Uncategorized

Summary

This discussion was hosted by the Digital Cooperation Organization (DCO) at the Internet Governance Forum, focusing on “Cooperation for Digital Resilience and Prosperity” and how to operationalize trust, resilience, and equity in digital spaces. The session brought together experts from various international organizations, governments, and regions to explore moving from theoretical frameworks to practical implementation of digital cooperation initiatives.

Hassan Nasser, DCO’s Special Envoy for Multilateral Affairs, opened by highlighting the organization’s mission to accelerate inclusive digital economic growth across its 16 member states spanning Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. He emphasized the challenge of fragmentation in the current multilateral system and introduced DCO’s Digital Economy Navigator as a tool to provide common assessment and understanding of digital economy priorities across 50 countries globally.

The panelists shared diverse regional perspectives and experiences. Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi from Nigeria discussed Africa’s priorities in diversifying from resource-dependent economies to digital-focused growth, emphasizing the need for continental cooperation and leveraging the Global Digital Compact. Representatives from WIPO, ERIA, and other organizations highlighted the importance of intellectual property frameworks, innovation ecosystems, and regional integration models in fostering digital transformation.

A key theme throughout the discussion was the critical need for better coordination between existing mechanisms like the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), and the newly adopted Global Digital Compact (GDC). Speakers emphasized avoiding duplication while building on established foundations and ensuring that global frameworks translate into concrete local implementation.

The conversation underscored significant digital divides that persist globally, with examples showing vast differences in digital adoption rates between developed and developing regions. Panelists stressed that successful digital transformation requires not just technological adoption but also cultural and organizational evolution, supported by capacity building and multi-stakeholder cooperation. The discussion concluded with calls for continued collaboration beyond formal forums to ensure that digital prosperity benefits all regions and populations.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Digital Cooperation and Multilateral Frameworks**: The session focused on operationalizing cooperation between international organizations, governments, and stakeholders to build digital resilience and prosperity, with emphasis on moving from theoretical discussions to practical implementation of frameworks like the Global Digital Compact (GDC) and World Summit on Information Society (WSIS).

– **Regional Digital Transformation Priorities**: Panelists shared diverse regional perspectives on digital economy development, including Nigeria’s shift from oil-dependent economy to digital diversification, ASEAN’s transnational AI innovation ecosystems, and the need for unified African positioning in global digital governance.

– **Innovation Ecosystems and Intellectual Property**: Discussion of how organizations like WIPO support digital innovation through IP frameworks, infrastructure, and global databases, while balancing protection for creators with access to information and fostering startup-friendly environments across different regions.

– **Implementation Challenges and Digital Divides**: Recognition of significant gaps between policy development and practical implementation, highlighting disparities in digital adoption (e.g., 80% online shopping in Norway vs. less than 5% in Africa) and the need for capacity building, infrastructure development, and culturally-adapted solutions.

– **Integration of Existing Mechanisms**: Strong emphasis on avoiding duplication by building upon established frameworks like WSIS and IGF, with National and Regional Initiatives (NRIs) serving as key vehicles for implementing GDC principles at local levels and ensuring multi-stakeholder participation.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to explore practical pathways for international digital cooperation, focusing on how to translate global digital governance frameworks into concrete actions that promote inclusive, sustainable digital transformation across different regions and development levels.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a consistently collaborative and constructive tone throughout. It was professional yet engaging, with participants demonstrating mutual respect and genuine interest in learning from each other’s experiences. The tone remained optimistic about the potential for cooperation despite acknowledging significant challenges, and there was a clear sense of urgency about moving from discussion to implementation. The moderator effectively maintained momentum while allowing for substantive exchanges, and the session concluded on an encouraging note with invitations for continued dialogue.

Speakers

**Speakers from the provided list:**

– **Sameem Ghaffar** – Multilateral Engagements Senior Manager at DCO (Digital Cooperation Organization), session facilitator

– **Giulia Ajmone Marsan** – Head of Startup and Digital Inclusion at ERIA (Economic Research Institute for ASEAN), former innovation economist at OECD

– **Liz Giener** – Strategist at Nortel, based in the US

– **Helen McGowan** – Senior Business Partnership Manager at DCO, online moderator based in Riyadh

– **Ryszard Frelek** – Representative from WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization)

– **Hassan Nasser** – Special Envoy for Multilateral Affairs at DCO

– **Concertina Tossa** – Head of International Affairs at the Italian Agency for Digital, expert in digital governance and IT policies

– **Torbjorn Fredriksson** – Head of the E-Commerce and Digital Economy Branch of UNCTAD, based in Geneva

– **Audience** – Various audience members asking questions

– **Luca Belli** – Professor of Digital Governance and Regulation at the FGV Law School in Brazil

– **Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi** – Director of Corporate Planning and Strategy at the National IT Development Agency of Nigeria

**Additional speakers:**

– **Edwin Chung** – From DotAsia, serves as secretariat for the Asia Pacific Regional IGF

# Comprehensive Report: Cooperation for Digital Resilience and Prosperity

## Executive Summary

This session, hosted by the Digital Cooperation Organisation (DCO) at the Internet Governance Forum, brought together international experts to explore practical pathways for operationalizing trust, resilience, and equity in digital spaces. Facilitated by Sameem Ghaffar with online moderation by Helen McGowan from Riyadh, the discussion focused on moving “from pledges to policies, from theory to practice” in digital cooperation initiatives.

The conversation featured diverse regional perspectives from Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, Latin America, and North America, examining how to integrate the newly adopted Global Digital Compact (GDC) with existing mechanisms such as the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) and Internet Governance Forum (IGF). Participants emphasized the need for enhanced collaboration in an increasingly fragmented world while addressing persistent digital divides and implementation challenges.

## Opening Context and Framework

Hassan Nasser, DCO’s Special Envoy for Multilateral Affairs, established the foundational context by highlighting the challenges facing digital cooperation efforts in “a more fragmented world.” He explained that “this is, of course, the reason why DCO was established, addressing those barriers, but also leveraging the opportunities coming from digital economy.”

DCO’s positioning as an intergovernmental organisation spanning 16 member states across Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia was presented as a response to fragmentation across agendas, mandates, and resources. Nasser introduced the Digital Economy Navigator as a practical tool providing common assessment and understanding of digital economy priorities across 50 countries globally, with plans for a second edition incorporating stakeholder feedback.

He also referenced DCO’s four-year agenda adopted in Jordan and the Cotonou Declaration from May 2024, emphasizing the organization’s commitment to moving beyond theoretical frameworks toward concrete implementation.

## Regional Perspectives on Digital Transformation

### African Economic Diversification

Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi from Nigeria’s National IT Development Agency highlighted Africa’s strategic shift from resource-dependent economies toward digital diversification. He explained that Nigeria “has had a monolistic economy, that is we are very dependent on mineral resources. And recently there has been a marked deviation from only depending on that.”

He emphasized the accessibility of digital opportunities and their potential to leverage Africa’s human resources, particularly its youthful population. However, he acknowledged that “local infrastructure availability and understanding implementation paths remain difficult terrain requiring international cooperation.”

### ASEAN Innovation Ecosystems

Giulia Ajmone Marsan from the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN (ERIA) presented insights on transnational innovation ecosystems in the Asia-Pacific region. Her organization focuses on developing AI innovation ecosystems through strategic partnerships and skills transfer programmes that transcend national boundaries.

Marsan emphasized breaking traditional regional boundaries, arguing that “organisations should break regional boundaries and learn across continents rather than limiting themselves to geographic labels.” This approach has enabled ASEAN countries to develop sophisticated digital innovation capabilities through collaborative frameworks combining technological advancement with sustainable development goals.

### Latin American Implementation Gaps

Luca Belli from FGV Law School in Brazil highlighted the gap between policy development and practical implementation, noting that “Latin America has comprehensive data protection laws but lacks regional framework for unified digital market,” despite having multiple regional organisations and 19 countries with data protection legislation.

He emphasized that “political momentum is always a very difficult element to guess,” identifying political will as often the missing ingredient in digital cooperation initiatives. Interestingly, he noted that “BRICS countries successfully achieved enhanced cooperation in cybersecurity and AI governance despite being informal club governance system.”

## Intellectual Property and Innovation Frameworks

Ryszard Frelek from the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) provided insights into IP ecosystems supporting digital innovation. He emphasized that effective IP frameworks require a “comprehensive approach including legal framework, infrastructure, industry-academia collaboration, and financing access.”

Frelek highlighted the growing importance of intangible assets, noting that their value reached significant levels in 2023, becoming increasingly important for SMEs and local businesses globally. WIPO’s support encompasses national IP strategy design, research and data provision through global databases, and capacity building programmes tailored to different development levels.

## Implementation Challenges and Digital Divides

### Quantifying Global Disparities

Torbjörn Fredriksson from UNCTAD provided stark evidence of persistent digital divides, observing that “in Norway, for instance, more than 80% of people are shopping online on a daily basis. In Africa, it’s typically less than 5%.” This disparity illustrated that while advanced economies debate AI governance, vast populations remain excluded from basic digital economic opportunities.

Fredriksson emphasized that “basic digital challenges remain despite AI advancement, requiring attention to fundamental access and opportunity issues.” He also highlighted coordination inefficiencies, noting “there are still too many examples of duplications of work, something that we need to minimize, especially in these times of shrinking resources for technical assistance and capacity building.”

### Practical Implementation Solutions

Liz Giener from Nortel challenged conventional assumptions about digital transformation requirements, arguing that “many governments overestimate or maybe oversold the need for a heavy legacy IT investment.” She provided examples from Estonia and Finland demonstrating how “lean modular architecture, trusted digital identity, and public-private partnerships” enable countries to leapfrog traditional infrastructure development stages.

Giener emphasized that “citizen-centric service design more effective than technology-first approaches” and announced Nortel’s upcoming entry into the LATAM market, providing practical frameworks for addressing digital inclusion challenges while building sustainable digital governance capabilities.

## Framework Integration and Governance Mechanisms

### Global Digital Compact and WSIS Integration

Concertina Tossa from Italy’s Agency for Digital emphasized that the “Global Digital Compact marks significant milestone in digital governance evolution, building on existing WSIS foundations.” She advocated for “effective integration between GDC and existing mechanisms like WSIS to avoid duplication and maximize resources.”

Tossa suggested that the upcoming WSIS+20 review process presents an opportunity to integrate GDC objectives systematically rather than creating separate implementation mechanisms. She explained that “National and Regional Initiatives (NRIs) can serve as operational mechanisms for translating GDC implementation at local levels.”

### Interactive Discussion on NRI Implementation

Edwin Chung from DotAsia, representing the Asia Pacific Regional IGF secretariat, raised practical questions about how NRIs can concretely implement GDC components at local levels. This inquiry sparked discussion about clearer guidance and support mechanisms to help regional and national IGF communities translate global commitments into actionable local programmes.

The discussion highlighted the potential for over 180 NRIs worldwide to “incorporate GDC objectives into agenda setting and report outcomes back to global frameworks,” leveraging existing multi-stakeholder participation mechanisms and local contextual knowledge.

## Cross-Regional Learning and Collaboration Models

Hassan Nasser emphasized the importance of “South-South cooperation and triangular cooperation essential for achieving global digital transformation goals.” This approach recognizes that developing countries often face similar challenges and can learn effectively from each other’s experiences.

Fredriksson highlighted the E-Trade for All partnership as demonstrating an “effective model for bringing 35 organisations together with common vision,” showing how multiple international organizations can coordinate around shared objectives while maintaining distinct mandates and expertise areas.

## Future Directions and Commitments

The discussion concluded with concrete commitments for continued collaboration. DCO committed to maintaining multi-stakeholder dialogue beyond the session, including at upcoming conferences, and developing a second edition of the Digital Economy Navigator incorporating stakeholder feedback.

Participants agreed that NRIs should systematically incorporate GDC objectives into their agenda setting and report outcomes back to global frameworks. The emphasis on continued informal dialogue and networking highlighted recognition that formal sessions alone cannot address complex coordination challenges.

## Conclusion

This session demonstrated both the potential and challenges of international digital cooperation in an increasingly complex global environment. The strong consensus around multi-stakeholder cooperation, building upon existing frameworks, and comprehensive ecosystem approaches provides a foundation for continued collaboration.

The diversity of regional perspectives highlighted the value of inclusive multi-stakeholder dialogue while illustrating the complexity of developing cooperation frameworks that can address vastly different development contexts simultaneously. The emphasis on moving from theoretical frameworks to practical implementation reflects growing maturity in digital governance discussions, with recognition that effective cooperation requires sustained commitment, innovative partnership models, and adaptive approaches that can evolve with rapidly changing technological and geopolitical contexts.

Sameem Ghaffar: This is, I think, one of the first sessions. Good morning, everybody. Welcome to the session hosted by DCO, Digital Cooperation Organization. We’re very, very pleased to have you here in the room and to have our participants online with us. I’m Samim Ghaffar, I’m Multilateral Engagements Senior Manager at DCO, and it’s my honor and pleasure to facilitate this session here today. We have with us online our colleagues from back in Riyadh, Helen McGowan, Senior Business Partnership Manager, who will be moderating online as well. We’ll be taking questions in the second segment of this session. The first session will be a panel discussion. We have with us a very distinguished panel of experts that have been assembled from various areas of expertise, and we’re very happy to have you in the room today. We thank you very warmly and would like also to thank the organizers of the IGF and warm thanks to the Norwegian government for their hospitality. Today the session entitled Cooperation for Digital Resilience and Prosperity, we don’t aim for it to be just a theoretical discussion. It’s about operationalizing trust, resilience, and equity in digital space. It’s about moving from pledges to policies, from theory to practice. We’ll be looking at the USIS and IGF discussions and also how the GDC adds to that very important equation. We have with us our Special Envoy for Multilateral Affairs, Hassan Nassar, and I will be giving him the floor for his opening remarks. Over to you, Hassan.

Hassan Nasser: Thank you very much, Samim. Thank you, everyone. Good morning in Oslo. This is, I think, one of the first sessions, so thank you for joining early. I really want to thank, of course, the organizers, the host country, the IGF Secretariat and all the stakeholders involved in this forum. For DCO, this is the second participation to IGF, and I know some of the participants here have a long experience in this forum. DCO was founded only four years ago as a unique intergovernmental organization mandated to accelerate inclusive and sustainable growth of the digital economy. With this mandate, we are supporting 16 member states across Africa, Europe, Middle East and Asia. And this mandate is mainly focusing on this aspect of digital enablers, digital business and digital society. Last year, during the IGF hosted in Riyadh, which is also the headquarter of the DCO, we had a first forum to explore the areas of digital cooperation, because, again, we think that this is the way forward to build digital prosperity and to ensure resilience of the digital economy. We are facing today a more fragmented world, and this is, of course, the reason why DCO was established, addressing those barriers, but also leveraging the opportunities coming from digital economy in terms of creation of jobs, creating of new opportunities and innovation. For today’s discussion, as mentioned by Samin, we really want to look and explore new cooperation. That’s why we have made sure that we have with us partners from member states, from other international organizations and from other governments. There is a space for all stakeholders, and the IGF is the good example of a multi-stakeholder process when it comes to digital cooperation and building a more safe, open and sustainable and inclusive digital future for all. In the DCO General Assembly hosted in February by the government of Jordan, the 16-member state adopted the four-year agenda for the organization. This four-year agenda focuses on specific elements which have been designed to really cover and ensure joint efforts. When we look at the current multilateral system, we can see, I think we can all see, the main challenge in terms of fragmentation, fragmentation of agendas, fragmentation of mandates, fragmentation of resources, and in DCO, we really want to address this issue of fragmentation by providing a common assessment, a common understanding of what is the situation today when it comes to digital economy. That’s why DCO, during the Summit of the Future hosted in the UN headquarters in New York September 24, launched the Digital Economy Navigator. The Digital Economy Navigator has been designed as a joint solution shared with all stakeholders to understand what are the priorities today, what is the situation today when it comes to digital economy, looking at the different aspects from digital enablers, digital society and digital business. This Digital Economy Navigator today covers not only the 16 DCO member states, but it covers a total of 50 countries around the world. We have shared the findings, the data of this Navigator, and we are currently working on a new edition of this Navigator. To work on this second edition of the Navigator, we will of course engage with all stakeholders to get their feedback, their input, and also to see how to activate and implement the findings coming from this tool. So today’s discussion for us is really an opportunity to start this multi-stakeholder dialogue when it comes to understanding better the digital economy. With the Digital Economy Navigator, we also hope to identify the right priorities for the member states, for all stakeholders, to then define where to invest and where to concentrate and coordinate efforts to build a more inclusive and sustainable digital economy. This cooperation will also help us to define and to ensure resilience of the digital economy, which as we’ve seen over the last years is a key issue and a key challenge for developing countries, but also for industrialized countries. So I’m really looking forward to the discussion today. We really want this to be an open discussion. We want to hear from other partners, other stakeholders. We really also invite you to connect beyond this session to make sure that we can continue this dialogue during IGF and beyond. We will be also attending the FFD4 next week in Sevilla, looking at financing development for digital economy, and we really continue to open this conversation for a more inclusive digital future. Thank you very much, and back to you, Sami.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you very much, Hassan, for these very interesting and clarifying remarks. We have with us today in the room five panelists, experts, but also two online. We have Oktat and Nortel. I will go a bit further later on into the introduction. But let me turn my first question of this panel to Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi. He’s a Director of Corporate Planning and Strategy at the National IT Development Agency of Nigeria. Nigeria is one of the member states of DCO, a very active member state and is championing a lot of digital transformation, and we’re very happy to have him in the room to clarify the priorities of the government of Nigeria, especially in light of the Cotonou Declaration that was adopted in May 2025 last month on the Worcester Review for Africa. So Dr., good morning, and I’m very happy to have you. What would be the priorities of Nigeria going forward? And we will keep this question three minutes, so we can give chance to everybody in the first part of this discussion. What would be the priorities and how does the multi-stakeholder approach support the priorities of the Nigerian government in the digital economy? Okay. Thank you very much, Moderator.

Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi: I’m very happy to be amongst you today for this discussion. The priorities of Nigeria in the area of digital cooperation as well as the WSIS Declaration in Cotonou, I think the digital economy, it’s vastly gaining ground in all that we do, it’s like as you all know. The digital economy of Nigeria has had a monolistic economy, that is we are very dependent on mineral resources. And recently there has been a marked deviation from only depending on that. So we take the digital economy as a priority area now because of the accessibility, because of its lack of critical investments, quite unlike the exploration of oil and all that. Here we are going to tap our vast human resources as well as harness the youthful age that we have in the country. So our priorities are shifting to this so that we can diversify our economy. And I’m sure most African countries as well are setting up policies as well as framework strategies to ensure that they tap from this digital economy offerings that are available to all of us. So going forward from that, answering your question directly, the Nigerian government has taken strategic steps to make sure that we tap from the multistakeholderism that’s proposed by the WSIS plus 20. And judging from the Cotonou Declaration, talking from the African perspective, we’ve decided that this time around the African nations should come together in unison and in an inclusive manner to position themselves to uphold leadership roles in the information society. The implication is that we must have a means of working together, tap from the strengths of others and then utilize, uplift the weaknesses that are found amongst us because it’s obvious that there are various levels of proficiency as well as capacity to utilize the digital offerings that we have. Most importantly, some countries are not at the forefront of the digital technology while others are much higher. So for us to be able to leverage on this availability and carry on the leadership role, there needs to be that inclusivity and more like an averaging effect. Those who have the strength will pull up those who are weak in the areas of providing policy assistance and all that. So that positions us in a very good position to see how we can benefit from the DCO arrangement and all strategies that are being formulated and planned for. So we intend to do that, passing through a unified African position in such a way that whatever we can benefit from the offerings of the DCO, we are going to key into it. The Global Digital Compact as well, which provides for some citizen-centric digital economy provisions will all tap into that. So we look forward to actually working with the DCO to make sure that the digital economy, all the provisions we’ve made and even the digital economy, all provisions that are made are tapped from and we’re going to benefit from all of that. Thank you very much.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you very much, Doctor. This collaboration at national, regional, continental level cannot happen without innovation. So I’ll turn my gaze to Richard from WIPO and I’d like to ask him, how is WIPO supporting and fostering innovation through their digital IP standards and how do they balance creativity and openness with standards? Over to you, Richard.

Ryszard Frelek: Thanks so much, Samin. And thank you, of course, to DCO and Hassan and all your colleagues for inviting WIPO to join this very interesting panel. Allow me first to perhaps highlight that when thinking about intellectual property, of course, there is the legal framework, which is important, but other aspects are equally important that shape this conducive IP ecosystem. This includes, of course, the infrastructure that helps the innovators and creators more easily to protect and manage their IP. This is about collaboration between the industry and the academia. This is about accessing the financing by startups and SMEs. And finally, of course, this is also about making sure that everyone everywhere is aware of how they can benefit from the IP system. And all of these elements and many, many more should be really taken into account when creating a national IP ecosystem that fosters innovation, creativity, and allows all entrepreneurs, including, of course, the digital ones, to thrive. This system is, of course, built to provide both the protection for our amazing innovators and creators through copyright, trademarks, patents, and many other IP rights, but also it gives them access to all the information contained, for example, in the patent information systems. So, of course, WIPO provides all entrepreneurs with services to more easily and cost-effectively protect their IP rights across borders, but also through, for example, the patent scope, we provide them with free-to-use global databases, which include, for example, in this case of patent scope, 122 million patent documents available, of course, for everyone to use. And as you know, WIPO, of course, works with our member states on many different areas and we support them in many different ways. Let me maybe just focus here on and mention three of them. So, first, we support our member states to design their national IP strategy, which take into account all these many different elements of the IP ecosystem, the legal provisions, the infrastructure, the financing, the awareness, so that we can help together work with our member states to tailor their IP ecosystem to help their local innovators and creators. Second, of course, we provide research and data that guide the policymakers world over, whether on an international or local level. So, for example, we have the Global Innovation Index, which is one of our flagship publications that ranks 130 economies and also specifies their innovation weaknesses and strengths. We have the IP statistic reports or, of course, we have the patent insight reports on the future of technologies. The third element, which is, of course, also very close to our heart, is that through a range of programs and initiatives, such as the IP management clinics or the work of our WIPO Academy, we want to help the local innovators understand how they can benefit from the IP system so that in the end of the day, they can successfully run their business, their initiative using this system. Of course, being here allowed me to also mention that we have the WIPO Conversation, which is this open, inclusive, also multi-stakeholder platform, where we provide everyone with a leading global setting to discuss the impacts on frontier technologies on all the relevant IP rights and, of course, to bridge that existing gap. So, over the past five years, 12,000 people, experts from the global experts, many of them attending, by the way, IGF, but also local innovators have been participating, and sessions focus on such areas as data, the metaverse in the past, but also, of course, as everywhere, AI. But what is also important following these conversations is that we launch a range of tools and underground projects. So, for example, we have the AI and IP Policy Toolkit or the upcoming AI Infrastructure Interchange. And this is the part where I can, of course, say so much more, and I love talking about these things, but I see the clock ticking. So, let me perhaps just mention as well that, of course, WIPO, in 2024, the Member States of WIPO have approved two international treaties, which is something we’re, of course, very proud of. Let me say by ending that, of course, as WIPO, we are here to serve the digital innovators, the creators, the entrepreneurs, and across the world, and we look forward to working with DCEO and all the many partners attending IGF and beyond to make sure that all our innovators and creators can benefit from IP.

Sameem Ghaffar: Many thanks, Samim, and over to you. Thank you very much, Richard. We hear a lot, and DCEO also subscribes to the notion of data-based policymaking. Let me turn to Julia Ajmon-Mossan, who is the Head of Startup and Digital Inclusion at IRIA, Economic Research Institute for ASEAN. What insights can you offer us from the global frameworks, like the GDC and regional integration models from the ASEAN countries? You are also a former innovation economist at the OECD, you have a wide range of experience. So what would be the insights you can give us on building interoperability and resilience into digital economies?

Giulia Ajmone Marsan: Thank you Samim. It’s a great pleasure to be here with all my fellow panelists. Thank you DCO, Hassan, for this kind invitation. So cooperations when it comes to digital innovation, it’s very much at the core of what we do. We are an international organization of 16 member countries based in Indonesia, in Jakarta. Our member countries are the 10 Southeast Asian economies, ASEAN, plus Korea, China, Japan, India, New Zealand and Australia. So we are very much at the center of the Asia-Pacific and Indo-Pacific. And we have recently established, thanks to the generous contribution of the government of Japan, our Digital Innovation and Sustainable Economy Center, IDISC. We are very interested, through the activity of the center, to explore the relationship between digital innovation and the Sustainable Development Goals, DSDGs. And that’s because through our activities we want to develop insights, but also policy dialogue, capacity building, to support a digital transformation that is compatible and conducive to the SDG framework, which is very much what the UN Global Digital Compact is about at the end, and I think also very much what many of my colleagues on the panel are working on. Let me give you a couple of examples. For instance, we are now currently very active in developing both local innovation ecosystem within Southeast Asia, but also in some cases transnational ones. And this is when our conversation today about international and global cooperation becomes so important. We are active in developing a strategic document called ASEAN-Japan AI Innovation Co-Creation Roadmap that will go directly to Ministers for Economic Development of ASEAN and Japan, where we are really looking at, on one hand, the strengths and areas of improvement of these 11 countries, but also ways to really develop a multinational AI innovation ecosystem based on connections of people, based on skills transfers between different areas of the world. Some countries of these 11 countries are benefiting from very young, tech-savvy, dynamic population. In other cases, aging economies, they may need to think about how to develop a very effective relationship with these young entrepreneurs that are developing fantastic start-ups, but also digital innovations. So this is one example of something that is very much in relation to our discussion today. We also know that, you know, just looking at our region is not enough in a globalized world. As Hassan was telling us earlier today, that global collaboration is becoming more difficult, but nevertheless, we need to keep trying and keep developing our relationships. And that’s because there is so much to be learned. So we are very active in certain G20 work, notably, and this is something I personally very much committed to, the work of a new engagement group of the G20 called Startup20 that is currently led by South Africa, the G20 Chair this year. But we had the pleasure to work also very, very well with India and Brazil last year. And this is again, you know, a global group that is pushing for the development of a global innovation ecosystem, looking at the strengths of different countries and also complementarities. And the idea is also to basically build a global dialogue. We are just at the beginning of this adventure. It’s a working group that was established under India three years ago, but nevertheless, it’s something very interesting because on one hand, we can share the very good lessons that we see in our region and learn from other regions in the world. We had a very, very interesting number of exchanges last year under Brazil, lots of, you know, interesting developments that could be pushed forward in terms of collaboration between Indonesia and Brazil, for instance, because of the size of the economy, certain sectoral specialization, including in digital innovation and so on and so forth. Coming back, you know, to the Pacific area, we are also very pleased to collaborate with APEC, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, this year under Korea. We are in touch with the Korean Ministry for Startup and SMEs, you know, and we will actively contribute to something that is called Global Eco-Innovation Forum. It will take place under the APEC Ministerial Week on MSMEs. And there, we will look at how to combine the digital transformation with the green transformation. So once again, you know, this idea to connect different SDGs, both at local level and international level. And maybe, you know, because we are probably short in time, let me just conclude by saying that even our collaboration with GCC countries is becoming more important than ever, especially after the two summits, ASEAN-GCC. So this is also another area where I really look forward to staying in touch with DCO, the countries in the Gulf, and you know, all the panelists that are present here today, because there is a lot that we can do. Thank you very much.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you, Giulia. I know there is a lot of nuggets and experiences from the areas of work that each of us are doing. And let’s keep it under two to three minutes, and in the second part of the panel, you can maybe share a bit more on your experience. We have next Concertina Tossa, the Head of International Affairs at the Italian Agency for Digital. Concertina is a very distinguished expert in digital governance and IT policies globally and also now at national level. We would like to have your experience regarding the GDC process and existing mechanisms like WSIS, IGF, and national and regional initiatives. How do they contribute to address challenges in the digital economy, based on your experience both at the transnational levels and local levels? How does GDC and those platforms have to solve these problems?

Concertina Tossa: Okay, so thank you for this invitation, it’s a pleasure to be a speaker in such an important panel. So the Global Digital Compact marks a significant milestone in the evolution of the global digital governance, and this is a result that began several years ago with the High-Level Panel on Digital Cooperation, continuing with the Roadmap for Digital Cooperation, and also was further shaped by our Common Agenda. And the GDC seeks to respond to complex challenges of digital transformation through coordinated global efforts aimed to building an inclusive, open, secure, and equitable and sustainable digital future for everyone. But in this context, it’s essential to foster synergy between the GDC and existing processes, and in particular, with the World Summit on Information Society, which has been active for more than 20 years, and even if in the last 20 years the digital landscape has evolved significantly with new priorities such as data governance, artificial intelligence, and biosecurity, the foundational principles of the WSIS remain relevant and complementary to those of the GDC. So the upcoming WSIS Plus 20 review process, it’s an important moment, it’s a key opportunity to strengthen and update the WSIS framework, incorporating the GDC objectives and priorities, and to avoid redundancy and duplication. So it’s an important moment to discuss which mechanism could facilitate this integration. And in this scenario, the IGF continues to serve as a primary platform for an inclusive dialogue among all digital stakeholders. Since its inception in 2006, the IGF has grown from a discussion forum to a structured ecosystem, including dynamic coalition, best practice forum, policy network, and especially the network of national and regional initiatives that now are comprising over 180 initiatives worldwide. The NRIs could play a strategic role in the local implementation of the GDC. Their multi-stakeholder structure and their close connection to the local context make them particularly well-suited to monitor the implementation of GDC principles at local level, to promote inclusive participation in digital policy development, to collect and transmit local needs, recommendations, best practice to the local level. So the NRI can act as an operational mechanism for translating and tracking the GDC implementation at the national and regional level, to ensure that the principles are not confined to the diplomatic or theoretical sphere, but are concretely reflected in public policies and local practices. So in conclusion, I think that the success of the GDC will depend heavily on the international community’s ability to build on and reinforce existing participatory frameworks. The IGF and the NRIs must be seen not just as a forum for dialogue, but as essential players in monitoring, implementing, and aligning Global Digital Policy with National and Local Realities. Thank you.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you very much, Cantatina. We have with us online Torbjörn Fredriksson, Head of the E-Commerce and Digital Economy Branch of OCTAD. Tobjörn?

Torbjorn Fredriksson: Well, thank you very much, moderator, and greetings here from Geneva. I wish I was there with you in Norway to celebrate the 20-year anniversary of IGF. The fast pace, I think we see on the digital landscape change, represents a huge challenge for governments when it comes to developing adequate policy responses. You know, this challenge is not made easier by the fact that governing digitalization cuts across so many different policy domains. And in order for the global community, including multilateral organizations like UNCTAD, WIPO, ITU, and others, to serve the needs of our member states in this context, it’s really important that we also manage to connect the dots between what every different organization is doing. And I think this can be achieved in multiple ways. We have already mentioned the key processes like the WSIS, GDC, etc. And the WSIS, for example, it was extremely important to help clarify which organizations that should take the lead in various areas. For example, UNCTAD, ITC, and the Universal Postal Union lead together in the area of e-business. It is also clarified that the IGF would be housed under UNDESA, even if it’s a very multi-stakeholder forum. The GDC, meanwhile, it helped to highlight certain areas that deserve more attention than what was previously noted in the WSIS outcome documents and in the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development. So, for example, we have the area of inclusivity and sustainability aspects of the digital economy. We have the human rights online. You have the data governance and the artificial intelligence that were given added impetus through the GDC. If I go to the area of UNCTAD, in the area of e-commerce and the digital economy, we have also taken an initiative to create what we call E-Trade for All, which is a partnership with a common vision to support developing countries that are trailing behind in what we call e-trade readiness. And by bringing 35 partners together, including AREA, WIPO, and DCO, it helps us to better understand what different organizations are doing and how we can find better ways to work together to achieve common goals. Unfortunately, there are still too many examples of duplications of work, something that we need to minimize, especially in these times of shrinking resources for technical assistance and capacity building, as well as for dialogue. When new initiatives are developed, we also need to ensure effective integration with existing mechanisms. So I agree there very much with Conchitina. That’s why it’s so important that when it comes to the GDC, that we make full use of the existing mechanisms that were born out of the WSIS process. And this is also what member states agreed upon in the most recent session of the UN Commission on Science and Technology for develop full integration of efforts between the GDC and WSIS is what we need. I’ll stop there. Thank you so much again.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you very much for these enlightening remarks, Torbjörn. I’ll shift my focus to Professor Luca Belli, Professor of Digital Governance and Regulation at the FGV Law School in Brazil. He has a lot more responsibilities and titles, but in the interest of time, let me just cut to the question. You’ve done a lot of research, Professor, in LATAM and BRICS countries. What lessons can you share that can accelerate the multilateral digital prosperity and bridge the gap for Global South?

Luca Belli: Thank you very much, Samim, and also Hassan for organizing this very timely discussion. And so as Samim was mentioning, we do a lot of research at the Center for Technology and Society on various issues that are very much of interest for DCO and its members and also for the participants here, especially data governance, digital transformation, AI, cybersecurity. And so I wanted to share a little bit of findings of two of our flagship projects, one dedicated to digital policies in the BRICS grouping, Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and the six more that have joined last year, including some DCO members. And then the other one called CPDP LATAM, which is an annual conference we organize on data governance in LATAM and includes also a lot of research and research and policy proposals also to increase convergence of data governance in LATAM. So first of all, I think that from what emerges from our research is that to trigger digital transformation, to facilitate it, there are multiple levers, right? First of all, policy frameworks that must be coherent, especially when you want to share them amongst multiple organizations or members of an organization. Then you have to have a sort of agile governance system because digital technologies are evolving and also the threats. So we also focus a lot on cybersecurity and the evolving landscape of digital threats is something extremely important to take care. And the only way to do it is to having a very agile multi-stakeholder governance to continuously cooperate with also non-governmental stakeholders that have their hands on cybersecurity. And then strategic investments. So it’s not only about policy priorities, but also having the funds to translate this into concrete actions. And this is not only through hardware and software, it’s also through capacity building for humans, which is the most important part. Now, how these elements play out in the two very different groupings that we work on, which are the BRICS and LATAM. Let me provide you two very telling examples to illustrate how this may work more or less successfully depending on the maturity of the mechanism, on the alignment of the priorities, but also I think one of the most important elements that we frequently forget is the political impetus and support that there is to achieve the results. BRICS, it has not been created as a club governance mechanism specifically for digital policies, but it sort of became one, at least digital policies, especially cybersecurity, cybercrime, AI have emerged as priorities, especially since the Snowden revelation in 2013, when then it was created a specific working group on ICT security. And it’s very interesting because it has triggered a sort of what in intergovernance jargon we call enhanced cooperation process, which is not common, but in practice, it worked over the past 10 years. And a case in point is the adoption of the UN Convention Against Cybercrime, which was an initiative basically of Russia and China supported by BRICS and their allied countries and brokered thanks to the very skillful work of the Brazilian diplomacy that managed to achieve this result. And again, we can criticize the text as any convention, but for me, what is relevant is to see the concrete result of this mechanism, which is not even in IGO and intergovernmental organization, is a club governance system like the G7 or the G20. Now, a counter example in the last 30 seconds I have at my disposal about LATAM, which is a very interesting example. We do a lot of research on data governance in LATAM. And 19 countries already have data protection laws in LATAM, all very similar because they all copy and paste from Europe, but diverse because they all have to adapt them to the national idiosyncrasies in cultural and legal terms. There are already several organizations that work supposedly effectively at the regional level from the Organization of American States, the Union of South American Nations, the Mercosur and all the partners. But despite already having all adopted laws and having organizations, there is no regional framework which would be extremely valuable not only to harmonize the policy, but also to allow a unique data market and fostering more cooperation at the regional level. So as one of the results of our conference last year, we produced also not only a study on these frameworks, but also a suggestion of what would be a regional framework. I know that DCO does not have Latin American members, but maybe in the future they will have. And so we already prepared the work for you if you want to use it. It is in open access. And also we have shared it with Brazilian colleagues that are chairing the Mercosur in December. So I don’t know. I mean, political momentum is always a very difficult element to guess, but maybe there might be now some political momentum to put in practice these ideas. Thank you very much.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you, Professor. Liz Giener is a very experienced strategist at Nortel and they have developed a lot of solutions. And what is very interesting is the collaboration and support to both public and private sector. Liz, what will be the lessons that you can share with us from Global North, but also extrapolating to Global South? What will be the experience of implementing digital solutions so that all these talks we’re having at the global level can be translated into action?

Liz Giener: Thank you. And thank you for the invitation to join you all today. And hello from the US where I am currently sitting. Nortel’s global headquarters is in Estonia and we’re celebrating our 25th anniversary this year. And I am in the US. and soon to be announcing as well, our entry into LATAM. So very thrilled for this news. Previously from Nortel’s experience, deploying digital solutions across Europe, the Middle East, Africa and North America, I wanted to speak to some of the underestimated enablers that can accelerate readiness and resilience for governments that may have a limited infrastructure. So the first one of four is having a lean modular digital architecture. Many governments overestimate or maybe oversold the need for a heavy legacy IT investment. So one example that we can reference is our work in Botswana where we helped the Botswana Unified Revenue Service leapfrog to a modern API based tax system running in the cloud and integrated with existing systems. This was without the need for major infrastructure upgrades. Secondly, I would focus on looking at trusted digital identity. This probably seems like a no brainer, but some governments often deprioritize digital identity, yet it is foundational for trusted scalable services. In both Estonia and Finland, Nortel helped implement national digital ID platforms that now enable seamless access to services across health, finance, government, and this dramatically increases both reach and resilience. And touching more directly your question on cross-sector partnerships, public-private collaboration accelerates resilience. In Oman, Nortel brought together government, telecommunications operators and banks to co-create citizen services, expanding access farther and faster than the government could do acting alone. Probably the most important, especially when you want to make sure that you are focused on trust and the trust of your citizens, is citizen-centric service design. Many programs focus on technology first, and it’s very easy to think this way rather than focusing on users. In both Lithuania and in Oman, Nortel led with user-centered design, ensuring that services were accessible across mobile-first channels. And this was a critical factor in markets that have a patchy infrastructure. So I want to enforce that with the right enablers, which include modular architecture, trusted identity, public-private collaboration, and human-centered design, many governments can leapfrog constraints, not just work around them. Nortel’s experience shows that even in limited infrastructure settings, it’s possible to build digital ecosystems that drive real resilience, inclusion, and in the end, and ideally, long-term prosperity. Thank you very much for including me today.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you very much, Lisa. I’m happy to have your perspectives. And I’d like to give the floor very quickly to Hassan again, just to synthesize a little bit. There’s a lot of angles, a lot of perspectives here. What do you make out of this, Hassan?

Hassan Nasser: Yeah, that’s, before we open probably for discussion, I think this is amazing. We have been from Asia to Latin America, passing by Africa and Europe in a few minutes. We’ve heard private sector, UN agencies, government entities. I think what we get from that is, first of all, there is a huge potential of digital economy to really help prosperity, to really help human development, as long as we make sure that this transformation, this digital transformation, this new economy, which is now becoming probably the economy, is also aligned with SDGs and with principle that we are all caring about. To do that, I think the other takeaway from me so far is we need cooperation. And that’s easy to say, that’s not easy to do. Because to have this cooperation, we need to share principle. We need to have also a common language. We need to have respect as well, which sometimes seems to be difficult in this world today. In terms of common principle and common ambition, we believe that the GDC was a big achievement to define, let’s say, direction of travel. And of course, we need to build with existing foundation, as mentioned by the panelists. We have very strong foundation, 20 years ago, defined to help us. So now we have, let’s say, this political commitment coming out of the summit of the future. We have an existing mechanism that we need to reinvent and refresh and support. We need also to really ensure that there is an openness when it comes to listening to different perspective. Today, we have on this panel, so this global South perspective, South-South cooperation, triangular cooperation will remain an essential part of what we are trying to achieve. So from DCO perspective, and I’m really curious, of course, to hear from the participants, from the audience as well, our commitment is to really support the consolidation of this mechanism to foster cooperation based on openness, based on shared knowledge, based on common language and common principles. But again, we have limited time. We hope that after this forum, we have a lot of coffees that will help us to continue the conversation.

Sameem Ghaffar: So back to you, Samim, and I hope we have some questions as well. Thank you very much, Hasan. We would really like to apologize to our audience because we couldn’t keep the interactive session as long as we wanted to be. But we open the floor for questions in the room, and then we’ll have time to take questions online as well. Helen is assisting online. The floor is open. If you don’t have questions from the room, and let me see if we can take a question from our live audience. Helen, over to you.

Helen McGowan: Hello, Samim. Hello, everybody in Norway. There aren’t any questions online yet to take forward. So hopefully somebody in the room will participate and have a question there.

Sameem Ghaffar: Well, in that case, I will- Torbjörn has a question. Yes, Torbjörn, please go ahead.

Torbjorn Fredriksson: Just to break the ice. Thank you so much. Let me just comment on one thing that Hasan said here. We’re talking about the digital economy now becoming the economy. I wish that was the case in all parts of the world, but I think it’s so important to keep in mind that we still have very huge divide, especially in the digital economy. Just to give one example, in Norway, for instance, more than 80% of people are shopping online on a daily basis. In Africa, it’s typically less than 5%. So I think it’s so important to keep this in mind, although we are carried away sometimes by all the amazing things that are happening with AI and so on and so forth. Many of the basic challenges still remain if we’re gonna make sure that the digital revolution brings value and opportunities full-scale in many parts of the development world.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you, Torbjörn. If any of the participants and speakers would like also to share, maybe they didn’t have a chance to complete their thoughts earlier, I’m happy to do that. Richard, we’ll go from left to right.

Ryszard Frelek: Thanks so much. I mean, I can reconfirm absolutely that cooperation is extremely important and DCEO, UNCTAD, thank you, of course, for having us as well as the partner for E-Trade. For all, we’re always very happily contributing with our IP expertise in E-Trade for all, but also in many different forums, including DCEO here in IGF and so forth. It’s just to perhaps using that opportunity for a quick conclusion is that just to perhaps say that the value of intangibles has been growing rapidly over these 25 years and it reached the 62 trillion US dollars worth in 2023 and intangibles, which are, of course, many of them protected by intellectual property are not only increasingly becoming important for some of the biggest companies, but even more especially it’s becoming important for the SMEs, the local businesses or innovative and creative individuals in every corner of the world. And WIPO together with all the partners is there to serve them.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you, Richard. We’ll go back to the room. We have a question from the audience, please, sir.

Audience: Thank you. This Edwin Chung from DotAsia. We actually serve as the secretariat for the Asia Pacific Regional IGF. I heard, I forgot who mentioned this from the panel, but about kind of the success of the GDC and implementing it into the NRIs. I think that’s a very interesting direction and something that is really important for the NRI community to understand. But how is that envisioned? What components of the GDC would you see more concretely being both promoted, advocated and implemented in the NRIs? I guess that’s sort of my question. I forgot who- It’ll be addressed to Concettina. Thank you very much.

Concertina Tossa: So as you know, I mean, the NRI as the national and regional expression of the IGF worldwide and there, there are so many issues that are part of GDC objectives that are discussed, managed and also directed. I was speaking about artificial intelligence, data governance, digital divide. I mean, all those issues are discussed at the NRIs level. So I think that’s an important space where, I mean, coming from this discussion, it could also monitor. This vision should be reported to the GDC but also to the other UN entities. I think this is an important process that should start after each IGF ends and after each national and regional initiative ends. It’s important to communicate, to spread results and to create these linkages that now are I think a little bit weak, this is what I think.

Audience: That’s a very good clarification, if I understand correctly then really what you’re suggesting is NRIs take the GDC as part of the input to their agenda setting as well as look at how the outcomes or outputs or the reporting could tie in back to the GDC. I think that makes a lot of sense. Thank you very much.

Giulia Ajmone Marsan: Giulia, do you have any comments on that question because the question was addressed from the region of your concern? No specific comment. I think that Conchettina has already addressed the question very well. Let me just add that I think she mentioned the UN system but of course there are also organizations beyond the UN system. We work a lot and very happily with the UN system but nevertheless this is a global effort. So I see the Global Digital Compact as a kind of vision. I mentioned at the beginning of my intervention that even us are very interested in this relationship between digital transformation and sustainable development goals. So it is something that is going to inspire a lot of organizations and stakeholders around the world. Again, multi-stakeholder approach, I think that some other speakers mentioned this before me. So whether we are private, multilateral, local, this is something that we need to work together and we also need to learn how to work together and in some cases we need to also learn our respective portfolios and mandates. But let me just add something before we move on. I think it’s also very important to be open to learn across regions. So before I was based in Paris, you mentioned I was working for another very big multilateral organization. Then I moved to Asia and I just realized that now that I’m based in Asia, not everybody of course, we had a wonderful conversation with Luca just before this panel, but don’t look at us as just an Asian organization. Of course we have expertise on Asia but we want to learn from Europe, the Americas, Africa, everywhere in the world. We also have lessons to share. So I think this is very important to try to break a little bit these boundaries, think outside the box and learn from different regions without just labeling institutions, this is Asia, this is Africa, it has nothing to do with me so it’s not interesting. Because every day, even through G20 South Africa, I’m learning so much about the continent and so many lessons that are so relevant for the economic development and prosperity of our member states.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you. We have time just for 30 seconds to Professor Luca, a doctor, and Liz.

Luca Belli: Luca. Yeah, I will use my 30 seconds wisely. So just to reiterate a couple of points that I think are key here, which is the fact that again, when we’re speaking about the GDC or any kind of other effort aimed at transforming digitally a nation, a company, a society, this is not only about adoption of technology, it’s not only a technological shift, it’s also an evolution, a cultural evolution and an organizational evolution, right? And so I think sometimes amongst academics we are a little bit frustrated because there are a lot of very nice declarations, policies, and even regulation at the national level that sounds fantastic in theory, but then the practice is very far. And so I think that the challenge here and how multi-stakeholder interaction could be explored more is to translate these excellent sometimes policy objectives into concrete actions. So to make it percolate from policy level, concrete change, capacity building is essential. And to let simply public servants know that the policy exists or capacity building is essential to make people understand they have an opportunity. And I mean, cyber security is a very good example. People consider it a cost, but if you make them understand that it’s an opportunity for business, they will consider it a business as an opportunity to invest money and time in it. I’m speaking too much, I’m seeing from your glance, so I will stop here. We have one minute to go. But just to conclude, let me tell you something that I think the DCO has a very good role in it because many regions in the world do not have a player like DCO that could help articulating this.

Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi: Thank you very much. I think you wrapped it up for us, but I would like to still give the floor to Dr. Ford. Last comment. My comments will go in the area of disparities between the whole system, globally and then regionally as well as nationally. As the professor said, there are beautiful policies and regulations and all that are out there, but the implementation is difficult. Now how do we address these differences? Local levels, infrastructure availability, as well as understanding the nitty-gritty of the implementation path that these things will take is a difficult terrain. I think the people in Africa will stand to benefit from these international corporations, but our peculiar issues will have to be put in the picture as well. So that is my final words for this. Thank you.

Sameem Ghaffar: Thank you very much. That’s a beautiful statement. Unfortunately, we cannot go further along this very, very exciting discussion, and we’ve come to an end of it, unfortunately, and we’re getting queues that I have to wrap up. Thank you very, very much. Everybody in the room, our panelists, online audience, and the organizers and everybody else involved from DCO’s side to support this. We’ve been in a very, very engaging session, and we hope that you’ve learned from this, and like Hassan said, we have time for coffee after for any other further discussion. Thank you. Thank you very, very much, and I hope you enjoyed it.

Agreement points

Need for effective integration between GDC and existing mechanisms like WSIS to avoid duplication

Speakers

– Hassan Nasser
– Concertina Tossa
– Torbjorn Fredriksson

Arguments

DCO serves as unique intergovernmental organization addressing fragmentation in digital economy through common assessment and understanding

Global Digital Compact marks significant milestone in digital governance evolution, building on existing WSIS foundations

Need for effective integration between GDC and existing mechanisms like WSIS to avoid duplication and maximize resources

Summary

All three speakers emphasize the importance of building on existing frameworks like WSIS rather than creating parallel systems, with focus on addressing fragmentation and maximizing limited resources

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development

Multi-stakeholder cooperation essential for successful digital transformation

Speakers

– Hassan Nasser
– Concertina Tossa
– Giulia Ajmone Marsan
– Luca Belli

Arguments

South-South cooperation and triangular cooperation essential for achieving global digital transformation goals

Multi-stakeholder cooperation essential for translating global digital policies into local realities

Organizations should break regional boundaries and learn across continents rather than limiting themselves to geographic labels

Implementation challenges exist between excellent policies and practical application, requiring focus on capacity building and cultural change

Summary

Speakers unanimously agree that multi-stakeholder approaches involving different regions, sectors, and levels of governance are crucial for effective digital transformation

Topics

Development | Legal and regulatory

Digital transformation requires comprehensive ecosystem approach beyond just technology

Speakers

– Ryszard Frelek
– Luca Belli
– Liz Giener

Arguments

IP ecosystem requires comprehensive approach including legal framework, infrastructure, industry-academia collaboration, and financing access

Implementation challenges exist between excellent policies and practical application, requiring focus on capacity building and cultural change

Citizen-centric service design more effective than technology-first approaches for building accessible digital services

Summary

All speakers agree that successful digital transformation requires holistic approaches that consider legal, cultural, organizational, and human factors, not just technological solutions

Topics

Development | Infrastructure | Intellectual property rights

Importance of addressing digital divide and ensuring inclusive participation

Speakers

– Torbjorn Fredriksson
– Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi
– Giulia Ajmone Marsan

Arguments

Significant digital economy participation gaps exist between developed and developing regions, with Africa at less than 5% online shopping versus Norway’s 80%

African nations need unified continental approach to leverage digital opportunities and address capacity gaps

Digital transformation requires combining with green transformation and sustainable development goals

Summary

Speakers acknowledge significant disparities in digital participation and emphasize the need for inclusive approaches that address capacity gaps and ensure equitable access

Topics

Development | Economic | Sustainable development

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize the importance of cross-regional learning and cooperation, moving beyond traditional geographic boundaries to foster global digital development

Speakers

– Hassan Nasser
– Giulia Ajmone Marsan

Arguments

South-South cooperation and triangular cooperation essential for achieving global digital transformation goals

Organizations should break regional boundaries and learn across continents rather than limiting themselves to geographic labels

Topics

Development | Economic

Both speakers advocate for building upon existing WSIS mechanisms rather than creating new parallel systems, emphasizing the need to strengthen and update current frameworks

Speakers

– Concertina Tossa
– Torbjorn Fredriksson

Arguments

Global Digital Compact marks significant milestone in digital governance evolution, building on existing WSIS foundations

Need for effective integration between GDC and existing mechanisms like WSIS to avoid duplication and maximize resources

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development

Both speakers highlight the gap between policy formulation and practical implementation, emphasizing the need for capacity building and addressing local contextual challenges

Speakers

– Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi
– Luca Belli

Arguments

Local infrastructure availability and understanding implementation paths remain difficult terrain requiring international cooperation

Implementation challenges exist between excellent policies and practical application, requiring focus on capacity building and cultural change

Topics

Development | Infrastructure

Unexpected consensus

Political momentum as crucial factor for digital governance success

Speakers

– Luca Belli
– Hassan Nasser

Arguments

Political momentum and support crucial for successful implementation of digital governance frameworks

South-South cooperation and triangular cooperation essential for achieving global digital transformation goals

Explanation

While technical and policy aspects are often emphasized in digital governance discussions, both speakers unexpectedly converged on the critical importance of political will and momentum for translating frameworks into concrete results

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development

Value of informal governance mechanisms alongside formal institutions

Speakers

– Luca Belli
– Concertina Tossa

Arguments

BRICS countries successfully achieved enhanced cooperation in cybersecurity and AI governance despite being informal club governance system

National and Regional Initiatives (NRIs) can serve as operational mechanisms for translating GDC implementation at local levels

Explanation

Both speakers recognize that informal or semi-formal mechanisms (BRICS club governance and NRIs) can be as effective as formal intergovernmental organizations in achieving digital governance objectives

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Cybersecurity

Overall assessment

Summary

Strong consensus emerged around the need for multi-stakeholder cooperation, building on existing frameworks rather than creating new ones, addressing digital divides, and taking comprehensive ecosystem approaches to digital transformation. Speakers consistently emphasized the importance of translating global policies into local realities through capacity building and inclusive participation.

Consensus level

High level of consensus with complementary perspectives rather than conflicting viewpoints. The agreement suggests a mature understanding of digital governance challenges and a shared commitment to collaborative, inclusive approaches. This consensus provides a strong foundation for implementing initiatives like the Global Digital Compact and strengthening existing mechanisms like WSIS and IGF.

Different viewpoints

Scope and urgency of digital divide challenges

Speakers

– Hassan Nasser
– Torbjorn Fredriksson

Arguments

DCO serves as unique intergovernmental organization addressing fragmentation in digital economy through common assessment and understanding

Significant digital economy participation gaps exist between developed and developing regions, with Africa at less than 5% online shopping versus Norway’s 80%

Summary

Hassan presents an optimistic view suggesting digital economy is becoming ‘the economy’ and focuses on coordination mechanisms, while Torbjorn challenges this notion by highlighting massive participation gaps and emphasizing that basic challenges remain unaddressed despite technological advances

Topics

Development | Economic

Effectiveness of existing versus new frameworks

Speakers

– Concertina Tossa
– Luca Belli

Arguments

Global Digital Compact marks significant milestone in digital governance evolution, building on existing WSIS foundations

Implementation challenges exist between excellent policies and practical application, requiring focus on capacity building and cultural change

Summary

Concertina emphasizes building on existing frameworks like WSIS and integrating them with GDC, while Luca expresses frustration that excellent policies exist but implementation remains poor, suggesting structural problems with current approaches

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development

Unexpected differences

Regional cooperation effectiveness

Speakers

– Luca Belli
– Giulia Ajmone Marsan

Arguments

Latin America has comprehensive data protection laws but lacks regional framework for unified digital market

ASEAN region developing transnational AI innovation ecosystems through strategic partnerships and skills transfer

Explanation

Unexpectedly, two regions with similar organizational structures show contrasting results – LATAM has laws but lacks coordination despite multiple regional organizations, while ASEAN successfully develops transnational innovation ecosystems. This highlights that institutional presence doesn’t guarantee effective cooperation

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion revealed subtle but significant disagreements on the urgency of digital divide challenges, the effectiveness of current policy frameworks, and approaches to regional cooperation. While speakers generally agreed on goals like digital inclusion and cooperation, they differed on assessment of current progress and optimal strategies.

Disagreement level

Moderate disagreement with significant implications – the differences in perspective on whether digital transformation is progressing adequately versus facing fundamental implementation challenges could lead to very different policy priorities and resource allocation decisions. The contrast between optimistic coordination-focused approaches and more critical implementation-focused perspectives suggests underlying tensions about the effectiveness of current multilateral digital governance approaches.

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize the importance of cross-regional learning and cooperation, moving beyond traditional geographic boundaries to foster global digital development

Speakers

– Hassan Nasser
– Giulia Ajmone Marsan

Arguments

South-South cooperation and triangular cooperation essential for achieving global digital transformation goals

Organizations should break regional boundaries and learn across continents rather than limiting themselves to geographic labels

Topics

Development | Economic

Both speakers advocate for building upon existing WSIS mechanisms rather than creating new parallel systems, emphasizing the need to strengthen and update current frameworks

Speakers

– Concertina Tossa
– Torbjorn Fredriksson

Arguments

Global Digital Compact marks significant milestone in digital governance evolution, building on existing WSIS foundations

Need for effective integration between GDC and existing mechanisms like WSIS to avoid duplication and maximize resources

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development

Both speakers highlight the gap between policy formulation and practical implementation, emphasizing the need for capacity building and addressing local contextual challenges

Speakers

– Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi
– Luca Belli

Arguments

Local infrastructure availability and understanding implementation paths remain difficult terrain requiring international cooperation

Implementation challenges exist between excellent policies and practical application, requiring focus on capacity building and cultural change

Topics

Development | Infrastructure

Key takeaways

Digital cooperation requires moving from theoretical frameworks to practical implementation, with emphasis on translating global policies into local realities

The Global Digital Compact (GDC) should build upon existing mechanisms like WSIS and IGF rather than creating duplicative structures, with effective integration being crucial for success

Multi-stakeholder cooperation is essential for digital transformation, requiring collaboration between governments, international organizations, private sector, and civil society

Significant digital divides persist globally, with developing regions like Africa having less than 5% online shopping participation compared to 80% in developed countries like Norway

Regional approaches to digital transformation vary significantly, with successful models emerging from ASEAN, BRICS, and other regional groupings that can provide lessons for cross-regional learning

Digital transformation is not just technological but requires cultural and organizational evolution, with capacity building being fundamental to success

National and Regional IGF Initiatives (NRIs) can serve as operational mechanisms for implementing GDC principles at local levels, bridging global frameworks with national realities

Intellectual property ecosystems require comprehensive approaches including legal frameworks, infrastructure, financing access, and capacity building to support innovation

Governments can leapfrog infrastructure constraints through lean modular architecture, trusted digital identity systems, and strategic public-private partnerships

Resolutions and action items

DCO committed to continue multi-stakeholder dialogue beyond the session and at upcoming FFD4 conference in Sevilla

DCO to work on second edition of Digital Economy Navigator with stakeholder input and feedback

NRIs should incorporate GDC objectives into their agenda setting and report outcomes back to global frameworks

Participants encouraged to continue conversations through informal networking and coffee meetings after the session

Organizations should strengthen coordination to minimize duplication of work, especially given shrinking resources for technical assistance

WIPO to continue collaboration with DCO and other partners through E-Trade for All partnership and other initiatives

Unresolved issues

How to effectively bridge the implementation gap between excellent policies and practical application at local levels

Specific mechanisms for integrating GDC with existing WSIS frameworks without creating redundancy

How to address infrastructure and capacity disparities between developed and developing regions

Concrete methods for translating global digital governance frameworks into actionable national policies

How to ensure adequate political momentum and support for sustained digital cooperation initiatives

Ways to address the fragmentation of agendas, mandates, and resources in the current multilateral system

How to balance regional peculiarities and local contexts with international standardization efforts

Suggested compromises

Use existing WSIS+20 review process as opportunity to integrate GDC objectives rather than creating separate mechanisms

Leverage NRIs as bridge between global frameworks and local implementation to avoid top-down approaches

Focus on South-South cooperation and triangular cooperation models to complement traditional North-South assistance

Combine digital transformation initiatives with green transformation and SDG alignment to maximize impact

Break regional boundaries in learning and collaboration while respecting local contexts and needs

Prioritize citizen-centric service design over technology-first approaches to ensure accessibility and adoption

We are facing today a more fragmented world, and this is, of course, the reason why DCO was established, addressing those barriers, but also leveraging the opportunities coming from digital economy… When we look at the current multilateral system, we can see, I think we can all see, the main challenge in terms of fragmentation, fragmentation of agendas, fragmentation of mandates, fragmentation of resources

Speaker

Hassan Nasser

Reason

This comment was insightful because it directly addressed one of the core challenges in global digital governance – the paradox of needing cooperation in an increasingly fragmented world. It reframed the discussion from theoretical cooperation to practical solutions for overcoming systemic fragmentation.

Impact

This set the foundational theme for the entire discussion, with subsequent speakers consistently returning to themes of cooperation, integration, and avoiding duplication. It established fragmentation as the central problem that all panelists would address from their respective domains.

The digital economy of Nigeria has had a monolistic economy, that is we are very dependent on mineral resources. And recently there has been a marked deviation from only depending on that. So we take the digital economy as a priority area now because of the accessibility, because of its lack of critical investments, quite unlike the exploration of oil and all that.

Speaker

Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi

Reason

This comment was thought-provoking because it highlighted how digital transformation can serve as economic diversification strategy for resource-dependent economies, offering a concrete example of digital economy as a development pathway that requires less capital investment than traditional industries.

Impact

This shifted the discussion from abstract policy frameworks to concrete national strategies, demonstrating how digital cooperation can address real economic challenges. It grounded the theoretical discussions in practical development needs.

Unfortunately, there are still too many examples of duplications of work, something that we need to minimize, especially in these times of shrinking resources for technical assistance and capacity building… When new initiatives are developed, we also need to ensure effective integration with existing mechanisms.

Speaker

Torbjörn Fredriksson

Reason

This comment was particularly insightful because it addressed the practical inefficiencies in the current system of digital cooperation, highlighting how resource constraints make coordination not just desirable but essential for effectiveness.

Impact

This comment reinforced Hassan’s earlier point about fragmentation but added the critical dimension of resource scarcity, leading other speakers to emphasize building on existing frameworks rather than creating new ones. It influenced the discussion toward practical integration strategies.

Despite already having all adopted laws and having organizations, there is no regional framework which would be extremely valuable not only to harmonize the policy, but also to allow a unique data market and fostering more cooperation at the regional level… political momentum is always a very difficult element to guess

Speaker

Luca Belli

Reason

This comment was thought-provoking because it illustrated the gap between having the technical and legal infrastructure for cooperation and actually achieving it, highlighting that political will is often the missing ingredient in digital cooperation initiatives.

Impact

This comment introduced a more nuanced understanding of cooperation challenges, moving beyond technical and policy issues to political economy factors. It prompted reflection on implementation gaps and the role of political leadership in digital transformation.

Many governments overestimate or maybe oversold the need for a heavy legacy IT investment… In both Estonia and Finland, Nortel helped implement national digital ID platforms that now enable seamless access to services across health, finance, government, and this dramatically increases both reach and resilience.

Speaker

Liz Giener

Reason

This comment was insightful because it challenged conventional wisdom about digital infrastructure requirements, suggesting that leapfrogging strategies could be more effective than traditional heavy infrastructure investments, particularly for developing countries.

Impact

This comment shifted the discussion toward practical implementation strategies and challenged assumptions about barriers to digital transformation. It provided concrete examples of how countries can achieve digital resilience without massive infrastructure investments.

We’re talking about the digital economy now becoming the economy. I wish that was the case in all parts of the world… Just to give one example, in Norway, for instance, more than 80% of people are shopping online on a daily basis. In Africa, it’s typically less than 5%.

Speaker

Torbjörn Fredriksson

Reason

This comment was particularly thought-provoking because it provided stark quantitative evidence of the digital divide, challenging the assumption that digital transformation is universally advanced and reminding participants of the fundamental inequalities that cooperation efforts must address.

Impact

This comment served as a reality check that grounded the discussion in the persistent challenges of digital inequality. It reinforced the urgency of the cooperation agenda and reminded participants that basic challenges remain alongside advanced AI and emerging technology discussions.

Overall assessment

These key comments fundamentally shaped the discussion by establishing a progression from problem identification to solution strategies. Hassan’s opening comment about fragmentation set the central challenge, which subsequent speakers addressed from their respective domains. The discussion evolved from abstract cooperation principles to concrete implementation strategies, with speakers building on each other’s insights about resource constraints, political challenges, and practical solutions. The comments created a comprehensive narrative arc: from recognizing systemic fragmentation, through understanding resource and political constraints, to identifying practical pathways for cooperation. Torbjörn’s reality check about digital divides served as an important anchor, ensuring the discussion remained grounded in the fundamental inequalities that make cooperation essential rather than optional. The interplay between these comments created a rich, multi-dimensional understanding of digital cooperation challenges and opportunities.

How can the Digital Economy Navigator be expanded and improved for its second edition to better serve stakeholders globally?

Speaker

Hassan Nasser

Explanation

Hassan mentioned they are working on a new edition of the Navigator and will engage with all stakeholders to get feedback and input, indicating a need for further research on how to enhance this tool

How can the fragmentation of multilateral agendas, mandates, and resources be effectively addressed?

Speaker

Hassan Nasser

Explanation

Hassan identified fragmentation as a main challenge in the current multilateral system that DCO wants to address, but the specific mechanisms for doing so require further exploration

What specific mechanisms can facilitate the integration between GDC and existing WSIS frameworks to avoid redundancy and duplication?

Speaker

Concertina Tossa

Explanation

She emphasized this as an important area needing discussion to ensure effective integration without creating overlapping efforts

How can National and Regional Initiatives (NRIs) effectively monitor and implement GDC principles at local levels?

Speaker

Concertina Tossa and Edwin Chung (audience)

Explanation

This was identified as a strategic role for NRIs, but the concrete mechanisms and components of GDC that should be promoted and implemented need further clarification

How can the huge digital divide in e-commerce adoption between developed and developing countries be bridged?

Speaker

Torbjorn Fredriksson

Explanation

He highlighted the stark contrast between Norway (80% online shopping) and Africa (less than 5%), indicating this gap requires targeted research and solutions

How can excellent policy objectives be effectively translated into concrete actions and capacity building?

Speaker

Luca Belli

Explanation

He expressed frustration about the gap between policy declarations and practical implementation, identifying this as a key challenge requiring further research

How can regional frameworks for data governance be developed and implemented, particularly in Latin America?

Speaker

Luca Belli

Explanation

Despite having 19 countries with data protection laws, LATAM lacks a regional framework, and Belli mentioned they have prepared suggestions that need political momentum for implementation

How can peculiar regional and local issues be effectively integrated into international digital cooperation frameworks?

Speaker

Dr. Wario Weh-Dimi

Explanation

He emphasized that while international cooperation is beneficial, local infrastructure availability and implementation challenges specific to regions like Africa need to be considered

How can duplication of work among international organizations be minimized, especially given shrinking resources?

Speaker

Torbjorn Fredriksson

Explanation

He identified this as an ongoing challenge that needs addressing to make better use of limited resources for technical assistance and capacity building

How can the relationship between digital innovation and Sustainable Development Goals be better explored and operationalized?

Speaker

Giulia Ajmone Marsan

Explanation

She mentioned this as a key area of interest for their Digital Innovation and Sustainable Economy Center, requiring further research and policy dialogue

Summary

This discussion focused on technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) and the need for multisectoral collaboration to address this growing issue. The session brought together researchers, advocates, and practitioners to share findings and identify gaps in current approaches to combating online violence against women and marginalized groups.

Neema Iyer presented research from Uganda’s 2021 elections, revealing that women politicians faced significant sexist and sexualized comments online, which deterred many from using social media for campaigning despite its affordability. Her team also studied AI’s impact on African women, finding under-representation in datasets, algorithmic discrimination, and threats to low-skilled jobs. Notably, their research on perpetrators revealed that many are minors who learn harmful behaviors in peer spaces, highlighting the need for better digital citizenship education for young people.

Ayesha Mago from the Sexual Violence Research Initiative discussed their global research agenda, which identified major gaps in TFGBV prevention strategies, understanding of perpetration patterns, and support for marginalized populations including women with disabilities and LGBTIQ+ individuals. She emphasized the disconnect between policy frameworks and actual survivor needs, noting that many well-intentioned regulations fail to provide meaningful support.

Tom Orrell highlighted the importance of context-specific approaches, sharing examples from the Philippines where local stakeholders collaborated to define TFGBV within their cultural context. The discussion revealed challenges in defining TFGBV boundaries, particularly when online harm translates to offline violence, and the critical need for safe online spaces for criminalized communities who depend on digital platforms for connection and support.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Research findings on women politicians and digital participation**: Discussion of studies showing that women politicians in Uganda faced sexist online violence during the 2021 “scientific election,” leading many to avoid social media campaigning despite its affordability and potential benefits for their campaigns.

– **AI’s discriminatory impact on African women**: Examination of how artificial intelligence systems contain data bias due to under-representation of African women, leading to algorithmic discrimination, digital surveillance issues, labor exploitation, and threats to low-skilled jobs.

– **Perpetrator-focused research and youth involvement**: Findings that a significant proportion of technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) perpetrators are minors who learn harmful behaviors in peer spaces online, highlighting the need for education about online empathy and behavior rather than focusing solely on victim-blaming.

– **Breaking down silos between communities**: Multiple speakers emphasized the critical need to connect digital rights advocates, GBV researchers, health professionals, and traditional women’s rights organizations who often work in isolation despite addressing interconnected issues.

– **Implementation challenges and survivor needs**: Discussion of gaps between policy creation and enforcement, particularly around cybercrime laws, and the need to center survivor voices in developing responses rather than focusing primarily on criminalization approaches.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to bring together researchers, practitioners, and advocates from different sectors (digital rights, gender-based violence prevention, health, policy) to share research findings, identify collaboration opportunities, and build a more connected community of practice around technology-facilitated gender-based violence.

## Overall Tone:

The discussion maintained a collaborative and solution-oriented tone throughout. It began formally with research presentations but became increasingly interactive and networking-focused as audience members shared their work and asked questions. The tone was serious given the subject matter but remained constructive and forward-looking, with speakers emphasizing opportunities for partnership and collective action rather than dwelling on problems alone.

Speakers

– **Neema Iyer**: Feminist researcher focusing on technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV), conducted studies on women politicians in Uganda’s 2021 elections, AI impact on women in Africa, and perpetrator research

– **Ayesha Mago**: Global Advocacy Director at SVRI (Sexual Violence Research Initiative), leads TFGBV work for a global research network that builds evidence on violence against women and children in low- and middle-income countries

– **Tom Orrell**: Works at Development Gateway, involved in implementation work developing tools, platforms, and policy recommendations in-country with local partners

– **Audience**: Various participants including representatives from different organizations and countries

**Additional speakers:**

– **Onu**: Secretary General of Bangladesh Internet Governance Forum

– **Representative from Digital Health and Rights Project**: Researcher studying tech-facilitated abuse among young people in Ghana, Kenya, Colombia, and Vietnam, particularly focusing on HIV communities and LGBTQ+ populations

– **Denny**: Works with organization called Tatl, builds open source software to research and respond to online harms, focuses on detection of online gender-based violence in Indian languages

– **Manpreet**: Works at Chen, involved in Survivor AI project and encryption work related to TFGBV

– **Carla**: Works for Association for Progressive Communications (APC), involved in Women’s Rights Program and Feminist Internet Research Network

– **Mia Marzot**: Digital rights advocacy lead at Oxfam, works with partners from 10 countries in the global south

– **Mohammed Aded Ali**: From Somalia, concerned about increasing digital gender-based violence

– **Santiago Danibia**: From VHRP program, trans man advocate working on safe digital spaces for trans people

– **Oni Kamakwakwa**: From Global Digital Inclusion Partnership, co-founder of Wise for Africa (feminist organization in South Africa working on feminist jurisprudence for gender-based violence cases)

# Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence: A Multisectoral Discussion on Research, Collaboration, and Prevention

## Introduction

This collaborative discussion at the Internet Governance Forum brought together researchers, advocates, and practitioners from diverse sectors to address technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV). The session featured extensive audience participation and networking, creating a dialogue that highlighted both the complexity of TFGBV and the urgent need for coordinated responses across traditional sectoral boundaries.

The discussion was anchored by three main presenters: Neema Iyer, a feminist researcher focusing on TFGBV with extensive experience studying women politicians in Uganda and AI’s impact on African women; Ayesha Mago, Global Advocacy Director at the Sexual Violence Research Initiative (SVRI), who leads TFGBV work for a global research network; and Tom Orrell, who contributed session management and facilitation. The session also featured significant contributions from audience members representing organisations across multiple countries and sectors, including digital rights advocates, health researchers, and women’s rights practitioners.

## Research Findings and Evidence Gaps

### Women Politicians and Digital Participation

Neema Iyer presented compelling research from Uganda’s 2021 elections, which she described as a “scientific election” due to COVID-19 restrictions that made digital campaigning particularly important. Her team’s findings revealed a troubling paradox in digital political participation. Whilst social media campaigning offers significant advantages for women politicians—particularly its affordability compared to traditional media—many women candidates chose to avoid these platforms entirely due to fear of online violence.

“So we actually found out it was actually really quite difficult to find the accounts of women to actually monitor because a lot of them chose to actually stay away from it instead of embracing,” Iyer explained. “Because women actually tend to really benefit from social media campaigning because it’s much more affordable… So it was a bit heartbreaking to see that they weren’t using it to its full capacity.”

The research documented extensive sexist and sexualised comments directed at women politicians, creating a hostile environment that effectively excluded them from affordable campaign tools. This finding illustrates how TFGBV creates structural barriers to democratic participation, moving beyond individual harm to systemic inequality.

### AI’s Discriminatory Impact on African Women

Iyer’s team also conducted groundbreaking research on artificial intelligence’s impact on African women, revealing multiple layers of discrimination embedded in AI systems. Their findings identified under-representation of African women in datasets used to train AI systems, leading to algorithmic discrimination that affects everything from facial recognition technology to hiring algorithms.

The research documented several key areas of concern: digital surveillance disproportionately affecting women, labour exploitation through AI-driven platforms, and threats to low-skilled jobs traditionally held by women. This work expands the understanding of TFGBV beyond social media harassment to encompass broader technological systems that perpetuate gender inequality.

### Global Research Agenda and Evidence Gaps

Ayesha Mago presented findings from SVRI’s global research agenda, which identified significant gaps in current approaches to TFGBV. The research revealed major shortcomings in prevention strategies, with current approaches focusing heavily on detection and punishment rather than addressing root causes.

“And the huge emphasis on detection and incarceration, in fact, is hindering approaches to actually preventing this kind of behaviour online,” Mago observed, challenging the dominant punitive approach to addressing online violence.

SVRI’s work identified particular gaps in understanding TFGBV’s impact on marginalised populations, including women with disabilities and LGBTIQ+ individuals. The research also highlighted a disconnect between policy frameworks and actual survivor needs, noting that many well-intentioned regulations fail to provide meaningful support to those experiencing online violence.

## Perpetrator-Focused Research and Youth Involvement

One of the most significant findings presented was Iyer’s research on TFGBV perpetrators, which revealed that a substantial proportion are minors. This discovery fundamentally challenges conventional approaches to addressing online violence.

“And quite interestingly, we found out that quite a big proportion tend to be minors. So it’s oftentimes children on the internet behaving badly,” Iyer explained. “So the question becomes then, how do we actually reach and teach younger people about how do you behave in online spaces? Because I think as humans, we’re taught so much how to behave in public… But that’s not the case once you build an account online.”

This finding suggests that many young perpetrators learn harmful behaviours in peer spaces online, where traditional social conditioning mechanisms don’t operate. The research indicates a need for education about online empathy and digital citizenship rather than focusing solely on victim-blaming or criminalisation approaches.

## Cross-Sector Collaboration and Breaking Down Silos

A central theme throughout the discussion was the critical need to break down silos between different communities working on related issues. Multiple speakers emphasised that TFGBV requires multisectoral responses that bring together digital rights advocates, GBV researchers, health professionals, and traditional women’s rights organisations.

Mago highlighted SVRI’s approach to fostering collaboration through their 300-member community of practice, which provides safe spaces for challenging conversations and resource sharing. “We run a community of practice… and we found that to be much more successful than these kinds of in-person conferences,” she noted, suggesting that online communities can be more effective for connecting diverse stakeholders globally.

Carla from the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) contributed significantly to this discussion, highlighting their Women’s Rights Program and Feminist Internet Research Network’s work in connecting researchers and advocates across different contexts.

The discussion revealed that whilst there is growing recognition of the need for collaboration, significant barriers remain. Several speakers noted that women’s rights organisations often show resistance to technical topics due to lack of digital skills and confidence, whilst technical communities may lack understanding of gender dynamics and survivor needs.

## Platform Expansion and Emerging Spaces

The discussion highlighted significant gaps in current research focus, particularly regarding platforms where young people are active. Iyer emphasised the need to expand research beyond traditional social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook to include gaming platforms such as Roblox and Fortnite, where many children spend considerable time.

This observation was supported by audience contributions, including research from the Digital Health and Rights Project showing that 75% of young people across four countries (Ghana, Kenya, Colombia, and Vietnam) experienced tech-facilitated abuse, with particularly high rates among LGBTQ+ and HIV-affected populations.

## Legal and Policy Implementation Challenges

Despite the existence of legal frameworks addressing online violence, the discussion revealed significant implementation challenges. Multiple speakers highlighted gaps between policy creation and enforcement, particularly around cybersecurity laws.

Oni Kamakwakwa from the Global Digital Inclusion Partnership provided a stark illustration of these challenges: “However, there is no knowledge of how to enforce it, including within the judiciary as well… But the reality of it is that we have women who continuously get harassed, including serious cases of revenge porn, where even the police are laughing at the incidents because they don’t realise that… this is how we expect judiciary clusters to actually respond to these cases.”

This observation highlighted how deeply embedded attitudes within law enforcement and judicial systems can undermine even well-crafted legal protections.

## Marginalised Communities and Recognition Issues

The discussion gave particular attention to the challenges faced by marginalised communities online. Santiago Danibia, a trans man advocate, raised a particularly poignant question about recognition in digital spaces: “My question is around how we work over that, over not having recognition even in the countries, and how we do or how we help or we move the idea of being recognised in the digital world, if we don’t have safe spaces even in the countries that are supposed to protect us.”

This question highlighted the intersection of legal recognition, safety, and digital inclusion for trans communities and other marginalised groups. The discussion revealed a fundamental tension in digital inclusion work: online spaces are often essential for marginalised communities to connect with support and partners, yet these same spaces can pose significant safety risks.

## Innovative Approaches and Tools

Several audience members shared innovative approaches to addressing TFGBV challenges. Denny from Tatl described building open-source software to research and respond to online harms, with a particular focus on detection of online gender-based violence in Indian languages. This work involved crowdsourcing data and developing machine learning models, with potential for replication across other countries and languages.

Manpreet from Chen discussed the Survivor AI project and encryption work related to TFGBV, highlighting how technical solutions can be developed with survivor needs in mind.

## Areas of Strong Consensus and Future Directions

The discussion revealed remarkable consensus on several key points: the need for cross-sector collaboration, shifting focus from victim-centred approaches to understanding perpetrator behaviour, addressing significant research gaps, and improving implementation of existing laws.

The session generated concrete commitments, including SVRI’s continued funding of research grants in low- and middle-income countries, encouragement for participants to join the TFGBV community of practice, and plans for follow-up networking. Iyer indicated plans to repeat the Uganda elections analysis in 2026 to compare changes over five years.

## Conclusion

This comprehensive discussion demonstrated both the complexity of technology-facilitated gender-based violence and the potential for collaborative responses across traditional sectoral boundaries. The session successfully brought together diverse perspectives and expertise, with extensive audience participation creating a foundation for continued collaboration and coordinated action.

The discussion revealed that whilst significant challenges remain—from definitional issues to implementation gaps—there is strong consensus on priority areas for action. The emphasis on perpetrator-focused research, cross-sector collaboration, and prevention-oriented approaches provides a clear direction for future work.

The collaborative tone and practical focus of the discussion, combined with concrete commitments for follow-up action, suggest that this conversation represents an important step towards more coordinated and effective responses to technology-facilitated gender-based violence.

Neema Iyer: and a number of other women politicians who participated in the 2021 elections in Uganda. And Uganda is actually going into elections again in 2026, that’s Jan next year. And we’re planning to do another analysis so that we can actually compare and look at how things have changed in the past five years. And what we found out is that women face a lot of sexist and sexualized comments online. But I think what was even more interesting, so this particular election, the president of Uganda called it a scientific election because it happened during COVID. And they were trying to reduce the number of rallies that were happening in public. So they said, let’s move more of the campaigning to an online space. But unfortunately, a lot of the women leaders don’t really have digital skills. That’s one, but there’s also the fear of what kind of online violence they might face that they don’t want to deal with. So we actually found out it was actually really quite difficult to find the accounts of women to actually monitor because a lot of them chose to actually stay away from it instead of embracing. Because women actually tend to really benefit from social media campaigning because it’s much more affordable. Like they can’t often afford the rallies or the radio shows or the TV ads, but social media is so much more affordable. So it was a bit heartbreaking to see that they weren’t using it to its full capacity. The next study we had is looking at the impact of AI on women in Africa. And we did this as part of a three-study series looking at what’s happening and what we think will continue to happen. And what we really found is that there’s an under-representation of African women in the data sets itself. So this leads to the kind of data bias. We found there’s a lot of algorithmic discrimination against marginalized women. There’s also issues of digital surveillance and censorship that AI makes very possible. There’s labor exploitation, and it also threatens low-skilled jobs. So just looking more holistically of what is AI doing to harm women in other ways beyond social media, for example. And then the last one I want to touch upon is our recent research on perpetrators. So a lot of research on TFGBV is really focused on women. Women as the victims, women should report, women should go to the police. It’s often that narrative that we see in this kind of research. And we said, OK, let’s just flip the script and see why do people engage in this kind of behavior? Why are the perpetrators of this kind of violence? And quite interestingly, we found out that quite a big proportion tend to be minors. So it’s oftentimes children on the internet behaving badly. And they learn this bad behavior in their peer spaces. So this kind of bad behavior is actually encouraged by their peers in these kind of spaces. So the question becomes then, how do we actually reach and teach younger people about how do you behave in online spaces? Because I think as humans, we’re taught so much how to behave in public. Our parents are constantly telling us what to do, what not to do. Society corrects you all the time. But that’s not the case once you build an account online. There are no rules. You can do whatever you want. You can insult anyone in whatever country. There are no repercussions, right? So it’s really trying to figure out where does this ideological radicalization happen to young people? And why are we focusing so much on victim blaming and platform inaction when there could be other pathways to reach minors to talk about empathy in online spaces? So a lot more work to be done in this sort of space. And just building into that, I think the time is really right for us to start studying the role of masculinity’s ideology. I think as a feminist researcher, we talk so much about feminist research, but I don’t think we dive deeply enough into the masculinities and what’s going on there and what is the connection to TFGBV. What are the perpetrator pathways? What does reformation look like? Why do people reform? What does that cause? And more importantly, I think we need to start looking at other platforms. I think we have focused for a long time on Twitter, Facebook. But if you look at the number of children that are playing Roblox that are on Fortnite, and I feel like we’ve barely touched the iceberg of what goes on there. So there’s a lot more research to be done, and I really hope we’ll have space to have that conversation. But I’ll pass it on to Aisha.

Ayesha Mago: Thank you, Nima. And thank you, Tom. And I think, actually, just listening to both Tom and Nima, it’s more clear than ever why we’re actually doing this together. And it’s a perfect segue from you, Nima, from what you were saying about research. Because I’m Aisha from the SVRI, that’s the Sexual Violence Research Initiative. I’m the Global Advocacy Director there, and I lead our TFGBV work. And SVRI is a global research network that builds evidence on violence against women and violence against children in low- and middle-income countries. And we do that to find out, really, what works and what doesn’t work, and to try and gather that information to really strengthen the field of violence programming and practitioners and policymaking and all of that, and at the same time, really strengthen researchers in low- and middle-income countries where there often aren’t the resources that they need to be. Within this, of course, there is a huge amount of work being done on TFGBV right now, and we do have quite a large evidence base. But there are still some really major gaps. In fact, as Nima has already mentioned, one of the key gaps is around perpetration. What we decided to do was, with some partners, the Association for Progressive Communications, UN Women, and the Global Partnership to End Online Harassment and Abuse, which is a coalition of multiple countries working on this, we decided to actually run a consultative process to create a research agenda for the field. And the point of that research agenda was to say, okay, we know there’s a lot of evidence out there, but where are the real gaps? And once we have conducted this process and identified these gaps, then we can work with researchers, with practitioners, with funders to persuade them to put resources where the real gaps are, and where the field as a whole is saying those gaps are. So we had feedback from hundreds and hundreds of people from around the world. I won’t go into the process, it’s way too long, but please do feel free to come and ask me if you’re interested in this. Because we really do believe in research priority setting as a sort of key thing for the field. And one of the areas we found that we really do not know much about is prevention, what works to prevent TFGBV, right? That includes tech company accountability, and as Tom mentioned, this whole area around safety by design and how to actually persuade tech companies to engage in that. But it also includes all the work Nima’s just talked about around perpetration. How do you stop people from perpetrating? And how do you deal with some of these really, really impactful studies that are showing that it is young people and lots of research that’s coming out of various places now that’s showing that the huge emphasis on detection and incarceration, in fact, is hindering approaches to actually preventing this kind of behavior online. We also found a big gap was on specific populations, and those are the populations that are most impacted by TFGBV. So that includes, you know, marginalized groups of women, such as women with disabilities, LGBTIQ+, populations, refugee and migrant women. So there’s an enormous invisibilization of these people in the research, even though we know that the impacts are the highest on them. Where there is data, it’s not just aggregated. Then there’s a whole area around survivor needs, and we’re going to try and talk about that a little bit more today, but it was around, like, what do survivors actually want in terms of services, and are all these policies and regulations and legal frameworks and stuff actually meeting that in any way? So the research agenda is a big part of our work on TFGBV. The other part is that we support a number of research grants all over the world, but in low- and middle-income countries, trying to drill down specifically into the areas of gaps that I’ve mentioned, and, you know, it might be work in Colombia on an app, working with the police to identify online grooming. It might be in South Africa on TFGBV and how it’s impacting specific communities of women with disabilities, young people in Nepal, gender disinformation in India. So a whole range of different research grants that we are funding, and actually a whole bunch of other stuff, but the one I want to mention I think is highly relevant in this context of bringing safety communities together is our community of practice. So we run a TFGBV community of practice. There are more than 300 members of it now. It really is a safe space to convene, to have really challenging conversations, to share resources, to share work, and right now we’re working on a partnership with UN Women where we are actually engaging in a whole series of policy dialogues so that some of the key messages, again, coming from the field can be fed into the larger global frameworks, and so that we can start saying, okay, what’s missing? What’s the field thing is missing, and, you know, how do we use the strength of some of the multilateral organizations, such as the UN, to actually get those messages across? So I mean, I’m going to stop there, other than just to say in terms of Internet Governance Forum, it’s a very, very different space for SVRI, but I think one of the key things that we really wanted to do was to start breaking some of the silos between digital rights and GBV researchers and practitioners, and we know that this is, you know, a huge, huge issue that needs multisectoral responses, but often we are not talking in the same rooms to each other, so that’s sort of a key goal for me here. Thank you.

Tom Orrell: Thank you. Thank you both. And thank you all for listening to us, and now it’s your turn to also get involved, so there’s no escape now, you’re not allowed to get up and walk away. We have a few questions for discussion, but actually before moving to those, we’d love to hear any reflections, thoughts, or any experiences of work that you’ve been doing on TFGBV, if you’d like to share with us, that would be great. We had hoped this would be a less formal networking session. This is the stage we were given. We didn’t expect to be standing on stage. Perhaps… We can go down. Should we sit on the edge of the stage, maybe, and that’s a nice kind of balance? Yeah. Yeah. Let’s go around. I’m going to just jump down. Oh. Not working. Oh, you have to lean. But… Oh, wow, that’s really… No, no one has a mic. No, for the live stream. Oh. Is it okay? All right, cool. Amazing. So would anyone like to jump in with any questions or experience sharing? And we can always move on to the conversation questions as well. One second, one second. Thank you. How do I change slides?

Audience: Good afternoon. My name is Onu from Bangladesh. I’m looking after Bangladesh Internet Governance Forum. I’m a Secretary General. Thank you very much. Your session and conversation is very well. But I have one observation regarding Ayesha. You mentioned the research funding you provide the community. You mentioned India. Do you have any planned research regarding this agenda in Bangladesh?

Ayesha Mago: So I don’t think we currently have a research grant in Bangladesh. But every year we do another set of research grants. But I don’t think we have one in Bangladesh right now, no. And not on TFGBV for sure. But we have funded research grants in Bangladesh on violence against women, yes.

Audience: Okay, okay. Your organization already involved any organization in Bangladesh?

Ayesha Mago: In the past, definitely. We’ve had partners there, yes. But I mean, we are not currently working with Bangladesh on this issue. But we would love to be. So let’s chat.

Audience: This is a bit of a comment on our work. And some questions that would be interesting to hear more about. So myself and my two colleagues, we’re from the Digital Health and Rights Project. So we’re really looking at things from a health angle. Particularly rooted in the HIV movement and communities living with and affected by HIV. We’ve just concluded a study with 300 young people in Ghana, Kenya, Colombia, and Vietnam. And we found that 75% of young people in our study had experienced tech-facilitated abuse. Some of that is along gender lines. A lot of that is around being LGBTQ+, or being part of a criminalized population of people living with HIV. So yeah, we’re really interested to connect with everyone. And learn more about this space and how we can be more engaged as we cross over multiple different spaces. And also, we really found that we were struggling to define tech-facilitated abuse and the bounds of it. So a lot of the young people were experiencing harm online, or the beginnings of harm. And then it translated into offline harm. And how we defined that was a really interesting piece of what we were talking about as a project. And the kind of classic phrase of your rights must be protected online as they are offline. And whether that really applies, because it’s quite a spectrum of both online and offline abuse. And the other really interesting conversation we’re having, and I think you kind of touched on it just there, was should we advocate for criminalization, and what other options are there? So yeah, those are the kind of questions that we would bring and want to discuss and learn more from others about. Amazing. Thank you very much. Hey, I’ll just add to the conversation around breaking silos. My name’s Denny, I’m with an organization called Tatl. Denny, we were supposed to meet. So we build open source software to research and respond to online harms. And OGPV is also one of our verticals for us. Our incentive to start this OGPV project was the lack of data sets and tooling when it comes to detection of online gender-based violence in Indian languages. So I feel like over the last two years, we’ve kind of created like a recipe where we started crowdsourcing slurs in Indian languages, annotating them and filtering them, consolidating them, whatever. And then co-create resources and machine learning models to detect OGPV in Indian languages. And I think the reason to share this with a larger group like this is that I think the process can be replicated across countries or across languages. And so happy to chat with other people who are looking to do something similar. Awesome. Super interesting. Thank you for sharing. It’s such amazing work. The lady at the back over here. And I thought there was another hand as well. Hi, my name is Manpreet from Chen. I think most of you have connected with us in different ways. Our current work, we’re actually working on Survivor AI, looking at helping, I think, again, I think all of you have connected in different ways, but just with the general other participants. Working on Survivor AI, working with where individual survivors can come onto the platform and create an escalation letter to support them and take down with any images on various different platforms. And we’re also working with European organizations around encryption and looking at how that actually impacts TBFGBV. And so, yeah, a lot of our resources around healing are in different languages as well and supporting that. So I think there’s some opportunities to connect and collaborate on different aspects around encryption and Survivor AI. Definitely, yeah, definitely. Thank you. Hi, hello everyone. I am Carla and I work for the Association for Progressive Communications. So first, thank you for starting this important conversation at the Internet Governance Forum and connecting the spaces because I think it’s quite relevant to have this conversation here as well. And I’m a huge fan of SVRI and policy and the work that they do and the work that we do together. I’m happy to say that APC, as some of you mentioned it too, that you have worked with us and we work with you. And it’s happy to see that there are more people that we can collaborate with on online gender-based violence or now TFGBV and these acronyms that we have on this subject. And yes, as APC, we have different approaches to the issue. And these approaches include as well research, capacity building, movement building. So APC has the Women’s Rights Program and in the Women’s Rights Program we have the Feminist Internet Research Network. And right now we are on the third cycle of research, specifically on technology-facilitated gender-based violence. We also have the platform GenderIT.org and through the platform it’s a think tank of feminist advocates who bring their voices and share from their own experiences on issues related to feminist internet, including technology-facilitated gender-based violence. We also have the Feminist Principles of the Internet and one of the principles is specifically on violence. So anyway, that’s just a very broad, small introduction of the work that APC does. We have a booth if you want to go and take a look. But I’m just excited to be here and to share with you and to learn from you as well, so thank you.

Neema Iyer: I’d also like to mention that the first project that I mentioned where we did the Africa-wide research was part of the Feminist Internet Research Network and it was really being a part of that network that actually set all our other feminist work in motion. I think it was really a transformative program and yeah, I just really appreciate having been a part of it all those years ago.

Audience: That’s great. Hi, thank you so much for convening this space. My name is Mia Marzot and I work for Oxfam. I’m the digital rights advocacy lead and particularly also have a booth right around the corner because we’re bringing together partners from 10 different countries in the so-called global south with the aim of making sure that the needs and perspectives of communities that are not necessarily always in these spaces are here. So we see Oxfam’s roles as acting a bit as a convener or raising the voices of the feminist young activists and organizations that we work with and partner with. And on that point, because you mentioned breaking silos and also the importance of making sure that this evidence that you’re gathering or the projects that you’re implementing are actually acted upon, that they don’t just remain words on a page as much as important it is to have words on a page. It’s great to see you guys here, but in, I guess, my question is in the more traditional spaces that have been looking at women’s rights and safety of women and girls, which opportunities do you see coming up, as in where can the technical community or the private sector tech companies should be engaging with? One place that comes to mind is the CSW, the Commission on the Status of Women. This year’s meeting had a very, very small focus on tech-facilitated gender-based violence and very little mention of it, although it’s an increasingly prevalent and important issue. So I guess my question is, what has been your experience in trying to bring some of the people that are maybe in this community, in these other spaces, and what opportunities do you see coming up where maybe we can join forces a little bit more as organizations or people concerned with this issue? We’ll come around here. Thank you very much for your presentation, much appreciated. My name is Mohammed Aded Ali, I’m from Somalia. Gender-based violence by digital is increasing, mainly women and girls, because blackmailing as well as harassing is an arena of digital issues. So, in your research, your prospective strategy, how that increasing violence can reduce, as well as who can take the responsibility of that increasing, because some of the country doesn’t have any policy or regulatory protecting the women and girls. That’s my question, thank you very much. Thank you.

Tom Orrell: We’ll come back to that. Thank you so much for all those reflections and inputs. We have some more, I was going to say, are there any more? Please keep it coming. We’ve got about 15 minutes left, so we can keep doing this for a few more minutes. Yeah, we can keep the conversation going. And also, if people want to respond to things that they’ve heard and questions that they’ve heard from others, please do jump in. It’s not just us.

Neema Iyer: If you have questions on things other people have mentioned.

Audience: Hi, my name is Santiago Danibia. I’m from the VHRP program, as my colleague said. So, I have a question. It’s around doing the project. We experienced the need to bring safe spaces, digital spaces, to trans people, making advocacy and incidency, over and even in the idea of a recognition of trans people in the difference, because usually when people talk about trans people, they only assume that trans people are trans women. I’m a trans man, and getting the idea of people recognizing myself and my community and my population around we being trans also has been one of our needs. And I wanted to ask a question, because you know that recently in the UK, the categorization about a woman becomes really hard for trans women, because they stop being recognized as women. So, my question is around how we work over that, over not having recognition even in the countries, and how we do or how we help or we move the idea of being recognized in the digital world, if we don’t have safe spaces even in the countries that are supposed to protect us. That’s a question.

Ayesha Mago: Possible question. That is such a hard question. I know. Nima, you take that. That joke is very nuanced as well.

Audience: Hello, my name is Oni Kamakwakwa. I’m from the Global Digital Inclusion Partnership, where we work on advancing meaningful connectivity for the global majority. And I guess my question is how do we make sure that standards for inclusion, for digital inclusion, begin to more boldly identify online safety as one of the things that actually impedes inclusion? So, it’s very uncomfortable to continuously be advocating for digital inclusion when there’s a whole population that is endangered by being included online specifically. So, that’s just one question. Also, personally, I’m a co-founder of a feminist organization in South Africa called Wise for Africa, that works on building feminist jurisprudence in how courts address gender-based violence specifically. And one of the things we’ve observed with online violence against women is that we always have really great policies, cybersecurity laws that criminalize the behavior. However, there is no knowledge of how to enforce it, including within the judiciary as well. Any insights and examples you can share with us for how we actually get past that hurdle? Because I feel like we are stuck on celebrating this amazing law. But the reality of it is that we have women who continuously get harassed, including serious cases of revenge porn, where even the police are laughing at the incidents because they don’t realize that, in the same way you see someone speeding down the highway and you chase them because they’ve broken a law, this is how we expect judiciary clusters to actually respond to these cases. So, are we making any progress, really, on the legal front, in terms of just enforcing these amazing policies and cybercrime laws that we are adopting?

Ayesha Mago: Sure.

Neema Iyer: There was a question on how to bring other spaces in. I do find some of the other questions were very difficult questions, but this one I feel I can answer. I actually want to talk about another research project that we had. It’s called Afrofeminist Data Futures. In that project, we talked to women’s rights organizations from all across Africa. I think we spoke to 40 organizations, but we mapped all of them, and we asked them about how they use data, their thoughts on data, just what do they think of their data future. We did this study in different languages. We did it with an Anglophone group, a Francophone group, and a Lusophone group. What I think was one of the most interesting insights is that as you moved across these languages, so countries colonized by the English, the French, and the Portuguese, you could really see, also going back to questions of digital inclusion, that there was a lesser and lesser understanding or skill level of digital skills. What I really felt was that there was a resistance to talking about data, to talking about digital rights, because they felt that it was really outside their domain of expertise. They felt like, okay, I’ve been doing women’s rights for many years, I understand this, I understand the pain of all these other issues, but when it came to talking about anything technical, they really would shy away. I’ve actually also experienced this when I’ve done trainings. I’ve done trainings with the most amazing people, talking about their times in Uganda, all the things they’ve been through, and then I come to train them on a data collection tool, and they become a different person. They just suddenly are very helpless. And so I think it really comes down to bringing them into the spaces, so us going into those spaces and them coming into our spaces, and getting rid of that fear of not knowing. So yeah, I think sort of what you’re doing, like bringing organizations to this convening, I think are really, really important. I also know the… Have you heard of the African School of Internet Governance? It’s another really amazing program. So I think all these programs, like FUN, AFRICIG, I think they’re so instrumental in bringing these different voices. And I don’t know if there are similar initiatives in other countries, but I think that they are very instrumental and there should be more of them. So answering that question.

Ayesha Mago: Great. Pass it on to you. So I wanted to quickly pick up on what you had mentioned about the measurement issues, because that’s a really, really big gap. And just very quickly, what I wanted to say was it came up big time in the research agenda that we still don’t have clear definitions. So how can we deal with, measure all of that? Lots of organizations are doing work on this. So I’ll share resources with you. And I’d love to hear more about your study as well. Remind me of other questions. I’ve got a whole list.

Tom Orrell: Okay, go on. I think there was a good question about where can the technical community and private sector companies be engaged in these spaces? Where can we join forces a little bit more?

Ayesha Mago: Right. I mean, just to add to what Nima was saying, I’m sure you have some ideas on this as well. But just to add, one thing we have found really successful, and maybe more successful than these in-person conferences, is something like the community of practice. Because people from all over the world and from all sorts of different sectors come to those meetings. And I mean, although they are online, it is a chance to really exchange views, exchange work, get to know about people’s programming and stuff that’s happening in all sorts of places that you just don’t. And often forums like this are actually very difficult to make those connections, right? I mean, I went to RightsCon last year, and I found it really hard to actually just keep a handle on things. So I would say those sorts of online communities are great spaces. And to keep pulling the tech sector in and not let them say no, I think that’s important. Yeah, I mean,

Tom Orrell: I’d add a couple of points to that on that particular question. From our perspective, and at Development Gateway, we do a lot of implementation work. So we work in-country with local partners to kind of develop tools, develop platforms, develop policy recommendations in-country. And I think from that development point of view, the closer you are to the context, the better your community is going to be and the more effective it’s likely to be. In the Philippines, we convened a two-day workshop bringing together national regulators, the local police force, representatives from city-level gender-based violence desks, together with media, media academics, local civil society groups, international civil society groups, UN women, all of these people in a room together. And we spent the first day basically talking about what TFGBV was in the Philippines. What is it here? Some people work on online. It’s a besmirchment and defamatory practice essentially, but it is a form of TFGBV when it’s gendered and it has become that in the country. So you uncover the nuances and the local practices and the local issues when you engage with people at that level. I think the value and the relevance of fora like the IGF is sharing and learning and building those communities of practice across country, across regions, across thematic areas, learning from each other, hopefully building synergies and sharing information as we move forward through those online spaces. But I think it’s also important for us to be able to feed into policy discussions and policy outcomes. What exactly we want to be saying, I don’t know, beyond platforms should be accountable for removing bad content. But I think that’s a very tricky question. There were a couple of other points I wanted to make in relation to some of the other questions. We’ve got about three and a half minutes, I’m not going to hog it all, don’t worry. I think you’re doing some really interesting work there on that intersection of SRH. Some of the comments that I just make I think apply to what you were saying as well, which is how do you actually define the parameters of TFGBV? I wanted to share a really cool experience that I had talking to someone who worked on sexual and reproductive health in the Philippines. She was part of the workshop I just mentioned, and she works for a local foundation in the Philippines that supports the training and deployment of frontline SRH workers. It hadn’t actually occurred to me, okay, wow, how do you integrate TFGBV into the work of a frontline SRH worker? Because it is a form of mental well-being that they need to support when you’re dealing especially with younger people who have this enormous access and presence online. For me, it was just a really interesting thing that I hadn’t, hands up, I hadn’t thought of that intersection before. But I think it just goes to show just how pervasive the digital aspect of our lives is. The point that you made about online harms then manifesting in the physical world, I think it’s been true for a while. But I think with TFGBV issues in particular, it’s especially poignant and especially painful I think for survivors, especially image-based abuse, et cetera. Those images, even when removed from some platforms, are likely to be somewhere in cyberspace for perpetuity, in perpetuity really. So the damage can be extremely long-lasting in the physical world. And that link with SRH I think is something that’s well worth teasing out. And what can we learn from successful SRH approaches over the last 20, 30 years, and how do we apply that to TFGBV? Those are some of the things I wanted to just share. We have about a minute and a half each. Maybe some final thoughts from my colleagues here, and then final thoughts really quickly.

Ayesha Mago: One and a half minutes. I just wanted to say one thing about what you were saying about how can you be recognized online when you are not recognized in the real world? I mean, we know both are the real world. And I do not have an answer for that question. But what I will say is that this incredibly difficult line specifically for communities that are discriminated against in public life, and therefore how important it is actually to access the online space, and then how do you navigate that online space? And it connects to what our colleague behind was also saying about like, but the online space is dangerous. But that online space is critical, right? Because for many people in communities that are criminalized, that is in fact the only space they have sometimes to connect with support communities, to connect with intimate partners, all of that. So while I do not have an answer to that, I think your point just makes it so much more important around how we have to make online spaces safe. And we have to keep fighting that fight. Yeah. Yeah.

Neema Iyer: I think I will take the last 15 seconds to just say thank you to everyone who contributed, everyone who asked questions. I think we were able to get the networking going a little bit. It was really interesting to hear about all the work that you are doing. So thank you for coming and making the session less awkward. I really appreciate it. Thank you all for being here. Thank you. Thank you so much. We did want to just say as well, for those who are interested in taking the network forward, there is a bar in the next room. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Agreement points

Need for cross-sector collaboration and breaking down silos

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Ayesha Mago
– Tom Orrell
– Audience

Arguments

Breaking silos between digital rights and GBV researchers is crucial for multisectoral responses to TFGBV

Context-specific implementation with local partners brings together diverse stakeholders more effectively than broad international forums

Women’s rights organizations across Africa show resistance to technical topics due to lack of digital skills and confidence

Summary

All speakers agreed that TFGBV requires multisectoral responses and that breaking down silos between different communities (digital rights, GBV researchers, women’s rights organizations, technical communities) is essential for effective solutions.

Topics

Gender rights online | Interdisciplinary approaches | Development

Research gaps and need for better definitions

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Ayesha Mago
– Audience

Arguments

Research needs to expand beyond Twitter and Facebook to platforms like Roblox and Fortnite where many children are active

Major research gaps exist in prevention strategies, specific marginalized populations, and survivor needs that current policies don’t address

Clear definitions are still lacking, making measurement and response difficult across organizations

Difficulty in defining tech-facilitated abuse boundaries when online harm translates to offline harm across a spectrum

Summary

Speakers consistently identified significant gaps in TFGBV research, including lack of clear definitions, insufficient focus on prevention, and need to expand research to new platforms and marginalized populations.

Topics

Gender rights online | Legal and regulatory | Children rights

Focus on perpetrators and prevention rather than victim-blaming

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Ayesha Mago

Arguments

Research on perpetrators reveals many are minors who learn harmful behavior from peers, suggesting need for education on online empathy rather than victim-blaming

Research shows emphasis on detection and incarceration hinders prevention approaches to online harmful behavior

Summary

Both speakers advocated for shifting focus from victim-centered approaches to understanding and preventing perpetrator behavior, particularly among young people.

Topics

Gender rights online | Children rights | Cybersecurity

Implementation and enforcement gaps in existing laws

Speakers

– Ayesha Mago
– Audience

Arguments

Research shows emphasis on detection and incarceration hinders prevention approaches to online harmful behavior

Despite good cybersecurity laws criminalizing behavior, there’s lack of knowledge on enforcement within judiciary systems

Police and courts often don’t understand severity of cases like revenge porn, treating them dismissively rather than as serious crimes

Summary

Speakers agreed that while laws exist to address TFGBV, there are significant gaps in implementation and enforcement, with justice systems lacking understanding of the severity of these crimes.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Gender rights online | Cybersecurity

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the need for more comprehensive research approaches that go beyond traditional victim-focused studies to understand perpetrator behavior and develop prevention strategies.

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Ayesha Mago

Arguments

Need to study masculinity ideologies and perpetrator pathways for reformation rather than focusing solely on feminist research

Major research gaps exist in prevention strategies, specific marginalized populations, and survivor needs that current policies don’t address

Topics

Gender rights online | Sociocultural | Human rights principles

Both recognized the paradox that vulnerable and marginalized communities most need online spaces for connection and support, yet these same spaces pose significant safety risks, creating tension in digital inclusion efforts.

Speakers

– Ayesha Mago
– Audience

Arguments

Online spaces are critical for criminalized communities to connect with support and partners, making safety even more important

Need to address how online safety impediments affect digital inclusion efforts for vulnerable populations

Topics

Gender rights online | Human rights principles | Development

Both emphasized the importance of working within local contexts and building capacity among traditional women’s rights organizations to engage with technical aspects of TFGBV.

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Tom Orrell

Arguments

Women’s rights organizations across Africa show resistance to technical topics due to lack of digital skills and confidence

Context-specific implementation with local partners brings together diverse stakeholders more effectively than broad international forums

Topics

Development | Gender rights online | Interdisciplinary approaches

Unexpected consensus

Online communities more effective than in-person conferences

Speakers

– Ayesha Mago
– Tom Orrell

Arguments

Online communities of practice are more successful than in-person conferences for connecting diverse sectors globally

Context-specific implementation with local partners brings together diverse stakeholders more effectively than broad international forums

Explanation

Despite being at an in-person conference (IGF), speakers agreed that online communities and local context-specific gatherings are more effective for meaningful collaboration than large international forums, which is somewhat counterintuitive given the setting.

Topics

Interdisciplinary approaches | Development

Gaming platforms as critical research frontier

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Audience

Arguments

Research needs to expand beyond Twitter and Facebook to platforms like Roblox and Fortnite where many children are active

75% of young people in study across four countries experienced tech-facilitated abuse, particularly LGBTQ+ and HIV-affected populations

Explanation

The consensus on gaming platforms as a critical but understudied area for TFGBV research was unexpected, as these platforms are often not considered in traditional discussions of online gender-based violence.

Topics

Children rights | Gender rights online | Cybersecurity

Overall assessment

Summary

Strong consensus emerged around the need for cross-sector collaboration, shifting from victim-focused to prevention-focused approaches, addressing research and definitional gaps, and recognizing implementation challenges in existing legal frameworks. Speakers also agreed on the importance of local context and the particular vulnerabilities of marginalized communities online.

Consensus level

High level of consensus with complementary rather than conflicting viewpoints. The agreement suggests a mature field where practitioners and researchers have identified common challenges and are aligned on priority areas for action. This consensus provides a strong foundation for collaborative efforts and coordinated advocacy, though the challenge remains in translating this agreement into concrete action across different sectors and contexts.

Different viewpoints

Unexpected differences

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion showed minimal disagreement, with speakers largely building on each other’s points collaboratively. The only disagreements were methodological – about whether online or in-person engagement is more effective, and different emphases on prevention strategies.

Disagreement level

Very low level of disagreement. This was primarily a collaborative knowledge-sharing session rather than a debate. The speakers demonstrated strong alignment on core issues and complementary expertise. The methodological differences actually strengthen the overall approach by offering multiple pathways to address TFGBV, suggesting that different strategies may be appropriate for different contexts and stakeholders.

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the need for more comprehensive research approaches that go beyond traditional victim-focused studies to understand perpetrator behavior and develop prevention strategies.

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Ayesha Mago

Arguments

Need to study masculinity ideologies and perpetrator pathways for reformation rather than focusing solely on feminist research

Major research gaps exist in prevention strategies, specific marginalized populations, and survivor needs that current policies don’t address

Topics

Gender rights online | Sociocultural | Human rights principles

Both recognized the paradox that vulnerable and marginalized communities most need online spaces for connection and support, yet these same spaces pose significant safety risks, creating tension in digital inclusion efforts.

Speakers

– Ayesha Mago
– Audience

Arguments

Online spaces are critical for criminalized communities to connect with support and partners, making safety even more important

Need to address how online safety impediments affect digital inclusion efforts for vulnerable populations

Topics

Gender rights online | Human rights principles | Development

Both emphasized the importance of working within local contexts and building capacity among traditional women’s rights organizations to engage with technical aspects of TFGBV.

Speakers

– Neema Iyer
– Tom Orrell

Arguments

Women’s rights organizations across Africa show resistance to technical topics due to lack of digital skills and confidence

Context-specific implementation with local partners brings together diverse stakeholders more effectively than broad international forums

Topics

Development | Gender rights online | Interdisciplinary approaches

Key takeaways

TFGBV research reveals significant gaps in prevention strategies, with current approaches focusing too heavily on victim-blaming rather than perpetrator intervention and education

Many TFGBV perpetrators are minors who learn harmful behavior from peers, indicating need for early intervention and online empathy education rather than criminalization approaches

Women politicians and marginalized communities avoid beneficial digital spaces due to fear of online violence, missing opportunities for affordable campaigning and community connection

Cross-sector collaboration between digital rights advocates and GBV researchers is essential but currently limited by siloed approaches and lack of shared spaces

AI and algorithmic systems perpetuate discrimination against African women and marginalized groups due to under-representation in datasets

Legal frameworks exist but enforcement remains problematic due to lack of understanding within judiciary and law enforcement systems

Online communities of practice are more effective than in-person conferences for connecting diverse global stakeholders across sectors

Research must expand beyond mainstream platforms like Twitter and Facebook to include gaming platforms where many children are active

Context-specific, local implementation with diverse stakeholders is more effective than broad international approaches

Resolutions and action items

SVRI to continue funding research grants in low- and middle-income countries targeting identified evidence gaps

Participants encouraged to join the 300-member TFGBV community of practice for ongoing collaboration

Follow-up networking planned for bar session to continue building connections

Uganda elections analysis to be repeated in 2026 to compare changes over five years

Replication of Indian language OGPV detection process across other countries and languages

Continued policy dialogues with UN Women to feed field messages into global frameworks

Unresolved issues

How to ensure legal recognition and safety for trans people in digital spaces when they lack recognition in their home countries

How to balance digital inclusion advocacy with online safety concerns for vulnerable populations

How to effectively enforce existing cybersecurity laws and educate judiciary systems on TFGBV severity

How to define clear boundaries of tech-facilitated abuse when online and offline harms intersect

How to bring technical and private sector communities into traditional women’s rights spaces like CSW

How to address increasing digital gender-based violence in countries lacking protective policies

How to overcome digital skills gaps and technical intimidation among women’s rights organizations

Suggested compromises

Using online communities of practice as alternative to challenging in-person conference networking

Focusing on local, context-specific implementation while maintaining global knowledge sharing through forums like IGF

Shifting from criminalization-focused approaches to education and prevention strategies for young perpetrators

Combining survivor-centered approaches with perpetrator-focused research rather than choosing one over the other

So we actually found out it was actually really quite difficult to find the accounts of women to actually monitor because a lot of them chose to actually stay away from it instead of embracing. Because women actually tend to really benefit from social media campaigning because it’s much more affordable… So it was a bit heartbreaking to see that they weren’t using it to its full capacity.

Speaker

Neema Iyer

Reason

This comment reveals a profound paradox in digital participation – that the very tool that could democratize political participation for women (social media) becomes inaccessible due to fear of violence. It challenges the assumption that digital spaces are inherently empowering and highlights how online violence creates systemic barriers to political participation.

Impact

This insight reframed the discussion from simply addressing online violence to understanding how it creates structural inequalities. It established the foundation for later discussions about digital inclusion and safety, showing how online violence isn’t just individual harm but a barrier to democratic participation.

And quite interestingly, we found out that quite a big proportion tend to be minors. So it’s oftentimes children on the internet behaving badly… So the question becomes then, how do we actually reach and teach younger people about how do you behave in online spaces? Because I think as humans, we’re taught so much how to behave in public… But that’s not the case once you build an account online.

Speaker

Neema Iyer

Reason

This comment fundamentally shifts the narrative from victim-blaming to understanding perpetration patterns. It challenges the typical focus on adult perpetrators and introduces the concept that online spaces lack the social conditioning mechanisms that exist in physical spaces. This insight suggests entirely different intervention strategies.

Impact

This observation redirected the conversation toward prevention and education rather than just response and punishment. It influenced later audience questions about enforcement versus other approaches, and sparked discussion about how to create accountability in digital spaces where traditional social norms don’t automatically apply.

And the huge emphasis on detection and incarceration, in fact, is hindering approaches to actually preventing this kind of behavior online.

Speaker

Ayesha Mago

Reason

This comment challenges the dominant punitive approach to addressing online violence, suggesting that current strategies may be counterproductive. It introduces a critical perspective on criminal justice responses and opens space for alternative approaches focused on prevention and rehabilitation.

Impact

This insight prompted several audience members to question criminalization approaches, including the audience member who asked ‘should we advocate for criminalization, and what other options are there?’ It shifted the discussion toward more nuanced approaches to addressing perpetration.

So, it’s very uncomfortable to continuously be advocating for digital inclusion when there’s a whole population that is endangered by being included online specifically.

Speaker

Oni Kamakwakwa

Reason

This comment exposes a fundamental tension in digital rights work – the conflict between promoting digital access and acknowledging that digital spaces can be dangerous for marginalized groups. It challenges the field to grapple with this uncomfortable reality rather than treating inclusion as an unqualified good.

Impact

This observation deepened the complexity of the discussion by highlighting how safety and inclusion can be in tension. It connected to earlier points about women politicians avoiding social media and reinforced the need for safety-first approaches to digital inclusion.

My question is around how we work over that, over not having recognition even in the countries, and how we do or how we help or we move the idea of being recognized in the digital world, if we don’t have safe spaces even in the countries that are supposed to protect us.

Speaker

Santiago Danibia

Reason

This question from a trans man highlights how offline marginalization compounds online vulnerability. It challenges the discussion to consider how digital safety intersects with broader systems of recognition and protection, particularly for trans communities facing legal erasure.

Impact

This question prompted Ayesha Mago to acknowledge the complexity of the issue and emphasize how critical online spaces become for criminalized communities, even when dangerous. It added intersectional depth to the conversation and highlighted how online safety is particularly crucial for those without offline protections.

However, there is no knowledge of how to enforce it, including within the judiciary as well… But the reality of it is that we have women who continuously get harassed, including serious cases of revenge porn, where even the police are laughing at the incidents because they don’t realize that… this is how we expect judiciary clusters to actually respond to these cases.

Speaker

Oni Kamakwakwa

Reason

This comment exposes the gap between policy and implementation, showing how even good laws fail without proper understanding and training. The detail about police laughing at cases illustrates how deeply embedded attitudes undermine legal protections.

Impact

This observation grounded the theoretical discussion in practical realities of implementation. It highlighted that having laws isn’t enough and that cultural change within institutions is necessary for meaningful progress.

Overall assessment

These key comments fundamentally shaped the discussion by challenging conventional approaches and revealing systemic complexities. The conversation evolved from a focus on documenting harm to understanding structural barriers, from punitive responses to prevention strategies, and from simple solutions to nuanced intersectional analysis. The most impactful comments introduced paradoxes – such as digital tools being both empowering and dangerous, or inclusion efforts potentially increasing harm – that forced participants to grapple with uncomfortable tensions in the field. The discussion became increasingly sophisticated as speakers built on each other’s insights, moving from individual experiences to systemic analysis and from single-sector solutions to multi-stakeholder approaches. The audience participation was particularly valuable in bringing diverse perspectives that deepened the complexity of the conversation and highlighted implementation challenges that pure research or policy discussions might miss.

How do we actually reach and teach younger people about how to behave in online spaces?

Speaker

Neema Iyer

Explanation

This is important because research shows that a significant proportion of TFGBV perpetrators are minors who learn bad behavior in peer spaces online, where there are no clear rules or consequences unlike in physical public spaces.

Where does this ideological radicalization happen to young people?

Speaker

Neema Iyer

Explanation

Understanding the pathways of radicalization is crucial for developing effective prevention strategies targeting young perpetrators of online violence.

What is the role of masculinity’s ideology in TFGBV?

Speaker

Neema Iyer

Explanation

This research gap is important because while there’s extensive feminist research on TFGBV, there’s insufficient exploration of masculinities and their connection to perpetration.

What are the perpetrator pathways and what does reformation look like?

Speaker

Neema Iyer

Explanation

Understanding how people become perpetrators and how they can be reformed is essential for developing effective intervention and prevention programs.

What goes on in gaming platforms like Roblox and Fortnite regarding TFGBV?

Speaker

Neema Iyer

Explanation

This is a significant research gap as many children use these platforms, but research has focused primarily on traditional social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook.

Do you have any planned research regarding this agenda in Bangladesh?

Speaker

Onu from Bangladesh

Explanation

This represents a geographic gap in current research coverage and potential for expanding TFGBV research to underrepresented regions.

How do we define tech-facilitated abuse and its bounds, especially when harm translates from online to offline?

Speaker

Digital Health and Rights Project representative

Explanation

Clear definitions are crucial for research, policy development, and intervention strategies, especially given the interconnected nature of online and offline harm.

Should we advocate for criminalization of TFGBV, and what other options are there?

Speaker

Digital Health and Rights Project representative

Explanation

This is important because research shows that emphasis on detection and incarceration may actually hinder approaches to preventing online violence.

How can the process of creating datasets and machine learning models for OGPV detection be replicated across countries or languages?

Speaker

Denny from Tatl

Explanation

This addresses the critical gap in detection tools for non-English languages and could improve global capacity for identifying and responding to TFGBV.

Where can the technical community or private sector tech companies engage with traditional women’s rights spaces?

Speaker

Mia Marzot from Oxfam

Explanation

Breaking down silos between technical and women’s rights communities is essential for comprehensive approaches to addressing TFGBV.

How can increasing digital violence be reduced and who can take responsibility, especially in countries without protective policies?

Speaker

Mohammed Aded Ali from Somalia

Explanation

This addresses the urgent need for prevention strategies and accountability mechanisms, particularly in contexts with weak regulatory frameworks.

How do we help trans people gain recognition in the digital world when they don’t have safe spaces even in countries that are supposed to protect them?

Speaker

Santiago Danibia

Explanation

This highlights the intersection of legal recognition, safety, and digital inclusion for marginalized communities, particularly trans individuals.

How do we make sure that standards for digital inclusion identify online safety as an impediment to inclusion?

Speaker

Oni Kamakwakwa

Explanation

This is crucial because promoting digital inclusion without addressing safety concerns can actually endanger vulnerable populations.

How do we get past the hurdle of enforcing cybersecurity laws and policies, including within the judiciary?

Speaker

Oni Kamakwakwa

Explanation

This addresses the critical gap between policy development and implementation, where good laws exist but enforcement mechanisms and knowledge are lacking.

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.