internet), and balancing innovation speed with proper safeguards and governance.

– **Digital Sovereignty vs. Global Cooperation**: Tension between maintaining national control over digital infrastructure while enabling international collaboration, with particular focus on reducing dependence on big tech platforms and building locally-controlled alternatives.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to explore different regional approaches to scaling Digital Public Infrastructure globally, examining how Digital Public Goods can facilitate this scaling while addressing challenges around local agency, interoperability, and inclusive technology development.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a collaborative and optimistic tone throughout, with speakers sharing experiences and best practices rather than competing perspectives. There was a strong sense of shared purpose among participants from different continents, united by common concerns about digital sovereignty and inclusion. The tone became particularly energized when discussing concrete examples of successful cross-border cooperation and when addressing audience questions about governance models and access challenges.

Speakers

**Speakers from the provided list:**

– **Jon Lloyd** – Director of Advocacy and 50 and 5 at the Digital Public Goods Alliance Secretariat; Session moderator

– **Desire Kachenje** – Senior principal at Codevelop fund, based in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; Looks after investments in Africa for core develop fund (non-profit investment fund focusing on supporting governments in rolling out digital public infrastructure)

– **Rahul Matthan** – From Trilegal; Expert on India’s digital public infrastructure (India Stack)

– **Henri Verdier** – From France; Former head of IT department for the French government, currently ambassador; Expert on European approaches to digital sovereignty and open source

– **Renata Avila** – From the Open Knowledge Foundation; Expert on Latin American perspectives on digital public infrastructure and digital commons

– **Audience** – Israel Rosas from the Internet Society (speaking in personal capacity)

**Additional speakers:**

– **Pei-Lin** – Online moderator, colleague at the Digital Public Goods Alliance (mentioned but did not speak in transcript)

– **Max** – Rapporteur for the session, colleague at the Digital Public Goods Alliance (mentioned but did not speak in transcript)

# Digital Public Infrastructure and Digital Public Goods: Regional Approaches to Global Scaling

## Executive Summary

This workshop session, hosted by the Digital Public Goods Alliance at IGF, brought together experts from four continents to examine how Digital Public Goods (DPGs) can advance regional Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) approaches. The session featured perspectives from Africa (Desire Kachenje), India (Rahul Matthan), Europe (Henri Verdier), and Latin America (Renata Avila), moderated by Jon Lloyd from the Digital Public Goods Alliance Secretariat.

The discussion revealed both convergent principles and divergent implementation strategies across regions, with strong consensus emerging around core DPI values of modularity, interoperability, and local capacity building. Jon Lloyd announced that Kazakhstan had joined as the 26th country in the 50 and 5 campaign, demonstrating growing global momentum for DPI initiatives.

## Regional Approaches to Digital Public Infrastructure Development

### Africa: Government-Led with Ecosystem Engagement

Desire Kachenje outlined Africa’s approach as “government-driven but ecosystem-enabled,” emphasizing that while governments must lead DPI initiatives to ensure public interest alignment, successful implementation requires active private sector and civil society engagement.

Tanzania exemplifies this approach, building DPI layers using both established DPGs like X-Road and locally developed platforms including the Jamii data exchange platform and Jamii wallet. Kachenje emphasized challenge-driven implementations, noting that projects addressing specific citizen needs achieve higher adoption rates than technology-first approaches.

The SADC region’s cross-border financial inclusion project demonstrates this principle, focusing on solving real problems for citizens conducting cross-border transactions. Rwanda’s establishment of a DPI center shows the continent’s commitment to building local capacity, though significant challenges remain around data governance frameworks and policy harmonization across borders.

### India: Flexible Modular Architecture

Rahul Matthan clarified misconceptions about India’s “stack” approach, acknowledging the terminology has created impressions of rigid implementation sequences. “I almost feel I must apologise for India stack because we started this idea of a stack, which leaves the impression that you must necessarily layer first identity, then payments, and then data sharing.”

India’s approach actually focuses on creating modular, interoperable elements that can be implemented in any order to address specific national priorities. This modularity enables countries to potentially achieve in 10 years what might otherwise require 50 years of incremental progress.

Matthan introduced the concept of building governance into system architecture itself, arguing that digital infrastructure can enable simultaneous innovation and regulation on the same platform.

### Europe: Digital Sovereignty Through Public Services

Henri Verdier positioned Europe’s approach within digital sovereignty concerns and the continent’s strong public service tradition. European alignment with DPI principles stems from both ideological commitment to public services and practical concerns about corporate control over digital infrastructure.

Verdier framed the discussion around fundamental democratic governance questions: whether societies can still empower people through infrastructure and good governments, or must accept living within big corporations’ infrastructure frameworks.

Rather than pursuing a single unified system, Europe emphasizes creating interoperable solutions that respect national sovereignty while building coherent regional capabilities. Verdier cited France’s partnership between the National Geographical Institute and OpenStreetMap as an example of successful public-private collaboration.

### Latin America: Community-Driven Innovation

Renata Avila highlighted Latin America’s strength in community-driven development, noting that several countries have legislation supporting open source and open content. The region’s approach emphasizes grassroots engagement, with active volunteer communities maintaining digital public goods like CKAN, Decidim, and other platforms.

Brazil’s PIX payment system exemplifies successful regional innovation, now expanding internationally. Similarly, India’s UPI system is gaining traction in the region through South-South cooperation agreements.

Avila distinguished between having strong DPG communities and implementing comprehensive DPI strategies, noting that “in Latin America we are very good at the digital public goods but we haven’t jumped yet to the big digital public infrastructure plans.”

## Key Challenges and Priorities

Interactive polls revealed participant priorities and concerns. When asked about top challenges, responses were evenly split between lack of interoperability, data privacy and security concerns, and local capacity limitations. A second poll showed participants prioritizing open source first principles and local talent development over funding concerns.

### Digital Inclusion and Access

The challenge of reaching 2.6 billion people without internet access emerged as critical, though participants agreed this shouldn’t halt DPI development. Solutions discussed included USSD-based platforms for basic mobile phones, physical access points at government offices, and offline-capable systems that synchronize when connectivity becomes available.

Matthan emphasized hybrid physical-digital approaches, while Kachenje outlined practical accommodations for various access methods. The consensus was that DPI systems should be designed from the outset to accommodate multiple access methods rather than assuming universal internet connectivity.

### Cross-Border Interoperability

Concrete examples demonstrated practical cross-border cooperation possibilities. Brazil’s PIX system’s international expansion and India’s UPI agreements with multiple countries illustrate how national DPI systems can achieve international reach while maintaining local control.

Regional initiatives are emerging across continents, with Africa developing payment systems and Latin America sharing geospatial infrastructure for climate-related data. The technical foundation for this interoperability lies in the modular, open-source nature of DPG-based systems.

## Governance Models and Democratic Control

An audience question from Israel Rosas about multi-stakeholder versus decentralized governance models revealed nuanced disagreements about optimal governance approaches. Avila argued for commons-based approaches ensuring community engagement beyond political changes, while Verdier emphasized that digital sovereignty requires “the ability to implement collective democratic decisions through technology infrastructure.”

The discussion revealed different pathways toward shared objectives of democratic control and community engagement, rather than incompatible visions.

## Economic Considerations

Contrary to common assumptions about resource constraints, funding emerged as a deprioritized concern among participants. This reflected growing awareness of inefficient spending on proprietary technology solutions that fail to deliver value or contribute to local economic development.

Avila noted awareness of “money wasted on tech monopolies that don’t deliver value or pay taxes locally,” while Matthan described DPI as “a relatively cheap alternative to traditional development approaches.” However, Verdier called for better economic theory to understand DPI’s role as public service infrastructure creating ecosystem-wide value.

## Climate Applications and Future Directions

Matthan suggested applying DPI principles to climate challenges, arguing that the same approaches enabling financial inclusion could revolutionize climate action by connecting previously siloed climate data systems. Avila reinforced this potential by highlighting Latin America’s successful regional cooperation on geospatial infrastructure for climate monitoring.

The Digital Public Goods Alliance’s open source policies survey was mentioned as part of ongoing efforts to understand and support DPG implementation globally.

## Areas of Consensus and Ongoing Challenges

Despite diverse regional contexts, participants demonstrated remarkable consensus on fundamental principles including modular, interoperable approaches and the priority of local capacity building over funding concerns.

Persistent challenges include harmonizing data governance frameworks across borders, integrating legacy systems with new DPI approaches, and developing sustainable funding models for DPGs beyond donor-funded projects.

## Conclusion

The discussion revealed both the potential and complexity of scaling Digital Public Infrastructure globally through Digital Public Goods. While regional approaches vary significantly in implementation details, convergence on fundamental principles of openness, interoperability, and local capacity building provides a foundation for continued cooperation and mutual learning.

The session demonstrated that DPI development concerns not merely technical challenges but fundamentally involves democratic governance, economic development, and social inclusion in the digital age. The emphasis on community engagement and local capacity building suggests that sustainable DPI approaches must emerge from local priorities and capabilities, supported by global cooperation on technical standards and knowledge sharing.

Jon Lloyd: The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to anyone, living or dead, is coincidental and unintentional. Please welcome the speakers. Good morning, everyone. It’s a real pleasure to be with you here this morning. Thank you to our generous hosts, the Kingdom of Norway. And a warm welcome to our session. It is the relevance of DPGs for advancing regional DPI approaches here in Workshop Room 2. I’m delighted to be here. It is a real pleasure to be here. Thank you for joining us. I’m delighted to be in the world you are and in person for being here bright-eyed and bushy-tailed in our first session on the second day. I’m the Director of Advocacy and 50 and 5 at the Digital Public Goods Alliance Secretariat. We’re delighted to have such a diverse group of participants both in person and online today. We’re delighted to have the global digital compact with the global digital infrastructure, also known as DPI, and digital public goods, which are also known as DPGs. Before we get going too far, though, I just wanted to introduce the 50 and 5 campaign. It’s one of the ways that the global digital compact has been put into action with the goal of making the world a safer and more inclusive place for all. We’re delighted to be here with the 50 and 5 campaign. It’s just over a year and a half into the campaign now, and in the spirit of this session, I’m very excited to announce that Kazakhstan is formally participating in the campaign as the 26th 50 and 5 country. We’re absolutely thrilled to share their commitment to implementing safe and inclusive DPI alongside their fellow 50 and 5 countries, including Kazakhstan, and we’re delighted to have them here today. So, let’s get started. I’m going to hand it over to our panelists. There we go. This topic is especially timely and relevant, as we consider last year’s global digital compact. In the GDC, countries have committed to implementing digital public infrastructure with safety and inclusion at its core, as well as committing to collaborate and cooperate with one another through sharing digital public goods. So, what does this mean in practice? So, in practice, countries can freely adopt digital public goods. That’s open source software, open data, open AI models, and open content collections that adhere to privacy and other applicable laws and best practices, do no harm, and help attain their sustainable development goals. So, what this means in practice is that countries can freely adopt digital public goods and use them to build components of their own, and to make the world a better place. So, let’s get started. So, just before I introduce our panel, I also want to introduce our fantastic team, helping facilitate the session. Joining as our online moderator here is Pei-Lin, and serving as our rapporteur today is Max, both my colleagues here at the Digital Public Goods Alliance. So, thank you to the two of you. We’re incredibly fortunate to have you here today. So, let’s get started. So, in the first room, we have Desire Kachenge from Codevelop. Next to me here is Rahul Matthan from Trilegal, Henri Verdier from France, and Renata Avila from the Open Knowledge Foundation. So, our objective for the next 75 minutes is clear. We want to explore different regional approaches to scaling DPI, and an opportunity to sporadically tackle scale of propriety and local agency and tech development. So, for our remote participants, you’ll be able to use our virtual platforms Q&A feature for questions. The chat for quick comments and reactions, and that is how we’ll be obtaining our questions. Onsite, here. Thank you again for being here. Let’s make this a truly insightful and collaborative session, and without further ado, over to you, Desire.

Desire Kachenje: Thank you so much. I will start by introducing myself. So, I am very honoured to be here. My name is Desire Kachenge. I’m based in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. I am a senior principal. I look after investments in particularly Africa for core develop fund. So, just really quickly, I’m sure a lot of our ecosystem here has heard about us, but core develop is an investment fund, a non-profit investment fund that focuses on supporting specifically governments, but also other stock stakeholders in rolling out digital public infrastructure. Our focus also expands to sort of like supporting in some of the challenges and bottlenecks, but also doing some research to understand a little bit more what digital public infrastructure looks like, but also the different approaches when it comes to deploying. And we work very closely with DPGs to see how they can make this sustainable. John, I don’t know if you want me to proceed?

Jon Lloyd: Sure, yeah. I would love to hear some context-setting remarks from the African perspective. Great.

Desire Kachenje: So, I think one of the key things that a lot of us are hearing, and what we’re seeing in the continent, is that digital public infrastructure is not just infrastructure. There are a number of other things that need to be considered when we want to roll out sustainable and scalable DPI. It’s also evolving to be not just a digital transformation initiative, but also sort of like a growth within the ecosystem to inspire innovation, but also to bring in private sector and other players. So, there are three key things that we’re seeing in the African region that I want to talk about. So, the first one would be, it’s being very government-driven, but ecosystem-enabled. So, I can give a good example here with Tanzania, where I’m based. Over the past few years, even before the concept around digital public infrastructure was formed, and some of the research around it had been done, Tanzania has been building different layers of DPI. So, they started working on the ID, like most countries, and then they started building an interoperable digital payment system, you know, starting with connecting mobile, you know, starting with connecting mobile operators separately, and then connecting banks, and then thinking, how can we build a platform that connects these two? In their first exploration on how this payment platform would be, they did work with a DPG, and they then decided to roll out an in-house platform that was and is still managed by the government. Currently, right now, Tanzania is exploring a very interesting, I would say, a very interesting implementation plan, whereby, while it’s government-driven, it is now rolling out what they are calling the Jamii data exchange platform. This is the third layer of the DPI. As they are doing this, they are not only working with local implementers within Tanzania, but they are bringing in different DPGs. Their data exchange platform is built on X-Rod, so they are working closely with X-Rod, but we are also working with them to build out what they are calling a Jamii wallet, which is a use case on top of this data exchange platform. They are doing this using digital local, which is a different type of DPG. At the same time, they are working closely with private sector to see how these platforms can interact, not just with government institutions, but also interact with private sector institutions and allow data exchange. That’s why I’m saying government-driven, but very much ecosystem-enabled. Another example is also around challenge-driven DPI. A lot of the data exchange platforms that are being rolled out, they are not being used by government institutions. A lot of public infrastructure platforms that have been rolled out so far, we are seeing a little bit of slowness when it comes to adoption. Even if it’s interoperable, even if it’s safe, if there is an adoption, and that means there’s no engagement with citizens, there’s no engagement with government institutions that need to use it, it cannot meet some of the potential that we see when it comes to DPI. So, the challenges that start with a challenge are not only more innovative and more customer-citizen-focused, but they also have more adoption from the point of rollout. I’ll give a good example in the SADC region right now. SADC region is the Southern Africa sub-Saharan countries. There are about 16 of them who are currently in the SADC group. One of the questions or challenges that came up is there is a lot of immigrants that are moving between these countries. While a lot of these immigrants might have a national ID and other documents, they’re still not in the formal form. The question then became why, and the quick answer was some of them just don’t have documents. For example, Zimbabwean, and I’m now working in South Africa, but I don’t have the right documents in South Africa to support me to be formally included in financial services. But then at the same time, we know that a lot of these countries already have national IDs. They already have national digital IDs. Then the SADC group had reached out to us and another partner within South Africa called FinMAC Trust to figure out, hey, can we build a use case that actually connects the national foundational IDs that are existing within these countries to be able to support immigrants to use formal financial services within Africa? We’ve seen the quick stakeholder engagement in this project. We already have private sector. These are the banks joining in. We already have the central banks who are paying attention to the project and seeing how they can come in. Then last but not least, innovation needs to meet serenity. That’s the other bit that I’m sure we’ll be exploring a lot more today, but there’s always a question around, hey, can we build a use case that actually connects the national foundational IDs that are existing within these countries to be able to support immigrants to use formal financial services within Africa? When we’re building DPI, especially specifically when we’re building DPI with DPGs, how do we ensure that countries have the local ecosystem to not only own, but run, maintain and develop new use cases? I think a good example is in Rwanda right now where they’re rolling out a number of use cases when it comes to DPI. And what they’re also doing on the side is they’re now deploying or they’re building up what they’re calling a center, a DPI center. And this DPI center is supposed to support ecosystem players, including developers, whether they’re in government or their private sector, and seeing in what ways they can be able to understand, build capacity for them to understand the use cases and how they can support in aspects of maintaining some of the use cases that will be rolled out in a few years. So I think that gives a bit of an example of how DPI has been rolled out in Africa. And if you know, I’m happy to explore this a little bit more. One thing I would mention is that there’s also challenges, which I think are globally, and we’re seeing it very in real time in Africa. And these are mainly to do with safeguards. So one of the one of them that I can mention is around data governance. So when we’re building these data exchange platforms, especially when the original bringing more than one country, we do not have we have very fragmented digital data governance frameworks that are existing. So this moves beyond just the platform itself. But how do we bring policy makers? How do we enable countries to harmonize some of the policies that are in place to ensure that the platforms have been built are safe and inclusive? So I will hand over back to

Jon Lloyd: you, John, and happy to take any questions. Thank you very much, Desire. That was a really excellent insight into into how Africa is approaching DPI development, especially using DPGs. Rahul, we’ll move on to you now. And we’ve heard so much about the India stack. And I would like to just hear more about like how India has approached its DPI development and its approach

Rahul Matthan: to DPGs as well. Thank you. Thank you, John. So I, I almost feel I must apologize for India stack, because we started this idea of a stack, which leaves the impression that you must necessarily layer first identity, then payments, and then data sharing. And really, it’s not mandatory that you have to do it in that way. So even though we sort of think about in stack and the stack approach as a pathway by which you must progress up the chain of DPI is, I’m here to say that the the real idea of a stack is that we are creating modular elements, DPGs that can be layered on top of each other in whichever order you want for whichever solution you want. And that really is the the stack approach that India has followed. Now, India happened to start with identity, and then built a very powerful payment system, which is currently doing 18 billion transactions a month, and then has built data sharing. But if you think sideways, India has built DigiLocker, which is a very powerful credential system. And credentials are very useful for a number of things, from skilling, to government to person payment solutions, to all sorts of things. And so the real India approach, I would say, is leaning into some of the definition of what DPI is, which is open, interoperable, modular systems. And you can start wherever you want on the stack, you don’t necessarily have to have an identity, digital identity system, it’ll help if you have one, but you don’t necessarily have to have one. But you have to build these solutions to be modular, interoperable, and open. Because it’s only if you build them to be modular, interoperable, and open, that you can really reach population scale, because you never have to rebuild something that you have built previously. And that is a really powerful statement of how digitalization needs to happen. Now, India has, of course, as you know, been doing this for 15 years. So if you do it for a decade and a half, you have some time for introspection, and you can go back and see, what is this thing that you’ve built? And once you’ve figured out that you’ve built something which is pretty cool, you can then go and see what else it can be used for. And one of the things that I’ve been playing with is this idea that some of the things that Desai was talking about, that we’ve got to really sort out data governance. Because at the end of it all, we are unlocking a lot of data, and we need to do it in a safe manner. And so how do you do it? The traditional lawyer in me says, you’ve got to write laws, and you’ve got to build policies, and you’ve got to do it the way we’ve done it for many centuries. But the power of digital, and the power of digital where everything is digital, is that you can actually build some of that governance into the design of the architecture that you’re using. Now, this is an idea that’s not new. 25 years ago, Lawrence Lessig wrote a marvelous book called Code and the Other Laws of Cyberspace, where he said that on the internet, code is law. Now, at that point in time, the internet was a thin sliver of what we all do. Today, the internet and digital is everything that we do. I’m here in Norway, and I don’t need to take out my wallet, which is remarkable, because in many cities, even in Europe, you have to. And I can travel around from Oslo to Lillstrom using just the app, know which train is coming when the train is canceled on me. I can very easily get the other train. It’s remarkable that you can do all of this using an entirely end-to-end digital system. But when we do that, we’ve got to remember that that same digital system gives us the tools to actually in-build governance directly into the interactions that we have. This, to me, is the hidden secret of digital public infrastructure, because digital public infrastructure really is an infrastructure layer that you have created for transactions. Laws are the offline way of telling us how transactions need to be conducted. And in an entirely online world, the laws that tell you how to transact can actually be written directly into the ways in which these different modules interact with each other. And so the term that I coined, the phrase I coined, is that we’re building an infrastructure on which regulators can regulate and innovators can innovate. And this is different from the other infrastructures that are built by innovators on which only innovation can happen on the terms of the people who control the platforms. And then regulators are forced to use the traditional old world ways of coming up and saying laws, etc. But if the regulators can also participate as regulators on that infrastructure, they will be able to set the rules and the innovators will be able to innovate on the same platform. And that really, I think, is the secret hidden message of digital public infrastructure.

Jon Lloyd: Yeah, it’s very interesting, especially given India has been a real leader in the DPI space and a real example that a lot of countries are looking to. And Omri, maybe we can move to you now. And we’ve heard a lot about this idea of the Eurostack, although we know it’s several different things. But I would like to hear more about the European approaches to digital sovereignty, role of open source in that, and in particular this concept of the digital commons and how that aligns with the digital public goods agenda. Okay, so thank you for being there. It’s a pleasure

Henri Verdier: to exchange with my friends. So I was listening to the two first speakers. I feel that the perception of the DPI movement in Europe was immediate and very positive, maybe because we have a long tradition and we love good specification. You know, Europe is a birthplace of, I don’t know, the metric system, the ITU, and a lot of open standards, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, a lot of open source like Linux, etc. And we love when the world is properly organized. So these ideas that you can manage, plan, we love it. And the second thing is that there is probably an ideological alignment because we have a strong culture of public services, and maybe in the discussion we need to precise that public service is not government, so that’s not exactly the same thing. And in France, the culture of the public servant is really strong, and they don’t consider that they are there to obey to the minister. They have a service to deliver and they do it. And probably a third connection is the idea that when we see the digital world as we see it, if we want to protect an open, free, decentralized, vibrant internet, and to protect democracy, the right to the people to decide their collective future together, and to impose some solution, we need this layer of DPI to implement some political decision and collective decision on the big, the open internet. So I think that we are ideologically aligned, but because the need to change was not the same, we didn’t go as fast as India, for example. I say very often in Bangalore, I use UPI in Bangalore, but in France you can buy a baguette with a contactless payment with your phone without any fee for decades. But that’s a very old and imperfect system. You need a bank account, a credit card, an emulation of the credit card, the connection, so that’s a very complex system, but you can do it, and that’s quite free. So the need to change was not the same until the growing concern regarding sovereignty. So France was probably the most concerned with sovereignty forever, because we are a bit Gaullist, so we say we decide, we want strategic autonomy. I have to say that a lot of other Europeans were a bit less concerned and then we have this movement which is not just the Trump administration we have also companies that becomes very very big and heavy and start to act as political actors so when you see of course the most obvious is Elon Musk but you can if you see carefully you can see others they want to decide the future of the of the world of geopolitics and national politics as to Brazil what Trump must try to do so we have a growing concern and to be frank we are really really really heavily dependent and vulnerable to American companies and American infrastructure everywhere can you do you remember last month the American government decided to cut the email of the prosecutor of the criminal international criminal court that’s something impressive so because of this we are progressing toward the slowly but firmly to other kind of digital public infrastructure will all this culture of good organization and public service and for example next year we’ll have the you digital wallet which is a very important step because we will have the same standard in all the European citizens phone to present and interact with digital ID and we we’ve learned to separate some attributes from the idea so for example I will be able to prove that that I am more than 18 years old without giving my name which is very compromising for a lot of issues and and now I’m going in the last 30 seconds to our very good and open source but we are still European and we are still 27 countries and so when you say to any European country let’s build a common EU stack they will say all of them will say of course let’s take my solution let’s take X road let’s take France connect let’s take and probably we’ve lost 10 years because of this because of a kind of competition between national solutions and now we are learning thanks to the open source movements to build buckets of interoperable solutions for example there is a Franco-German project a sweet numeric that’s the desk for the public servants this is not one solution this is a series of module and you can you can add your own module the group will test if this is interoperable with the others the group will develop the interoperability if needed and we will have so I finished to say that the only way from my perspective for real EU stack is not one stack is a variety of solution and altogether we pay attention and we build interoperability and the EU stack will be a cloud of nebulous we say in French of solutions but and we you will be able to decide I take matrix or I take another one but I know that when I do enter in this world I can interact with all the others and we are progressing fast from one year more or less things are accelerated and this is deeply connected to the DPG movement because for this we need all those communities of open source open standards developers small companies

Jon Lloyd: associations etc excellent thank you Henri I think you’ve touched on especially those issues around I guess the sovereignty issue which is coming up design and Rahula both kind of covered that in their introductions as well and Renata let’s move to you and I’d like to hear more from the Latin American perspective as well about how how countries in lack approaching DPI as

Renata Avila: well yes I think that it really connects well with the last bit of Henry because I think that the emphasis in Latin America is communities and it is very interesting because we start early the vision of the public infrastructure was being discussed in Latin America early 2000s and an example of that is that seven countries in Latin America have legislation for open source and open content so those those two pillars it is not words but actions in many countries in Latin America I can list it Argentina Brazil Ecuador Peru Venezuela Uruguay and Cuba and I will say that the first thing that the Latin American countries understood together with code is law is that technology is politics and we learned the hard way you know like after some sanctions to some countries in Latin America of course you are shot you’re cut off vital things that you need to do your work and that accelerated in the early 2000s a transition you know when when when Latin American countries were like you know adopting some policies that were not welcome but the main provider of technology had to move the open source was the the way you know and and the interesting thing is what it was institutionalized they were like yeah units inside ministers in charge of this and there were like resources allocated to that and but in parallel and it’s something that is very important because that didn’t last long the institutionality after transitions and left right left right left right as it is seen in our very vital democracies and many like you know was discarded or defunded but what it stayed was the community component and the that’s the highlight of the continent the communities around open source the communities around free software the communities around open content are very active like it’s very interesting you know you see in Europe like a lot of funding for community works and digital social innovation and so on compared it’s not enough but compared to Latin America in Latin America is the volunteer you know it’s what you do after work it was what you do on weekends you edit a Wikipedia article you code and contribute to a collaborative platform and and so what I will say that what it is different is that in Latin America we are very good at the digital public goods and but we haven’t jumped yet to the big digital public infrastructure plans except some specific cases one case that is very exciting is the case of pics in Brazil and it is it is it even made it to Europe you know like I am at the moment living partially in Portugal and I was in Lisbon and I saw pics I could pay by pics in in Portugal Brazilians can pay with pics in Portugal imagine that you know like it’s very interesting and it is being adopted in Panama Peru Bolivia Paraguay Venezuela Ecuador and Argentina is doing a pilot and it makes sense because Brazil is you know half of our continent so all the border countries are making easy to exchange we are not Europe we don’t have the euro it’s difficult these frictions with currencies and a lot of very complicated legislation because of money laundry and so on so this is making a real difference and the other thing that I want to highlight this the ugly dog nobody speaks excite in an exciting way about it is the geospatial infrastructure most of Latin America sure geospatial infrastructure which is that is a digital public good and that’s amazing that really enables the work of many many public offices and on the other highlight is data see can which open knowledge foundation coded initially and in now is one of the default platforms in more than 20 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean and and D can as well and so the civic and the CDM also is many of the Latin American participatory platforms and many other smaller civic tech projects follow the logic and I already listed a digital public goods but one thing that before I do not want to forget because it connects to India is an emergent emergent trend of South South cooperation which is very very exciting in in the frame of bricks and carry comb India stack has signed emojis with Cuba Colombia Suriname to not in Tobago and you remember Buddha and Barbados and that’s a subregion practically you know the Caribbean and Colombia Colombia is the only one in the mainland but it is very very exciting to see how all of this connects the the Caribbean Caribbean communities also super strong in communities of open source and so what I will say that is the highlight of the region is that it’s a region that can make what will be different is that is not only the tech techies and the regulators but is the community ready to take active informed participation in how you build your digital public infrastructure and so that those are the exciting news from the region great thank you so much and

Jon Lloyd: we’re going to jump in now to a real question-and-answer component of this we’d really like to have your feedback and questions particularly online make sure that you’re submitting those we’ve heard a lot of common threads coming through here and common use cases in particular I think one compelling thing that’s coming out is this idea of the cross-border use cases which I don’t necessarily think that countries are considering when they’re implementing their own DPI but the importance of interoperability and the solutions is becoming more and more prominent you mentioned it with pics and I’m funnily enough that you can now use in Europe And, of course, Desire covered that as well with just being able to access financial services using your digital ID. And so, but Rahul, maybe I can jump to you quickly. But what do you think are some of the big differences between the way that India has been approaching its DPI development and what you’ve been hearing from the other speakers?

Rahul Matthan: So look, I don’t think there’s much that’s different. I think, you know, we came from a different place. As Henri said, we, to India, and I think this is true of a lot of the global south, this is the only way to leapfrog development so that we can, I think the statistics are, do in 10 years what would have otherwise taken us 50 years. And I think a lot of countries are seeing that. Now, France didn’t need to do that because France had already put the 50 years in and they were sort of 50 years ahead. And for the rest of the developed world, this is not, in that sense, a necessity for many of the traditional elements of the stack. And I think, you know, digital identity, if you’ve got a very strong civil registry, you don’t really need to do what India did and get biometrics to the whole population. You just rely on your civil registry. If you’ve got a working payment system that reaches everyone in the country, you don’t need to go and build a PICS because already there’s a way in which to do it. But for the countries of the global south where they’re seeing that there’s a lot that we have to achieve, this is a quick way to do it. Now, just to touch on the interoperability across borders, India, as you know, is a subcontinent. And so in many ways, of course, there is a need to interoperate with other countries, but we are a billion people and we really need to focus first on interoperating inside and reaching everyone in the country, which is what the identity system did. Unfortunately, the payment system, as big as it is, is only covering maybe 300 to 400 million people. We have a billion left to cover. So we have a long road ahead of us, even within the country. But I think there are many other elements where we can and must cooperate. I’m going to put a plug for climate because using digital public infrastructure to solve the climate crisis is probably the most important, urgent innovation that we can think of as the next step of digital public infrastructure. You may think, as I’m saying this, you may say, what is he talking about? But let’s just agree this is 10 years from the Paris Agreement. The Paris Agreement isn’t really working. Temperatures are rising beyond the point where I think we can scale it back to our climate objectives. The approach of building grand consensus between countries is not working because countries are not committing and people are walking out of the agreement. We’ve got to find a different way. And the one thing about DPI is DPI unlocks abundance. We are stuck with data and valuable opportunity in silos that don’t connect to each other. And if we can just rethink the way in which we address climate challenges by connecting our silos, we will find that solving the climate problem does not cost the trillions of dollars that it’s estimated to cost because that is an old world way of thinking of solutions. And I strongly urge all of us here, I mean, COP is in Brazil this year, and I strongly urge all of us to rethink the way we go about this because DPI has shown a way for very, very big challenges like financial inclusion. I see no reason why that can’t be applied to something as important as climate change.

Jon Lloyd: And Renato, I’ll jump to you because you mentioned this a little bit when you were speaking earlier, but Latin Americans are sharing geospatial data, I think, in terms of addressing that climate using digital public goods. How have they been built and governed in a way that’s enabling this cooperation and collaboration?

Renata Avila: Well, I think that the Geosur project, I don’t know the details of the governance, but it is usually cooperation across the region is very dynamic and fluid, especially in two issues, in cross-border cooperation and in health issues. I think that the pandemic, PAHO, for example, has played a key… There’s regional mechanisms that have enabled this cooperation. I think that also two actors have played a crucial role, and one is the Inter-American Development Bank, and the other is, you know, the regional mechanisms such as CELAC and OAS, to make countries agree on general frameworks, of course, not at the level of coordination of Europe, but close to that. I think that also the lack of tailored solutions and the lack of prioritization by the Global North of solutions specific to Latin America had accelerated that in the geospatial area. And one more that is very important. It has also… Latin America has been one of the pioneers together with India, actually, in opening also knowledge and opening research that will be like key… It’s a combination of data, knowledge and infrastructure that makes the region very ripe for more ambitious efforts around climate.

Jon Lloyd: Excellent. And speaking about regional ambitions, desire, we’ve heard a lot, especially from the East Africa community recently, we know that there are commitments being made on this idea of cooperation and collaboration. So there’s a lot of political will there. And that’s a thread that I’ve kind of heard coming through as well. But is there also a risk through moving too fast and not necessarily taking a multi-stakeholder approach and the effects that that might have on inclusion or exclusion of people and in terms of being able to access services?

Desire Kachenje: Thank you. Great question. So I think the way you’ve put it is actually very correct. There’s a lot of political will. And this is more specifically, I would say, when it comes to digital payments, even like with the East African communities, mostly around digital payments and how we can, you know, connect some of this digital infrastructure that’s existing. So right now, just for context, it’s worthwhile to understand that, you know, in Africa, DPI is looked at mainly to kind of solve some of the fragmentation issues, but also to bring together inclusion. So like to solve for the digital divide. And digital payments took off more, I think, in Africa region than, you know, in most other parts of the world, because it came from a need, a necessity that a lot of African citizens want to send small amounts of money to rural areas that probably don’t have network and don’t have internet. And that caused, you know, mobile banking to skyrocket, et cetera. And then from there, it was now easy to create interoperability because it was very clear the use case that needs to be there. Now, I think to answer your question, there are two risks that, you know, a lot of countries are looking at and a lot of regional operators are looking at. We already have PASS, which is the Pan-African Payments Incentive System. We have TCIB for the southern region. And there are a number of others that are coming up. But one of the bigger questions has been there is a lot of smaller amounts that are being shared across these countries. And the platforms, while the interoperability is there, they are not really accommodating such amounts. And so some of the work that is being done, and I think I want to give, you know, more like congratulations to some of the DPGs in DPI right now who are focusing on working with some of these regional organizations, for example, Comesa, to say, hey, can we have a use case that just focuses on something like merchant payments, where these are your smaller payments, and to enable smaller SMEs or to smaller amounts to be sent in the region. So this is really helping when it comes to inclusion. An example of this is that Comesa is currently working with Modulook, which is a DPG for payment platforms. And they’re doing a trade platform whereby it will allow smaller traders to send smaller amounts of money within the region. The other bit I think we’ve mentioned, it comes to that there is a lot of legacy systems that are existing in Africa currently. And a lot of these legacy systems, it’s been hard to then transition them to actual platforms, and then it’s even harder to transition them in a way that we’re using the DPI approach, you know, making them interoperable, making them open. And we are seeing right now that DPGs is taking, a lot of countries are taking a different look at DPGs and they’re more open, although we’re also seeing specific requests that, fine, let’s use an open source platform, but can we have the data being on-prem, so being on the ground, which then brings a lot of questions around, you know, how do we manage this? How do we incorporate this? So I would say when it comes to inclusion, it’s usually to look after the low-income populations and the harder-to-reach populations. And the other bit is then how do we ensure that, you know, a lot of the governments are comfortable in some of the open systems as they are built, and spending less more time in trying to customise them specifically for one country, because then now when we’re trying to connect regionally, we have to do more customisation, which can be quite expensive and time-consuming.

Jon Lloyd: Interesting. And Omri, I’m going to ask you a question a little bit about some of this regulation. You know, we’ve heard the Silicon Valley approach of move fast and break things. Unfortunately, it seems like they’ve broken too much, perhaps. But I think in Europe, given that often the rest of the world would look to Europe in terms of tech regulation. and the DSA, the AI Act, all of that kind of thing. But what we’re hearing here is that with DPGs and for DPI, there needs to be a lot of flexibility and openness in the approach. But in terms of, I guess from this European or French perspective, what are some of the non-negotiable elements that need to be in place, I guess from your perspective, in order to maintain that sense of innovation and collaboration, but need to, I guess, set the box in order for us to all play in?

Henri Verdier: Very interesting questions. I’m building an answer. Yes, obviously, there are non-negotiable elements and that are all the decision of free democracies. So privacy, human dignity, free speech, as we consider that free speech should be. So it doesn’t allow you to ask to kill people online, et cetera, et cetera. And if we cannot implement our collective decision, we are not a democracy anymore. And that’s why sovereignty matters, because you cannot conceive a democracy without sovereignty. You can conceive sovereignty without democracy, but you cannot conceive democracy without sovereignty. So first, second observation, starting from the Indian, I will take the Indian vocabulary. You cannot regulate just with law. You need a techno-legal approach. By the way, you need champions if you’re not creative, innovative. If you don’t have research, intellectuals, creators, companies, startups, et cetera, you won’t impose your views. So you have to be part of the movement, and you have to conceive a way to implement a bit the regulations. So that’s why we need a longer conversation regarding rules as code. But yes, that’s important to be sure that when you decide something, you know how to implement it. Interesting example, for years and years in Europe, we are very concerned by age verification, because we know that very, very young children go to pornographic websites, but I’m speaking about the age of eight. Ten percent of the children less than eight years old are seeing pornographic content online. But if you just say, we want to check the age, it doesn’t mean nothing. So the question is, how can we do this? And because we need to respect privacy, et cetera, the only solution is to have a proof of age separate from the identity. And for this, you need to conceive an infrastructure, and that is efficient, auditable, because we need also to be sure that they are really separating those information, et cetera. Because your question is about regulation, it’s also politics, I just want to add one last word. I was asking to myself, what do we have in common, because we are from four continents, and we have a lot in common. And I was thinking that something that we have in common is a bit hidden, because it’s so obvious that we don’t pay attention to this. In a nutshell, I think that we would all agree that a good society needs equal access to some basic public services, needs democracy and a collective decision, needs free speech and free innovation for the market, et cetera, et cetera. But this is not a real consensus. So we have this in common. This is not what most of the companies of the Valley think. And they are developing an infrastructure to capture our economies, to transform us into a kind of global Uber driver’s economy, within their platform, where they take all the added value. And if you pay attention, there is a real theory, probably it started with Milton Friedman, but now they have more and more books, the network states, worse to be seen, because that’s the program of Elon Musk. Let’s replace the old-fashioned nation states with big vertical companies, one for education, one for… And that’s the big front line and the big battle. Can we still empower the people through infrastructure and good governments to respect dignity and innovation and everything, or do we have to let our lives within big corporations and their infrastructure? And that may be one of the secret connections between all those movements.

Jon Lloyd: I’m just going to pause for a second here, and we’re going to launch a Mentimeter poll. Those of you online, there was applause in the room next to us, which we heard. So there is a Mentimeter poll here. If you’re able to join using this QR code or go to the link here in Menti, we’ll launch that in just a second. I think people are still taking photos of the QR code. It’s just coming up now. Okay. Let’s launch that poll. So we’ve heard a little bit about some of these challenges in DPI implementation from regional perspectives here, but in terms of scaling DPI globally, what do you think are the biggest challenges? We can see some of the answers coming in now. All of us panelists are watching them come in. Do we have multiple answers? It’s the biggest challenge, Henri. You had to choose just one. Yeah, these are quite interesting answers. I’ll just read out what the options are here. So we’ve got lack of interoperability, ensuring data privacy and security, addressing local capacity and agency, funding and resource allocation, and political will and governance. It looks like we’ve got a bit of a dead heat here between three of these options. I’ll just open it up to our panelists. What are your reactions to seeing this, Renata?

Renata Avila: You know what I love is that everybody deprioritized funding and resource allocation because we are now well aware of all the money spent in tech monopolies that deliver nothing and not even pay taxes in our countries. So I think that that’s clear. That’s consensus now. And when you were saying what we have in common, what we have in common is that we are squeezed without options and we really need to work together, all the people here at this table, in reverting the lack of options and the heavy dependencies that we have in a system that is not delivering for democracy or for sovereignty. The second thing that is very interesting in the results is also the need to address local capacity and agency because very quickly something that I am a part of is that most of the local capacity, most of the programs training civil servants are run by big tech from Silicon Valley. Most of it, most of it, like basically training our civil service just to think that they are the only solution available and ignoring all this rich ecosystem of possibilities that we could take. So those are like my two comments.

Henri Verdier: Henri, very briefly this time, I am the only one that did vote for economic allocation because of the word allocation. First, it was very difficult to choose because everything here was very important, but I feel that we need a better economic theory of the economic role of DPI. If we decided in Europe a century ago to make postal service or whatever as public services, it was because it did create so much value everywhere that it was quite impossible to take the value everywhere. So I think that this is the best way to finance something that creates value everywhere. We need such a theory for the modern version of public service that is DPI.

Jon Lloyd: Do we still have Desire with us? I hope so because Desire, how are digital public goods addressing some of these issues around like funding resource allocation where Africa is a historically resource constrained area still now? What is the role of digital public goods in helping address that in terms of DPI development and launch?

Desire Kachenje: Yes, so I think firstly it’s very interesting for me to see this because I agree, I really like that adjusting local capacity is quite high up there. I think what we’re seeing here, funding and resource allocation is still quite a huge issue because a lot of these other issues, addressing local capacity, political will and lack of interoperability for a lot of African countries, they do need funding to sort of solve some of these issues. I think there’s a slight difference there in terms of the outlook here. In terms of DPG, I would say it’s a double-edged sword. So there’s one side that a lot of DPGs already have easy to use and source code that can be easily implemented within African countries. But then at the same time, a lot of DPGs still need to build local capacity. within the countries that they’re operating in, which then this requires time and resources and funding. So DPGs have done a great job in understanding the challenges and needs, specific needs, when it comes to different African countries and different approaches to DPI. And I think DPGs are also putting their hand up in terms of coming up with easier ways or more efficient ways to roll out. But at the same time, there’s also the other side that a lot of DPGs are funded. So sustainability around maintaining some of the DPGs long term for them internally itself is still something that needs to be discussed. But when they are rolling out in African countries, the customization and the the ability to remain sustainable past the project, especially because most of most of the project when it comes to DPIs that use DPGs are donor funded. So sustainability past that donor funded project is still a question. And then last but not least, John, if I really want to touch on data, privacy and security, and I know that, you know, it’s it’s something that we’re discussing on and on. But it’s such a crucial issue, even when it comes to working with DPGs, because a lot of let’s say if we look at something like that, there are some countries that still do not have clearly defined, you know, what is what does it look like when it comes to digital data for specific populations, like when we’re looking at children? What is that a privacy for children, especially when it comes to things like digital IDs or digital bathroom registrations? So while we have a number of DPGs such as OpenCRVS, which are doing a great job when it comes when it comes to like registrations. But this, you know, we’re seeing a bit of a struggle here for countries to then adapt privacy and security issues, which kind of make a lot of projects halt in between, because then you will have CSOs coming in and saying, how safe is this? Yes. So I think that’s my quick take.

Jon Lloyd: Excellent. Yeah, that was extremely useful. We’re going to launch a second Mentimeter question now, because it relates a lot to what Desire was just speaking about. So here we go. Hopefully you still have the Mentimeter link up from before. But which of these do you believe is most effective in ensuring countries build and evolve technologies based on their own priorities? So here’s the Mentimeter link. If you if you lost it before our options here, we’ve got open source first principles, decentralized DPG governance models, promoting digital commons, which I think relates to the European agenda here, local talent development and training to address some of those capacity issues. And then this idea of, I guess, international funding, but with local control. So this is very interesting as well in terms of open source first principles. I know Renati, you spoke about many countries in Latin America having this open source first approach. And seeing some of the answers changing here now as well. Oh, God. It’s very interesting. Also, if there’s anyone present with us who would like to ask a question, please feel free to come up and and ask them at the microphones either side of the stage. We’d love to hear from you. Hey, Len, how are answers coming in, questions from online? Or we can take a look in a second. Great. And Rahul, maybe as these results are coming in, what are your reflections about this?

Rahul Matthan: I mean, it’s interesting to see funding right at the bottom. I think this is repeating what we saw in the previous Mentimeter. And I think the idea really is that it doesn’t take a lot of funding. It’s not that funding is not important, but actually, DPIs are a relatively cheap alternative to doing this. I think it’s interesting to see local talent development right on top, because this is something that we sometimes don’t really fully grok as to how important this is. You can build these wonderful platforms, but there is a last mile that needs to be implemented by government servants, NGOs, even ordinary citizens. And the development that’s required in order to do that is actually non-trivial. And we can’t automate everything away, as no matter what you do with digital, there’s always that last mile. But even as I’m speaking, I’m seeing that we’ve got three tied for third place. And it’s clearly local talent and open source as the top two, which in many ways really aligns with the way I think about these things. This is really the two most important things we should be thinking about.

Jon Lloyd: And do you see the use of digital public goods in assisting with the local talent development and training?

Rahul Matthan: Of course. No, I mean, look, we can keep chipping away at the amount of physical or non-digital steps that we need to take to build this. And I think certainly in doing that, building DPG type training, talent development solutions using Sunbird and things like that are extraordinarily powerful. But I think that at least when I speak to DPI development in other countries and not just in my country, I find that this is the thing that governments are most concerned about. And it may just be a fear of the unknown, but a lot of governments are concerned about how much it’s going to take to actually really roll this out in countries. And I think that’s certainly something that we can look to improve using DPG solutions, building DPIs even just for talent development. But we can’t ignore the fact that this is a concern and that this is something that needs to be actively addressed.

Jon Lloyd: Thank you. And we have a gentleman here with a question. If you could just start by introducing yourself and then, yeah, and if it’s directed to the panel or anyone in particular.

Audience: Okay. Thank you very much. My name is Israel Rosas. I’m with the Internet Society, but this question is in my personal capacity. I’ve seen that the data public infrastructure is broadly prominent in the global data compact, for instance. And now that we are discussing how to integrate the global data compact implementation into the WSIS Plus 20 review process, I’m curious about the framing of decentralized governance models for DPI. What would be the panel’s impression on, instead of just decentralized governance models, adopting a truly multi-stakeholder governance approach for DPI? Because I think that there are slight but important differences, so it will be interesting hearing your thoughts. It’s a broad question for the panel. Thank you.

Rahul Matthan: I mean, look, I’m a huge fan of decentralized anything, but we’ve got to realize that we all need to cleave to a certain set of common principles. And so, once again, picking back on Henri’s point, the concern with a lot of this is sovereignty. And one of the challenges with sovereignty is that if you’re utterly decentralized, in the process of being completely decentralized and multi-stakeholder, you can lose some of the sovereignty requirements that you individually need. So to me, I like the global digital compact. I’m part of the DPI safeguards framework, once again, all of which are saying, let’s build some principles that we all agree with. And then let’s leave it to countries to develop the bespoke governance frameworks that are appropriate for their context and what they want to achieve. And I think that that is the combination we need. As Henri said, what is common to all of us? There are many things that are common to all of us. We must absolutely adhere to those things, because that’s the reason why we can all meet at places like this and exchange views in a language that we all understand. But at the same time, we’ve got to recognize that we as nations and as sub-national institutions have our own objectives that we want to achieve. Some of those in India, in Africa, in Latin America are very different from what Europe and North America want to achieve and can achieve. It’s not wrong. It’s just that those are differences that we’ve got to recognize. And part of the way we recognize the difference is to also recognize the commonalities and say, as long as we’re common, you can be different. And maybe that’s what you’re trying to say, because multi-stakeholderism also is that. But I fear that we lose that if we make it not grounded on common principles. And I think the common principles are important.

Henri Verdier: If I can add one word. As Raoul said at the beginning, a EU stack or Indian stack doesn’t have to be a cathedral. It can be diverse and modular, etc. Some things are very regalian, we say in French, regalian. The source of citizenship is a state. You cannot crowdsource citizenship. But you can build important parts in a very multi-stakeholder approach and with a new form of cooperation for the state with civil society, with public goods. For example, in France, before being the ambassador, I was the head of the IT department for the government. I did build a strong partnership between the National Geographical Institute and OpenStreetMap. And now we do deliver some important public services in cooperation between OpenStreetMap and the National Geographic Institute. Or we did build our own instant messaging system, CHAP, with Matrix. And we just asked Matrix to develop some features and we did finance. And they did implement it as they want. So you can, for a lot of important parts of this, you can be completely multi-stakeholder in the governance and development. And for other parts, probably you cannot because the state has some role.

Renata Avila: I wrote a paper precisely about that with some colleagues and we suggest instead of multi-stakeholder approach a commons-based governance approach for digital public infrastructure and it beyond the national uses is the only way that it will help scale and localize digital common efforts. It increases transparency and accountability, it accelerates impact, it reduces governance data and even localization frictions and the most important thing it secures community engagement so even if the government changes you have people actively involved in the governance of infrastructures that are of common benefit.

Jon Lloyd: We have a question from the chat here that I will just address and this is a lot to do with inclusion and specifically around access and desire. I’m going to look to you because we’ve heard examples from digital public goods for example Mojaloop which is a digital payment system. Many people access that on feature phones rather than smartphones but the question here is with 2.6 billion people not using the internet, any comments on how to overcome the divide?

Desire Kachenje: I was actually just reading that same question and asking myself the same thing. I think what we have seen with a lot of this is not just for payment systems even when you’re looking at something like ID, one of the key questions you would get from the African citizens, we were talking about this ID for Africa a month ago whereby a lot of citizens are asking the question, I don’t have internet, why do I even need a digital ID and what does that look like? Instead of that can we focus on providing access such as internet to rural areas? So yes, it’s a big question and I think one of the things that I’ve seen a lot of specifically LADPGs trying to address is to create other ways for access when it comes to some of the use cases that are being deployed. So like you mentioned Mojaloop, they are providing access for future phones. If you look at other things such as data exchange platforms, there are some data exchange platforms that are built upon USSDs which is something that is very common for a lot of African countries but the governments have really tried and some of the nations and some of the governments have really tried to create systems whereby all local communities have spaces within their proximity that have access to desktops and internets and all of these digital platforms can be accessed there. So if you move in, if you walk around some of the revenue authorities across African countries, they do have desktops and access points whereby you can still use the digital platform at their office using those platforms. So that is something that has been a lot of countries are trying to do but I think Joseph is raising a very significant question that goes beyond just rolling out use cases when it comes to DPI. The question is the access to internet is still a prominent challenge when it comes to a lot of African countries and I think other countries.

Jon Lloyd: Sorry, you just broke up there and I think that illustrates this point a little bit in terms of access. We’ve only got a little bit of time left, thank you Desire. Just one final question before we continue, which is we’ve heard so much about this idea of like e-gov and all of that kind of thing leading up to this, now it’s like the DPI approach. Just very quickly, are there any differences? Are we talking about the same thing? Is the DPI approach, particularly using DPGs, is this a fundamental new way of thinking? I mean look, I hate to use the Shakespearean

Rahul Matthan: phrase arose by any other name. I really don’t care as long as it is open, modular, interoperable and to me I think we are trying to call the same thing by different names and I’m not going to sort of stick my hat on a particular name. We’ve got to achieve the same thing no matter where in the world we are, no matter what we call it and I think that if we stop, as Andre says, saying my solution is best and try and find a way to say, look, these are all solutions that have the same common ideas, let’s find a way to make them work because countries have built entire infrastructures on a particular solution. It’s no point saying that that is a bad solution. You’ve got to find a way to make that work with whatever you’ve got because we are now moving to a multi-stakeholder world where these systems have to work with each other. I do want to use UPI in Brazil the same way PIX is being used in Portugal but I can’t. I want to use UPI here in Norway but I can’t. We’ve got to now sort of stop worrying about which it is as long as we can make them interoperable. I just want to pick up on that last question which was around the need for the internet. I don’t want to ignore the statement that there is a large population that has been denied access to some of these miracles because they don’t have the internet but at the same time I don’t want that to be a reason for us to stop building DPIs until the whole world is connected because we can’t do that either. We have to push this out. I realized my horror that there are parts of Canada that don’t have 24 by 7 electricity. Now electricity is a hundred year old technology and if we wait for every last person on the planet to be connected whether Elon Musk does it from space or we do it on the ground, it’s too late. What we have to do is to ensure that access to DPIs is not denied because of a lack of connectivity and there are many ways to do that. We can build offline solutions. All we’re saying is that this is a digital public infrastructure. We’re not saying it’s an internet driven digital public infrastructure though that’s how it’s delivered in a lot of places. We’re saying lean into the power of digital and then the way you access digital could be using the internet, it could be using QR codes, you can do what we call fidgetal, half physical half digital, you can do online offline, many many solutions. When India rolled out Aadhaar, we did not have internet in the entire country that we were reaching. Many people went out, enrolled people offline, came back to wherever they’ve got connectivity and uploaded it into the server. We still do that in a lot of different technologies. Africa should do it, there are parts of the world even in the developed world where you don’t have wonderful connectivity. That does not mean you stop building our DPI because we’re not saying it is internet driven. We’re saying lean into digital. On that note, I think we need to wrap it

Jon Lloyd: up. So thank you especially to our speakers, Desire, Rahul, Henri and Renata for your insights here. What we’re hearing is that despite these kind of like nuanced regional approaches, the things that really count are openness, interoperability, this ability to work together, build out your local vendor ecosystems, capacity development, all those kind of things are important and the importance of political will. Essentially we have a shared ambition for this inclusive and interoperable DPI. Digital public goods are kind of coming through as a way to ensure that that is able to happen. One of the things that came up in the Mentimeter was this idea of open source policies. I’m just going to plug a survey here that the Digital Public Goods Alliance, 24 members of the alliance have put together this open source policies and practices survey. We would love everybody, as many people as possible to be doing this. We’re aiming to collect even if you don’t necessarily have an open source first policy, it’s really useful to have your insights in this and the learnings from that are going to enable other countries to learn from one another, organizations to learn from one another and able to implement digital public goods. I’ll also just mention here we will be having some actionable recommendations coming out of this policy for strengthening things like local capacity and agency in addition to the survey. We encourage you to continue to engage. Do we have to make your survey on a google doc? Really? Really? I was hoping that wouldn’t come up. Next time. Our rapporteur Max, he’s going to be synthesizing the key takeaways from this session and we’ll upload that to the IGF session page. Thanks for calling us. Thank you again. We look forward to continuing this important work together. We ended slightly early. Thank you again so much. Workshop two. Workshop two.

Agreement points

Modular and interoperable approach to DPI development

Speakers

– Rahul Matthan
– Henri Verdier

Arguments

India’s stack approach creates modular, interoperable elements that can be layered in any order, not necessarily following the identity-payments-data sequence

Europe has ideological alignment with DPI due to strong public service culture and concerns about digital sovereignty, leading to interoperable solutions rather than one unified stack

Summary

Both speakers emphasize that DPI should be built as modular, interoperable components that can be combined flexibly rather than following rigid sequential approaches or creating monolithic unified systems

Topics

Infrastructure | Digital standards

Funding is not the primary constraint for DPI development

Speakers

– Rahul Matthan
– Renata Avila

Arguments

DPI represents a relatively cheap alternative to traditional development approaches, enabling 10 years of progress in what would otherwise take 50 years

Funding is deprioritized because of awareness of money wasted on tech monopolies that don’t deliver value or pay taxes locally

Summary

Both speakers agree that funding constraints are overemphasized, with DPI offering cost-effective alternatives and growing awareness that money spent on tech monopolies has been wasteful

Topics

Economic | Development

Local capacity building is crucial for DPI success

Speakers

– Desire Kachenje
– Rahul Matthan
– Jon Lloyd

Arguments

DPGs provide cost-effective alternatives but require local capacity building and sustainable funding models beyond donor-funded projects

DPI can use various access methods including QR codes, ‘phygital’ (physical-digital) solutions, and offline-online hybrid approaches

Open source first principles and local talent development are most effective for ensuring countries build technologies based on their priorities

Summary

All speakers emphasize that building local capacity and talent development is essential for sustainable DPI implementation, regardless of the technical approach used

Topics

Development | Capacity development | Infrastructure

Digital sovereignty requires technical capability to implement democratic decisions

Speakers

– Henri Verdier
– Rahul Matthan

Arguments

Digital sovereignty requires the ability to implement collective democratic decisions through technology infrastructure, not just technical independence

DPI enables ‘regulators to regulate and innovators to innovate’ on the same platform through techno-legal approaches rather than traditional law-only regulation

Summary

Both speakers agree that true digital sovereignty means having the technical infrastructure to enforce democratic decisions and regulatory frameworks, not just independence from foreign technology

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Infrastructure | Human rights

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize community-driven and challenge-focused approaches to DPI development, prioritizing real user needs and community engagement over technology-first implementations

Speakers

– Desire Kachenje
– Renata Avila

Arguments

Challenge-driven DPI implementations have better adoption rates than technology-first approaches, as seen in SADC region’s cross-border financial inclusion project

Latin America emphasizes community-driven approaches with strong open source legislation in seven countries and active volunteer communities maintaining digital public goods

Topics

Development | Sociocultural | Legal and regulatory

Both speakers highlight successful examples of South-South cooperation in DPI, showing how developing countries can share and adapt each other’s digital infrastructure solutions

Speakers

– Renata Avila
– Rahul Matthan

Arguments

India’s UPI system shows potential for international cooperation, with agreements signed with Caribbean and South American countries through South-South cooperation

Brazil’s PIX payment system demonstrates successful cross-border expansion, now usable in Portugal and being adopted across Latin American countries

Topics

Economic | Infrastructure | Development

Both speakers agree that lack of universal internet connectivity should not prevent DPI development, and that alternative access methods can bridge the digital divide

Speakers

– Rahul Matthan
– Desire Kachenje

Arguments

DPI can use various access methods including QR codes, ‘phygital’ (physical-digital) solutions, and offline-online hybrid approaches

2.6 billion people without internet access represents a significant challenge, but DPI development shouldn’t wait for universal connectivity

Topics

Development | Digital access | Infrastructure

Unexpected consensus

Deprioritization of funding as main constraint

Speakers

– Rahul Matthan
– Renata Avila
– Henri Verdier

Arguments

DPI represents a relatively cheap alternative to traditional development approaches, enabling 10 years of progress in what would otherwise take 50 years

Funding is deprioritized because of awareness of money wasted on tech monopolies that don’t deliver value or pay taxes locally

Better economic theory needed for DPI’s role as public service that creates value everywhere, similar to historical postal services

Explanation

Unexpectedly, speakers from different regions (India, Latin America, Europe) all agreed that funding is not the primary barrier to DPI development, contrary to common assumptions about resource constraints in developing countries

Topics

Economic | Development | Infrastructure

Commons-based governance over traditional multi-stakeholder approaches

Speakers

– Renata Avila
– Henri Verdier

Arguments

Commons-based governance approach for DPI is preferable to traditional multi-stakeholder models as it ensures community engagement beyond government changes

Europe has ideological alignment with DPI due to strong public service culture and concerns about digital sovereignty, leading to interoperable solutions rather than one unified stack

Explanation

Both speakers unexpectedly converged on preferring community-based governance models over traditional institutional approaches, emphasizing continuity beyond political changes

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development | Sociocultural

Overall assessment

Summary

Strong consensus emerged around core DPI principles: modularity and interoperability over monolithic systems, local capacity building as essential, funding not being the primary constraint, and the need for governance approaches that ensure democratic control and community engagement

Consensus level

High level of consensus despite different regional contexts, suggesting that DPI principles are universally applicable while allowing for local adaptation. This consensus has significant implications for global DPI development, indicating that a common framework can accommodate diverse regional approaches while maintaining core principles of openness, interoperability, and democratic governance

Different viewpoints

Governance models for DPI – Multi-stakeholder vs Commons-based vs Sovereignty-focused approaches

Speakers

– Audience
– Renata Avila
– Rahul Matthan
– Henri Verdier

Arguments

Multi-stakeholder governance approach should be adopted for DPI instead of just decentralized governance models

Commons-based governance approach for DPI is preferable to traditional multi-stakeholder models as it ensures community engagement beyond government changes

DPI enables ‘regulators to regulate and innovators to innovate’ on the same platform through techno-legal approaches rather than traditional law-only regulation

Digital sovereignty requires the ability to implement collective democratic decisions through technology infrastructure, not just technical independence

Summary

Speakers disagreed on the optimal governance model for DPI. The audience member advocated for multi-stakeholder approaches, Renata preferred commons-based governance for continuity, Rahul emphasized techno-legal integration allowing both regulation and innovation, while Henri stressed sovereignty and democratic decision-making capability.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development | Infrastructure

Funding priorities and economic theory for DPI

Speakers

– Henri Verdier
– Renata Avila
– Desire Kachenje

Arguments

Better economic theory needed for DPI’s role as public service that creates value everywhere, similar to historical postal services

Funding is deprioritized because of awareness of money wasted on tech monopolies that don’t deliver value or pay taxes locally

DPGs provide cost-effective alternatives but require local capacity building and sustainable funding models beyond donor-funded projects

Summary

Henri emphasized the need for better economic theory and proper funding allocation for DPI as public service, Renata argued funding isn’t the main constraint due to waste on tech monopolies, while Desire highlighted ongoing funding challenges in Africa where donor dependency remains problematic.

Topics

Economic | Development | Infrastructure

Unexpected differences

Role of funding in DPI development priorities

Speakers

– Henri Verdier
– Renata Avila
– Desire Kachenje

Arguments

Better economic theory needed for DPI’s role as public service that creates value everywhere, similar to historical postal services

Funding is deprioritized because of awareness of money wasted on tech monopolies that don’t deliver value or pay taxes locally

DPGs provide cost-effective alternatives but require local capacity building and sustainable funding models beyond donor-funded projects

Explanation

Unexpectedly, speakers from different regions had contrasting views on funding importance. While poll results consistently showed funding as low priority, Henri (Europe) argued for better economic allocation theory, Renata (Latin America) dismissed funding concerns due to tech monopoly waste, and Desire (Africa) emphasized ongoing funding challenges. This regional divide on funding perspectives was surprising given the supposed consensus.

Topics

Economic | Development | Infrastructure

Overall assessment

Summary

The main areas of disagreement centered on governance models for DPI (multi-stakeholder vs commons-based vs sovereignty-focused) and the role of funding in DPI development, with unexpected regional differences on economic priorities.

Disagreement level

Low to moderate disagreement level. While speakers had different approaches and emphases, they shared fundamental agreement on core DPI principles (openness, interoperability, modularity) and the importance of local capacity building. The disagreements were more about implementation methods and governance structures rather than fundamental goals, suggesting productive debate rather than irreconcilable differences. This level of disagreement is constructive for the DPI field as it allows for diverse regional approaches while maintaining common principles.

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize community-driven and challenge-focused approaches to DPI development, prioritizing real user needs and community engagement over technology-first implementations

Speakers

– Desire Kachenje
– Renata Avila

Arguments

Challenge-driven DPI implementations have better adoption rates than technology-first approaches, as seen in SADC region’s cross-border financial inclusion project

Latin America emphasizes community-driven approaches with strong open source legislation in seven countries and active volunteer communities maintaining digital public goods

Topics

Development | Sociocultural | Legal and regulatory

Both speakers highlight successful examples of South-South cooperation in DPI, showing how developing countries can share and adapt each other’s digital infrastructure solutions

Speakers

– Renata Avila
– Rahul Matthan

Arguments

India’s UPI system shows potential for international cooperation, with agreements signed with Caribbean and South American countries through South-South cooperation

Brazil’s PIX payment system demonstrates successful cross-border expansion, now usable in Portugal and being adopted across Latin American countries

Topics

Economic | Infrastructure | Development

Both speakers agree that lack of universal internet connectivity should not prevent DPI development, and that alternative access methods can bridge the digital divide

Speakers

– Rahul Matthan
– Desire Kachenje

Arguments

DPI can use various access methods including QR codes, ‘phygital’ (physical-digital) solutions, and offline-online hybrid approaches

2.6 billion people without internet access represents a significant challenge, but DPI development shouldn’t wait for universal connectivity

Topics

Development | Digital access | Infrastructure

Key takeaways

Regional approaches to DPI development vary significantly but share common principles of openness, interoperability, and modularity

Digital Public Goods (DPGs) provide cost-effective alternatives to proprietary solutions but require substantial local capacity building and sustainable funding models

Cross-border interoperability is emerging as a critical success factor, with examples like Brazil’s PIX system and Africa’s regional payment initiatives demonstrating practical implementation

Digital sovereignty and democratic governance can be maintained through commons-based governance approaches rather than traditional multi-stakeholder models

Local talent development and open source first principles are the most effective strategies for ensuring countries build technologies based on their own priorities

DPI development should not wait for universal internet connectivity – offline and hybrid solutions can bridge the digital divide

Climate change represents a significant opportunity for DPI application through connecting data silos and enabling more cost-effective solutions

The distinction between e-government and DPI is less important than achieving open, modular, and interoperable systems regardless of terminology

Resolutions and action items

Digital Public Goods Alliance to continue collecting responses for the open source policies and practices survey from 24 alliance members

Rapporteur Max to synthesize key takeaways from the session and upload to the IGF session page

Continue engagement on developing actionable recommendations for strengthening local capacity and agency

Kazakhstan formally announced as the 26th country participating in the 50 and 5 campaign

Unresolved issues

How to address the 2.6 billion people without internet access while continuing DPI development

Sustainable funding models for DPGs beyond donor-funded projects

Harmonization of fragmented data governance frameworks across countries, particularly for cross-border implementations

Balancing speed of implementation with multi-stakeholder inclusion to avoid exclusion of populations

Data privacy and security frameworks for specific populations like children in digital ID systems

Long-term sustainability and maintenance of DPI systems after initial implementation

Integration of legacy systems with new DPI approaches in a cost-effective manner

Suggested compromises

Use modular, interoperable approaches rather than insisting on specific technological solutions or naming conventions

Implement ‘phygital’ (physical-digital) hybrid solutions to accommodate areas without reliable internet connectivity

Adopt commons-based governance that balances state sovereignty requirements with multi-stakeholder participation

Focus on common principles while allowing countries to develop bespoke governance frameworks appropriate for their context

Build offline-capable DPI solutions that can sync when connectivity is available

Combine government-driven initiatives with ecosystem-enabled implementation involving private sector and civil society

Start DPI implementation wherever countries have capacity rather than following a prescribed sequence

I almost feel I must apologize for India stack, because we started this idea of a stack, which leaves the impression that you must necessarily layer first identity, then payments, and then data sharing. And really, it’s not mandatory that you have to do it in that way… the real idea of a stack is that we are creating modular elements, DPGs that can be layered on top of each other in whichever order you want for whichever solution you want.

Speaker

Rahul Matthan

Reason

This comment is insightful because it challenges a common misconception about DPI implementation – that there’s a prescribed sequence that must be followed. It reframes the ‘stack’ concept from a rigid hierarchy to a flexible, modular approach, which is crucial for countries with different starting points and priorities.

Impact

This comment set the tone for the entire discussion by establishing that DPI approaches should be flexible and context-specific rather than one-size-fits-all. It influenced subsequent speakers to emphasize regional variations and the importance of tailoring solutions to local needs rather than copying India’s exact approach.

The traditional lawyer in me says, you’ve got to write laws, and you’ve got to build policies… But the power of digital, and the power of digital where everything is digital, is that you can actually build some of that governance into the design of the architecture… we’re building an infrastructure on which regulators can regulate and innovators can innovate.

Speaker

Rahul Matthan

Reason

This comment introduces a paradigm shift from traditional regulatory approaches to ‘code as law’ – embedding governance directly into digital infrastructure design. It presents a novel solution to the tension between innovation and regulation.

Impact

This concept of techno-legal approaches became a recurring theme, with Henri Verdier later building on it by discussing ‘rules as code’ and the need for technical implementation of regulatory decisions. It shifted the conversation from viewing regulation as a constraint to seeing it as an integrated part of infrastructure design.

Innovation needs to meet serenity… When we’re building DPI, especially specifically when we’re building DPI with DPGs, how do we ensure that countries have the local ecosystem to not only own, but run, maintain and develop new use cases?

Speaker

Desire Kachenje

Reason

This comment highlights a critical gap often overlooked in DPI discussions – the sustainability and local ownership beyond initial implementation. It introduces the concept that technical deployment is insufficient without local capacity for long-term stewardship.

Impact

This comment redirected the discussion toward capacity building and local agency, which became central themes throughout the session. It influenced the Mentimeter poll results where ‘local talent development and training’ emerged as a top priority, and shaped subsequent discussions about the importance of community engagement and local ownership.

There is probably an ideological alignment because we have a strong culture of public services… we need this layer of DPI to implement some political decision and collective decision on the big, the open internet… Can we still empower the people through infrastructure and good governments to respect dignity and innovation and everything, or do we have to let our lives within big corporations and their infrastructure?

Speaker

Henri Verdier

Reason

This comment reframes the entire DPI discussion as fundamentally about democratic sovereignty versus corporate control. It elevates the conversation from technical implementation to existential questions about the future of democratic governance in the digital age.

Impact

This comment created a philosophical anchor for the discussion, with other speakers referencing the tension between public and private control. It influenced Renata Avila’s response about communities being ‘squeezed without options’ and shaped the conversation about sovereignty as a non-negotiable element in DPI development.

What I will say that is different is that in Latin America we are very good at the digital public goods and but we haven’t jumped yet to the big digital public infrastructure plans… the highlight of the continent is the communities around open source… it’s what you do after work it was what you do on weekends you edit a Wikipedia article you code and contribute to a collaborative platform.

Speaker

Renata Avila

Reason

This comment introduces a crucial distinction between having strong DPG communities and implementing comprehensive DPI strategies. It highlights the role of grassroots community engagement as a foundation for sustainable digital infrastructure, contrasting with top-down government-led approaches.

Impact

This observation about community-driven development influenced the later discussion about governance models, leading to Renata’s proposal for ‘commons-based governance approach’ rather than traditional multi-stakeholder models. It also reinforced the importance of local capacity and community engagement that emerged in the poll results.

I strongly urge all of us to rethink the way we go about [climate change] because DPI has shown a way for very, very big challenges like financial inclusion. I see no reason why that can’t be applied to something as important as climate change.

Speaker

Rahul Matthan

Reason

This comment dramatically expands the scope of DPI applications beyond traditional use cases to global challenges like climate change. It suggests DPI could revolutionize how we approach complex, multi-stakeholder problems by connecting previously siloed data and systems.

Impact

While this comment came later in the discussion, it opened up new possibilities for thinking about DPI applications and influenced Renata’s response about Latin America’s geospatial infrastructure cooperation. It demonstrated how DPI thinking can be applied to cross-border, global challenges beyond traditional government services.

Overall assessment

These key comments fundamentally shaped the discussion by establishing several critical frameworks: the flexibility and modularity of DPI approaches (challenging rigid implementation models), the integration of governance into technical architecture (moving beyond traditional regulation), the centrality of local capacity and community engagement (ensuring sustainability), and the broader democratic implications of infrastructure choices (framing DPI as essential for sovereignty). The comments created a progression from technical implementation details to philosophical questions about democratic governance in the digital age. They also established common ground among diverse regional approaches while respecting local contexts and priorities. The discussion evolved from describing what different regions are doing to exploring why these approaches matter for democracy, sovereignty, and global cooperation. The interactive polls reinforced these themes, with participants prioritizing local capacity development and open-source approaches over funding, validating the speakers’ emphasis on community engagement and sustainable development over purely technical or financial solutions.

How do we ensure that countries have the local ecosystem to not only own, but run, maintain and develop new use cases when building DPI with DPGs?

Speaker

Desire Kachenje

Explanation

This addresses the critical challenge of local capacity and agency in DPI implementation, ensuring sustainability beyond initial deployment

How do we bring policy makers and enable countries to harmonize digital data governance frameworks, especially when bringing more than one country together for data exchange platforms?

Speaker

Desire Kachenje

Explanation

This highlights the fragmented nature of data governance frameworks across countries and the need for policy harmonization for cross-border DPI initiatives

How can we use digital public infrastructure to solve the climate crisis as the next step of DPI innovation?

Speaker

Rahul Matthan

Explanation

This represents a new frontier for DPI application, suggesting that DPI could unlock solutions to climate challenges by connecting data silos and enabling new approaches beyond traditional consensus-building

How can we implement rules as code and techno-legal approaches in DPI governance?

Speaker

Henri Verdier

Explanation

This addresses the need for embedding regulatory compliance directly into digital infrastructure design rather than relying solely on traditional legal frameworks

How can we develop a better economic theory of the economic role of DPI to understand its financing and value creation?

Speaker

Henri Verdier

Explanation

This seeks to establish theoretical foundations for understanding how DPI creates value across entire ecosystems and how this should inform funding models

How do we ensure sustainability of DPGs long-term, both internally for the DPGs themselves and for countries implementing them past donor-funded project periods?

Speaker

Desire Kachenje

Explanation

This addresses the critical challenge of maintaining DPI systems and DPG platforms beyond initial implementation phases and donor funding cycles

How do we address privacy and security issues for specific populations like children in digital ID and birth registration systems?

Speaker

Desire Kachenje

Explanation

This highlights gaps in privacy frameworks for vulnerable populations in DPI implementations

How can we overcome the digital divide for 2.6 billion people not using the internet while still advancing DPI development?

Speaker

Online participant (via chat)

Explanation

This addresses the fundamental challenge of inclusion in DPI when a significant portion of the global population lacks internet access

What would be the implications of adopting truly multi-stakeholder governance approaches for DPI instead of just decentralized governance models?

Speaker

Israel Rosas (Internet Society)

Explanation

This explores different governance models for DPI and their potential impacts on implementation and sovereignty

How can we make different DPI systems interoperable across countries (e.g., using UPI in Brazil or PIX in other countries)?

Speaker

Rahul Matthan

Explanation

This addresses the practical challenge of cross-border interoperability between different national DPI systems

Summary

This joint session of the Dynamic Coalition on Core Internet Values and the Dynamic Coalition on Network Neutrality explored how the internet’s foundational principles can guide AI governance as artificial intelligence becomes increasingly central to digital interactions. The discussion centered on two key questions: how internet principles of openness and decentralization can inform transparent AI governance, and how network neutrality concepts like generativity and fair competition can apply to AI infrastructure and content creation.

Vint Cerf emphasized that while the internet and AI are “different beasts,” AI systems should prioritize safety, transparency, and provenance of training data. He highlighted emerging standards like agent-to-agent protocols that could enable interoperability between AI systems. Sandrine Elmi Hersi from France’s ARCEP outlined three areas for applying internet values to AI: accelerating transparency in AI models, preserving distributed intelligence rather than centralized control, and extending non-discrimination principles to AI infrastructure and content curation.

Renata Mielli from Brazil’s CGI noted that while some internet governance principles like freedom and interoperability can transfer to AI, others like net neutrality may not directly apply since AI systems are inherently non-neutral. Hadia Elminiawi discussed Africa’s AI strategy and raised practical questions about implementing transparency requirements, suggesting that requiring open-source safety guardrails might be more feasible than full model transparency.

Several participants emphasized the challenge of market concentration in AI, contrasting it with the internet’s originally decentralized architecture. The discussion revealed tensions between promoting innovation and ensuring accountability, with speakers noting the need for risk-based approaches, liability frameworks, and multi-stakeholder governance. The session concluded with calls for transforming these principles into technical standards and regulatory frameworks while maintaining the collaborative spirit that made internet governance successful.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Fundamental architectural differences between Internet and AI**: The discussion emphasized that while the Internet was built on open, decentralized, transparent, and interoperable principles, AI systems (particularly large language models) operate through centralized, opaque, and proprietary architectures controlled by a handful of major companies, creating tension between these two paradigms.

– **Applying Internet governance principles to AI governance**: Speakers explored how core Internet values like openness, transparency, non-discrimination, and net neutrality could be translated into AI governance frameworks, while acknowledging that some principles (like technical neutrality) may not directly apply since AI systems are inherently non-neutral.

– **Market concentration and gatekeeper concerns**: Multiple speakers highlighted the risk of AI systems becoming new gatekeepers that could limit user choice and content diversity, drawing parallels to earlier Internet governance challenges around platform dominance and the need for regulatory oversight to preserve competition and openness.

– **Global South representation and digital equity**: The discussion addressed how AI governance frameworks must include diverse global perspectives, particularly from Africa, Latin America, and Asia, to avoid replicating the digital divides and power imbalances that have characterized Internet development.

– **Practical implementation challenges**: Speakers debated the realistic prospects for international cooperation on AI governance, questioning whether major AI companies and governments have sufficient incentives to participate in multilateral governance frameworks, and emphasizing the need for risk-based approaches, liability frameworks, and technical standards.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to bridge Internet governance principles with emerging AI governance challenges, exploring how decades of experience regulating Internet infrastructure and services could inform approaches to governing artificial intelligence systems. The session sought to move beyond theoretical frameworks toward practical implementation strategies for ensuring AI development remains aligned with values of openness, transparency, and user empowerment.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a thoughtful but increasingly cautious tone throughout. It began optimistically, with speakers drawing encouraging parallels between Internet and AI governance challenges. However, the tone became more realistic and somewhat pessimistic as participants acknowledged significant obstacles, including corporate resistance to regulation, geopolitical tensions, market concentration, and the fundamental differences between Internet and AI architectures. Despite these challenges, the session concluded on a pragmatic note, with calls for continued collaboration and specific next steps for the working groups involved.

Speakers

**Speakers from the provided list:**

– **Olivier Crepin-Leblond** – Co-chair of the session, moderator for remote participation

– **Pari Esfandiari** – Co-chair for the Dynamic Coalition on Core Internet Values

– **Luca Belli** – Co-chair for the Dynamic Coalition on Network Neutrality

– **Vint Cerf** – Joining remotely from the US, works with a company that has invested heavily in AI and AI-based services, co-creator of internet networking protocols

– **Sandrine ELMI HERSI** – Representative from ARCEP (French regulatory authority for electronic communications), involved in shaping digital strategies within government

– **Renata Mielli** – Coordinator of CGI.br (Brazilian Internet Steering Committee), leading debates on net neutrality, internet openness and AI issues in Brazil

– **Hadia Elminiawi** – Representative from the African continent, discussing AI governance from African perspective

– **William Drake (Bill Drake)** – Commenter/additional speaker

– **Roxana Radu** – Commenter/additional speaker (participating remotely)

– **Shuyan Wu** – Representative from China Mobile (world’s largest telecom operator), commenter/additional speaker

– **Yik Chan Ching** – Representative from PNAI (Policy Network on Artificial Intelligence), intersectional process of IGF

– **Alejandro Pisanty** – Online participant, previously involved in core internet values dynamic coalition discussions

– **Audience** – Various audience members who asked questions (including Dominique Hazel Monsieur from W3C, and Andrew Campling – internet standards and governance enthusiast)

**Additional speakers:**

– **Dominique Hazel Monsieur** – Works for W3C (World Wide Web Consortium), oversees work around AI and its impact on the web

– **Andrew Campling** – Internet standards and internet governance enthusiast

# Bridging Internet Core Values and AI Governance: A Comprehensive Report

## Executive Summary

This joint session of the Dynamic Coalition on Core Internet Values and the Dynamic Coalition on Network Neutrality examined how established internet governance principles might inform emerging AI governance frameworks. Moderated by Olivier Crepin-Leblond and co-chaired by Pari Esfandiari and Luca Belli, the discussion brought together international experts to explore the intersection between internet governance and AI systems.

The session revealed both opportunities and challenges in applying internet principles to AI governance. While speakers agreed on the importance of values like transparency and safety, they identified fundamental differences between the internet’s distributed architecture and AI’s centralized model. The discussion produced practical recommendations including risk-based governance approaches, technical standards development, and targeted interventions at AI-internet intersection points.

## Opening Framework and Central Questions

Pari Esfandiari opened by establishing the session’s premise: as generative AI becomes a primary gateway to content, internet core values must guide AI governance. She posed two key questions: how can internet principles of openness and decentralization inform transparent AI governance, and how can network neutrality concepts apply to AI infrastructure and content creation.

Luca Belli immediately introduced a fundamental tension, observing that “the Internet and AI are two different beasts.” He noted that while celebrating 51 years since foundational internet work, the internet was built on open, decentralized, transparent, and interoperable architecture, whereas AI operates through highly centralized architecture controlled by major companies. This architectural difference became a recurring theme throughout the session.

## Expert Perspectives

### Vint Cerf: Technical Standards and Safety

Vint Cerf, joining remotely, emphasized that AI systems should prioritize safety, transparency, and provenance of training data. He highlighted ongoing work on agent-to-agent (A2A) protocols and model context protocols (MCP) to ensure interoperability between AI systems, drawing parallels to internet protocols.

Cerf challenged purely centralized views of AI, noting that “every time someone interacts with one of those [large language models], they are specializing it to their interests and their needs.” He advocated for risk-based approaches focusing on user risk and provider liability, with higher safety standards for high-risk applications like medical diagnosis and financial advice.

### Sandrine Elmi Hersi: Regulatory Framework

Representing ARCEP (French regulatory authority), Elmi Hersi outlined a three-pronged approach: accelerating transparency in AI models to make “black boxes” more auditable; preserving distributed intelligence by ensuring plurality of access to AI development inputs; and extending non-discrimination principles from network neutrality to AI infrastructure and content curation.

She raised particular concerns about content diversity, questioning how to ensure diversity when AI chatbots provide single answers instead of hundreds of web pages traditionally offered by search engines.

### Renata Mielli: Brazilian Perspective

Coordinator of CGI.br (Brazilian Internet Steering Committee), Mielli noted that while some internet governance principles like freedom and interoperability can transfer to AI, others like net neutrality may not directly apply since AI systems are inherently non-neutral, unlike internet infrastructure.

She emphasized transforming principles into technical standards while distinguishing between governance and regulation, and highlighted the need to reduce asymmetries and empower Global South voices in AI governance discussions.

### Hadia Elminiawi: African and Practical Perspective

Elminiawi provided insights from the African continent, noting that African countries’ AI capabilities vary significantly due to infrastructure, electricity, connectivity, and resource differences. She challenged idealistic transparency approaches, asking whether it is “realistic or even desirable to expect that all AI models be made fully open source.”

She suggested requiring open-source safety guardrails rather than full model transparency, proposing a more pragmatic approach balancing openness with security and investment concerns.

## Additional Interventions and Perspectives

### William Drake: Critical Analysis

Drake provided a critical intervention emphasizing the need to define precisely what aspects of AI require governance rather than applying generic principles. He questioned whether there is genuine functional demand for international AI governance, noting that “we simply can’t just assume, because the technology is there and the issues are there, that there’s a functional demand.”

He suggested developing a detailed mapping matrix of which internet properties apply to specific AI contexts and applications.

### Andrew Campling: Social Media Lessons

Campling suggested looking at social media governance lessons rather than internet governance, emphasizing duty of care and precautionary principles. He noted the importance of learning from past failures in social media regulation.

### Dominique Hazel Monsieur: W3C Standards Work

Representing W3C, Monsieur highlighted ongoing work on AI and web standards, focusing specifically on the intersection of AI and internet technologies rather than broader AI governance.

### Yik Chan Ching: Policy Network Perspective

From the Policy Network on Artificial Intelligence (PNAI), Ching mentioned ongoing research on liability, interoperability, and environmental protection in AI systems, noting significant progress in AI standards development across regions.

### Shuyan Wu: Digital Equity Focus

From China Mobile, Wu emphasized ensuring equal access, protecting user rights, and bridging digital divides in the AI era.

### Alejandro Pisanty: Commercial Reality

Participating online, Pisanty questioned fundamental incentive structures, asking “Why would OpenAI, Google, Meta, et cetera… why would they come together and agree to limit themselves in some way?” He advocated for applying existing rules for automated systems rather than creating entirely new frameworks.

## Key Themes and Challenges

### Architectural Differences

The fundamental difference between internet and AI architectures emerged as a central challenge. The internet’s distributed design contrasts sharply with AI’s concentrated ownership and control, creating new governance challenges.

### Market Concentration Concerns

Multiple speakers highlighted concerns about AI market concentration and the emergence of new gatekeepers that could limit user choice and content diversity, drawing parallels to earlier internet governance challenges.

### Transparency vs. Practicality

A significant tension emerged between calls for maximum transparency and practical constraints including investment protection and security concerns. Speakers debated appropriate levels and mechanisms for AI transparency.

### Global South Inclusion

Several speakers emphasized including Global South perspectives and addressing existing digital divides to prevent their reproduction in AI governance frameworks.

## Areas of Convergence

Despite disagreements, several areas of consensus emerged:

– **Risk-based approaches**: Multiple speakers supported prioritizing governance based on risk levels and application contexts

– **Technical standards importance**: Strong agreement on the need for AI interoperability standards

– **Safety and transparency needs**: General agreement that AI systems require more transparency than currently provided

– **Stakeholder inclusion**: Consensus on the importance of diverse participation in governance discussions

## Implementation Recommendations

The session produced several concrete recommendations:

### Continued Collaboration

Participants agreed to continue discussions through Dynamic Coalition mailing lists to address unresolved issues.

### Detailed Mapping Exercise

Drake’s suggestion for developing a mapping matrix of internet properties applicable to specific AI contexts was endorsed as a practical next step.

### Regulatory Development

ARCEP committed to completing its technical report on applying internet core values to AI governance.

### Focused Interventions

Rather than generic AI governance, speakers recommended focusing on AI-internet intersection points where governance needs and stakeholder incentives may be clearer.

## Unresolved Questions

The discussion concluded with acknowledgment of fundamental questions requiring further work:

– How to balance innovation incentives with transparency and accountability requirements

– Whether binding international AI agreements are feasible given current political realities

– How to address liability and responsibility in multi-agent AI systems

– What constitutes genuine functional demand for AI governance versus assumed need

## Conclusion

This session revealed both promise and challenges in applying internet governance principles to AI systems. While there was agreement on core values like safety and transparency, fundamental tensions emerged between internet and AI architectures, transparency ideals and practical constraints, and governance aspirations and commercial realities.

The discussion produced pragmatic recommendations focusing on risk-based approaches, technical standards development, and targeted interventions. However, unresolved tensions around transparency requirements, stakeholder participation, and international cooperation indicate significant work remains to develop effective AI governance frameworks that preserve internet values while addressing AI’s unique characteristics.

The session demonstrated the value of diverse international perspectives while highlighting the need for continued dialogue and practical experimentation to bridge the gap between principles and implementation in AI governance.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Right, welcome everybody to this session, this joint session of the Dynamic Coalition on Core Internet Values and the Dynamic Coalition on Network Neutrality. I’m Olivier Crepin-Leblanc, and co-chair of this session is going to be Luca Belli for the Dynamic Coalition on Network Neutrality and Pari Esfandiari for the Core Internet. It’s great to see such a lot of you here. As Luca said, if anybody wants to step up over to the table here, they’re very welcome to do so. We are going to have a session that’s going to be quite interactive. So we’ll have the speakers speak and so on, and then we’ll see if we can have a good discussion in the room about the topic. I’m just going to do just a quick introduction of the speakers that we have. And so we’ll start with four speakers, each providing their angle on the topic. We’ll have Vint Cerf, who’s joining us remotely. Unfortunately, he couldn’t make it in person at this IGF. So he’s over in the US and he will actually let us know at some point when he will be online, because he is also as often doing more than one session at the same time. Actually, I am. I am online. He’s already there. Goodness gracious. OK, sorry, Vint. I have two eyes, but they both look in the same direction. I don’t know why. I should have also checked the screen. So Vint Cerf, Hadi Alminiawi, and then we’ll have Renata Mielli also here and Sandrine ELMI HERSI, who’s sitting next to me. After that, we’ll have what we call additional speakers. They’ll be commenting on what they’ve heard from the original, from the first set of speakers. There’s three commenters, William Drake, Bill Drake, Roxana Radu and Shouyuan Wu, who’s just arrived from China. So the very last minute managed to make it here. So welcome to all of you. And then after that, we’ll open it to a wider discussion. But I’m kind of wasting time. We’ve only got 75 minutes, so I’m going to hand the floor straight over to Luca and to Pari for the next stage. Thank you.

Pari Esfandiari: Thank you very much Olivia and welcome everybody. It’s great to be here with all of you So we convene this session bridging internet and AI governance from theory to practice Not just because things are changing fast but because the way we think about digital governance is being fundamentally reshaped. As technologies converge and accelerate, our governance systems haven’t kept up and at the center of this shift is artificial intelligence Let’s start with theory, the internet’s core value global, interoperable, open, decentralized, end-to-end, robust and reliable and freedom from harm These were not just technical features, but deliberate design choices that made the internet a global common for innovation, diversity and human agency. Now comes generative AI It doesn’t just add another layer to the internet It introduces a fundamentally different architecture and logic. We are moving from open protocols to centralized models gated, opaque and controlled by a handful of actors. AI shifts the internet pluralism towards convergence replacing inquiry with predictive narration and reducing user agency This isn’t just a technical shift. It’s about who gets to define knowledge, shape, discourse and influence decisions. It’s a profound governance challenge and a societal choice about the kind of digital future we want. If we are serious about preserving user agency, democratic oversight and an open, informative ecosystem, the core internet values can serve as signposts to guide us, but it needs active support, updated policies and cross-sector commitment. This is where the practice begins. The good news is we are not starting from scratch from UNESCO’s AI ethics framework to the EU AI Act, the US AI Bill of Rights and efforts by Mozilla and others. We are seeing real momentum to root AI governance in shared fundamental values. So yes, there is a real divergence, but also real opportunities to shape what comes next. And that’s our focus today. With that, I will hand it over to my co-moderator, Luca Belli. Thank you.

Luca Belli: Thank you very much, Pari and Olivier. And also, let me hold this. Is this working? Yes. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Are you sure? Because I’m not hearing myself. Is this working? I am here. Can you hear us? Okay. I’m sorry. It’s my headphone. It’s not working. It’s not useful when I have to hear myself anyway. All right. So thank you very much, Olivier and Pari, for having organized this and for having been the driving force of this session that actually builds upon what we have already done last year in our first joint venture that was already quite successful. And I think that what’s already emerged, I always say that it’s good to build upon the sessions and building blocks and reports that we have already elaborated so that we move forward, right? And actually something that already emerged as sort of consensus last year in Riyadh are two main points. First is that we have already discussed for pretty much 20 years, at least here at IGF, internet governance and internet regulation. And so we can start to distill some of those teachings and lessons into what we could apply to regulate the evolution of AI and AI governance. And second, and to quote what Vint, the expression Vint used last year, the Internet and AI are two different beasts. So we are speaking about two things that are two digital phenomenon, but they are quite different. And the Internet, as Pari was reminding us very eloquently, has been built on an open, decentralized, transparent, interoperable architecture that made the success of the Internet over the past 70 years, 50 years, 50 years at least since Vint penned it in 1974. And yeah, but the question here is how we reconcile this with a highly centralized AI architecture. And I think that here there is a very important point we have been working on, on net neutrality and Internet openness debate over the past year, that is the concept of Internet generativity that we have enshrined in the documents, the report we have elaborated here over the past years, which is the capacity of the Internet to evolve thanks to the unfiltered contributions of the users, is the consequence of the fundamental core Internet values. Openness, transparency is to create a level playing field, a capacity to innovate, to share and use application services content and to make the Internet evolve according to how the users want to do. So users, not only users, passive users are prosumers. They create the Internet. Now, this is in fundamental tension with an AI that is frequently proprietary, non-interoperable, very opaque, both in the data sets that are used for training, that usually are the result of massive scraping of both personal data and copyrighted content in very peculiar ways that might be considered illegal in most countries with data protection or copyright legislation. And then the training and the output of it is very much opaque for the user. And very few companies can do this and supply this. So there is an enormous concentration phenomenon ongoing, which is quite the opposite of what the original internet philosophy was about. Now, to discuss this point, we have a series of fantastic speakers today. I think that, as I was mentioning before, as we are celebrating 51 years of the paper by Vint and Bob Kahn on the internet networking protocol, and a protocol for internet working networks, right, if I’m not mistaken. I think the first person that should go ahead should be Vint. So Pari, please, the floor is yours to present Vint.

Pari Esfandiari: Thank you very much. We have two actually overarching questions. And we would like our speakers to focus on those two overarching questions. I would read it for you. How can the internet’s foundational principles of openness and decentralization guide transparent and accountable AI governance, particularly as generative AI becomes a main gateway to content? And the second question, how can fundamental network neutrality principles such as generativity and competition on a level playing field apply to AI infrastructure, AI models, and content creation? So Vint, drawing on your unique experiences in both funding architecture of the internet and your work with the private sector, we are curious to hear your comments on these questions. Over to you.

Vint Cerf: Well, thank you so much for this opportunity. I want to remind everyone that I am not an expert on artificial intelligence. I barely manage my own intelligence, let alone artificial. But I work with a company that has invested very heavily in AI and in AI-based services. So I can reflect a little bit of that in trying to respond to these very important questions. The first thing that I would observe is that the Internet was intended to be accessible to everyone. And I think the AI efforts are reflective of that as well. The large language models, well, let me distinguish between large language models and machine learning tools for just a moment. All of you are well aware that AI has been an object of study since the 1960s. It’s gone through several iterations of phases, the most recent of which is machine learning, reinforcement learning, and then large language models. The reinforcement learning mechanisms have given us things like programs that can beat the best players of Go, programs that can tell you how proteins fold up, and that tells us something about their functionality. And more recently, there’s something at Google called Alpha Evolve, which is an artificial intelligence system that will invent other software to solve problems for you. The large language models that we interact with embody huge amounts of content, but they are specialized when they interact with the users. You use the term prompting to elicit output from these large language models. And the point I want to make here is that every time someone interacts with one of those, they are specializing it to their interests and their needs. So in a sense, we have a very distributed ability to adapt a particular large language model to a particular problem or to respond to a particular question. And that’s important, the fact that we are able to personalize. Our interactions with these sources of information is a very important element of useful access. The question about interoperability of the various machine learning systems is partly answered by the agent model idea. That is to say, the large language models are becoming mechanisms by which we can elicit not only responses, but also actions to be taken. So the so-called agentic generative AI is upon us. And consonant with that are two other standards that are being developed. One is called A2A, or agent-to-agent interaction, and the second is called MCP, which is a model context protocol to give these artificial intelligence agents a concept of the world in which they’re actually operating. The reason these are so important, and they create interoperability among various agentic systems, is that it’s very important for precision. It’s important that the agents, when they interact with us, and when they interact with each other, to have a well-defined context in which that interaction takes place. And we need clarity, and we need confidence that the semantics are matched between the two agents. If anyone has ever played that parlor game called telephone, where you whisper something in someone’s ear, and then they whisper in the next person’s ear, and you go down the line, and whatever comes out on the other end is almost never what started out at the beginning. We don’t want chains of agents to get confused, and so the A2A and MCP are mechanisms. to try to make that work a lot better. So I think this is a very important notion for us to ingest into the work of the core internet values, except they will have to become core AI values, which is clarity in interaction among the various agents, of course, among other things. Last point I would make is that as you interact with large language models, the so-called prompting exchanges, one of the biggest questions that we always have is how accurate is the output that we get from these things? We all know about hallucination and the generation of counterfactual output coming from agents. It’s very important that provenance of the information that is used by the agents or by the large language models and references be available for our own critical thinking and critical evaluation of what we get back. And so once again, that’s a kind of core internet value. How do I evaluate or how can I evaluate the output of these systems to satisfy myself that the content and the response is accurate? So those are just a few ideas that I think should inform the work of these dynamic coalitions as we project ourselves into this online AI environment. But I’ll stop there because I’m sure other people have many more important things to say in response to these questions.

Pari Esfandiari: Thank you very much, Brent, for that very informative discussion. And with that, I would go to Sandrine. Sandrine, based on your experience shaping digital strategies within government, how would you see this? Thank you.

Sandrine ELMI HERSI: Thank you. And let me first start to say that it’s a real pleasure to… Thank you all for joining this session today and to discuss this important topic with partners from the Net Neutrality and Core Internet Values Coalition. And before we ask how to apply openness and transparency to AI governance, I would like to insist on the why and why this application has become essential. So as it was already covered by Vint, LLMs, notably Generative AI tools, are becoming a new default point of entry to online content and services for users. Since our conversation at the last IGF at Riyadh, we’ve been seeing this trend accelerating through the development of the use of individual chatbots, but also the establishment of response engines integrating into mainstream search tools. Generative AI is also increasingly embedded directly in end-users’ devices. And we are also seeing a shift from early-generation LLMs to new RAG, so Retrieval Augmented Generation systems that are now included in AI tools and that can directly draw from the web. And looking ahead, agentic models could also centralize a wide range of users’ actions into a single AI interface. So the question is really, will tomorrow’s Internet still be open, decentralized and user-driven if most of our online action is mediated by a handful of AI tools? So now, regarding the how, ARCEP, the French regulatory authority for electronic communications, is currently conducting technical hearings and file testing with a team of data scientists to explore this very question. All through our report is currently in development, we can already identify three main areas for action to apply internet core values to AI governance. The first area is accelerating on AI transparency, understanding generative AI models, what data they use, how they process information, and what limits they have is a prerequisite for trust. There is some progress, more and more players are now engaging with researchers and through sectorial initiatives such as standards and code of conduct, but many models remain black boxes. We need greater openness, especially to research, to the research community, to improve auditability and explainability, but also the efficiency of models. The second area is preserving the notion of intelligence at the age of networks, which is the original spirit of the internet, intelligence distributed among users and applications, not centralized in platforms or infrastructure. We must notably ensure that users remain able to choose among diverse services and sources. This may require working on the technical and economic conditions that shape AI outputs to guarantee a certain level of neutrality, plurality of views, and openness to a diverse range of content creators and innovators. Last but not least, regarding the principle of non-discrimination that is also at the center part of net neutrality. So net neutrality, non-discrimination principle, was originally applied to prevent… Internet Services Providers from privileging their own services or partners in vertical markets. But today’s ISPs are not the only digital digital gatekeepers that can narrow the perspective and freedom of choice of end-users. So at ARCEP, we are now working on assessing to what extent this principle of non-discrimination and openness can be extended to AI infrastructure, AI models, but also how AI curates and presents contents. On this, very shortly, we notably investigate two questions. The first one is how to preserve the openness of AI markets, notably through ensuring that plurality of economic players have access to key inputs necessary for LLM developments, including data, computing resources, but also energy. And the second question we are also diving into is ensuring that we keep a diversity of content on the internet, knowing that when they use AI chatbots and response engine, end-users only have access to one answer instead of hundreds of web pages. So we must ensure that generative AI is not just simply amplifying already dominant sources, but is open to smaller and independent content creators and innovators. That might mean in the future working on defining sector-wide frameworks or interconnection standards on fair contractual conditions, as it was done for IP interconnection. And to end, the goal is not, of course, to block innovation, but on the contrary, to make sure that innovation and AI are compatible with preserving internet as a common good.

Luca Belli: Thank you very much Sandrine for these very excellent thoughts and I think it’s very good to see how you are illustrating that what has been done in terms of internet openness regulation or net neutrality debates over the past 15 years is precisely trying to enshrine into law the original philosophy of openness transparency and decentralization and priority of the internet and make sure that when what we can call gatekeepers or point of controls emerge they behave correctly and if necessary a law protects the rights of the users and the regulator oversees the laws to make sure that the obligations are implemented. Now what is very difficult now is to understand who are the new gatekeepers and how to implement the law that maybe still does not even exist in these terms. So I would like to now give the floor to Renata Mielli who is the coordinator of the CGI in this moment and CGI has been also leading the debate on net neutrality internet openness and now also many AI issues in Brazil. So Renata the floor is yours.

Renata Mielli: Thank you Luca and thank you all for inviting me for this session especially because I believe we are establishing a continuity and we are deepening the debate we started in Riad when we discuss AI from a perspective of sovereignty and the empowerment of the global south last year and how to reduce the existing asymmetries in this field and now we are talking about how to bridge the internet governance and principles to AI principles and governance and to contribute to this session I choose to look at the world We have considered the work we have done in CGI.br on principles for the Internet and try to reflect on what makes sense and what does not make sense when we’re thinking about AI in a perspective of establishing a set of principles for development, implementation and use of AI technologies taking into account what Luca just said about the differences, the high economic concentration, the opacity of the systems and taking into account also what Vint said, there are two different principles. In this sense, I would like to start by looking at what is not covered when we are talking about AI in these ten principles. The first thing I see and a lot of people are mentioning a lot is transparency and explainability because these two principles are very essential when we talk about AI because it involves a series of procedures that are not in the same way when we are dealing with the Internet. Internet is open, Internet is decentralized, all the protocols are built in a very collaborative way, but this is not the case of AI. So AI system governance and deployment and development needs to ensure high levels of transparency especially for the social impact assessment of this type of technology as well as for the creation of compliance process that ensures other principles like accountability, fairness and responsibility. We are discussing a series of specific principles for AI that were not necessarily conceived in the context of internet governance. In terms of CJIS Decalogue, I’d like to point out which ones can be, in some way, interoperable with AI principles. In this case, I think, of course, freedom, human rights, democratic and collaborative governance, universality in terms of access and the benefits of AI for all, diversity when talking about language, culture, the necessity of inclusion of all kinds of expressions, also standardization and interoperability between the various models and, of course, we need legal and regulatory environment for these systems. We can think that the perspective used for the internet governance is applicable to AI principles in context. From another perspective, principles like security need to be addressed with two other principles, safe and trustworthy, and ethical, I point another one, so they can be answered with discussion about impacts on rights like privacy and data protection. Finally, an important part of this exercise of evaluating internet governance principles and their possible alignment with AI governance principles is to identify what was conceived for the internet that is not applicable in the AI context. In this aspect, only to mention because I don’t have more time, I point to the principles of net neutrality because the proposed here is to present have observed net neutrality in relation to telecommunications infrastructure and this is not applicable to AI. And there is neutrality in the technology itself. AI is not neutral. And I think in inputability also is another principle that is not easily transferred from the internet to AI because here we have to understand the responsibility in the AI chain. So these are some thoughts I have to share in the beginning of this panel. Thank you very much.

Luca Belli: Thank you very much, Renata. And actually you also bring into the picture something extremely relevant I think for which the IGF is also an appropriate forum, being a UN forum. The fact that we have been debating this for 20 years. There are a lot of debates also going on in the Global South about this since at least 20 years. But what we see in terms of mainstream debates and policymaking and even construction of AI infrastructure, especially cloud infrastructure is an enormous predominance of what we could call the Global North. So it’s very interesting to start to bring into the debate the Global South voices. We’ve started with Brazil. Now we are continuing with Ms. Adia Elminaoui that is here representing the African continent, which is an enormous responsibility. So please, Adia, the floor is yours.

Hadia Elminiawi: Thank you. Thank you so much. And I’m happy to be part of this very important discussion. So let me first start to highlight the similarities between AI and the Internet that make the Internet’s core values well suited as a foundation for AI governance. AI can be considered one of those general-purpose technologies impacting economic growth, maybe quicker than any other general-purpose technology that has emerged in the past, such as steam engines, electrifications, computers. AI is driving revolutionally changes in all aspects of life, including healthcare, education, agriculture, finance, services, policies, and governance. By definition, AI isn’t just one technology, but it’s a constellation of them, including machine learning, natural language processing, and robotics that all work together. Similarly, the Internet stands as another powerful general-purpose technology that has fundamentally changed the way we live, work, and interact, enabling new ways of communication, education, services, provision, and conducting businesses. The Internet infrastructure is foundational to artificial intelligence, enabling cloud services, including managing on-site data centers and real-time applications. In addition, many of the services and applications that are being delivered over the Internet infrastructure are using AI to deliver better experiences, services, and products to users. So when it comes to Africa, the capabilities of African countries regarding AI vary significantly across the continent due to differences in the availability of resources, infrastructure, including reliable and efficient electricity, broadband connectivity, data infrastructure like data centers and cloud services, accesses to sets of quality data, AI-related education and skills, research and innovation, and investment. So last year in July 2024, the African Union Executive Council endorsed the African Union Continental AI Strategy. The Continental AI Strategy is considered pivotal to achieving the aspirations of the Sustainable Development Goals. And likewise, the internet plays a critical role in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. No poverty, good health and well-being, quality of education, digital industry, innovation and infrastructure. Other relevant regulatory approaches around the globe include EU’s AI Act adopted in 2024, the Executive Order for Removing Barriers to American Leadership in AI in January 2025, sectoral oversight in the US, the UK Framework for AI Regulation, the 2023 G7’s Guiding Principles and Code of Conduct, and China also has developed some rules, Egypt also has its second edition of the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy in 2025. So in all those strategies, we see some of the core principles that have shaped the internet, such as openness, interoperability and neutrality, guiding various AI governance strategies. So the question now becomes, how do we translate those agreed principles and frameworks into actions? And in some cases, what do those principles in practical terms mean or look like? So let’s look at openness and transparency. What does this mean?

Luca Belli: Hadia, may I ask you to wrap up in 30 seconds?

Hadia Elminiawi: Yes, sure. So that would be very quick. I’m almost done. So open access to research and requiring AI model, maybe. It means open access to research and requiring AI models to include components for full understanding and auditing. But what does ensuring transparent algorithms in practical terms mean? Is it realistic or even desirable to expect that all AI models be made fully open source? Given the amount of capital investment in these models, requiring complete openness could discourage investment in AI models, destroying a lot of economic value and hindering innovation. At the same time, transparency and openness raise some important ethical and security concerns. Is it truly responsible or logical to allow unrestricted access to tools that could be used to build weapons or plan harmful disruptive actions? We may need layered safeguards. AI algorithms on top of other AI algorithms to ensure responsible and secure use. So what alternative solutions can we consider? One possibility could be requiring all AI developers to implement robust safety guardrails and have these guardrails open source rather than the models themselves. In addition, AI developers could be required to publish the safety guardrails that they have put in place. I guess this is an open discussion. And with that, I would like to wrap up and thank you.

Pari Esfandiari: Thank you very much, Hadia. And on that, I think that I want to thank all the panelists for their insightful contribution. And now I want to invite our invited community members to comment on what they have heard. So you are also welcome to share your own views on the broader issues we have touched upon. And on that, I would start with Roxana. Roxana Pardue, you have five minutes. Please start.

Roxana Radu: Thank you very much. I’m sorry for not being able to join you in person. I would just like to start. Let me start by saying that there is a flourishing discussion now around ethics and principles in AI governance. In fact, it’s what we’ve seen developed over the last five or six years. It’s a plethora of ethical standards and guidelines and values to adhere to. But the key difference with internet governance is the level of maturity in these discussions and also the ability to integrate those values that are newly identified into technical policy and legal standards. What we’ve done in internet governance over the last 30 years is much more than identifying core values. We apply them, we’ve embedded them into core practices, and we are continuing to refine these practices day by day. I think there are four key areas that require attention at this point in time where we can bridge the internet governance debates and the AI governance discussions. First is the question of market concentration. Look, I was already alluding to gatekeepers, how do we define them in this new space? Highly concentrated ownership of the technology, of the infrastructure, and so on and so forth. Second is the diversity and the equity in participation in engaging different stakeholders, but also stakeholders from parts of the world that are not equally represented. Thirdly, there is the hard-learned lesson of personal data collection, use, and misuse. We have more than 40 years of experience with that in the internet governance space, and we’ve placed emphasis on data minimization, to not collect more than what you need. This lesson does not seem to apply to AI, in fact it’s the opposite. Collect data even if you are not sure about its purpose currently, machines might figure out a way to… to use that data in the future, is the opposite of what we’ve been practicing in recent years in internet governance. And fourthly, and very much linked to these previous points, there’s a timely discussion now around how to integrate some of these core values into technical standards. With AI, there seems to be a preference for unilateral standards, the giants developing their own standards, sharing them through APIs, versus globally negotiated standards, where a broader community can contribute. And those voluntary standards could then be adopted by companies and by participants in those processes more broadly. I think we need to zoom in on some of these ways of bringing those core values into practices. And it’s very opportune to do that now at the IGF. Thank you.

Luca Belli: Thank you very much, Roxana. And I think that there are some interesting points that are emerging here. Also something that I want to very briefly comment on, because it was raised before, is that we are discussing here how core internet values can apply to AI. And I think it’s interesting to do this in joint venture with the Coalition on Net Neutrality, because net neutrality is actually the implementation of core internet values into law. And as any lawyer that has studied Montesquieu would tell you, what counts in the law is the spirit of the law, right? I remember 10 years ago writing an article on the spirit of the net, where I was mentioning precisely net neutrality was the enshrining into law, the spirit of the net, the core internet values, right? And so we now have to understand a way to translate this into an applicable way to AI. And I think that is the huge challenge we have here today. And I’m pretty sure that our friend Bill Drake knows how to solve this challenge. Believe the floor is yours.

William Drake: Obviously I do not. Thank you. Okay well first of all I congratulate the organizers of this session on putting together an interesting concept. I mean trying to figure out how you map internet properties and values into the AI space I think is definitely a worthwhile activity. As Roxana noted it kind of builds on all the discussions at international level in recent years about ethics whether in UNESCO and other kinds of places and I think that you know it’s it’s worth carrying this forward but I would start by noting just there’s a few constraining factors. Three in particular. First conceptually let’s bear in mind again going back to what Vint said we’re talking different beasts you know we’re not talking here about a relatively bounded set of network operators and so on we’re talking about a vast and diverse range of AI processes and services in an unlimited range of application areas from medicine to environment and beyond so which internet properties will apply generally or in specific context simply can’t be assumed. We need to do close investigation and mapping and I think there’s a great project there for somebody who wants to develop that matrix. I look forward to reading whoever does that first. There are reasons to wonder whether some of these things really do apply clearly. Renata suggested that net neutrality for example might not be so directly applicable. There’s a lot of other challenges I think there intellectually. Secondly of course is the material interests of the private actors involved. Luca referred to the concentration issues. It’s nice to think about values but I wouldn’t expect all the US and Chinese companies that are involved in this space to join an AI engineering task force and hum their support for voluntary international standards. To the contrary they’ve kind of demonstrated that they’ll do pretty much anything to promote their interests at this phase including sponsoring military parades for dear leaders in Washington. and so on. So it’s unclear how much they would embrace any kind of externally originated constructs like neutrality, openness, transparency, etc. that don’t really fit well into their immediate profitability profile and how well these things would apply to very large online platforms and search engines, etc. Again, real challenges there. And lastly, of course, the material interests of states. Net neutrality, of course, is verboten in the United States now. Applying it to AI, of course, would be too. Generally speaking, multilateral regulatory interventions are impossible to contemplate in the Trump era, at least for those of us who are in North America. And I’m not sure what China would sign on to in that context. So in principle, you would like to think, though, that transparency and openness with regard to governance processes, especially international governance processes, could be pursued. And there, you know, I would just like to flag a couple of quick points before I run out of time. Lessons from Internet governance, I think, that are relevant. One, first, we have to be real clear about where there’s an actual demand for international governance and regimes and the application of these kinds of values and so on. We simply can’t just assume, because the technology is there and the issues are there, that there’s a functional demand. You know, often people point to things and say, oh, there’s some new phenomena. We must have governance arrangements. But very often the demand for governance arrangements is not equally distributed across actors, and those highfalutin aspirations don’t get fulfilled. So, you know, I mean, we used to talk about safety, right? There was a lot of international discussion around safety. Now suddenly safety is out the window, and we’re all talking about, well, we want to promote innovation and investment. So, you know, it’s easy to say that we have this kind of this demand to do all these new wonderful normative things, but in reality, you know, when push comes to shove, we have to look at where there’s a real functional demand. Where do you actually need international governance, interoperability or harmonization of rules. In the telecom space, if you look historically, right, radio frequency spectrum, we had to have non-interference. Telecom networks had to be interconnected and have standards to allow the network to pass traffic between them. So there was a strong incentive for states to get on board and do something even if they had different visions of how to do that and they could fight over it. What do those aspects of the AI process that absolutely require some kind of coordination or harmonization, it’s not entirely clear and I think we can’t just assume that. Other last point, I don’t want to run out of time, is just to say, going as somebody who was around 20 years ago and remembers all the fights over internet governance and what is internet governance and so on, we are in a liminal moment like we were 20 years ago where people are not clear what is the phenomena, how do we define it, what does governance mean in this context, etc. This requires a great deal more thinking about when you’re applying it to the specificities of the AI space. I think I hear a lot of these discussions in the UN where people seem to be just grafting constructs from other international policy environments onto AI and saying, well, we’ll just apply the same rules that apply elsewhere. And this is like saying that we’ll apply the rules from the telegraph to the telephone and from the telephone to television and, you know, every new technology, we’re going to look at it through the lens of previous technologies, but often that doesn’t work so well. And my last point, and then I’ll stop, multilateral action I’d be very careful in thinking about. I noticed that the G77 in China in a reaction to the co-facilitators’ stuff on the AI is saying that they want binding international commitments coming out of the UN process, that they will not accept purely informal agreements coming out of the UN process. I look at what’s going on in the AI space, I’m thinking, seriously, what kind of binding international agreements are we going to begin negotiating how in the United Nations? in the near term. And if you set that up at the front end is the object that you’re trying to drive towards, you can just see how difficult all this is going to become very quickly. So I probably went over five minutes, so I’ll stop. Thank you.

Pari Esfandiari: Thank you very much, Bill. And for the sake of time, I’m not going to reflect. You packed an awful lot of information on that that section, but we don’t have enough time. So therefore, I directly go to Shuyan Wu. Shuyan Wu, floor is yours.

Shuyan Wu: Okay, thank you. Hello, everyone. It’s a great pleasure to hear, to attend this important discussion. I am from China Mobile, one of the world’s largest telecom operator. So I’d like to share the practices and experiences from China Mobile to bridge internet and AI governance. In the age of internet, we continue to promote the development of the internet ecosystem towards fairness, transparency, and inclusiveness. This commitment is reflected in our efforts across infrastructure development, user rights protection, and bridging the digital divide. Firstly, in terms of infrastructure development, we strive to ensure equal access and tool and inclusive use of internet services. China Mobile’s mobile and broadband networks now cover all villages across the country. We’ve also built the world’s largest and most extensive 5G network. Second, when it comes to protecting users’ rights and interests, we work actively to create a transparent and trustworthy online environment. We provide clear user-friendly service mechanisms and have introduced quality management tools to ensure users’ right to information and independent decision-making. For specific groups such as elderly and minors, We focus on fraud prevention education and offer customized services to build a safer and greener digital space. Third, to bridge the digital divide and support inclusive growth, we’ve implemented targeted solutions. For elder users, we offer dedicated discounts and have tailored our smart services to their needs. For minors in rural areas, our 5G smart education cloud network services are helping to reduce the gap in education resources between urban and rural communities. As the transition from the internet era to the age of AI, China Mobile is actively adapting its experience and capabilities to the evolving needs of AI governance. We’re striving to build a digital ecosystem featuring universal access, decentralization, transparency, and inclusiveness. We are investing in AI infrastructure to promote resource sharing and encourage decentralized innovation, backed by our strong computing power, data resources, and product solutions such as large language models and AI development platforms. At the same time, we continually leverage AI capabilities to build a transparent and trustworthy digital environment, effectively safeguarding user rights. For instance, China Mobile applies AI-powered information detection technologies in scenarios like video calls and financial services to help users identify false or harmful content. Moreover, we are committed to ensuring that the benefits of AI are shared by all. For minors, we launched personalized education and eminence education scenario interaction solutions. For the elderly, we offer AI-powered entertainment, health monitoring, and safety services and for rural areas our smart village doctor system delivers quality health care to remote communities. That’s all for my sharing. Thank you.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: As everyone points over to me thank you very much and now we’re going to open the floor for your input and for your feedback on what we’ve had so far. I’m the remote participation or online participation moderator as well and there’s been a really interesting debate going on online. I’m not sure how many of you have been following this. I was going to ask whether we could have the two main participants that were speaking back and forth online Alejandra Pisanti and Vint Cerf as well because Vint of course is always active both online and with us. So and then we’ll have after those two then we’ll start with the queue also in the room. Yeah all right let’s get going Alejandro you have the floor. Thank you.

Alejandro Pisanty: Good morning. Can you hear me well? Yes very well. Thank you. Thank you. I was making these points also in previous discussions of the core internet virus dynamic coalition. If you are trying to look at translating what the experience of governance from the internet to AI to artificial intelligence I think there’s a few points that are valuable to take into account and many of them have been made already so I’m trying to just group them. First is you have to define pretty well what you want to govern. What branch of the enormous world of artificial intelligence you actually want to apply some governance. Otherwise you’ll have some more serious ill effects. Using AI for molecular modeling, protein folding and so forth that kind of problem or using it as a back office system for detecting fraud in credit cards and so forth are very different beasts in turn. So it’s very important not to regulate one of them let’s say regulates with such generality that rules from one of them will impede progress in other ones where they are absolutely not necessary. Second, what I think is very important, and we learned this from internet governance, from 30 years of internet governance, is make sure you are governing the right thing in the following sense. What does AI, as the internet in turn, bring new to things that we already know? What rules do we already have that we can just apply or modify for taking into account AI? For example, we have purchasing rules, especially in governments, where you know the constraints that you have on systems that you can buy for government, like they cannot be discriminatory, they cannot be harmful, and so forth. So you can apply those rules instead of creating a whole new world. It’s like medical devices, for example, you already have so many rules for automated medical devices, you can extend those to artificial intelligence, the harms and the consequences of the harms. So these will be different, they will be amplified, there’s probability, there’s uncertainty, but we know how to deal with that and we just need to change the scale and a better understanding of these factors. Next, what do you expect to obtain from governance? Do you want more competition? Do you want a reduction of discrimination and bias? Do you want more respect for intellectual property? Do you want more access to global resources for the global south, and so forth? Because this will determine the institutional and organizational design. And next and most important, and this is something that a NetMundial plus 10 meeting, for example, does with other good that it has, is how do you actually bring these different stakeholders? Who are the stakeholders and how do you bring them to the table? If you want to regulate large language models provided over the internet for chatbots, like are the dominant aspect of public discussion these days. Why would they come to the table? Why would OpenAI, Google, Meta, et cetera? not to speak about Mistral and certainly the providers in China and other countries which are operating under completely different sets of rules, why would they come together and agree to limit themselves in some way? Also to sit at the table with people who are their users or their clients, potentially their competitors if something arises from their innovation. And especially, how do you bring them together to put some money into the operation of the system? To agree to have a structure, to agree to have their hands tied in some extent. What has happened, for example, in internal governance is very different things for, let’s say, the domain name system and fighting phishing and scams. For the domain name system, you have companies fearing that strong rules for competition would come from the US government and they agreed finally to come together with civil society and the technical community, which is also a key point. The experts have always to be at the table. As the ICANN paper has stated very recently for intergovernance, the technical community is not one more participant. It’s a pillar and you need to know what the limitations and the capabilities of that technology are. I’ll stop there. Thank you.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you, Alejandro. OK, next, Vint Cerf.

Vint Cerf: First, I have to unmute. So thank you so much, Alex. I always enjoy your line of reasoning. Let me suggest a couple of small points. The first one is that with regard to regulation of AI based applications, I think a focus of attention should be on risk to the users of those technologies and of course, potential liability for the provider of those applications. So a high risk application such as medical diagnosis or recommended medical treatment or maybe financial advice ought to have a high level of safety associated with it, which suggests that if there is regulation. the provider of the service has to show due diligence that they have taken steps that are widely agreed to reduce risk for the user. So risk is probably a very important metric here. And concurrently, liability will be a very important metric for action by the providers of AI-based services. I think that another thing which is of significance is the provenance of the materials used to train these large language models, for example, and explainability chain of reasoning, chain of thought, those sorts of things to help us understand the output that comes from interacting with these large language models. And finally, I mentioned this earlier, but let me reiterate that the agent-to-agent protocol and the model context protocols are there, I think, partly to make things work better, more reliably, but they might also be important for limiting liability. In other words, there’s a motivation for implementing these things with great care and designing them with great care so that it’s clear, for example, in a multi-agent interaction, which agents might be responsible for what outcomes. Again, something that relates to liability for parties who are offering these products and services. So I’ll stop there. I hope that others who are participating in this will be able to elaborate on some of these ideas.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you, Vin. Just one point. Earlier in the chat, you mentioned, I’m seeing here, indelible ways to identify sources of content used to train AI models. Could you explain a bit?

Vint Cerf: Yes, I was trying to refer to provenance here. The thing that people worry about is that the material used to train the model may be of uncertain origin. And if someone says, well, how can I rely on this model? How do I know what it was trained on? Here, I think it should be possible to identify what the sources were in a way that is incontrovertible. Digitally signed documents or materials that whose provenance can be established is important, because then we can go back and say to the parties providing those things or ask them questions about the verifiability of the material that’s in that training data.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: OK, thanks very much for this and apologies for the for the wait. But please over to the gentleman standing at the microphone and please introduce yourself in your intervention.

Audience: Thank you. Yes. Hi. Thank you for the excellent panel. I’m Dominique Hazel Monsieur. I work for WCC where among other things, I oversee our work around AI and its impact on the web. So this is a place where a lot of web standards are being developed. I guess I wanted to make two remarks, one on scope and one maybe on incentives for governance. One of the topics that was brought up in terms of scope, we are at the IGF and it’s been mentioned a number of times. AI is extremely broad. One, I think, useful way to segment the problem is to look at the intersection of AI and Internet. And there are a number of those like AI has been fed from a lot of web content. A lot of web content is now being produced through AI. AI is starting, as Vint was describing, to be used as agents on the web and on the Internet. So looking exactly at these intersections and what AI changes to the existing. and they are all critical components of their strategy about both building their tools and distributing the tools. And they can only make that remain true if they don’t impoverish the ecosystem to a point where there is no more content they can feed on or no more services that could accept to reuse or integrate with the system. So at the end of the day, I think it’s really a matter of in particular in this emerging agents architecture that Vint was describing that we understand what are the expectations for these agents learned from rules that already exist. For instance, in the web space, we have a number of very clear expectations as to what you ought to do if you’re a browser, literally a user agent. And understanding how they apply to AI-based agents I think is going to be hopefully very illuminating about what kind of governance we should put in place around that.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you very much for your intervention. And the next person in line, please introduce yourself.

Audience: Yeah. Hi, sorry. My name is Andrew Campling. In this context, I’m an internet standards and internet governance enthusiast. To build on Bill’s comments, I probably wouldn’t start from here either. But here we are, and we’re probably too late to be somewhat pessimistic. But if I was going to look anywhere to start, it wouldn’t be the internet. I’d probably look closely at lessons from social media specifically, where we’ve got, in my opinion, a small number of highly dominant players who are disinterested in collaborative multi-stakeholder initiatives, unless they’re commercially worthwhile to them. If we look to the internet model, and we try to collaborate, build a multi-stakeholder governance model, I don’t think there’s a commercial imperative for the players to do that. It’s far too easy to game the system and take a long time, and by the time something’s agreed, it will be irrelevant. So if I was to start anywhere, I’d look closely at duty of care as a key requirement, and also explore why we wouldn’t apply the precautionary principle widely, and use those as two foundational building blocks. I wouldn’t start with internet governance. So apologies for the pessimism, but I think we have to be pragmatic and realistic where we are. Thank you.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: I should say, this is quite a British intervention. Okay, thank you so much. Pass it over to Luca, or should we go for the conclusions, because there’s only about six minutes. Yeah, I think we can go.

Luca Belli: We have six minutes. Do we have any other comments or questions in the room? I don’t see any hands. We have exhausted the comments from the online participants. I think we can go for a round of very quick conclusions, like very prehistoric tweets of 240 characters. We don’t have time, because we’ve got to go now to Jek. Well, Jekshan is the person. Oh, Jekshan. Yeah, sorry. Sorry. We have already Jekshan that has a chat GPT, will distill all the knowledge in five minutes result.

Yik Chan Ching: Okay and thank you very much for giving me the five minutes to make some comment. Actually I’m from PNAI, you know the police level of artificial intelligence which is also the intersectional process of IGF. So it’s very interesting to have the joint section between the PNAI and the DCs. Yeah I found that discussion is really fascinating and so my observation is that there’s a two observation also based on the PNAI’s past three years research on the AI governance. For example we did a two report on liability and interoperability or these big issues and environmental protections. So I think there’s a two issue I would like to make some comments. The first one is about the institutional secting and because Bill asked how can we you know collaborate at the global level and what are the initiative or interest. I think there’s a first of all we know that there’s a UN you know process going on in terms of the scientific panels and also global dialogues. So we probably give some you know opportunities and a little bit trust to them and hold on to see what are the outcome from the UN level. And secondly I think for my experience what really make a difference between the AI governance and internet governance or social media governance is that we learn from our past experience especially you know social media’s experience. So we have such a vibrant discussion you know intervention, earlier intervention or precautional principle you know as we British said and from different stakeholders from civil society, from academia and you know from the industry. So I think in that sense you know we’re more much more precaution than the social media. Internet Errors. So which probably will make a difference. And certainly, the second one is in terms of which area we should look at. From my experience and also the PNAS experience, I agree with Vint. First of all, it’s risk. Risk is very important, you know. And secondly, the safety issues. And of course, liability, because liability is a mechanism we hold the AI developers and the deployments accountable. So that’s very important, I think. The third one, of course, is interoperability. So when we talk about interoperability, it’s not only about a principle, ethics, norms, but also standard, you know. So the standard will play a significant role in regulator AI. And I’m very glad we see a lot of progress in terms of AI standard making. For example, at the EU level, there’s a lot of standard. So they’re going to have a kind of, you know, announcement of the EU standard in terms of AI act. But there’s also standard, huge progress of standard making in China in terms of safety issue or the Africa issue. So I think the AI standard will be one of the very crucial areas for us to regulate AI in the future. I think I’ll stop here. Thank you very much.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you very much, Yig-Chan. And there’s two minutes left, I guess, to just ask any of our co-moderators on their reflections. I was going to say one tweet from each one of our participants, but I don’t know if we can do it in the two minutes. Should we try? One tweet? Yeah, why not? Quick tweet. Okay, let’s start with the table then, with the person the furthest to my right, which is your left. Bill Drake?

Luca Belli: A message of hope in 20 seconds.

William Drake: A message of hope in 20 seconds. Wow.

Luca Belli: Or of disgrace, as you prefer.

William Drake: I was going to say abandon all hope. All right. Well, I just echo again the point about being very clear about exactly. What demand is there for what kind of governance over what kinds of processes? Too much of the discussion around these issues is just too generic and high level to be very meaningful when we get down to the real nitty-gritty of what’s going on in different domains of AI development and application, and so we need a dose of realism there. But I like the idea of the mapping effort that you’re trying to do, and I look forward to seeing you guys develop more.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you, Bill. Next, Weixin.

Shuyan Wu: Okay, thank you. It’s my first time to attend this kind of discussion, and it’s very important to share my opinions and discuss with all of you. I hope I have another chance to continue to exchange our ideas with all of you. Thank you. Thank you.

Hadia Elminiawi: Regional and international strategies and cooperations should not be seen as conflicting with national sovereignties. National and international strategies, cooperations and collaboration should go in parallel and hand-in-hand. They should support and strengthen the goal of one another. They need to have aligned objectives and implemented simultaneously.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you, Hadia. Sandrine.

Sandrine ELMI HERSI: Yes, so we can no longer think AI governance and internet governance as separate entities. As we noted today, the strong interlinks between LLMs and internet content and services, thus applying internet core principles to AI, is not a whim or accessory. It is the only way to preserve the openness and richness of the internet we spend years to build, and we can and must act now to establish a multi-stakeholder approach with that in mind.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you. Renata.

Renata Mielli: Just three words. How to transform these principles into technical standards, we talked about this, and I want to say we need oversight, agency and regulation, and we need to remember that governance and regulation are two different things, and governance needs to be multistakeholder, and we need national regulations for AI systems.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you, Roxana.

Roxana Radu: I’ll just say that we need to walk the talk, so now that we’ve done this initial brainstorming session, I look forward to seeing what we can come up together in terms of bridging this gap between what we’ve learned in internet governance, and where we’re starting in AI discussions. This is not to say that everything applies, but we’ve learned a lot, and we shouldn’t reinvent the wheel.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you. And finally, Vint.

Vint Cerf: I think my summary here is very simple. We just have to make sure that when we build these systems, we take safety in mind for all of the users. That’s going to take a concerted effort for all of us.

Olivier Crepin-Leblond: Thank you very much, and if anybody in the room is interested in continuing this discussion, which I hope you are after this session, then please come over to the stage and share your details with us. You can get onto the DC’s mailing lists and continue the discussion and participate in future such work. Thank you.

Agreement points

Risk-based approach to AI governance with focus on user safety and provider liability

Speakers

– Vint Cerf
– Yik Chan Ching
– Alejandro Pisanty

Arguments

Focus should be on risk to users and liability for providers, with high-risk applications requiring higher safety levels

Risk assessment, safety issues, and liability mechanisms are crucial for holding AI developers accountable

Need to apply existing rules for automated systems and medical devices to AI rather than creating entirely new frameworks

Summary

Multiple speakers converged on the importance of implementing risk-based governance frameworks that prioritize user safety and establish clear liability mechanisms for AI providers, particularly for high-risk applications like medical diagnosis and financial advice.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Cybersecurity

Need for AI transparency and explainability to address opacity challenges

Speakers

– Sandrine ELMI HERSI
– Renata Mielli
– Vint Cerf
– Hadia Elminiawi

Arguments

Many AI models remain “black boxes” requiring greater openness to research community for auditability and explainability

AI systems need transparency and explainability especially for social impact assessment and compliance processes, unlike the naturally open internet protocols

Provenance of information used by AI agents and references must be available for critical evaluation of outputs

Complete openness of AI models may be unrealistic given capital investment and could discourage innovation and raise security concerns

Summary

Speakers agreed that AI systems require significantly more transparency than current implementations provide, though they acknowledged practical challenges in achieving complete openness due to investment and security concerns.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Importance of technical standards and interoperability for AI systems

Speakers

– Vint Cerf
– Yik Chan Ching
– Audience

Arguments

Agent-to-agent protocols and model context protocols are being developed to ensure interoperability among AI systems

AI standards development is progressing significantly in EU, China, and other regions, particularly around safety issues

Need to focus on intersection of AI and internet where AI feeds on web content and produces web content

Summary

There was strong agreement on the critical role of developing technical standards for AI interoperability, with recognition of ongoing global efforts in standardization and the need to focus on AI-internet intersections.

Topics

Infrastructure | Digital standards

Similar viewpoints

These speakers shared the view that while internet and AI are fundamentally different architectures, the core principles that made the internet successful should be adapted and applied to AI governance, particularly through extending network neutrality concepts.

Speakers

– Luca Belli
– Pari Esfandiari
– Sandrine ELMI HERSI

Arguments

Internet and AI are “two different beasts” – Internet built on open, decentralized architecture while AI is highly centralized and proprietary

Internet’s foundational principles of openness, decentralization, and transparency should guide AI governance as generative AI becomes a main gateway to content

Network neutrality non-discrimination principle should extend to AI infrastructure, models, and content curation to prevent privileging of certain services

Topics

Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Both speakers expressed skepticism about the feasibility of applying internet governance models to AI, emphasizing the need for more pragmatic approaches that account for commercial realities and dominant market players.

Speakers

– William Drake
– Andrew Campling

Arguments

Private actors’ material interests make them unlikely to embrace externally originated constructs like neutrality and transparency

Duty of care and precautionary principle should be foundational building blocks for AI governance

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

Both speakers emphasized the importance of inclusive AI development that bridges digital divides while respecting national approaches, with focus on ensuring benefits reach underserved populations.

Speakers

– Hadia Elminiawi
– Shuyan Wu

Arguments

Regional and international AI strategies should align with and strengthen national sovereignties rather than conflict with them

China Mobile’s experience shows importance of ensuring equal access, protecting user rights, and bridging digital divides in AI era

Topics

Development | Legal and regulatory

Unexpected consensus

Limitations of direct application of internet governance principles to AI

Speakers

– Renata Mielli
– William Drake
– Hadia Elminiawi

Arguments

Net neutrality principles may not directly apply to AI since AI technology itself is not neutral unlike internet infrastructure

Need to define precisely what aspects of AI require governance rather than applying generic high-level principles

Complete openness of AI models may be unrealistic given capital investment and could discourage innovation and raise security concerns

Explanation

Despite the session’s goal of bridging internet and AI governance, there was unexpected consensus among speakers from different backgrounds that direct application of internet principles to AI faces significant practical and conceptual limitations.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Infrastructure

Importance of leveraging existing regulatory frameworks rather than creating entirely new ones

Speakers

– Alejandro Pisanty
– Roxana Radu
– Yik Chan Ching

Arguments

Need to apply existing rules for automated systems and medical devices to AI rather than creating entirely new frameworks

Internet governance experience over 30 years provides mature framework for applying values to technical, policy and legal standards that AI governance lacks

Early intervention and precautionary approaches in AI governance benefit from lessons learned from social media governance failures

Explanation

There was unexpected agreement across speakers that AI governance should build upon existing regulatory experience and frameworks rather than starting from scratch, representing a pragmatic approach to governance development.

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion revealed significant agreement on the need for risk-based AI governance, transparency requirements, and technical standards development, while acknowledging fundamental challenges in directly applying internet governance principles to AI systems.

Consensus level

Moderate to high consensus on core governance needs (safety, transparency, standards) but significant disagreement on implementation approaches and the applicability of internet governance models. This suggests that while there is shared understanding of AI governance challenges, the path forward requires careful consideration of AI’s unique characteristics rather than simple adaptation of existing frameworks.

Different viewpoints

Feasibility of complete AI transparency and openness

Speakers

– Hadia Elminiawi
– Sandrine ELMI HERSI

Arguments

Complete openness of AI models may be unrealistic given capital investment and could discourage innovation and raise security concerns

Many AI models remain “black boxes” requiring greater openness to research community for auditability and explainability

Summary

Hadia questions whether requiring full transparency and open-source access to AI models is practical given massive capital investments and security risks, while Sandrine advocates for greater openness particularly to researchers for auditability purposes

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Cybersecurity

Direct applicability of net neutrality principles to AI

Speakers

– Renata Mielli
– Sandrine ELMI HERSI

Arguments

Net neutrality principles may not directly apply to AI since AI technology itself is not neutral unlike internet infrastructure

Network neutrality non-discrimination principle should extend to AI infrastructure, models, and content curation to prevent privileging of certain services

Summary

Renata argues that net neutrality cannot be directly applied to AI because AI technology is inherently non-neutral, while Sandrine advocates for extending non-discrimination principles from network neutrality to AI systems

Topics

Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Starting point for AI governance frameworks

Speakers

– William Drake
– Andrew Campling

Arguments

Must identify where there’s actual functional demand for international governance rather than assuming need based on technology existence

Duty of care and precautionary principle should be foundational building blocks for AI governance

Summary

William emphasizes the need to identify functional demand for governance before creating frameworks, while Andrew advocates for starting with duty of care and precautionary principles as foundational elements

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Optimism vs pessimism about multilateral AI governance

Speakers

– William Drake
– Yik Chan Ching

Arguments

Multilateral regulatory interventions face political obstacles, and binding international agreements may be unrealistic

Early intervention and precautionary approaches in AI governance benefit from lessons learned from social media governance failures

Summary

William expresses pessimism about the feasibility of multilateral AI governance given current political realities, while Yik Chan is more optimistic about early intervention approaches based on lessons learned from social media

Topics

Legal and regulatory

Unexpected differences

Neutrality of AI technology itself

Speakers

– Renata Mielli
– Sandrine ELMI HERSI

Arguments

Net neutrality principles may not directly apply to AI since AI technology itself is not neutral unlike internet infrastructure

Network neutrality non-discrimination principle should extend to AI infrastructure, models, and content curation to prevent privileging of certain services

Explanation

This disagreement is unexpected because both speakers come from regulatory/governance backgrounds and might be expected to align on extending internet governance principles to AI, but they fundamentally disagree on whether AI’s inherent non-neutrality prevents direct application of net neutrality principles

Topics

Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Feasibility of international AI governance

Speakers

– William Drake
– Hadia Elminiawi

Arguments

Private actors’ material interests make them unlikely to embrace externally originated constructs like neutrality and transparency

Regional and international AI strategies should align with and strengthen national sovereignties rather than conflict with them

Explanation

This disagreement is unexpected given both speakers’ extensive experience in international governance – William’s pessimism about private sector cooperation contrasts sharply with Hadia’s optimism about aligning international and national strategies

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

Overall assessment

Summary

The main areas of disagreement center on the practical implementation of AI governance principles, the extent of transparency required, the applicability of existing internet governance frameworks to AI, and the feasibility of international cooperation

Disagreement level

Moderate to high disagreement level with significant implications – while speakers generally agree on the importance of applying internet values to AI governance, they fundamentally disagree on how to achieve this, suggesting that developing consensus on AI governance frameworks will require substantial additional work to bridge these conceptual and practical differences

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

These speakers shared the view that while internet and AI are fundamentally different architectures, the core principles that made the internet successful should be adapted and applied to AI governance, particularly through extending network neutrality concepts.

Speakers

– Luca Belli
– Pari Esfandiari
– Sandrine ELMI HERSI

Arguments

Internet and AI are “two different beasts” – Internet built on open, decentralized architecture while AI is highly centralized and proprietary

Internet’s foundational principles of openness, decentralization, and transparency should guide AI governance as generative AI becomes a main gateway to content

Network neutrality non-discrimination principle should extend to AI infrastructure, models, and content curation to prevent privileging of certain services

Topics

Infrastructure | Legal and regulatory

Both speakers expressed skepticism about the feasibility of applying internet governance models to AI, emphasizing the need for more pragmatic approaches that account for commercial realities and dominant market players.

Speakers

– William Drake
– Andrew Campling

Arguments

Private actors’ material interests make them unlikely to embrace externally originated constructs like neutrality and transparency

Duty of care and precautionary principle should be foundational building blocks for AI governance

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

Both speakers emphasized the importance of inclusive AI development that bridges digital divides while respecting national approaches, with focus on ensuring benefits reach underserved populations.

Speakers

– Hadia Elminiawi
– Shuyan Wu

Arguments

Regional and international AI strategies should align with and strengthen national sovereignties rather than conflict with them

China Mobile’s experience shows importance of ensuring equal access, protecting user rights, and bridging digital divides in AI era

Topics

Development | Legal and regulatory

Key takeaways

Internet’s foundational principles of openness, decentralization, and transparency can serve as signposts for AI governance, but require active adaptation since Internet and AI are ‘two different beasts’

AI governance faces fundamental tension between Internet’s open, distributed architecture and AI’s centralized, proprietary model controlled by few actors

Risk-based approach to AI governance should focus on user safety and provider liability, with high-risk applications requiring higher safety standards

Transparency and explainability are essential for AI systems but complete openness may be unrealistic due to investment concerns and security risks

Network neutrality principles of non-discrimination should extend to AI infrastructure and content curation to preserve diversity and prevent gatekeeping

Technical standards and interoperability protocols (like agent-to-agent and model context protocols) will be crucial for AI governance implementation

Global South perspectives and capabilities must be included in AI governance discussions to address existing asymmetries

AI governance should build on 30 years of Internet governance experience rather than starting from scratch, while recognizing what doesn’t directly apply

Multi-stakeholder governance approach is essential, but private actors’ commercial interests may limit participation in voluntary international standards

Resolutions and action items

Continue discussion through Dynamic Coalition mailing lists for interested participants

Develop detailed mapping matrix of which Internet properties apply to specific AI contexts and applications

ARCEP (French regulator) to complete ongoing technical report on applying Internet core values to AI governance

Focus on intersection points between AI and Internet rather than trying to govern all AI applications generically

Explore alternative transparency solutions like requiring open-source safety guardrails rather than full model openness

Unresolved issues

How to define and regulate new AI gatekeepers when traditional Internet governance models may not apply

Whether complete AI model transparency is realistic or desirable given investment requirements and security concerns

How to ensure meaningful participation of major AI companies in voluntary international governance frameworks

What specific aspects of AI actually require international coordination versus national regulation

How to balance innovation incentives with transparency and accountability requirements

Whether binding international AI agreements are feasible given current political climate

How to transform high-level principles into actionable technical standards and regulatory frameworks

How to address liability and responsibility in multi-agent AI systems

What constitutes functional demand for AI governance versus assumed need based on technology existence

Suggested compromises

Require open-source safety guardrails and published safety measures rather than full AI model transparency

Apply layered safeguards approach with AI algorithms monitoring other AI algorithms for responsible use

Focus on risk-based regulation where high-risk applications have stricter requirements rather than blanket AI rules

Extend existing regulatory frameworks (medical devices, purchasing rules) to AI applications rather than creating entirely new governance structures

Pursue sector-specific AI governance approaches rather than generic cross-cutting regulations

Combine national AI regulations with aligned international cooperation strategies that support rather than conflict with sovereignty

Start with duty of care and precautionary principles as foundational building blocks rather than comprehensive Internet governance models

The Internet and AI are two different beasts. So we are speaking about two things that are two digital phenomenon, but they are quite different. And the Internet, as Pari was reminding us very eloquently, has been built on an open, decentralized, transparent, interoperable architecture that made the success of the Internet over the past 70 years… but the question here is how we reconcile this with a highly centralized AI architecture.

Speaker

Luca Belli

Reason

This comment crystallized the fundamental tension at the heart of the discussion – the architectural incompatibility between the internet’s foundational principles and AI’s current development trajectory. It moved beyond surface-level comparisons to identify the core structural challenge.

Impact

This framing established the central problematic that all subsequent speakers had to grapple with. It shifted the discussion from whether internet values could apply to AI, to how they could be reconciled with AI’s inherently different architecture. This tension became a recurring theme throughout the session.

Every time someone interacts with one of those [large language models], they are specializing it to their interests and their needs. So in a sense, we have a very distributed ability to adapt a particular large language model to a particular problem… And that’s important, the fact that we are able to personalize.

Speaker

Vint Cerf

Reason

This insight reframed AI from being purely centralized to having distributed elements through user interaction. It challenged the binary view of centralized vs. decentralized systems and introduced nuance about how users can maintain agency even within centralized AI systems.

Impact

This comment provided a counterpoint to concerns about AI centralization and influenced later discussions about user agency and the potential for maintaining some internet-like distributed characteristics in AI systems. It offered a more optimistic perspective on preserving user empowerment.

Is it realistic or even desirable to expect that all AI models be made fully open source? Given the amount of capital investment in these models, requiring complete openness could discourage investment in AI models, destroying a lot of economic value and hindering innovation… Is it truly responsible or logical to allow unrestricted access to tools that could be used to build weapons or plan harmful disruptive actions?

Speaker

Hadia Elminiawi

Reason

This comment introduced crucial practical and ethical constraints that challenge idealistic applications of internet openness principles to AI. It forced the discussion to confront real-world trade-offs between values like openness and safety/security concerns.

Impact

This intervention shifted the conversation from theoretical principle-mapping to practical implementation challenges. It introduced the concept of ‘layered safeguards’ and sparked discussion about alternative approaches to transparency that don’t require full openness, influencing the overall tone toward more pragmatic solutions.

What we’ve done in internet governance over the last 30 years is much more than identifying core values. We apply them, we’ve embedded them into core practices, and we are continuing to refine these practices day by day… With AI, there seems to be a preference for unilateral standards, the giants developing their own standards, sharing them through APIs, versus globally negotiated standards.

Speaker

Roxana Radu

Reason

This comment highlighted a critical difference in governance maturity and approach between internet and AI governance. It identified the shift from collaborative standard-setting to unilateral corporate control as a key challenge, moving beyond principles to examine governance processes themselves.

Impact

This observation redirected attention from what principles to apply to how governance processes differ between domains. It influenced subsequent discussions about stakeholder participation and the challenges of bringing AI companies to collaborative governance tables.

We simply can’t just assume, because the technology is there and the issues are there, that there’s a functional demand [for international governance]. You know, often people point to things and say, oh, there’s some new phenomena. We must have governance arrangements. But very often the demand for governance arrangements is not equally distributed across actors.

Speaker

William Drake

Reason

This comment challenged a fundamental assumption underlying the entire session – that AI governance is necessarily needed or wanted by key stakeholders. It introduced a dose of political realism about power dynamics and incentives that was largely absent from earlier idealistic discussions.

Impact

This intervention served as a reality check that sobered the discussion. It forced participants to consider not just what governance should look like, but whether it’s actually achievable given current power structures. This influenced the final discussions toward more pragmatic approaches and acknowledgment of constraints.

If you want to regulate large language models provided over the internet for chatbots… Why would OpenAI, Google, Meta, et cetera… why would they come together and agree to limit themselves in some way? Also to sit at the table with people who are their users or their clients, potentially their competitors if something arises from their innovation.

Speaker

Alejandro Pisanty

Reason

This comment cut to the heart of the governance challenge by questioning the fundamental incentive structures. It moved beyond technical and ethical considerations to examine the political economy of AI governance, highlighting why voluntary cooperation might be unrealistic.

Impact

This comment reinforced the realist turn in the discussion initiated by Drake and others. It contributed to a more sober assessment of governance possibilities and influenced the final recommendations toward focusing on areas where there might be actual incentives for cooperation, such as liability and risk management.

Overall assessment

These key comments fundamentally shaped the discussion by introducing increasing levels of realism and complexity. The session began with an optimistic framing about mapping internet values to AI governance, but these interventions progressively challenged assumptions, introduced practical constraints, and highlighted structural differences between the domains. The comments created a dialectical progression from idealism to realism, ultimately leading to more nuanced and pragmatic conclusions. Rather than simply advocating for applying internet principles to AI, the discussion evolved to acknowledge the fundamental tensions, power dynamics, and implementation challenges involved. This resulted in a more sophisticated understanding of the governance challenge and more realistic recommendations focused on specific areas like risk management, liability, and targeted interventions rather than wholesale principle transfer.

How do we define who are the new gatekeepers in AI and how to implement laws that may not even exist yet to regulate them?

Speaker

Luca Belli

Explanation

This addresses the fundamental challenge of identifying control points in AI systems and developing appropriate regulatory frameworks, which is crucial for applying internet governance principles to AI

What alternative solutions can we consider for AI transparency beyond making all models fully open source?

Speaker

Hadia Elminiawi

Explanation

This explores practical approaches to transparency that balance openness with security concerns and investment protection, which is essential for developing workable AI governance frameworks

How can we develop a detailed matrix mapping which internet properties apply generally or in specific AI contexts?

Speaker

William Drake

Explanation

This would provide a systematic framework for understanding how internet governance principles can be applied across different AI applications and contexts

What aspects of AI processes absolutely require international coordination or harmonization?

Speaker

William Drake

Explanation

This is critical for determining where international governance efforts should focus and where there is genuine functional demand for coordination

How do we bring different stakeholders, especially dominant AI companies, to the table for governance discussions?

Speaker

Alejandro Pisanty

Explanation

This addresses the practical challenge of creating incentives for major AI players to participate in governance frameworks that may limit their operations

How can we establish indelible ways to identify sources of content used to train AI models?

Speaker

Vint Cerf

Explanation

This is important for establishing provenance and accountability in AI systems, which is fundamental to trust and liability frameworks

How do existing web standards and expectations for user agents apply to AI-based agents?

Speaker

Dominique Hazel Monsieur

Explanation

This explores how established internet protocols and standards can be extended to govern AI agents operating on the web

How can we transform AI governance principles into technical standards?

Speaker

Renata Mielli

Explanation

This addresses the practical implementation challenge of moving from high-level principles to actionable technical specifications

What does ensuring transparent algorithms mean in practical terms for AI systems?

Speaker

Hadia Elminiawi

Explanation

This seeks to define concrete requirements for AI transparency beyond abstract principles

How can we ensure AI systems remain open to smaller and independent content creators rather than just amplifying dominant sources?

Speaker

Sandrine ELMI HERSI

Explanation

This addresses concerns about AI systems potentially concentrating power and reducing diversity in content and innovation

Summary

This panel discussion examined the case for local artificial intelligence innovation that serves humanity’s benefit, focusing on three key dimensions: inclusivity, indigeneity, and intentionality. The session was moderated by Valeria Betancourt and featured experts from various organizations discussing how to develop contextually grounded AI that contributes to people and planetary well-being.

Anita Gurumurthy from IT4Change framed the conversation by highlighting the tension between unequal AI capabilities distribution and increasing demands from climate and energy impacts. She emphasized that current AI investment ($200 billion between 2022-2025) is three times global climate adaptation spending, raising concerns about energy consumption and cultural homogenization through Western-centric AI models. The discussion revealed that local AI development faces significant challenges, including limited access to computing infrastructure, data scarcity in local languages, and skills gaps.

Wai Sit Si Thou from UN Trade and Development presented a framework focusing on infrastructure, data, and skills as key drivers for inclusive AI adoption. The presentation emphasized working with locally available infrastructure, community-led data, and simple interfaces while advocating for worker-centric approaches that complement rather than replace human labor. Ambassador Abhishek Singh from India shared practical examples of democratizing AI access through government-subsidized computing infrastructure, crowd-sourced linguistic datasets, and capacity-building initiatives.

Sarah Nicole from Project Liberty Institute argued that AI amplifies existing centralized digital economy structures rather than disrupting them, advocating for radical infrastructure changes that give users data agency through cooperative models and open protocols. The discussion explored various approaches to data governance, including data cooperatives that enable collective bargaining power rather than individual data monetization.

The panelists concluded that developing local AI requires international cooperation, shared computing infrastructure, open-source models, and new frameworks for intellectual property that protect community interests while fostering innovation for the common good.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Infrastructure and Resource Inequality in AI Development**: The discussion highlighted the significant AI divide, with infrastructure, data, and skills concentrated among few actors. Key statistics showed AI investment doubled to $200 billion between 2022-2025 (three times global climate adaptation spending), and single companies like NVIDIA controlling 90% of critical GPU production.

– **Local vs. Global AI Models and Cultural Preservation**: Participants debated the tension between large-scale global AI systems and the need for contextually grounded, local AI that preserves linguistic diversity and cultural knowledge. The conversation emphasized how current AI systems amplify “epistemic injustices” and western cultural homogenization while erasing local ways of thinking.

– **Data Ownership, Intellectual Property, and Commons**: A significant portion focused on rethinking data ownership models, moving from individual data monetization to collective approaches like data cooperatives. Participants discussed how current IP frameworks may not serve public interest and explored alternatives for fair value distribution from AI development.

– **Infrastructure Sharing and Cooperative Models**: Multiple speakers advocated for shared computing infrastructure (referencing models like CERN) and cooperative approaches to make AI development more accessible to smaller actors, developing countries, and local communities. Examples included India’s subsidized compute access and Switzerland’s supercomputer sharing initiatives.

– **Intentionality and Governance for Common Good**: The discussion emphasized the need for deliberate policy choices to steer AI development toward public benefit rather than purely private value creation, including precautionary principles, public procurement policies, and accountability mechanisms.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to explore pathways for developing “local artificial intelligence” that serves humanity’s benefit, particularly focusing on how AI innovation can be made more inclusive, contextually relevant, and aligned with common good rather than concentrated corporate interests. The session sought to identify practical solutions for democratizing AI development and ensuring its benefits reach marginalized communities and developing countries.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a collaborative and solution-oriented tone throughout, with participants building on each other’s ideas constructively. While speakers acknowledged significant challenges and structural inequalities in current AI development, the tone remained optimistic about possibilities for change. The conversation was academic yet practical, with participants sharing concrete examples and policy recommendations. There was a sense of urgency about addressing these issues, but the overall atmosphere was one of thoughtful problem-solving rather than criticism alone.

Speakers

**Speakers from the provided list:**

– **Valeria Betancourt** – Moderator of the panel session on local artificial intelligence innovation pathways

– **Anita Gurumurthy** – From IT4Change, expert on digital justice and AI democratization

– **Wai Sit Si Thou** – From UN Trade and Development Agency (UNCTAD), participated remotely, expert on inclusive AI for development

– **Abhishek Singh** – Ambassador, Government of India, expert on AI infrastructure and digital governance

– **Sarah Nicole** – From Project Liberty Institute, expert on digital infrastructure and data agency

– **Thomas Schneider** – Ambassador, Government of Switzerland, economist and historian with expertise in digital policy

– **Nandini Chami** – From IT4Change, expert on AI governance and techno-institutional choices

– **Sadhana Sanjay** – Session coordinator managing remote participation and questions

– **Audience** – Various audience members including Dr. Nermin Salim (Secretary General of Creators Union of Arab, expert in intellectual property)

**Additional speakers:**

– **Dr. Nermin Salim** – Secretary General of Creators Union of Arab (consultative status with UN), expert in intellectual property law, specifically AI intellectual property protection

# Local Artificial Intelligence Innovation Pathways Panel Discussion

## Introduction and Context

This panel discussion, moderated by Valeria Betancourt, examined pathways for developing local artificial intelligence innovation that serves humanity’s benefit. The session was structured around three key dimensions: inclusivity, indigeneity, and intentionality. Participants included Anita Gurumurthy from IT4Change, Ambassador Abhishek Singh from India, Wai Sit Si Thou from UN Trade and Development, Thomas Schneider (Ambassador from Switzerland), Sarah Nicole from Project Liberty Institute, and Nandini Chami from IT4Change.

The discussion was framed by striking statistics from the UN Digital Economy Report: AI-related investment doubled from $100 to $200 billion between 2022 and 2025, representing three times global spending on climate change adaptation. This established a central tension about democratising AI benefits whilst addressing resource constraints and environmental impact.

## Round One: Inclusivity and the AI Divide

### Infrastructure Inequality

Wai Sit Si Thou highlighted the profound inequalities in AI development capabilities, noting that NVIDIA produces 90% of critical GPUs, creating significant infrastructure barriers. This concentration represents what speakers termed the “AI divide,” where computing resources, data, and skills remain concentrated among few actors.

Anita Gurumurthy emphasised that despite improvements in chip efficiency, energy demand from data centres continues creating environmental concerns. She noted that efficiency gains are being used to build larger models rather than reducing overall environmental impact.

### Shared Infrastructure Solutions

Ambassador Singh presented India’s approach to addressing infrastructure inequality through public investment. India created shared compute infrastructure with government subsidising costs to less than a dollar per GPU per hour, making expensive AI computing resources accessible to smaller actors who cannot afford commercial cloud rates.

Thomas Schneider described similar initiatives including Switzerland’s supercomputer network and efforts to share computing power globally. Multiple speakers endorsed a CERN-like model for AI infrastructure sharing, where pooled resources from multiple countries could provide affordable access to computing power for developing countries and smaller organisations.

### Framework for Inclusive Development

Wai Sit Si Thou presented a framework for inclusive AI adoption based on three drivers: infrastructure, data, and skills, with equity as the central focus. This approach emphasised working with locally available infrastructure, community-led data, and simple interfaces to enable broader adoption.

The framework advocated for worker-centric AI development that complements rather than replaces human labour, addressing concerns about technological unemployment. Solutions should work offline to serve populations without reliable internet access and use simple interfaces to overcome technical barriers.

## Round Two: Indigeneity and Cultural Preservation

### Epistemic Justice and Cultural Homogenisation

Anita Gurumurthy highlighted how current AI development amplifies “epistemic injustices,” arguing that Western cultural homogenisation through AI platforms erases cultural histories and multilingual thinking structures. She noted that large language models extensively use Wikipedia, demonstrating how AI systems utilise commons-based resources whilst privatising benefits.

The discussion revealed tension between necessary pluralism for local contexts and generalised models that dominate market development. Gurumurthy posed the critical question: “We reject the unified global system. But the question is, are these smaller autonomous systems even possible?”

### Preserving Linguistic Diversity

Ambassador Singh provided examples of addressing this challenge through crowd-sourcing campaigns for linguistic datasets. India’s approach involved creating portals where people could contribute datasets in their local languages, demonstrating community-led data collection that supports AI development reflecting linguistic diversity.

Wai Sit Si Thou emphasised that AI solutions must work with community-led data and indigenous knowledge for local contexts, advocating for approaches that complement rather than replace local ways of knowing.

## Round Three: Intentionality and Governance

### Beyond “Move Fast and Break Things”

Nandini Chami presented a critique of Silicon Valley’s “move fast and break things” approach, arguing that the precautionary principle should guide AI development given potential for widespread societal harm. She emphasised that private value creation and public value creation in AI are not automatically aligned, requiring deliberate policy interventions.

Chami highlighted how path dependencies mean AI adoption doesn’t automatically enable economic diversification in developing countries, requiring intentional approaches to ensure public benefit.

### Data Governance and Collective Approaches

Sarah Nicole challenged mainstream thinking about individual data rights, arguing that data gains value when aggregated and contextualised. She advocated for collective approaches through data cooperatives that provide better bargaining power than individual data monetisation schemes.

This contrasted with Ambassador Singh’s examples of marketplace mechanisms where individuals could be compensated for data contributions, citing the Karya company that pays delivery workers for data contribution. Nicole argued that individual data monetisation yields minimal returns and could exploit economically vulnerable populations.

### Democratic Participation

The discussion addressed needs for public participation in AI decision-making beyond addressing harms. Chami argued for meaningful democratic participation in how AI systems are conceptualised, designed, and deployed.

Sarah Nicole supported this through advocating for infrastructure changes that give users voice, choice, and stake in their digital lives through data agency and cooperative ownership models.

## Audience Questions and Intellectual Property

Dr. Nermin Salim raised questions about intellectual property frameworks and platforms for protecting content creators. Timothy asked remotely about IP frameworks and natural legal persons in the context of AI development.

The speakers agreed that current intellectual property frameworks are inadequate for the AI era. Gurumurthy highlighted how trade secrets lock up data needed by public institutions, whilst large language models utilise commons like Wikipedia without fair compensation to contributors.

## Key Areas of Agreement

### Cooperative Models

Speakers demonstrated consensus on the viability of cooperative models for AI governance, with support spanning civil society, government, and international organisations. There was strong agreement on shared infrastructure approaches and resource pooling.

### Community-Led Development

All speakers agreed on the importance of community-led and contextual approaches to AI development, representing a challenge to top-down, technology-driven deployment approaches.

### Need for Reform

Multiple speakers identified problems with existing intellectual property frameworks, agreeing that current regimes inadequately balance private rights with public interest.

## Unresolved Challenges

The discussion left critical questions unresolved, including the fundamental tension between pluralism and generalised models: how can smaller autonomous AI systems be made economically viable against dominant large-language models with scaling advantages?

The complexity of developing concrete metrics for safety, responsibility, and privacy in AI systems beyond “do no harm” principles remains challenging, particularly for establishing accountability across transnational value chains.

## Recommendations

Speakers proposed several concrete actions:

– Establish shared AI infrastructure models pooling resources from multiple countries

– Create global repositories of AI applications in key sectors that can be shared across geographies

– Develop crowd-sourcing campaigns for linguistic datasets to support AI development in minoritised languages

– Implement public procurement policies steering AI development toward human-centric solutions

– Explore data cooperative models enabling collective bargaining power

## Conclusion

This panel discussion revealed both the urgency and complexity of developing local AI innovation pathways serving humanity’s benefit. The speakers demonstrated consensus on the need for alternative approaches prioritising collective organisation, public accountability, and cultural diversity over purely market-driven solutions.

The conversation highlighted that inclusivity, indigeneity, and intentionality must be addressed simultaneously in AI development. However, significant challenges remain in translating shared principles into practical implementation, particularly the tension between necessary pluralism and economic pressures toward centralisation.

The discussion provides foundation for alternative policy approaches emphasising public interest, collective action, and democratic participation in AI governance, opening space for more deliberate, community-controlled approaches to AI development that could better serve diverse human needs whilst respecting resource constraints.

Valeria Betancourt: Welcome, everybody. Thank you so much for your presence here. This session is going to look at the case for local artificial intelligence, innovation pathways to harness AI for benefit of humanity. We have, I have the privilege to moderate this panel today. As the Global Digital Compact underscores, there is an urgent imperative for digital cooperation to harness the power of artificial intelligence, innovation for the benefit of humanity. Evidence so far produced in several parts of the world, particularly in the context of the Global South, increasingly points to the importance of contextually grounded artificial intelligence, innovation for a just and sustainable digital transition. This session is going to look at three dimensions of local artificial intelligence, inclusivity, indigeneity, and intentionality. Our speakers from the expertise and on viewpoints will help us to get a deeper understanding of how these dimensions played out for local AI that is contextual and that contributes to the well-being of people and planet. So I have the pleasure of having Anita Gurumurthy from IT4Change to just help us to frame the conversation that we will have. And I will invite Anita then to come and please frame the conversation, set the ground for and the tone for the conversation.

Anita Gurumurthy: Thank you, thank you, Valeria, and it’s an honor to be part of this panel. So I think the starting point when we look at a just and sustainable digital transition is to reconcile two things. On the one hand, you have an unequal distribution of AI capabilities, and on the other, you actually have, you know, an increasing set of demands owing to climate and energy and the impacts of innovation on a planetary scale. And therefore, the question is, how do we democratize innovation and look at ideas of scale afresh, because the models we have today are on planetary scale. Both the production and consumption of AI innovation need to be cognizant of planetary boundaries. Essentially, then, what is this idea of local AI? Is it different from ideas of localizing AI? Is there a concept such as local AI? Will that even work? I just want to place before you some statistics, and we have a colleague online who will speak about this from UN Trade and Development, from the Digital Economy Report that was brought out by the UN, and I want to quote some statistics. Between 2022 and 2025, AI-related investment doubled from $100 to $200 billion. By comparison, this is about three times the global spending on climate change adaptation. So, we’re investing much more on R&D and for AI and much less on what we need to do to, in many ways, look at the energy question and the water question. Supercomputing chips have enabled some energy efficiency, but market trends suggest that this is not going to make way for building or for developing models differently. It’s going to support bigger, more complex large-language models, in turn mitigating the marginal energy savings. And I’m going to talk a little bit about the future of computing and how it’s going to change the way we do things that are possible because chips are becoming more energy efficient. So the efficiencies in compute are really not necessarily going to translate into some kind of respite for the kind of climate change impacts. Now, I want to give you, you know, this is just for shock value. Energy demand of data centers. And this is a very, very vital concern. We also know that around the world there have been water disputes, you know, because of this. So there is this big conundrum, you know, we do need and we do want small is beautiful models. But are they plausible? Are they probable? And while there is the strong case for diversified local models, I want to really underscore that there are lots of people already working on this. And we have some people, you know, governments that are investing in this. And there are communities that are investing in this. And these are very important because from an anglocentric perspective, you know, we think everything is working well enough. You know, LLMs are doing great for us. Chat GPT is very useful. And certainly so, you know, to some extent. But what we ignore is that there is a western cultural homogenization and these AI platforms amplify epistemic injustices. So we are certainly doing more than excluding non-English speakers. We are changing the way in which we look at the world. We are erasing cultural histories and ways of thinking. So we need to retain the structures of our multilingual societies so those structures allow us to think differently and decolonize scientific advancement and innovation in AI. So how do we build our own computational grammar? And this is a question I think that’s really important. And we reject the unified global system. But the question is, are these smaller autonomous systems even possible? And we do this for minoritized communities, minoritized languages. And the second question is, many of the efforts in this fragmented set of communities are really not able to come together. And perhaps there is a way to bring them in dialogue and enable them to collaborate. So this tension between pluralism that is so necessary and generalized models that seem to be the way, the only way AI models are developing in the market, is this tension is where the sweet spot of investigation actually lies. And with that, I revert back to you.

Valeria Betancourt: Thank you, Anita. Thank you for illustrating also why enabling public accountability is a must in the way in which artificial intelligence is conceptualized, designed, and deployed. Let’s go to the first round of the conversation I mentioned that we will be digging into three dimensions of local AI, inclusivity, indigeneity, and intentionality. The first round will focus on inclusion. And the question for Wai Sit Si Thou, the UN Trade and Development Agency, and also Lynette Wambuka from Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data is, what are the pathways to AI innovation that are truly inclusive? And how can local communities be real beneficiaries of AI? So let me invite our panelists to please address this initial question. So can we go with Wai Sit Si Thou? Yes. It’s online. It’s remotely. Welcome. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Wai Sit Si Thou: Just to double-check whether you can see my screen and hear me well. Yes. Yes. Okay, perfect. So my sharing will be based on this UNTACF flagship publication that was just released two months ago on the title, Inclusive AI for Development. So I think it fits into the discussion very well. And to begin with, I would just want to highlight three key drivers of AI development over the past decades. And they are infrastructure, data, and skills. And we want to look into the questions of eq-fizziness. We need to focus on these three key elements. Because right now we can see a significant AI divide. For example, in terms of infrastructure, one single company, NVIDIA, actually produced 90% of the GPU, which is a critical component for computing resources. And we witness the same kind of AI divide in data, skills, and also other areas like R&D, patent, scientific publication on AI, etc. So this is the main framework that helps us to dive into the discussion on how to make AI inclusive. And the first message that I have is on the key takeaway to promote inclusive AI adoption. This is featured in our report on many successful AI adoption cases in developing countries. And based on the framework that I just shared, on infrastructure, one very important takeaway is to work around the local available digital infrastructure. Right now, over the world, we have still one third of the publication population without access to the Internet. So some kind of AI solution that is able to work offline would be essential for us to promote this adoption. And that is what I meant by working around the locally available infrastructure. And the second point on data, it is essential to work with community-led data and also indigenous knowledge so we can really focus on the specific problem, on the issue in the local context. And the third key takeaway is the skills that I mentioned. We should use simple interface that help a user to use all this AI solution. And the last one is on partnership, because from what we investigate, many of this AI adoption at the local level, The second message that I have is on the worker-centric approach of AI adoption. From the previous technological evolution, we understand there are four key channels where AI may also impact this productivity and workforce. On the left-hand side, we have on the top left, starting with the automation process that AI could substitute human neighbor. And then on the top right-hand side, we have AI complementing human neighbor. And the other two channels are deepening automation and creating new forms of jobs. And from the previous experience, automation or this technology adoption actually focuses on the left two bubbles, that is, replacing human neighbor. But if we really want to have an inclusive AI adoption that benefits everyone, we should focus on the right-hand side, on how AI can complement human neighbor and creating meaningful new jobs. And with that, we need to focus on three areas of action. The first one is, of course, empowering the workforce that include basic digital literacy to re-skilling and up-skilling, so to make them adapting to this new AI approach of work progress. And the second very important point is what I also mentioned before, with the engagement with the worker. So we work with the community, we work with the workers, with the design and implementation of AI to make sure that you fit the purpose and also gain the trust of this whole AI adoption process. And the last point is about fostering the development of human-centric AI solution. That would be the major responsibility of the government through our endeavoring public procurement. and other tax and credit incentives that steer this AI adoption to an inclusive and worker-centric approach. And the last thing that I want to highlight is at the global level, there are also four key areas that we can work on. As Anita mentioned, accountability is key. What we want to advocate here is to have a public disclosure accountability mechanism that could reference the ESG reporting framework that is really mature nowadays in the private sector. So an AI equivalent could happen with public disclosure on how this AI works and its potential impact. So this is the accountability period. And second one is on digital infrastructure. To provide equitable access to AI infrastructure, a very useful model that we can learn from is the CERN model, which is the world’s largest particle physics laboratory right here in Geneva that I am working at. And this model could help pool the resources to provide shared infrastructure for every stakeholder. And the third one is on open innovation, including open data and open source that can really democratize long-range resources for AI innovation. And what we need is to coordinate all these fomented resources for better sharing and better standard. And the last point that I want to highlight is on capacity building. We think that an AI-focused center and network model after the UN-CIMEC technology center and network could help in this regard to provide the necessary technology support and capacity building to developing countries. And of course, the self-serve cooperation could help us address common challenges. Like in East Africa, Rwanda may not have enough data source to change AI with the local language of Swahili. But grouping the East African countries together, then And we can put this Swahili common language in the region to have better AI training. So these are some of our recommendations that I have, and I am happy to engage in further discussion.

Valeria Betancourt: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Jackie. So obviously, multidimensional approach is needed for the dividends of AI to be distributed equally. With that, I would like to give the floor to Lynette Wamboka, Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data, to also help us to… It’s not here. It’s not here? Yeah. OK, sorry. So is anyone in the panel willing to contribute to this part of the conversation in relation to how to bring the benefits of AI to local communities before we move to the other round? OK, if not, we can check whether there are any reactions from the remote participants, any questions in relation to this point, or from here from the audience. You are also welcome to comment and provide your viewpoint. OK, if not, we can move to the second round, which is going to look at indigeneity. With radical shifts, do we need an artificial intelligence infrastructure for an economy and society attentive and accountable to the people? And I will invite Ambassador Aridha Ambaki, Government of India, to comment, and Sarah Nicole from Project Liberty Institute to also help us to address this dimension of local AI. Please, Ambassador. Thank you.

Abhishek Singh: Thank you for convening this and bringing this very, very important subject at FORC, like how do we balance between wider AI adoption, building models, building applications, vis-a-vis the energy challenges that we are there, which hampers in some ways our goals towards sustainable development that we had all agreed. So, it’s not an easy challenge for governments across, because on one hand we want to take advantage of the benefits that are going to come, and on the other hand we want to limit the risks that are coming on climate change and sustainable development. So, the approach towards local AI sounds, seems to be good, but to make that happen there will be several necessary ingredients to that. Many of it was highlighted by our speaker from UNCTAD very succinctly, but I would like to just mention that what we observe in India, in many ways, given the diversity that we have, given the languages that we have, linguistic diversity, cultural diversity, contextual diversity that we have, is kind of a microcosm of the whole world. How do we ensure that whatever we build in a country of our size and magnitude applies to all sections of society, everybody becomes included in that. So, in that, one key challenge of course relates to infrastructure, because AI compute infrastructure is scarce, it’s expensive, it’s not easy to get, very few companies control it, and to do that, and if you democratize access to compute infrastructure, the model that we adopted in India was to ensure that we create a common central facility through which, of course provided through private sector providers, but this compute should be available to all researchers, academicians, startups, industry, those people who are training models or doing inferencing or building applications, and this compute, we worked out a mechanism so it becomes available at an affordable cost. We underwrite to the tune of almost 40% of the compute cost from the side of the government, so end user gets it at a rate which is less than a dollar per GPU per hour. So, this model has worked and I do believe the solution that was proposed earlier, building a CERN for AI, so if we can create a global compute infrastructure facility across countries or several foundations, multilateral bodies joining in and creating this infrastructure, making it available, it can really and Nisha. So, we have to make sure that we really solve the access to infrastructure challenge that we have. The second key ingredient for building AI applications and models is, of course, about data. How do we ensure that we have data sets available? So, it’s okay to desire to have local AI models, contextual models, but until we have necessary data sets in all languages and all contexts, all cultures, it will not really happen. So, we have to make sure that we have data sets in all languages and all contexts. So, we have to make sure that we have data sets in English and maybe major Indian languages, but when it came to minor Indian languages, we had very limited data sets. We launched a crowd-sourcing campaign to get linguistic data across languages, across cultures, in which people could kind of come to a portal and contribute data sets. So, that has really helped. So, that model can, again, be kind of made global, and that’s what we are trying to do. So, we have to make sure that we have data sets in all languages, as well as contextual and linguistic data sets. That can be, again, an innovative solution towards making the data sets more inclusive and more global. The third key ingredient on which we need to kind of enable, even if we have to push local AI, is about capacity-building and skills. Like, AI talent is also rare and scarce, it’s limited. So, we need to make sure that we have capacity-building and skills, and we need to make sure that we have capacity-building and skills, and we need to make training to students and to AI entrepreneurs with regard to how to train models, how to wire up even 1,000 GPUs. It requires necessary skills. If we can take up a capacity-building initiative driven by a central initiative through the UN body or the global partnership on AI, and ensure that all those capacity-building initiatives are implemented, it can really, really help. So, if we can take up capacity-building initiatives and training, and doing inferencing and building models and using AI for solving societal problems, it can really, really help. of course, build use cases, AI use cases in key sectors, whether it’s healthcare, whether it’s agriculture, whether it’s education, and create a global repository of AI applications which can be shareable across geographies. If we are able to take these three steps across the infrastructure, data sets, you know, training, capacity building, and building use cases, repository of use cases, I think we’ll be able to push forward the agenda of adoption of AI and building local AI at some stage. Absolutely, Ambassador. Definitely, AI models have to reflect contextually grounded innovation norms and ethics. Then I would like to invite Sarah Nicol from Project Liberty Institute.

Sarah Nicole: Please share your thoughts with us on this issue. Yeah, thank you very much for the invitation to give this short lightning talk. And thank you for the first insight as well. I will be a little bit controversial and really appreciate the way the question was framed. So I really appreciate the radicality aspect in it. Because the mainstream view is really that AI is a completely disruptive technology, that it changes everything in our societies, in our economies, in our daily life. But I would argue quite the contrary. AI is essentially a neural network, right, that replicates the way the brain works. It analyzes specific data sets. From those data sets, it finds connection, creates patterns, uses those patterns to respond to certain tasks like prompt, search, and so on. So overall, AI is an automation tool. It is a tool that accelerates and amplifies everything that we know. So necessarily, the current structure that is highly centralized and that strips users’ data out of their control is reinforced by AI. and it also reinforced the big tech companies and everything that we’ve been knowing for decades. It benefits from the centralization of the digital economy that is necessary to train its model. So, AI is very much so the result of the digital economy that has been in place for multiple, multiple years. So, if AI is a continuity and an amplification of what we already know, then the radicality needs to come from the response that we’ll bring to it. And at Project Liberty Institute, we believe that every people, users, citizen, call it what you want, deserves to have a voice, a choice and stake in their digital life. And this goes first by giving users data agency. This requires infrastructure design changes, profound one. In digital economy, data is not just a byproduct. It is a political, social and economic power that is deeply tied to our identities. And most of the network infrastructure that is currently in place has been captured by a few dominant tech platforms. So, necessarily everything that is built under falls under this proprietary realm. Scrapping, of course, empowerment of users, transparency, privacy and so on. So, AI rapidly shapes everything that we’re doing in our life. So, we need to rethink this infrastructure model because it shapes data agency. And Anita, you’ve been great to launch this report with us in Berlin last month. So, I’ll be happy to share also this report that we wrote for policymakers specifically to equip them with thinking how to digital infrastructure questions. But infrastructure for agency is really what we’re focusing on at the Institute. So, we are the steward of an open source protocol that is called a DSNP, it builds directly on top of TCPIP and allow users . And finally, DSNP allows users better control of their own data by enabling them to interact with a global, open, social graph. What this means is that your social identity on DSNP is not tied to one specific platform like it is today in most tech platforms, but it exists independently, and so it allows transportability of your data, but also interoperability. So, this is a core part of infrastructure that represents a radical shift for an economy and society, attentive and accountable to the people. But unfortunately, this would be a little bit too good to be true if all that was needed was a few lines of code and some spec and protocols. As important is the business model, and there’s a lot of work to be done here, because to this day, the most lucrative business model is the one that scraps data, users’ data, and then uses it for advertising, and we have yet to find a scalable alternative to this. And in order to build what we call the fair data economy, we are in need of metrics. We need to be better at articulating what we mean by safety, responsibility, privacy, what exactly do we mean behind this beautiful world? So, we need qualitative and quantitative metrics to define all this. Likewise, we need to go beyond the do-no-harm principle and also go beyond the do-no-harm principle to really shape a positive vision of technology that is socially and financially benefiting everyone. And one of the approaches that we are exploring at the institute is the one of data co-operative. The co-operative model has a legacy of hundreds of years, and it’s actually pretty well fit for the age of AI. Here’s a recent audio clip that was produced by an astrophysicist at the with those who wanted to, but let me extract two points from this report that I think is interesting for the sake of this discussion. Data cooperative allows to rethink the value of data in a collective manner, and I think that’s very important because the debate is very much structured around personal data and individual data, but the issue is so structural that we need to empower users with collective bargaining tools against suspected cooperation. And the second point is, in the age of AI, data needs to be of high quality, and data cooperatives provide the right incentive for data contributors to improve the quality of their data, because then it contributes to greater financial sustainability of their own co-op, so it’s also for data-pulling purposes. And of course there are many other models that exist, data commons, data trust, you name it. A radical shift for a better economy anyway will need many tries, many stakeholders to be involved, and we are already seeing this every day in multiple communities across the world. But one last thing that I wanted to mention here today is, what I just said, I don’t think this should be considered as radical at all. We own our identity in the analog world, we don’t accept others to make billions on top of our own identity, so why should it be that different in the online world? So all in all, the goal is really to have a voice, a choice, and stake online, and I don’t think this is radical, I think this is pretty much common sense.

Valeria Betancourt: Thanks. Thank you, thank you Sara, I think you have helped us to pave the way very nicely to the next round of conversation, because if we want AI to be meaningful to people, the intention behind it is absolutely crucial. And with that, I would like to invite Ambassador Thomas Schneider from the government of Switzerland and Nandini Chami from IT4Change to address the question on how should AI innovation… And now, I would like to ask you to share your views on how we can make the transition pathways be steered from the common good, with that intention of the common good.

Thomas Schneider: Please share your views on that. Ambassador, welcome. Thank you, and thank you for making me part of this discussion, because this is a discussion of fundamental importance that is also something that, maybe not necessarily a poor, but definitely a small country like mine, that we’re seeing, and you’ve highlighted some of the aspects. How can a small actor cope, survive, call it whatever you want, in such a system where, by design, the big ones have the resources, have the power? But the question is, does it have to be like this, or is it just, would there be alternatives? And I think we have already heard a number of elements where you actually can, how would the small ones need to cooperate in order to benefit from this as well? And of course, we know about the risks and all of this, but I think it would be a mistake not to use these technologies, because the potential is huge. And being an economist and a historian, and not a lawyer, actually, much of this reminds me of the first revolution in the industrial revolution, where, for instance, Switzerland was a country that was lagging behind. They had already trains and railways in the UK, and we were still walking around in the mountains. But then we were catching up quite quickly. But it wasn’t just enough to buy locomotives and coaches from the UK or produce them ourselves. We had to realize that you need to build a whole ecosystem in order to allow you to use this technology to make it your own, and some of it has been mentioned. What struck me, lately I just read an article about the extinguishing of the Credit Suisse, of the Swiss bank, and it struck me again, this bank was created by the politician and his people that were actually bringing the railways to Switzerland and building the railway system. So what did they do? They did not just buy coaches and build railways and bridges and tunnels. They also built the 88 Zurich. So they knew we need to have engineers. We need to have people that have the skills to actually drive these things, build the infrastructure. So they did not just create the railway. They created the first universities like in polytechnical universities. And they created, they knew like we are a small country, we do not have the resources. We need somebody that gives us credit. We need to have a financial system around it and it also connects you. You can have nice ideas, but if you do not get the resources for them, nothing happens. And that was remarkable that this was all through basically by one person plus his team in the 1840s and 50s. And I think we need to understand and I think we have heard a lot of input. What do we need? Each community for herself, but also in order to be able to create our own ecosystem and how to cooperate with others that are in the same situation. It can be communities in the different countries. It can actually also be communities at the other end of the world. But that may actually create a win-win situation with you. So I think this is really important and for the small actors, how can we break this vicious cycle of scaling effects that you cannot deliver? And we have heard also some elements that are important for us in Switzerland. The cooperative model is actually something much of our success stories economically are actually still cooperatives. The biggest supermarket in Switzerland was created 100 years ago as a cooperative. It is still a cooperative, not as much as it used to be, but legally it is a cooperative. Every customer can actually… We actually vote, so every few years there’s a discussion, should this supermarket be able to sell alcohol or not? And they want to, but the people say no. And we have insurances that are cooperatives and so on, so that’s an element. And another element is sharing the computing power. In Switzerland we’ve been working with NVIDIA to develop their chips 10 years ago, and now we have the result, we have one of the 10 biggest supercomputers, apart from the private ones of course of the big companies, that is in Switzerland. We cooperate with Lumi, with the Finns, and we try to create a network, we’ve started to set up a network to share computing power across the world for small actors, universities and so on. So this initiative is called ICANN, I-C-A-N. So there’s lots of things to do, and I think if we do a nice summary of the elements that we have heard so far, we can actually, yeah, that gives us some guidance for the next steps.

Valeria Betancourt: Thank you, thank you Ambassador Nandini, please help us with your views. It’s a very interesting conversation, and I think we are having this at a very timely moment,

Nandini Chami: when there is a recognition that if we are talking about a just and sustainable digital transition, we need to get out of the dominant AI paradigm and move towards something else. So I’ll just begin by sharing a couple of thoughts about challenges that we face in terms of steering AI innovation pathways for the common good. And these reflections come from the UNDP’s Human Development Report of 2025, which focuses on the theme, people and possibilities in the age of AI. So the first challenge that, you know, in this report we find is that in terms of shaping the trajectories of AI innovation, private value and public value creation goals are not always necessarily or automatically aligned. And to quote from a report, despite AI’s potential to accelerate technological progress and scientific discovery, current innovation incentives are geared towards rapid deployment, scale, and automation, often at the expense of transparency, fairness, and social inclusion. So how do we shape these with intentionality and consciously? That is very important. The second insight from this report is that since development is a path-dependent project, these path dependencies mean that AI adoption does not automatically open up routes to economic diversification. We just heard reflections on ecosystem strengthening, and this report also adds to the similar lens that the economic structures in many developing countries and LDCs may limit the local economy’s potential to absorb productivity spillovers from AI, and there may be fewer and weaker links to high-value added activities. So this actually means that there needs to be a complementarity between development roadmaps and AI roadmaps, and the objectives of development, the specific contextual strength opportunities challenges and weaknesses mapping in terms of where the potential for economic diversification lies, and where we use AI as bridge-building, as a general-purpose technology. These become extremely contextually grounded activities to do, and we need to move beyond an obsession with AI economy roadmap development as just a technological activity and look at it as an ecosystem activity. So from this perspective, I would just like to share from our work at IT4Change about three to four reflections on what it would take to make techno-institutional choices that will shape these innovation trajectories in these directions that we seek. So first, we come to the issue of technology foresight, and in the panel also we were discussing the question of do-no-harm principle. Oftentimes in these debates, we hear a discourse of inevitability of AI as a Frankenstein technology that will just definitely go out of control, and there’s a lot of long-termist alarmism about we will no longer be able to control AI. But what happens is this starts distracting from setting limits on AI development in the here and now, which actually means that in operationalizing and actionizing the do-no-harm principle, instead of moving fast and breaking things, we probably need to go back to the precautionary principle of the Rio Declaration about what we need to do to shape technologies. And secondly, as the Aarhus Convention on Environmental Matters specifies in the context of environmental decision-making, we need to be talking about right of the public to access information and participate in AI decision-making, so we are not just looking at rights of affected parties in the AI harms discourse. The second point is that in AI value chains which are transnational, which are very complex, and which have multiple actors and system providers and deployers and subject citizens on whom AI is finally deployed, how do we fix liability for individual, collective, and societal harms, and how do we update our product fault liability regimes so that the burden of proof is no longer on the affected party to prove the causal link between the defect in a particular AI product or service and the harm that was suffered? , they are the founders of OpenAI, and we are very proud to be a part of that, given the black box nature of this technology, thinking this through becomes very important. And thirdly, when we look at the technological infrastructure choices, of course, OpenAI affordances become very important as a starting point, but it’s also useful to remember that they don’t automatically become a part of the technology, and they do need to be part of the technology, but it’s very important to remember that there are many barriers to innovation and inclusivity, as experiences of how we build open-source AI on top of the stacks have shown, where it’s very much possible that a big tech firm’s dominant firms are able to use the primary infrastructure, and that’s why OpenAI is so important. So, I think that’s what this research shows. And my last point is actually about policy support for fostering alternatives, particularly federated AI commons thinking. So, there are alternative visions such as community AI that focus on looking at task-specific experiences in specific communities at IT4Change. We are exploring the development of such a model with the public school education system in Kerala, for instance. There have also been proposals that have been made in G20 discussions as part of the T20 dialogues about how do we shape public procurement policies and the directions of public research funding for the development of shared compute infrastructure, which came up in our discussion. And also, how do we ensure that in the participation of different market actors on public AI stacks and the use of public AI computing?

Valeria Betancourt: Thank you so much, Nandini. Let me check with Sadhana if there are remote participants who want to make interventions or have questions, and I also invite you all to also get ready with your questions and comments and reactions if you have one. Thank you, Valeria.

Sadhana Sanjay: I hope everyone can hear me. There is one question in the chat from Timothy who asks, digital transformation is built upon intellectual property rights frameworks, means of ownership and trade. When considering existing trends, projects and works that are resourced versus those that lack resourcing, how are the natural legal persons provided the necessary support to retain legal agency, both for themselves as well as to support traditional roles such as those of a parental guardian or others? Thank you, Sadhana. Is anyone in the panel? Anyone in the panel who would like to address that question? I didn’t hear the question clearly. This is about intellectual property. If you could repeat the second half, I got the first half, but not the second. If I understand correctly, the question is asking, given that there are ownership rights conferred on the developers of AI and non-natural legal persons such as corporations, the question is about how can natural legal persons such as ourselves retain our rights and agencies over the building blocks of AI, both individually as well as those who might be in charge of us such as guardians and custodians?

Abhishek Singh: One part is that, of course, the way the technology is evolving, there is IP-driven solutions and there are open-source solutions. So what we need to emphasize is to promote open-source solutions to the extent possible so that more and more developers get access to the APIs and they can build applications on top of it. The second part of it is that, with regard to… like, ultimately, somebody has to pay for these solutions. Like, it’s not that everything will come for free. And those companies which are known to provide services for free, they monetize your data. We all know about it. There have been big tech companies who are indulging in that. So at some point of time, we’ll have to take a call, whether if I want to use a service, like you mentioned, a chat GPT service, which kind of helps me in improving my efficiency, my productivity. Either I pay for their service or I contribute to their assets. So that call, individuals, companies, societies will need to take, that what is the cost of convenience or what is the cost of getting a service, in what form we can do. The other part which can be done, which is very complex, is to work out a marketplace kind of mechanism in which every service is priced. So, if we are contributing data sets, if I’m contributing to building a corpus in a particular language, then can we incentivize those who are contributing the data sets? In fact, there is an initiative, there is a company called Karya in India, which is doing that, which is actually paying people for contributing data sets, which kind of ensures that those who are part of the ecosystem, they do that. Then there are companies which have started incentivizing delivery boys, food delivery boys and cab drivers, Uber drivers, so that when they drive around, they get details about city amenities, about garbage dumps, about missing manual covers, street lights, traffic lights not functioning, sharing that information with the city government. and then they get in turn paid for doing that service. So, if the way a data contributor in what form is contributing, there can be models, there can be mechanisms in which a cost and revenue sharing model can be developed. But it will require specific approaches to the specific use case, but it’s not that cannot be done.

Valeria Betancourt: Thank you, Ambassador. Maybe if I can add, there’s a number of good examples. First of all, property rights are not carved in stone.

Thomas Schneider: This is something that can be and will need to be reformed, renegotiated. With what outcome and how, this is another question. Because otherwise, in many ways, property rights don’t work also for journalism, for media, in that part. So, we’ll have to develop a new approach and question what was the original idea behind property rights. The idea may be right, but then we need to find a new approach. That’s one element. And the other thing is like, this is what you may do on the political level, on the market level. And the other one is try to find ways to create a fair share system for benefits. And one is try to monetize it, like a kind of transaction, give every transaction or every data transaction a value. And the other thing is, and I think we’ve already heard this, go for, not think it only from the individual, but think it from society or from Switzerland. Also, we are a liberal country, but many things, people don’t want it to be privatized, because they think this should be in public hands. It’s like waste management or hospitals, it’s a very hot issue and so on. So, I think we should think about how, as a society, if we want to develop our health system, for instance. Health data is super important, it’s super valuable. And of course, the industry needs a lot of money to develop new pharmaceutical products. But how can we organize ourselves as a society, not because as an individual we are too weak, And the whole society can say, OK, we are offering something to businesses that can develop stuff that is OK, that they make money. But we want somehow a fair share of this because we are kind of your research lab. And then if you are a group, a big group, then you can actually have also a political weight. And then you need to find creative, concrete ways to actually then get this thing concretely done. So you need to work on the idea and the concept and on defining ways. But it’s a super important question. And if I can build on those two and fully agree with what’s been said.

Sarah Nicole: The question of having a stake in your data has often been framed on a personal level. And actual studies have shown that you would make very, very little if you were to monetize your own data. You know, the year would be like a couple of hundreds of euros or dollars. And the worst thing is that it could lead also to systems where poor people would probably spend lots of time online to generate very small revenue from this. So the answer will not be on an individual perspective, but it would be on a collective one. Because it’s when the data is aggregated, it’s when the data is in a specific context that then it gains value. And here again, let me bring the cooperative model. And that’s true. Theoretically, there’s a lot of work on data cooperative. Practically speaking, it’s still yet to emerge. But also one of the reasons is that it is not natural for businesses to turn into a cooperative model. Because it’s being perceived as this socialist or communist thing, which it is not. And hundreds of years of legacy have proven that. But there are many data cooperatives that pool specific data with a specific type of expertise. And then allow some AI to be trained on this expertise and high quality data. where we can have better rights and better protections for individuals once it is aggregated in common. So, really, the mentality really needs to shift from this personal data frame discussion, I think that benefits also a lot of the big tech companies, to a more collective and organization perspective.

Valeria Betancourt: Thank you. Anita.

Anita Gurumurthy: I don’t think that there’s an easy answer and I think we need to step up and rethink as people have said on this entire idea of what’s ownership. Two things I would like to say is that for developing countries particularly, I think in our global agreements on trade and intellectual property, we oftentimes cede our space to regulate in the public interest back in our countries. So often, transnational companies use the excuse of trade secrets to lock up data that otherwise should be available to public transportation authorities, public hospitals, etc. And perhaps we do need to strongly institute exceptions in IP laws for the sake of society to be able to use that threshold of aggregate data that is necessary to keep our societies in order. I’m sorry, I’m using that terminology in a very, very broad sense. But I mean, that is needed. You just can’t lock up that data and say it’s not available because it’s a trade secret. The second is that the largest source for the large language models, especially ChargPT, was Wikipedia. So you actually see free riding happening on top of these commons. And therefore, that’s another imperative, I think, for us to rethink the intellectual property regime on, well, we will do open source. But what if my open source meant for my community is actually servicing profiteering? So we do need laws to think through those data exchanges, whether it’s agricultural data, whatever data commons, or public data sets do need to protect society from free riding and also foul dealing. Foul dealing is when the exploitation really reaches a very, very high threshold. The last point I wanna make is we’ve been talking about the nudge economy that has generated the data sets, but what we read today is that there’s an economy of prompt. On top of AI models that you see when you search is the way in which you’re defining your prompts as users, and that is perfecting the large language models. So this is a complexity from nudge to prompt, which means that all of us are feeding the already monopolistic models with the necessary information for that to become more efficient. Which effectively means that the small can never survive.

Valeria Betancourt: So what do you do then for the small to survive is actually a question of societal commons so that this economy of prompt and economy of profiteering from prompt can actually be curtailed. And I think these are future questions for governance and regulation, but essentially also for international cooperation. That’s excellent. Okay, let me now invite your comment, please, or your question.

Audience: My name is Dr. Nermin Salim, the Secretary General of Creators Union of Arab. It’s a consultative status with the UN. And by accident, I’m expert intellectual property. So for comment for this question, I want just to comment about the intellectual property of AI. In the WIPO, the International Organization of Intellectual Property, they not yet reached the ideal convention for protecting AI because it’s divided between two sections. The AI as a data at the. . We are a platform for sharing content in a digital way, in a digital technology way, and the content which is generated by AI. But for this, we are at a civil society, have launched in the IGF last, IGF in Riyadh, a platform for protecting the content for users for digital area. When the users want to share their content, they find Whois, social media, internet, fax machines, Swish, we make a platform to submit and take a QR code, and verify by blockchain, go to the government, a minister siz responsible for registration, whoever gave them the 29 to the authority needs to verify it and customize it a little bit to obtain a personal property is taking into cza insid the case lóg conflict between users. That’s just a comment for the questions. We are a minute away from the end of the session. I would like to invite everyone of you, the panel, to share some final remarks. Yes. I would like to start with Nandini, who is the chair of the

Valeria Betancourt: panel, and I would like to invite her to share some final remarks. It’s available now as a demo. Thank you very much. Just very brief final remarks, like

Nandini Chami: 10 seconds with the highlight that you would like to leave the audience with, please. Let me start with you, Nandini. I think the discussion is showing us that there’s a long history of AI being a problem in the world. AI is a problem in the world, and while continuing to incentivize innovation and preserve common heritage, particularly in knowledge IP, AI is a new instantiation of that problem. Yes, Ambassador Schneider. Thank you, I just say this was really exciting and I hope we can follow up on this because it’s super important and I thank you really for this discussion. Sarah.

Sarah Nicole: Thank you will be the last thing as well. Ambassador. Yeah, my takeaway is that the

Abhishek Singh: cooperative model for infrastructure data sets works and then maybe for models and applications we need to push forward more for open source models without the concerns of IP and other stuff. Absolutely. I’m thinking that the public and the local cannot exist without each other. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely and thank you so much for your presence and not easy answers as you said and oh yes, I’m sorry, Jackie, please your final remarks. Yes, thank you. I think data is a very strategic and key asset for both AI and the digital economy and with that I just want to

Audience: share with you that we have recently established a multi-stakeholder working group on data governance so hopefully that could provide some recommendation on how we can develop a good data governance framework. Thank you. Absolutely, so not easy answers, some of the responses and solutions

Valeria Betancourt: are coming from the margins, from the academia, from the social movements and different groups impacted by digitalization so yes, let’s keep the conversation going and let’s use this space and hopefully also the WSIS last interview in order to be able to define the grounds for different approaches and a different paradigm for AI for the common good. So, thank you so much for your presence and to all of you for your contributions. Thank you so much. Thank you.