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Summary

This session focused on addressing digital divides and promoting equitable access to computing resources, particularly in developing countries and marginalized communities. Participants discussed various challenges, including inadequate infrastructure, high internet costs, and lack of digital literacy, especially in rural areas and among women. They emphasized the need for multilingual approaches to digital education and the importance of localizing development efforts.

Speakers highlighted the role of collaboration between governments, private sectors, and civil society in bridging these gaps. They stressed the importance of creating favorable policies to attract investment in digital infrastructure and promote cross-border data exchange. The discussion also touched on the potential of emerging technologies like AI and blockchain, while acknowledging the need to prioritize basic digital literacy for many communities.

Capacity building emerged as a crucial theme, with participants emphasizing the need to categorize and tailor digital literacy efforts to different skill levels. The importance of mentorship and continuous learning was highlighted, along with the potential of community-driven initiatives like community networks. Speakers also discussed the ethical considerations of technology use and the need for people-centered approaches.

The session concluded with participants envisioning a fully digital world characterized by connectivity, empowerment, accessibility, and shared computational resources that uplift all rather than deepen inequalities. Overall, the discussion underscored the complex challenges in achieving digital equity and the multifaceted approaches required to address them.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– Digital divide and inequalities in access to technology, especially in developing countries and rural areas

– Need for digital literacy and capacity building initiatives, tailored to different levels

– Importance of infrastructure development and affordable connectivity

– Multi-stakeholder collaboration and policy frameworks to support digital inclusion

– Localization of digital solutions and content to reach underserved communities

The overall purpose of the discussion was to explore ways to bridge the digital divide and ensure more equitable access to computing resources and digital technologies, particularly for developing countries and marginalized communities.

The tone of the discussion was passionate and solutions-oriented. Participants shared personal experiences and perspectives from their countries, creating an atmosphere of mutual learning. The tone became increasingly action-oriented as speakers proposed concrete ideas for addressing challenges. There was a sense of urgency but also optimism about the potential for positive change through collaboration and targeted efforts.

Speakers

– MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Coordinator for the youth IGF in Tanzania, ITU generation connect youth envoy

– NOAH ABDELBAKI: Instructor in the PAYAIG in the Arabic cohort, Engineer from Egypt

– ATANAS BAIZIRA: Software engineer, Coordinator for the youth IGF in the Democratic Republic of Congo

– CHRIS ODU: From Nigeria

– MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI: African youth ambassador in Internet Governance, Binti Digitale ambassador from Tanzania

– DR. MONOJIT: Researcher at internet governance, works at a think tank of the government of India

Additional speakers:

– OSEY KEGHYA: From Ghana

– KENDI KOSA: From Mozambique

– SOBY ABRAHAM FIFI:

– RAZEN ZAKARIA: Abayag ambassador from Egypt

– RAPID SUN: From Cambodia

– GRACE: From Cameroon

Expanded Summary of Discussion on Bridging the Digital Divide

This session brought together a diverse group of speakers from various countries to address the pressing issue of digital divides and promote equitable access to computing resources, with a particular focus on developing countries and marginalized communities.

Introduction of Speakers and Their Backgrounds

The discussion featured speakers from different regions, including:

– Atanas Baizira from Uganda

– Millenium Anthony from Nigeria

– Matilda Moses-Mashauri from Tanzania

– Soby Abraham Fifi from Cameroon

– Kendi Kosa from Kenya

– Dr. Monojit from India

– Chris Odu from Nigeria

– Noah Abdelbaki from Egypt

– Osey Keghya from Cameroon

Each speaker brought unique perspectives based on their experiences in their respective countries.

Recognizing the Digital Divide

Chris Odu emphasized the importance of first identifying and accepting the problem of the digital divide before seeking solutions. This set the tone for a frank discussion about the challenges faced in different regions.

Key Challenges in Digital Access and Literacy

The speakers identified several significant challenges hindering digital inclusion:

1. Infrastructure and Connectivity: Atanas Baizira highlighted the lack of digital infrastructure in rural areas, while Millenium Anthony pointed out the high cost of internet access as a major barrier.

2. Gender Inequality: Matilda Moses-Mashauri shared her personal experiences from rural Tanzania, emphasizing the disparity in access to digital resources between genders. She underscored the need for targeted efforts to ensure equal opportunities for girls and boys.

3. Language Barriers: Atanas Baizira noted that language differences pose a significant obstacle in accessing digital content and education.

4. Basic Digital Literacy: Soby Abraham Fifi stressed the widespread lack of basic digital literacy skills, particularly in underserved communities.

Strategies for Bridging the Digital Divide

The discussion yielded several proposed strategies to address these challenges:

1. Multilingual Approaches: Atanas Baizira advocated for digital literacy training in local languages to make content more accessible and understandable. He highlighted the PAYAIG program’s approach to providing training in multiple languages.

2. Public-Private Partnerships: Kendi Kosa suggested leveraging partnerships between the public and private sectors to develop digital infrastructure.

3. Localized Capacity Building: Matilda Moses-Mashauri emphasized the importance of tailoring capacity building efforts to local needs and contexts, drawing from her experiences in Tanzania.

4. Cross-Border Collaboration: Dr. Monojit proposed increased collaboration between countries to share best practices in digital development.

5. Mentorship Programs: Chris Odu highlighted the value of mentorship and guidance for technology learners. He also suggested utilizing resources like ITU Academy and YouTube for learning about technology.

Role of Different Stakeholders

The speakers agreed on the importance of multi-stakeholder collaboration but had varying emphases on the roles of different actors:

1. Government: Chris Odu stressed the government’s role in creating favorable policies to support digital inclusion.

2. Private Sector: Noah Abdelbaki focused on the need for private sector investment in digital infrastructure.

3. Civil Society: Millenium Anthony highlighted the crucial role of civil society in grassroots digital literacy efforts.

4. Youth: Osey Keghya emphasized the importance of youth involvement in shaping digital policies and the need for continuous learning and innovation in addressing digital divide issues.

Emerging Technologies and Developing Countries

The discussion also touched on the potential and challenges of emerging technologies:

1. Data Exchange Frameworks: Noah Abdelbaki called for the development of policies to support data exchange between countries.

2. AI and E-commerce: Chris Odu and Atanas Baizira discussed the potential of AI and e-commerce for development, while also acknowledging the need for ethical considerations in technology use.

3. Mobile Banking: Atanas Baizira highlighted opportunities for innovation in mobile banking.

4. Adoption Challenges: Rapid Sun raised questions about the difficulties in adopting advanced technologies like AI without basic infrastructure in place.

Ethical Considerations and People-Centered Technologies

Atanas Baizira emphasized the importance of ethical use of technology and the need for people-centered technologies that address local needs and contexts.

Audience Questions and Concerns

The discussion included questions from the audience:

1. Grace from Cameroon asked about how to start learning about technology.

2. Razen Zakaria inquired about internet justice and equality in countries affected by war.

3. Rapid Sun questioned AI infrastructure development and collaboration between developing countries.

Visions for a Fully Digital World

The session concluded with each panelist sharing their vision of a fully digital world, emphasizing themes of inclusivity, equal access, and the transformative power of technology for development.

In conclusion, this discussion highlighted the complex challenges in achieving digital equity and the multifaceted approaches required to address them. The speakers emphasized the need for collaborative, localized, and culturally sensitive strategies to bridge the digital divide and ensure that the benefits of digital technologies are accessible to all.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: So, welcome to the session, to our day zero session on sharing and exchanging compute new digital divisions. My name is Millennium Anthony. I am from Tanzania. I am the coordinator for the youth IGF in Tanzania, and I’m also an ITU generation connect youth envoy, and today I’m going to be moderating this amazing session. So I have here with me joined the three speakers and the others who are going to be joining us soon. But before we move further in our discussion, I would like to just give a concept of whatever that we’re going to be discussing for the next one hour. As we all know that we have all this, the new technologies like AI, all this, the robotics and all that, so, and then we also know that there’s this one group that is able to access all these tools easy, but then considering countries like the global south countries, they’re still having difficulties to get connected, to stay online. And this has been contributed by different factors. For example, the high cost of the internet bundles, people can’t access. Some other group, they can’t access the tools, let’s say, have access to computers or mobile phones and all that. So today we are going to have a discussion with my panelists here. We’re going to explore different aspects on how we can ensure, like, people from the global south, but also this other larger group that is left can become online, despite that we have all these emerging technologies that are really coming up high, right? Yeah. So before I go in the discussion, I would like to welcome my speakers. So they’re going to introduce themselves and then I can ask them the questions and then each one of them can respond. So I’ll start with you, Noah.

NOAH ABDELBAKI: Thank you, Millennium. So hi, everyone. Good morning. My name is Noah Abdelbaki. I’m from Egypt and I’m an instructor in the PAYAIG in the Arabic cohort. I’m an engineer by profession. Thank you.

ATANAS BAIZIRA: Thank you so much. Good morning, everyone. I’m Atanas Baizira from the Democratic Republic of Congo. I’m a software engineer by profession and I’m the coordinator for the youth IGF in the DRC. And I’m very happy to be here.

MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI: Hello. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. My name is Matilda Moses-Mashauri from Tanzania. I’m also an African youth ambassador in Internet Governance. I’m a Binti Digitale ambassador. And it’s such a very amazing and a great chance to be here in this very productive and interactive session. Looking forward to collaboration in case of any questions. ideas, we get to talk with others. It’s a very informative session and I can’t wait to get into it. Thank you very much.

CHRIS ODU: Hello, good morning ladies and gentleman, my name is Chris Odu from Nigeria. Sorry I just walked in, we are trying to just get ourselves together. We are looking forward to this session, thank you very much.

DR. MONOJIT: Hi, my name is Monojit, I am a researcher at internet governance, it is pleasure to be here and I am looking forward to this session. Thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you. Okay, thank you very much. So I’m going to be asking questions to my speakers in no particular order. Like I’ll just ask in any order, so just be ready to contribute, yeah? And so I’m gonna start with, first we need to explore some of the challenges. So I’ll start with you, Matilda. In your experience, what are the most significant invisible barriers that contribute to compete disparities in the region, especially that you’re from the African region, and how do you see they’re going to be addressed in the near future?

MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI: Thank you very much, Millennium, for a very insightful question. The challenges are so many, compared, I mean, especially the fact that I’m working very closely with the women and young girls in my country. And I can tell you, I have been, I did these projects not only in the city, but I did go deep, I did the projects in Kigoma, so I was able to see the challenges. I myself was affected, there’s so many challenges in the young girls, and you can see the disparities are a lot. So if you told me, as a young girl, being born as a girl in Africa, in the rural area, that’s a challenge already, you know? And then trying to engage that young girl into the digital world, that’s also another challenge, because we do not have those digital infrastructures, and I’m speaking facts from my country, because I do this, and I did this, you know? So the challenges are so many for young girls. And if you ask me about what we can do, Millennium, to, like, what we can do to overcome the challenges, or to, there’s so much we can do for a young girl. First of all, we do need this gender equity into, like, the proper gender equity into the digital literacy. Whatever the young boy can access should be exactly what also a young girl can access. Same. But then in Africa, for example, I’m telling you, in Kigoma, I went, I met a dropout kid, a 16 years old dropout kid, with two babies. But then if you ask her routine when she was going to school, she has to wake up in the morning, do the home chores, and then go to classes, come back early, make lunch, because she also has kids, go back to class again, come back again. Earlier, later evening. Do the chores again, you know, they didn’t have it. But what’s what about the boy child? He wakes up in the morning goes to school comes back goes to play games or football whatever so you can already see so first we need to treat the same same exact opportunity than the chances that the Young boy gets or that a boy gets should be exactly what I should get what you should get But a younger in Kigoma should get but in my country start to be honest It’s really difficult. The digital infrastructure is poor, you know, the digital infrastructure is poor We do not have this digital infrastructures. We go even if we go we’re gonna go to do with this The session like this the programs, you know, it’s not even about teaching It’s about trying to engage them into this tech technical world people are very they have amazing and confident works People want to be like they have vision But then they do not know even how to dream about those dreams because how can they dream of something that they do not know? So they do not know what is technology. They do not even know what is digital digital interest digital world Never saving a smartphone in their lives Then how am I supposed to teach that young girl that you know what you can be a software developer you can be or a Graphic designer you can be a whatever an engineer if so, there’s so many things to to to there’s so many things you have to do For Tanzania for Tanzania. There’s so much that we have to do so much From the government level from the from the government level from the school from the curriculum itself There’s so many cultures we have to unlearn we have this this this this this this this this this this this this this Cultures that affect us young girls from different. I’m also coming from from a lake zone tribe So I understand but thanks to you know for me It’s different now because at least my parents at least I was able to go to good schools at least I was able to live In the city so for me you can’t sell much, but what about that person who cannot go to those good schools? What about that person whose parents cannot even afford to take them to good schools? You know so it’s a it’s very complicated millennia, but we are trying the heading there So thank you very much in there, and I really love whatever involves young girls and women. Thank you Wow

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you so much for telling that was impressive for me Especially that you talked about gender inequality in terms of accessing all of these resources when it comes to, like, young women and, like, young boys. So there’s that inequality that currently exists. And picking up from the same discussion, I’ll come to you, Noah. Now we have talked about all this marginalized group. How do you think we can ensure that the marginalized communities have access in shaping the voices of, like, policies and solutions to reduce these disparities?

NOAH ABDELBAKI: Yeah, thank you, Millennium. So I guess that everyone needs to have a say in drafting these policies because we need to attract investors to invest in our, like, countries. Africa and the Middle East are very central in the world, but we, like, big tech companies are not heavily investing in this area at all. We don’t have, like, big data centers in our region that would, like, provide many computation resources and enough computation resources for us to use the technology and also design technology that is suitable for us as Africans, as Middle Easterns, as people from the global south. But we don’t have enough resources to do this. So when drafting the policies, we need to, like, ensure having, like, of course, first it needs to be we need to adopt a multi-stakeholder approach, invite everyone to the table to have a say in this and drafting the frameworks. We need to ensure having, like, proper infrastructure to support, like, technology that is growing each and every day. Because we, for example, in Egypt, we still don’t have the LTE or 5G network. We just got the license. I’m sure it’s the same situation most of the African countries. So we need to have the proper infrastructure to support the tech that is that we are using and that is growing each and every day. We are in the age of data and AI. So we need to support this. Also I’m calling all the governments to draft the policies to support the data exchange between the countries and also the data production laws because this will attract tech companies, cloud service providers, internet service providers to invest in our countries. And this will affect our GDP in a positive way and will also attract other investors and we will retain the talent in our countries instead because we are losing our talents. They are leaving our countries. They’re looking for jobs elsewhere, including women. It’s not only the male talents we’re losing. So I need to I hope we can create a better future by having the proper data frameworks and policies to support our future of computation.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: All right. Thank you so much, Noah. So investing and allowing proper policies on the cross-border data transfer. So we have the marginalized group, Atenas. So we have been discussing about digital literacy and all that, especially that you come from PAYAIG where we impact the community with the internet governance knowledge. What would be your contribution on how we can incorporate digital literacy into formal and informal education so that we may ensure that we have sustainable benefits for everyone?

ATANAS BAIZIRA: Thank you so much, very good question and just that you mentioned it’s very important to really rethink the way we see digital literacy not only in the formal way like the normal curriculum when it comes to high school, university and postgraduate but it’s also in the informal way how we can build capacity of the people who are already on ground. Sometimes we talk about marginalized communities, they are not only the youth, they are not only in rural areas, sometimes they are also the old generations that they are already in business for years but then digital technologies are coming to, you know, interfere with the way they deal with business and now they are very marginalized. They are even, when it comes to cyber security questions, they are really very easy to get in this sense so that we also need to rethink literacy in a sense that we do not only reach the people who are at school but also the people who are already working so we give them enough capacity to navigate the digital world very well. So one of the things we are doing is an initiative that came out of Africans to build capacity of African people around internet governance and what is interesting about this program is that the language barrier is something in all the regions we have a lot of languages but then most of the technologies they come with predestination of languages they come with and also discussions around those technologies also will be around most of them happening in English, the IGF one of the good cases. So what we did with PAYAIG is train people in languages that are very close to them, so they will understand very well the stakes of the digital space, they will understand the stakes of internet governance in languages that are very close to them. So we did, we are doing trainings in five languages which include Arabic, Portuguese, French, English and Swahili. So what is original in this program is now we have African languages that are incorporated in this digital literacy initiative and people, from the feedback we are getting, you see that after the training, the people have been trained, are ready to enter the ecosystem, they’re already doing great. If the entrepreneurs you see now, they’re leveraging on the digital technologies because they are more aware of the opportunities that are around. So I think it’s very important to start investing in digital literacy. We don’t have to wait for when everything will be alright because it takes time to make sure everything is aligned, but we start from where we are. Even on your personal capacity, you can start by making sure you preach the gospel of the literacy of the digital space around you. Make sure when you are with people, some of us have knowledge about some of these cases we are having. You can use smartphones, you can use now AI, you can use quantum technologies are coming and they will not wait for when we are ready for them to develop. So they are already developing. So we need to start from where we are, starting to, you know, balance between our other priorities. that are different from regions to region, but also getting into the space, taking enough knowledge so that we can keep the pace and go towards the digital future that we all want. Back to you, Millennium, thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you so much, Adonis. That was very, I liked the multilingualism part, especially considering countries like, let’s say countries like my country, like Tanzania, we have 121 languages. So you can imagine we have some communities, our national language is Swahili, but then we have these other groups that don’t even speak Swahili. So you can imagine we have like all these new technologies like AI, then we want to teach, let’s say in English, people don’t even understand our own national language, how can you teach in English? So it’s really important when we’re doing all this digital literacy thing, the trainings, we do it in the language that our people understand so that we can bring everyone on board. So that’s how we ensure that nobody is left behind. So I’ll come to you, Dr. Monojit. So we have seen, we have talked about all this AI, the quantum computing, they’re really transforming the world and I really like it, but then we have these developing countries, like our countries, like the global south countries that we’re still not to the point that we are benefiting from all these technologies enough. So what do you see, we can, like how do you see we can ensure that all these innovations, like the AI, these all new technologies, are being, what do you say, like are helping or are succeeding in all these developing countries? How can we ensure that?

DR. MONOJIT: Yeah, you can hear me now? I’m so sorry. Technological disadvantage, you rely too much, you know, considering that it is on. Okay, thank you, Milena, so much. But firstly, I’d like to congratulate or thank the first speaker. I’m sorry about your name. But you see the change that you have brought. If you see in front, you’ll see a lot of women participants or representative, probably this is the hard effort that you guys have been doing for the past few years. You see the representation, they’re mostly equally in number or women to be more. Our moderator also has been a gracious lady who is leading the and spearheading. So continuing to the fact that, you know, the point which you have highlighted and my next female speaker, that on technological sharing, you know, I come from India and we are certainly one of the leading countries in terms of technology, if you see the digital payments and such. There are a few initiatives that I’ll tell you a little about just the background that I was previously into academia. I was a student, I did my PhD in Internet Governance. Then I switched to media and now I am in a very prestigious think tank of the government of India. Our main motto is that to flourish or ensure that the language is never a barrier, which again is a very key point highlighted by my panelists. So we have developed, you know, the government of India at large has developed a translation mechanism or a tool called Anuvadhini AI that ensures that we are outreaching the knowledge that we have into all 22 official languages of the country. So alongside this, what we have tried to ensure, and I’m just giving you this fact because what I wish here is that let this be an opportunity for collaboration, you are particularly, you all here present here, also in the audience. You know, you form a, not just for today, but in future also you’ll be a power that represents the country in any society, whether it is academia or such. So that from here, when we go back, we can explore possible collaboration. Now that I’m part of the government of India’s think tank, if at all I don’t represent, you know, in government capacity, but I’m sure the people of India and the government at large will be definitely very happy, you know, to share this knowledge. Now you see, recently what the government has done is ensuring buying or taking the subscription of all leading journals that are available globally and making it a repository. so that all the students from far-flung areas and also from the middle, who cannot get access by paying in their capacity, can get access to their depository, so that they can have access to the knowledge, which is a kind of fundamental right, that I can say. So this sort of, I am very much sure that collaborating with African Union and also African at large, or other countries, like my colleague is from Middle East, or representing the voice of Middle East, I can say, so we can definitely collaborate on that, because this session at large, we talk sharing and exchanging compute, so we can always focus on these areas, that we can, AI, whether it is AI, whether it is sharing of the resources, I think we can certainly collaborate, and India being a rich power in this aspect at least, we can explore collaborations, and I don’t see there is any hindrance to it, geopolitically, whatever the concepts may are, but ideas and innovations like this always are welcomed across the globe. So with this, I hand it over to Milenia once again, thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you so much, doctor. You have spoken about collaboration, in terms of like, the government and stuff, now I want to come to you, Chris. Like, Dr. Monojit has spoke about the importance of collaboration, now we have, let’s say considering we have different stakeholders, let’s say in the internet governance space, we have the governments, we have the technical communities, we have the civil societies, so how can we ensure, like, this multi-stakeholder we have, let’s say all this, the government and all that, the relationship between them is equitable, or is like, good, so that we may ensure we are driving change in all these developing countries, or just the world at large. Like, how can we ensure a good collaboration between the multi-stakeholders?

CHRIS ODU: Okay, so. Okay, give me that. Okay, thank you very much. So good morning once again. Thank you very much for the question. And before I just go ahead, I think I would like to appreciate this balancing, gender balancing. I think it’s territory, so we’re good. Good, so you talked about collaboration and doctor here, first of all, kicked off the pace. The first thing we need to do first is you need to identify do we have, have we accepted we have a problem? That’s the first thing. For instance, you cannot just, even if a doctor is trying to treat you, the patient must first agree that he or she is sick before he can actually receive treatment. So first of all, one of the things we are actually having, the issues we have is that we think, we know we have a problem, we know that we have a problem, but have we, all of us, all the various stakeholders, have we accepted and agreed that we need to solve that problem? Because for me to be able to work with you, we must actually agree. One of us must actually agree to work together. One of the key things I see, or I feel, because I’m going to speak in, is this better? Can you hear me? You can? I can’t, yeah. Please, let’s try to fix this because my moderator is not hearing me, so I need her to hear me. Okay. You can hear me now, better, okay. So I think sometimes, you know, technology just fails us, but we’re good now. So for me to be able to work with you, first of all, we must agree on something. There must be a mutual benefit between both of us. And the truth is, the government can’t do it all alone. We need partnerships. But rather, but the thing is, the government first must lay the foundation. And what’s the foundation? A good policy. Good, you cannot have a poor policy and you expect a private sector to come in. and do any collaboration with you. It’s not gonna work because, for instance, if I’m coming from the private sector, I want to know what’s in for me. That’s the thing, what’s in for me. So you need to have favorable policies for us to be able to work together in harmony. And I would just like to touch on something which is very key for me, which is capacity building. I think we’re actually lacking a lot in capacity building. And when I’m speaking, I’m speaking from my own primary constituency, which is Africa, you understand? We do have a lot of issues when it comes to capacity building. I’ll give you an instance. We’re talking about digital literacies, digital technologies. I’ll use blockchain as an example, okay? We’re in a time where blockchain is actually a thing. You go everywhere, you hear blockchain, blockchain, blockchain. But if you go back to Africa, a lot of people still do not understand what blockchain is you get. So it’s something, for instance, but technology is supposed to, we’re supposed to be speaking, when you’re talking about technology, we’re supposed to be speaking the same language. If I come here, even if you’re speaking Arabic, I’m speaking English, but we’re here to speak technology. So we should be able to communicate on something. And we should be able to speak on something. Something must connect us. And what’s that connection? Technology. So we need to actually build our capacity wherever you’re coming from. We must be able to speak the same language, which is technology. And that’s why I said it’s good, we now use this platform, and go back to our various regions, and ask that, how can I be a change? The change must start with each and every one of us. What am I going to do? Am I going to mentor? Am I going to teach? Am I going to guide? Well, how do I play my own part? Because as a stakeholder, all of us have a role to play. The government, the private sector, the business people, everybody has a role to play. So we shouldn’t just go back and say, we leave it for the government, or we leave it for this sector, no. Each and every one of us, once we leave this place, we should go with a mindset of. What’s that little thing I can do and contribute to my own constituency? How am I going to contribute and give my own quarter? For instance, I do a lot of mentoring. I do a lot of mentoring on digital literacy. Okay, trying to see how, because most times when we speak, we’re just speaking to those in the urban areas. How about the rural areas? That’s those at the bottom of the ladder. How are we going to bring them into these conversations? We’re talking about technology, technology, technology, but someone in a rural village, a remote village, does not really understand this technology. How can we bring them on board? So that’s actually part of collaboration. How can we collaborate and make sure that this group of people are not left behind? So my take is we should always champion change wherever we go. We should be the contributors too. Thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Wow, thank you so much, Chris. I was about to chip in a question when you were speaking, but then in the end, you ended up answering it. My moderator must hear me. Okay, so now, I think I want to move the direction to the floor. Now, I want, if you guys want to share something, especially in your specific countries, something that you have seen, the challenges that you have seen, or if it’s something that you have seen that is working in your country in terms of bridging this whole digital divide. So I want to open the floor if you want to share something like that. Yeah, I’ll start with you, Keghya.

OSEY KEGHYA: Hello. I hope I’m audible enough. Yes. Okay, thank you very much. My name is Osei Keghya from Ghana. A lot has been shared, and thanks to you for the insightful conversation. But my concern is that, I ask, who are we benchmarking? We are talking about sharing and exchanging. computing, new digital divisions. Every now and then, I know people are from Africa, Middle East, Europe, Americas. There are new challenges which are evolving every now and then. But who are we benchmarking? What way are we trying to develop digital literacy? These are the questions, the nuances we should look at. So, Chris also did talk about mentoring, which is very, very good. But one thing I have noticed in our countries, specific countries, is that it has become too robotic and mechanistic that it stifles innovation. So, if I’m imparting young people, in terms of mentorship, go my way, go this way. So, it’s no ground for innovation, birth my way. But we need to move from that area and see it as a wrestle and a dance, where there is information sharing, where we can continually innovate. And the one last thing is continuous learning. In this whole bridging the divide, trying to introduce computation and all, there must be continuous learning. And in this continuous learning, we talk of multi-stakeholder approach, which is very good. By government’s hold and a balance of power, are they ready to juggle with the people, private sector, and civil society. Our side is Bravity. Thank you very much. Wow, thank you so much, Keghya.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Is there? Yes, please.

KENDI KOSA: I don’t know if you can hear me. Yeah. My name is Kendi Kosa. I’m from Mozambique. I have some ideas here about the infrastructure development. Since we are, we’ve been facing challenges in building resilient and accessible broadband infrastructure and underserved and rural communities, as Matilde mentioned. To address these issues through public-private partnerships and innovation solutions, I brought here some ideas about infrastructure for telecommunications. I believe that an effective approach to ensure that these areas without broadband infrastructure can connect through the infrastructure sharing model, which is a strategy that involves cooperation among different telecommunications operators to use the same infrastructure such as towers, cables and fiber optic networks. I believe that for that, we must approach something for Africa, which is the cost reductions for the Internet. We have also accelerated the access for it and minimized the environment impact. Plus we have an improvement for service quality. Also for the implementation of these ideas, I think about a favorable regulation, which is necessary to have a regulatory framework that encourages infrastructure sharing. That would be clear to the guidelines to protect competition and consumer rights. We also need a partnership agreement, government involvement in this for the infrastructure part, and plus innovative business models. I believe in that. So thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Wow. Thank you so much. I really like the discussion that is going on here, especially, okay, I’ll come back to you one time, and especially I liked the telecommunication. I think for my country, I think I’ll say. the telecommunication companies, they haven’t been a very good collaboration between the telecom companies. At least every telecom company is trying, they’re competing, you know? So there is no, what do you say, cooperative effort that is done to ensure like, okay, our goal is just one. All of us want to bridge this divide, we want to provide service to our people, but then it’s just like rival, who will reach there first? But then if we do it all together, I think we’ll reach far. And, wait, yes, welcome.

SOBY ABRAHAM FIFI: Okay, all right, thank you. My name is Soby Abraham Fifi. Can you hear me? Yeah. Okay, all right. So, listening to some of the conversations that go on, I will focus more on the literacy aspect and capacity aspect on that. Chris was mentioning that at least we have to do some capacity, literacy models aspect. But I have two questions in this one. What actions are we taking? And which categories can we sort it out? The reason why I’m saying is that sometimes, let’s say, the people in this room may understand the concept of internet governance. So when we come, we discuss about emerging technologies, advancing technology, you all mentioned blockchain and other stuff, right? It’s a conversation on different categories. But when we come to the lower aspects of the category we’re gonna look about digital literacy, that’s where we see the gap, because people can come and discuss about AI, digital infrastructure, emerging technologies, blockchain, but most of those people who are listening to that conversation, some people don’t even understand basic computer literacy, how to even operate basic tools within the IT aspect. So come to think of. the AI. So what I want us to do is that, in terms of conversation among youth, we can close the gap by categorizing and prioritizing where we need to focus on. So there might be a group that we can group them, okay people who have advanced the stage of using basic technology tools, this conversation we can focus on them. Then we the youth can start developing models that is tailored to digital literacy training. How to even use basic things, because even some people don’t even know how to use Zoom. So if we are having a conversation on closing the digital gap, digital AIs and other stuff, how can they even connect to do that? So we need to start by prioritizing the categories of people that we are dealing with, and make sure that we try to put in this. And the people in the room, let me take the panelists as an, we cannot bring you to start learning how to use computers because you are advanced on that. So that conversation will go. So whilst we are going, we should also look up, look down to the people that we have below, so that we can train them in basic things. So whilst we are also catching up with advanced world in African youth, we can also bring people who don’t have any idea to start also from somewhere. Then we’ll be bringing them in along along. So I think some will be ahead of people, but you always get the chance to bring people included in the conversation and topics. Thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you, Fifi. Do you wanna respond, Chris, to that?

CHRIS ODU: Can you hear me? Yes. Good, okay. Fifi, thank you very much for that thoughts. I agree totally with you. I agree totally with you. That’s why you see, when I started the conversation, I said something. I said, we need to identify our problems. Before you visit a doctor, you must first of all, believe that you’re actually not feeling fine before even going to the hospital. So we must first of all identify the problems and how we’re gonna identify those problems is having this kind of conversations. That’s why, for instance, whatever the work you do, you are the grassroots, you know these problems, you know how to categorize them, okay? So we cannot all be on the same pace, it’s not possible. Everybody must be on a very different level, even in schools and everything, there are different classes where you categorize people. So first of all, we need to identify our problems. We need to accept that we have this problem. And what’s that problem? Capacity building, yes, we’ve identified that. Now, what exactly are we building? How, which categories? What, is it people that do not know how to use devices? Is it people that want to construct robots? Is it people that want to control blockchains? What exactly? So once we’re able to do this, and how do we do that? Is by each and every one of us taking that responsibility to say, yes, I want to contribute in this way. So thank you very much for that contribution of yours.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you very much. Atanas, you wanna say?

ATANAS BAIZIRA: Thank you so much. Very interesting conversation, actually. I wanted to say something quite interesting in this area, is that I have an example where we have seen a rise of literacy not coming from a special entity going to teach people, but the interest raising from actually the audience. What is interesting here, like the cases in India, what they have managed to do is to widen the digital infrastructure. And what happened is we have seen a rise in digital literacy in e-commerce, in mobile banking. So I believe internet infrastructure is an engine that will motivate the literacy to come also, and the pace when it comes to continuing with innovation. India now, when we talk about innovation in ICT, there is definitely an engine at some point. So I believe in our different countries, when we will be able to implement sustainable infrastructure that are reaching all the different areas, can it be the urban space or the rural areas, when we’ll reach all of them, they will definitely make use of the infrastructure they have, Sometimes it’s very interesting, they are very innovative, and use ways that we didn’t even think we were able to use. We have a case in many countries now that are sustainable infrastructure solutions that are known for profit, which we call community networks, whereby people around communities get together and say, we need internet, and we see it as a good, a force for good, an enabler. We are a community of agriculture, but we see that the internet will be an enabler in us selling our local products. So they get together, they connect to a certain access point, because the internet, what is it? It’s a network of networks. So they create, they have already their own interpersonal network, but then they connect to the internet at a certain place. And now you see trade will be moving around the space, quite interesting. And when you see the numbers, they get to do wonders with the access they have got. So I think we need to build capacity in infrastructure that will help us go with the pace. One person was talking about, you know, we have other priorities. In some countries, people are not able to feed themselves, and you see internet connection costs almost like half of their salary or something. So if you are them, you need to pay school fees of your children or connect to the internet. What is the choice you are going to take? So access to connectivity is very important. And for us to make sure this access is easy, we need to have infrastructure all around. When we have infrastructure, we need to have access. It will be cheap, and people will be able to actually, not only prioritizing, they will definitely prioritize the key aspect of their life, but they will balance, you know that we are moving with our natural challenges, but also we are not left behind. As we are solving our different challenges in life, we are leveraging the ICT, we are leveraging the digital solutions, so that we solve our challenges, helped by the digital solutions, and that will be very helpful for us to move together. So that’s what I wanted to bring to the table today.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: All right, Matilda, you have something to say?

MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI: You know, like, whatever involves capacity building, like I’m in love with it. So for the development to that, you know what I think? We do not even need like, it’s not like we need something like sustainable development. I think for my country in particular, since I am working very closely with the people in the rural areas, we need to localize, localize infrastructural development. Because if you see in there, we are like, what, using 5G already? 5G, eh? In, I was in Singida just a few, I think less than five days ago, there’s not even 2G there. And I’m supposed to teach those women capacity building. So we do these capacity buildings, really, at the urban areas, we do a lot, even in the rural areas. But then we go to the capacity buildings without the infrastructure for that capacity building. So if I have the 2G internet, and sometimes actually the 2G is until if I find any, I need to find a spot, climb on top of a tree, or sit somewhere across, around the mountain. You know, to try to balance the signal like frequency wave. So we need to localize this, the development. So the private sectors, the government, they really need to push their focus for the digital infrastructure development into the local areas, the rural areas. You know, speaking about it, you people, you think it’s worse than even how I’m explaining. It’s worse, I’m telling you. It’s a… I don’t know how… For my country, for Tanzania, it’s worse, guys. I’ve been in Kigoma, Kasulu, where the sand is literally red. You know, you just go there, I have white hair, by the way, so you can imagine with the dust how my hair was, with the 2G internet not working, trying to teach these women. The women do not even have… I went, for example, for Kigoma, these people, it was the women entrepreneurs, they were doing amazing job. Confidently, I’m telling you, perfect job. So we went there to, you know, give them the digital capacity building, how to engage them to the digital marketing. Mind you, we want to engage them to the e-commerce. Mind you, these people do not have a smartphone, never even seen one, can’t even write their names. You know, the e-commerce also comes, you’re, oh, my God. And oh, guys, the situation is bad. What I just wanted to say, the point should just be like we should localize this development to the rural areas, localize the infrastructure, the digital infrastructures, yeah, so we need this. And this is… Actually, for this situation, it’s actually different because I went there to teach the women entrepreneurs. But if I was doing for the women and men entrepreneurs, I’m pretty sure even the men will be facing the same challenge because it’s something they don’t know, something is not there, it’s like going… One day, you know, a lady once asked me, so you guys came here talking about dream, dream, dream. What is a dream to begin with? And someone doesn’t even know what is a dream to begin with. And then I’m about to tell this person, you know what? You can be a software engineer, you can do this, and the vision compact, it’s just terrible. So that’s what I wanted to say.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: All right, thank you so much. So you can do, like from this discussion that has been going on, so you can do digital, like capacity building or digital literacy without having proper infrastructures. So it’s really important to make sure that we invest on proper infrastructures so we can ensure like everyone can get access to all these things. So before I get to see if there’s any online contribution, I think there was one contribution back there. So I’ll go to it and then I’ll see online if I have a question or any contribution.

GRACE: Okay, can you hear me all? Good morning, I’m Grace from Cameroon. I want to be more practical about what you have said because I’m a learner. I don’t want to say that I’ve understood everything, but I’m here to learn. So you mentioned something like identify your problem. Okay, I love technology. I want to learn more about it. I want to solve problem. I want to make money from technology. But how? How can I start? Where am I starting? So I think one obsession like that is to help us to understand more what is all about technology and all the rest. So I would like to just have a small advice about it. Thank you very much.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: You wanna say? Okay, so I can have Chris respond to that and then we can move to one on site and then we can move online.

CHRIS ODU: I hope I’m audible now. Yes. Okay, so thank you very much my sister from Cameroon for that question. You know, I like going back to my analogy of the doctor. You know, when you have an illness, you would have to make inquiries. Where is this doctor? How can I treat this illness? Good, and one of them is what you have just done. Asking questions of how. Where, how can you start and all of that. that. I think just a little bit of linkage of what Fifi said. There are different levels, everyone is not on the same level and we are here as supposed experts, okay, we are still bigger experts and all of that. There are actually resources online where you can actually make those inquiries or how to learn. For instance, if you want to go into, let me just use the case of blockchain, someone might want to say, okay, I want to go into this blockchain, I want to actually know how beneficial it can be because blockchain is broad, okay, it’s come to solve problems that are existing. However, we are not using that blockchain to solve those problems. So you can now say, okay, you want to tap into that sector, so how can I now know about more about blockchain? There are a lot of resources online, one of them I can link you to is the ITU Academy website. Yes, it has a whole lot of good resources where you can actually learn. There are some of the paid resources, some are actually free. Yeah, ITU, that’s our International Telecommunication Union, that’s one of them and also one of the very good places which we always go to, YouTube. YouTube is our friend, that’s why I look at it, YouTube is our friend. I think we can, you can virtually see almost everything in YouTube but sometimes, what I like saying, that’s why I mentioned earlier about mentoring, okay. My friend here from Ghana also said something about mentoring, which is you would actually put the person on the same path as you. Well, I kind of also disagree with him on that because, for instance, when we’re all young, we needed parents to actually put us on the path. It doesn’t mean we have to be the same like them, we need someone to guide you on the path, first of all. So, okay, it’s always good to attach yourself to a mentor. You don’t have to be exactly as a mentor but he’s gonna put you because he has gone through hurdles already, so he’s gonna put you through so that you don’t go to the same hurdles as he or she has gone through. So, that’s why having a mentor is also key because they’re going to put you through whatever you need, direct you on the right path, and also direct you to where you can actually get these resources. So, I hope I’ve been able to answer that for you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you. Wow. Thank you so much, Chris. So, I’ll take, if you can take one minute, if you can, and then I’ll move on line because we’re out of time, and then we can close. Okay. So, one minute, one minute, and then one minute from online, and then we close with my panelists.

RAZEN ZAKARIA: Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. I’m Razen Zakaria from Egypt. I’m an Abayag ambassador. I have a very important question about the internet justice and equality. Nowadays, we see that, especially in the countries that have aborts, there’s not people that can have an access to the internet to reach out their voices to the world and to connect with the people around all of the world. Who are the sectors that have a right to manage, not control or prevent people to get access to the internet? So, who are the sectors that have a right to manage this internet rights to the people in this society that have a word? This is my question.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Okay. Is there anyone who wants to respond? If you can respond in less than one minute, I’ll appreciate.

ATANAS BAIZIRA: Very good question, actually, Razen. What is pretty much interesting is that every aspect of life, the digital technologies are being influenced and can influence. Things we are seeing currently, when you see people affected by war, definitely people using ICT technologies as war tools. But also we are seeing humanitarians using digital technologies to solve these issues. So if we take technology, we don’t have to take it and frame it in an area, but we need to see it as a tool that you can use for good and we advocate for the use of technology for good. It’s like a knife. A doctor can use the knife to help operate and save a life, but someone else can use a knife to kill someone. You get the point. The knife is not the problem. The problem is the people. So I think technologies that are centered around the people are definitely the ethical one and we need to use them in a sense that, you know, looking for what sense that is ethical and that’s the only way forward. From my perspective. Thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: All right. Thank you so much. I’m going to move online first and then I get to my last on site and then we close. So please, yeah. If you can take one minute or less, that’d be nice. Yeah, thank you so much, Lamayla. And please, the floor is yours.

RAPID SUN: Good morning. My name is Rapid Sun from Cambodia. So my question to the panelists from India. So can you elaborate more about the mechanism about that for the infrastructure setting, especially for AI development? And how… Hello? Do you hear? Yes. Okay. So how the developing country join the mechanism, for example, if you already have the mechanism in place for setting the infrastructure? Thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: All right. Dr. Manojit, can you answer in like… Have you… Yeah. Can you answer in like one minute or less?

DR. MONOJIT: Yes. Okay. So to beat the question, I’d like to… share that since we are almost close by neighbors, Cambodia and India are not very far, we can certainly explore the collaboration aspects in not just the governmental side but also the private players, you know. We’ll be interested to share the best practices and particularly given the fact that Cambodia and India share very close relations, we do have a very friendly relations between us, probably we can take this ahead, probably post-session or something, I think there are multiple avenues that we can collaborate and obviously given the fact that Cambodia and the relation with Africa, we all can be working together, at least disseminating the skills and the best practices can always be explored at any point of time.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Okay, thank you very much Dr. Marajit. I think we can, you guys can link up after the session too and then you can discuss further, right? So I would like to thank my panelists and of course the floor for participating in this session and I would like my panelists with one word to close this. How does a fully digitally world look like to you in one word? Like a fully digitally developed world look like to you in one word? I don’t know who is ready to start but whoever is ready to start just in one word, a fully digital world,

ATANAS BAIZIRA: how does it look like to you? For me a fully digital world, it’s about people who are connected

NOAH ABDELBAKI: and interconnected. Connection, connectivity, okay. For me it’s about empowerment and enablement.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Empowerment and enablement. Matilda? Yeah, I actually wrote something here, so I like

MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI: to leave you guys with the thoughts which is the compute divide is a challenge, we all agreed, but also an opportunity. So it is an opportunity to rewrite the rule. of digital engagement to ensure that computational power becomes a shared result that uplifts all, and not that privilege that deepens inequality.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: I like that word. A lot of words. One word.

CHRIS ODU: Chot, while we live here, let’s be the change that we seek to see.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Change.

DR. MONOJIT: For me, it will be accessible. That’s what our government of India is also looking for, to make sure every resource available on the internet is accessible for everyone, irrespective of the distance, like as I mentioned in my course, the far-flung area students are also getting everyone. So accessible should be that one word. Thank you.

MILLENIUM ANTHONY: Thank you very much. Thank you so much, everyone, for attending. I’d also like to thank my online participants. This was really amazing from the contribution that I received from the floor and online. Hope to see you around. Thank you so much. Have a nice day. Yeah, my panelists, please. Let’s take a picture before we leave. We can make it. Oh, that’s amazing. Congratulations. Good luck. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Agreement Points

Digital divide and infrastructure challenges

MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI

ATANAS BAIZIRA

MILLENIUM ANTHONY

KENDI KOSA

Lack of digital infrastructure in rural areas

High cost of internet access

Public-private partnerships for infrastructure development

Multiple speakers agreed that lack of digital infrastructure and high costs of internet access are major barriers to digital inclusion, especially in rural areas. They suggested public-private partnerships as a potential solution.

Importance of digital literacy and capacity building

MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI

SOBY ABRAHAM FIFI

ATANAS BAIZIRA

CHRIS ODU

Lack of basic digital literacy skills

Multilingual digital literacy training

Localized and targeted capacity building efforts

Mentorship and guidance for technology learners

Several speakers emphasized the need for digital literacy training and capacity building, highlighting the importance of localized, multilingual approaches and mentorship programs.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the importance of private sector involvement in developing digital infrastructure, either through direct investment or public-private partnerships.

NOAH ABDELBAKI

KENDI KOSA

Private sector investment in digital infrastructure

Public-private partnerships for infrastructure development

Both speakers highlighted the importance of cross-border collaboration and knowledge sharing to improve digital literacy and development efforts.

ATANAS BAIZIRA

DR. MONOJIT

Multilingual digital literacy training

Collaboration between countries to share best practices

Unexpected Consensus

Ethical use of technology

ATANAS BAIZIRA

CHRIS ODU

Importance of ethical use of technology

Potential of AI and blockchain for development

While discussing different aspects of technology adoption, both speakers unexpectedly converged on the importance of ethical considerations in technology use and development, emphasizing the need for human-centered approaches.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement included the need for improved digital infrastructure, the importance of digital literacy and capacity building, and the role of multi-stakeholder collaboration in addressing the digital divide.

Consensus level

There was a moderate to high level of consensus among the speakers on the key challenges and potential solutions for bridging the digital divide. This consensus suggests a shared understanding of the issues, which could facilitate more coordinated and effective efforts to address digital inequalities in developing countries.

Different Viewpoints

Approach to digital literacy training

SOBY ABRAHAM FIFI

ATANAS BAIZIRA

Lack of basic digital literacy skills

Multilingual digital literacy training

While Soby Abraham Fifi emphasizes the need for basic digital literacy skills, Atanas Baizira focuses on multilingual training to overcome language barriers. This represents a difference in approach to addressing digital literacy challenges.

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around approaches to digital literacy training, the role of different stakeholders in infrastructure development, and the prioritization of basic vs. advanced technologies.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among the speakers is relatively low. Most differences are in emphasis or approach rather than fundamental disagreements. This suggests a general consensus on the importance of bridging the digital divide, with variations in proposed strategies. These differences could lead to a more comprehensive approach if integrated effectively.

Partial Agreements

Both speakers agree on the need for tailored approaches to digital literacy, but differ in their focus. Matilda emphasizes localization based on community needs, while Atanas focuses on language-specific training.

MATILDA MOSES-MASHAURI

ATANAS BAIZIRA

Localized and targeted capacity building efforts

Multilingual digital literacy training

Both speakers agree on the need for investment in digital infrastructure, but Chris emphasizes the government’s role in creating favorable policies, while Noah focuses on attracting private sector investment.

CHRIS ODU

NOAH ABDELBAKI

Government’s role in creating favorable policies

Private sector investment in digital infrastructure

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the importance of private sector involvement in developing digital infrastructure, either through direct investment or public-private partnerships.

NOAH ABDELBAKI

KENDI KOSA

Private sector investment in digital infrastructure

Public-private partnerships for infrastructure development

Both speakers highlighted the importance of cross-border collaboration and knowledge sharing to improve digital literacy and development efforts.

ATANAS BAIZIRA

DR. MONOJIT

Multilingual digital literacy training

Collaboration between countries to share best practices

Key Takeaways

The digital divide remains a significant challenge, especially in developing countries and rural areas

Multi-stakeholder collaboration and targeted capacity building are crucial for bridging the digital divide

Infrastructure development and affordable access are foundational for digital inclusion

Digital literacy efforts need to be localized and consider language barriers

Emerging technologies like AI and blockchain present both opportunities and challenges for developing countries

Resolutions and Action Items

Explore collaborations between countries to share best practices in digital development

Implement multilingual digital literacy training programs

Develop public-private partnerships for infrastructure development in underserved areas

Engage youth in shaping digital policies and initiatives

Promote mentorship programs to guide technology learners

Unresolved Issues

How to effectively balance basic digital literacy needs with adoption of advanced technologies

Specific mechanisms for ensuring equitable access to digital resources in conflict-affected areas

Detailed strategies for making digital infrastructure economically viable in rural and remote areas

How to address the gender gap in digital access and skills across different cultural contexts

Suggested Compromises

Balancing investment in urban and rural digital infrastructure development

Combining top-down policy approaches with grassroots digital literacy initiatives

Adapting global technological standards to local needs and contexts

Finding a middle ground between rapid technological advancement and ensuring no one is left behind

We do not have this digital infrastructures. We go even if we go we’re gonna go to do with this The session like this the programs, you know, it’s not even about teaching It’s about trying to engage them into this tech technical world people are very they have amazing and confident works People want to be like they have vision But then they do not know even how to dream about those dreams because how can they dream of something that they do not know?

speaker

Matilda Moses-Mashauri

reason

This comment highlights the fundamental challenge of digital literacy in underserved areas – the lack of basic infrastructure and exposure that prevents people from even conceptualizing the possibilities of technology.

impact

It shifted the discussion towards the need for basic infrastructure and exposure before advanced digital literacy can be meaningful. It prompted others to consider more foundational issues in bridging the digital divide.

We need to draft the policies to support the data exchange between the countries and also the data production laws because this will attract tech companies, cloud service providers, internet service providers to invest in our countries.

speaker

Noah Abdelbaki

reason

This comment introduces the important role of policy and regulation in creating an environment conducive to technological investment and development.

impact

It broadened the conversation from just infrastructure and education to include the policy landscape needed to support digital development. It prompted discussion of multi-stakeholder approaches.

So what we did with PAYAG is train people in languages that are very close to them, so they will understand very well the stakes of the digital space, they will understand the stakes of internet governance in languages that are very close to them.

speaker

Atanas Baizira

reason

This comment highlights the importance of linguistic and cultural accessibility in digital literacy efforts.

impact

It introduced the concept of localization in digital education efforts, prompting others to consider how to make digital literacy more culturally relevant and accessible.

We need to identify our problems. Before you visit a doctor, you must first of all, believe that you’re actually not feeling fine before even going to the hospital.

speaker

Chris Odu

reason

This analogy effectively frames the importance of problem identification and acceptance before solutions can be implemented.

impact

It refocused the discussion on the need to properly diagnose and acknowledge digital divide issues before jumping to solutions. It prompted more nuanced consideration of the challenges faced in different contexts.

I believe internet infrastructure is an engine that will motivate the literacy to come also, and the pace when it comes to continuing with innovation.

speaker

Atanas Baizira

reason

This comment presents the idea that infrastructure itself can drive literacy and innovation, rather than the other way around.

impact

It challenged the typical order of thinking about digital development, suggesting that infrastructure investment could lead organically to increased digital literacy and innovation. This prompted discussion about prioritization in digital development efforts.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by broadening the scope of considerations in addressing the digital divide. They moved the conversation from a focus on just education and skills to include infrastructure, policy, cultural relevance, and the interplay between these factors. The discussion evolved to recognize the complexity of the issue, acknowledging that solutions must be multifaceted and tailored to local contexts. The comments also highlighted the need for a bottom-up approach, starting with basic infrastructure and cultural understanding before moving to more advanced digital literacy efforts.

How can we ensure gender equity in digital literacy?

speaker

Matilda Moses-Mashauri

explanation

Matilda emphasized the need for equal access to digital resources and education for girls and boys, highlighting the current disparities in opportunities.

How can we attract more tech companies and investors to Africa and the Middle East?

speaker

Noah Abdelbaki

explanation

Noah discussed the need for policies and frameworks to encourage investment in digital infrastructure in these regions.

How can we incorporate digital literacy into both formal and informal education?

speaker

Millennium Anthony

explanation

This question was posed to explore sustainable ways to build digital skills across different segments of society.

How can we ensure AI and other new technologies benefit developing countries?

speaker

Millennium Anthony

explanation

This question was raised to address the gap in technology adoption and benefits between developed and developing nations.

How can we improve collaboration between different stakeholders in the internet governance space?

speaker

Millennium Anthony

explanation

This question was asked to explore ways to enhance multi-stakeholder relationships for driving change in developing countries.

How can we categorize and prioritize different levels of digital literacy training?

speaker

Soby Abraham Fifi

explanation

Fifi suggested the need to tailor digital literacy efforts to different skill levels, from basic computer use to advanced technologies.

How can we localize digital infrastructure development in rural areas?

speaker

Matilda Moses-Mashauri

explanation

Matilda emphasized the need to focus on building digital infrastructure in underserved rural areas to enable effective capacity building.

Who has the right to manage internet access in countries affected by conflict?

speaker

Razen Zakaria

explanation

Razen raised this question to address issues of internet justice and equality in conflict-affected regions.

How can developing countries join or replicate India’s mechanisms for AI infrastructure development?

speaker

Rapid Sun

explanation

This question was asked to explore possibilities for international collaboration on AI infrastructure.

Summary

This discussion focused on the first international treaty on AI, human rights, democracy, and the rule of law, recently concluded by the Council of Europe. Participants from various countries shared their perspectives on the treaty’s significance and implementation. The convention aims to establish a baseline for AI governance while balancing innovation with safeguards for human rights and democratic values.

Key points emphasized included the importance of international cooperation in addressing AI’s cross-border nature and the need for a shared understanding of AI risks and opportunities. Participants highlighted the treaty’s role in setting clear principles and parameters for AI development and use, while allowing flexibility for different national approaches. The convention was praised for its focus on human rights in the context of emerging technologies.

Several speakers noted the importance of involving multiple stakeholders, including the technical community and civil society, in the ongoing development and implementation of AI governance frameworks. The treaty’s provisions for safe innovation and research were highlighted as crucial elements. Participants also discussed the convention’s potential impact on fighting disinformation and protecting democratic processes.

The discussion underscored the global nature of the treaty, with speakers emphasizing its openness to countries beyond Europe and the potential for broader international cooperation. The convention was presented as a starting point for ongoing dialogue and adaptation to the rapidly evolving field of AI. Overall, the participants viewed the treaty as a significant step towards creating a global framework for responsible AI development and use.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The importance of the AI treaty as the first legally binding international instrument on AI governance

– Balancing innovation and safeguards for human rights, democracy and rule of law

– The need for international cooperation and a shared baseline for AI governance

– Implementation challenges and plans at the national level

– The treaty’s potential impact on researchers, developers and the technical community

The overall purpose of the discussion was to explore different countries’ perspectives on the recently concluded Council of Europe treaty on AI, human rights, democracy and rule of law. Panelists shared insights on their country’s approach to implementing the treaty and discussed its significance for global AI governance.

The tone of the discussion was generally positive and collaborative. Panelists emphasized the historic nature of the treaty and the importance of international cooperation. There was a sense of shared purpose in addressing AI challenges while fostering innovation. The tone remained constructive throughout, with panelists building on each other’s points and acknowledging the complexity of the issues involved.

Speakers

– Thomas SCHNEIDER: Chair/moderator of the discussion

– Işil Selen DENEMEÇ – Head of Legal Department, Digital Transformation Office of the Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye

– Ambassador Brendan DOWLING – Ambassador for Cyber Affairs and Critical Technology (Australia)

– Mauricio GIBSON – Head of Multilaterals at the International AI Policy Directorate at the UK’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT)

– Allison PETERS: Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Democracy Human Rights at Labor, U.S. State Department

Additional speakers:

– Nigel CASSIMIRE, Deputy Secretary-General, Caribbean Telecommunications Union

– Lina VILTRAKIENE, Lithuanian ambassador for digital economy

Expanded Summary: Council of Europe AI Treaty Discussion

Introduction

This discussion focused on the recently concluded Council of Europe treaty on AI, human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. Participants from various countries shared their perspectives on the treaty’s significance and implementation challenges. The convention aims to establish a baseline for AI governance while balancing innovation with safeguards for human rights and democratic values.

Key Themes and Discussion Points

1. Significance of the AI Treaty

The discussion emphasized the importance of the treaty in addressing AI governance. Ambassador Dowling from Australia succinctly captured the core tension addressed by the treaty: “We all see the upsides of AI. We all see the benefits for development, for economic opportunity. But with every new phase of digital technology, we’ve seen human rights, the rights of women and girls, the rights of freedom of speech, democracy jeopardised.” This comment set the tone for much of the subsequent discussion.

2. Balancing Innovation and Safeguards

A central theme was the treaty’s aim to balance AI innovation with protection of human rights and democratic values. Allison Peters from the U.S. State Department emphasized this point, stating, “We don’t want to do anything as it relates to regulation that cracks down on innovation, doesn’t allow that innovation to happen, and so certainly, with this convention, we see a convention that allows us to harmonize various different international approaches to AI, and one that still allows companies to innovate.”

Mr. Gibson from the UK government provided insight into a specific provision addressing this balance, noting an exemption for research and development: “In the convention, there is a sort of, I think I touched upon it in my statement as well, but an exemption for research and development. So what that doesn’t mean is it just excludes all and every single form of research and development from the convention, but it creates a sort of a limitation and a safeguard.”

3. International Participation and Perspectives

David Fairchild from Canada highlighted the effort to involve a diverse range of countries in the treaty process: “It’s not the UN, but at the same time we felt it was extremely important to try to get as many member states from as many regions involved in the process.”

Isil Denemec from Turkey introduced the perspective of how a country’s specific geopolitical context shapes its approach to AI governance, stating, “Turkey’s unique position, geopolitical and geostrategic position influences its approach to global AI governance.”

Tetsushi Hirano presented Japan’s perspective, emphasizing their commitment to human-centric AI and the importance of international cooperation in AI governance.

4. Implementation Approaches and Challenges

Countries are taking varied approaches to implementing the treaty and aligning it with national AI regulations. Mr. Gibson explained the UK’s approach, which includes the AI Safety Institute and efforts to align with international frameworks while maintaining a pro-innovation stance.

Mr. Thomas Schneider introduced the Huderia (human rights democracy and rule of law risk and impact assessment methodology) as a tool for assessing AI systems’ impacts. He also clarified the distinction between the Council of Europe and the European Union, emphasizing the Council’s focus on human rights, democracy, and the rule of law.

5. Addressing AI-Specific Challenges

Lina Viltrakiene, the Lithuanian ambassador for digital economy, highlighted the importance of combating AI-driven disinformation and protecting democratic processes. She also mentioned the Vilnius Convention and Lithuania’s role in the treaty signing.

6. Future Developments and Adaptations

The discussion touched on the potential for future adjustments as new countries join the treaty. Nigel Cassimire from the Caribbean Telecommunications Union inquired about the process for additional countries to join in the future.

Additional Points of Interest

1. A question from the scientific community addressed the potential impact of the treaty on daily coding practices.

2. The brief discussion on disinformation highlighted its relevance to the treaty’s objectives.

Conclusion

The discussion underscored the global nature of the treaty and its potential for broader international cooperation. Participants viewed the convention as a significant step towards creating a framework for responsible AI development and use, while acknowledging the need for ongoing dialogue and adaptation in response to the rapidly evolving field of AI.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: So, can you hear me okay? Many people can hear me? Okay. All right, let’s start. So, as you know, this early morning session is about the first international treaty on AI, human rights, democracy, and the rule of law, which has been concluded earlier this year. And of course, the aim is to cope, to help us cope with the risks and opportunities that AI offer or bring. And I will not go into detail about risks and opportunities because we all by now more or less know what these are, at least for the time being. So, let’s start right away with Ambassador Dowling from Australia. Australia was also actively participating in the negotiations of the treaty until this March. So, how does Australia view the balance between innovation and safeguards so that we have a robust and resilient innovation thanks to AI, but also make sure that human rights, democracy, and rule of law is protected? Thank you. Look, that’s the key question I think we’re all grappling with. We all see the upsides of AI. We all see the benefits for development, for economic opportunity. But with every new phase of digital technology, we’ve seen human rights, the rights of women and girls, the rights of freedom of speech, democracy jeopardised. So, I’m really positive about the Council of Europe’s effort here to get ahead of the curve, to say that we will step in early in the development of this technology and its far more ubiquitous use and try to set some guardrails, protections for rights, speech, the preservation of democracy. I think we made the mistake in earlier phases of technology when we saw software development in the 90s, when we saw social media in the early 2000s, in saying we trust the technology world, we trust commercial entities to prioritise safety and rights online. learnt the hard way that that’s not the case, that we shouldn’t expect commercial entities to be the guardians of rights and privacy, that that’s a role for governments and civil society to work together on. AI is a fast evolving area of technology but I think what this treaty does is set some very clear principles and parameters that say here are the expectations that governments have on the development of this technology, here is how we expect all platforms to preserve rights, privacy, ensure their technology is not misused and so I think acting that early in a way that’s not overly onerous or prescriptive, I think the treaty strikes at right balance where it will not stifle innovation. We feel that it’s a very commendable effort to try and set those parameters early in this particular phase of AI to ensure that we’re not looking back in 10 years time saying well we wish that we’d done more in the early phase to preserve rights and democracy. Thank you very much Ambassador Dowling. Now we go to to the West, to the United States. We have Alison Peters here, Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Democracy Human Rights at Labor, the State Department. So Miss Peters, the US was very active in the negotiations on that treaty as we have been able to read also in some journals. How do you see the treaty promoting respect for human rights democracy around the world, not just in Europe or in the United States and how does the convention, the way it is in front of us now, reflect the United States approach for rights respecting AI?

AUDIENCE: Well first and foremost just a huge thank you to you Thomas and your incredible team. I think it has been several years of negotiations and close partnership I think across governments engaged in the Council of Europe and it is because of your leadership that we’re really here today talking about the fact that many of our countries have now signed the world’s first ever treaty on artificial intelligence and that’s quite a feat. I think second we really need to acknowledge that in a context in which we continue to have debates in the United Nations and in the broader multilateral system in terms of the applicability of international law, particularly international human rights law, it’s quite striking that the world’s first ever treaty on artificial intelligence is focused on human rights, democracy and the role of law. For the United States you know we engage actively in this negotiation process because we see a couple of key benefits in having a legally binding convention on our artificial intelligence. And of course, Ambassador Dowling laid out some of the both opportunities and risks that we see as it relates to artificial intelligence and emerging technologies. But we know first and foremost, having a convention will really help us set a shared baseline on rights respecting, use, development, design of artificial intelligence. And that shared baseline goes beyond just the United States and other countries sort of in the global north, right? That shared baseline is a shared baseline that is really global in context, that is applicable to every single country that is here at IGF and beyond. But we know, given the debates that we’re seeing in terms of human rights and their applicability to emerging technologies, that having a sort of shared baseline amongst democracies on rights respecting design, development, and use of AI is critical. Certainly, the benefits don’t end just with implementation of this convention, as we’ve seen, for example, in the Council of Europe context where we have the Budapest Convention on cybercrime, having an instrument in which our governments can focus on shared cooperation, having a mechanism for shared cooperation, is incredibly useful, is incredibly salient as we continue to debate issues around cybercrime in the UN system now. The follow-up cooperation mechanisms that we expect with this AI convention will also, I think, provide a really important opportunity to advance our shared efforts and promote human rights, democracy, and the role of law on the context of artificial intelligence, including allowing us to really share best practices across the board, across governments, across regions. Third, I will say, you know, you asked the question on how this helps advance sort of the US priorities as it relates to artificial intelligence, and as we look at the need to place safeguards on AI, on AI systems, and the companies that develop them, it’s also really critical that we preserve the space for innovation, right? We don’t want to do anything as it relates to regulation that cracks down on innovation, doesn’t allow that innovation to happen, and so certainly, with this convention, we see a convention that allows us to harmonize various different international approaches to AI, and one that still allows companies to innovate, to be creative, to create new AI systems that help really advance the opportunities as it relates to AI, but also help crack down on some of those risks that we’re talking about. In our system, all of these priorities are bipartisan in nature, so even though our government is changing over quite soon, this is a priority that we see across the board, across political parties in our countries, and we look forward to working with the many governments on this stage, but hopefully other governments here at IGF who will join us in this process. So again, just a huge thanks for having us today.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: Thank you. And I think at one point that is important is that it’s not just the convention and the parties, it’s the bigger cooperation setting around, which is something that we have been able to see with the Cybercrime Convention, with the Budapest Convention, as an important factor as well. Let us now move to another ICE country. Canada, Mr. Fairchild, you also participated very actively in the work on the treaty, helping us to count the hours that we have left to find compromise on everything. So if you could share your insights into how international cooperation can strengthen the treaty and ensure that it reflects the shared values of democratic nations.

AUDIENCE: Thank you very much, Ambassador, and good morning to everybody. It’s great to be here, day zero, it’s always a bit of a cold start. So thank you, and I think first of all, I’d start by thanking the Council of Europe, we have some of the staff here from the actual process in the room. It was a very long journey, but I think at the end of the day, the result is a very positive one. speaks for itself. So I think, and just to reflect a bit of the earlier comments, I mean this is the first international treaty on an emerging technology. I think it’s really important to reinforce that, you know, it’s the Council of Europe that brought forward this idea and has seen the creation of effectively what is the first legally binding instrument that is creating obligations on signatories to uphold certain values. Human rights, respect for democracy, and the rule of law. I think that’s an important statement in and of itself because it’s very different from a lot of the other work that’s going on in other multilateral fora which are speaking more on the normative basis. And I think which is why Canada, who’s not a member of the Council of Europe, it was an observer to the process, and others on the floor here, really sought to participate because this was our opportunity to frame at the international level effectively the first legally binding instrument. So from our perspective it was crucial to be there as an active participant on the delegation. We spent a lot of time trying to involve as many states as possible and so I think this is another important element to bring to the to the debate. It’s not the UN, but at the same time we felt it was extremely important to try to get as many member states from as many regions involved in the process. And so throughout the nearly two years of negotiation we saw a gradual increase not only in the number of participants but in fact signatories, hopefully at the end of the day. And so a cluster of observer groups in and of themselves. Could you bring me also an earphone for me?

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: Okay. And I think it’s an important statement. And we continue in that regard. So even past the end of the negotiations we’re seeing more states actively coming forward, trying to become part of the process. Of course post negotiations it’s sort of… have to take the treaty as it is but we are seeing increased interest particularly the Americas showed a high level of interest Asia as well we had Japan who was one of the observers but more countries at this point seemingly coming forward with an express interest and why is because they also have at the national levels everybody is come fascinated with the question what to do about AI. AI is a step change in the environment it’s an enabling technology which means if you haven’t regulated legislated or created frameworks to manage AI it is going to impact pretty much every sector of your government and every public policy area and so for us from the beginning we were also part of the previous process that the Council of Europe ran for the two years prior to the launch of negotiations this was all about framing and it’s important member states have obligations and so that the context of this framework instrument was to create a baseline and this is an interesting second point is this is one of the few areas where we were negotiating international treaty where there was frankly no floor most member states don’t have AI legislation so it wasn’t about leveling up at the international level it was actually about creating the baseline level to which member states have to now meet and so was it a very unique opportunity for Canada who is quite advanced in its own legislative and regulatory frameworks to help in fact you know create that floor and so I think we were quite successful always negotiations is about concessions but the end of the day I think you know could we have had an in a stronger instrument yes could we have had a weaker instrument yes and I think at least from Canada’s perspective there was a fine balance to the negotiations but at the end of the day what we have successfully created our baseline obligations that member states now have to take away and as they develop their own regulatory and national legislative frameworks they must meet these obligations I think that was a critical reason for us to be a part of this thank you thank you very much

AUDIENCE: David, I’m now nicely cabled and hearing myself several times with several loops. So yes, I think this is an important element that you named, that we didn’t start like comparing our national bases, but we had to basically set this floor, set this baseline from scratch, which was a challenge, but it was also an opportunity to seize. So now we go to a European country for once. We have Izil Deminec from Turkey, Turkey. You were also actively participating in the negotiations. How is Turkey planning to implement this convention? How are you going to organize yourself so that you address the challenges posed by AI and help your country to stay innovative at the same time? Thank you, Thomas. Thank you for the organization and the invitation as well. I hope my voice is… So as a member of the Council of Europe, Turkey recognizes the transformative potential of AI and obviously it brings with it a profound batch of legal and ethical questions. And the rapid spread of AI made it essential for everyone to take proactive steps to uphold AI principles at every stage of the AI lifecycle, which we were addressing at the CAI as well. To establish a robust framework that fosters ethical, sustainable, and innovative AI while addressing the unique challenges that AI poses, we have adopted the National AI Strategy back in 2021. It was drafted together with the Digital Transformation Office and the Ministry of Industry and Technology, and it is built upon six strategic priorities, which includes regulating to accelerate socio-economic adaptation. one of the ways Turkey is planning to address these challenges is through strengthening the legal framework. This is being done through amendment of existing laws or adopting of new ones as necessary and alongside the AI rules and regulations we are also working on our frameworks concerning both personal and non-personal data because we cannot separate the two from together as data is an integral element of AI technologies. So as per the strategy Turkey’s core objective focus on establishing an agile and inclusive process at developing governance mechanisms that promote impartiality, privacy, ethical oversight and algorithmic accountability while we also enhance data capacity to assess AI socio-economic impacts. The strategy also underscores the importance of fostering innovation which was one of our concerns at the CAI as well and ensuring alignment with international ethical standards. So I will be very briefly listing some of the key measures to support these goals. Aligning national AI regulations with international frameworks and commitments to maintain consistency with global governance structures. Creating an AI impact assessment framework which we are currently dealing with at the CAI to evaluate ethical social and economic impacts of AI systems. Preparing and implementing guidelines for algorithmic accountability and explainability to ensure transparency in automated decision-making and encouraging capacity building initiatives and public awareness in AI use. These are some of the issues that we are actually dealing with at the CAI. So it is essential to emphasize that legal challenges, these legal challenges require legal solutions beyond just legal considerations because we need to encompass social, financial, political and other dimensions at the same time. And Turkey’s unique position, geopolitical and geostrategic position influences its approach to global AI governance. That’s why we have been actively monitoring and participating in international efforts. shape AI governance frameworks, not just at the CAI, which is also one of the strategy’s six priorities. This commitment is also clear in our active involvement at the CAI processes from the very beginning, since the CAHI, which led to the development of the first global legally binding AI treaty. So we are aware that we are at the forefront of disruptive technological change and it is evident that AI holds immense power, potential to shape our societies for the better. But how can we do this? We need robust ethical and legal frameworks that guide the process. So the framework convention emerging from the CAI process represents a pivotal step in this direction, which embodies the collective efforts of nations to ensure AI aligns with human rights, democratic values and shared global practices. We must recognize that AI knows no borders and its impact is inherently global, therefore a legally binding international instrument is not just desirable, but also essential to address these issues, to create a unified approach. Well, this instrument we hope will ensure accountability, transparency and fairness, while fostering trust among stakeholders to also help the development of this technology. Therefore we will continue to be actively contributing and remaining in the CAI processes and other alongside our other work on AI and other technological advancements. Thank you.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: Thank you very much Isil and I think it’s also important to raise the importance of data and data governance. The convention of course deals mainly with AI, but you find hints to data across the convention and if you in particular if you look at the explanatory report, then of course you find references to appropriate data quality and other issues related to data. Now we have an online participant. I hope the connection works. It is a colleague Tetsushi Hirano from Japan. Japan has been also a very active participant in the negotiations on that treaty at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg and but Japan has not only been a very active at the Council of Europe, Japan has also led other important initiatives like the G7 Hiroshima framework and of course Japan is also active in other processes like OECD and others. So Tetsushi, I hope you are there. My question to you would be How does Japan’s approach to AI governance align with the principles being proposed in this treaty? See whether the connection works … Any information from the… it’s coming? What’s the time in Japan now? What is the time difference? It’s already in the afternoon. Yeah, or we can if there’s some difficulties we can we have one more physically present human being here supposed to talk. We can switch the order, Vadim. No, he is coming. Okay. So let’s… Yeah, now we hear you. Hello. Did you hear my question or should I repeat it?

AUDIENCE: Okay. Okay, excellent, so we’re happy to listen to you now, Tetsushi. If you can speak up a little louder, your voice is a little low, so that may help. Do you hear me? Yeah, okay. Okay. So I’m very happy to be able to participate in this session to discuss this important international treaty with familiar faces from the negotiation. And I would like once again to thank Thomas and the CHI secretariat for their outstanding work and support throughout the negotiation process and to congratulate the states and the EU for signing the convention. In answer to Thomas, I think it is symbolic that this treaty was adopted in an institution that was founded on the bitter lessons of the Second World War. At the heart of what the Council of Europe stands for are common values that Japan shares. This is one of the reasons why, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Japan, together with Canada, the United States of America and Mexico, became an observer in the Council of Europe. These common values are crystallized in different ways in international law and in the constitution of the 57 states that have agreed on the frame of conventional artificial intelligence. The aim of the convention is to ensure that the activities within the life cycle of artificial intelligence systems comply with existing international and national legal obligations. This means that Japan, along with 56 other countries, has agreed on a framework to marry the shared values into the future where AI systems will be used in every corner of society. Some of the principles of the framework are transparency, equality, privacy, reliability, which are developed taking into account the socio-technical characteristics of AI technology. These principles will be operationalized in the risk and impact management framework. In my view, one of the challenges for the implementation of this treaty is the operationalization of these principles in accordance with existing legal obligations. It seems that the key lies in building capacity on the ethical, legal, and social implications of technological characteristics of AI, such as explainability or accuracy. This summer, Japan launched a new discussion on the future domestic framework for AI regulation under the AI Strategy Council, taking into account the new rules, guidelines, as well as recent achievements in the international forum, including the Hiroshima AI process. At the same time, we are accelerating the internal process of signing the convention. I am convinced that it is to possess the right balance of innovation and regulation. Thank you. Wait a second, the connection has turned really bad. Sound and zoom is okay. So you can tell us what, yeah, okay. We’re having a little bit of a technical issue here. If you could repeat the last few sentences that you said because we have missed it, unfortunately.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: Thank you. Well, we can’t hear you. We don’t hear anything. It’s just very faint, faint noise, but our 500 people technical team is already working on it. So. Um. I have to wait. Okay. Okay, thank you, Tetsushi. I think we’ve heard some elements from you, at least. There seems to be a problem that here in the room, we can’t hear you anymore. Maybe let’s use the time and we’re happy to take you back in the discussion. Let’s move on to Mr. Gibson. You may not have anything to do with the famous guitar brand, but you work for the UK government. So, yeah. In the UK, now that you signed the convention, how do you use the convention to also move things ahead on national level? And how are you seeing international cooperation thanks to the convention, but also in other frameworks? What are the UK’s plans for the coming months?

AUDIENCE: Yes, thank you. Thank you, Ambassador. Can people hear me? go ahead yeah people hear me yeah now we can really thank you very much thank you ambassador yes not not quite linked to the Gibson guitars I do get that and I do get Mel Gibson as my uncle but yeah I am yes and as to your question I think a good way of framing this is looking at starting off by considering the UK’s approach to air governance obviously we’ve had a government recently and we’re thinking about the opportunities of AI and really want to capitalize those as well in order to turbocharge economic growth and you know without a sort of sense of an understanding of the risks mitigating risks tackling key risks as well we won’t be in a position to fully capitalize or you know capture the full potential of the technology as well and so that’s the kind of key framing I think is really important when we go into discussing the Council Europe AI treaty as well as other international governance frameworks really understanding that working together cooperation and setting global baselines due to the transcendental cross-border nature of the technology is fundamental and really harnessing the potential of every sort of input from different countries civil society and the private sector as well whilst recognizing that in order to really capture the the benefits opportunity and harness innovation you need a technology that is trustworthy that those risks are understood that you can have that safe secure trustworthy AI and really capture that as well so I think that’s been a sort of key framing I think for us as well at the international level we’ve really not been able to highlight the it’s such an extent though but when the UK we sort of had the first AI safety summit in Bletchley that paved the way for a great deal of discussion on a lot of these risks and what we need to do to mitigate that. And in doing so, we were very keen to really reinforce in the Bletchley Declaration the importance of safe, secure, trustworthy AI and building that understanding of risk as well. With that in mind, we were also very keen to really harness the possibilities of securing innovation for that. And so bringing Frontier AI Labs and companies on board in that process has been really fundamental and really highlighting the importance of getting voluntary commitments, pushing the conversation along with a range of sectors to really ensure that the public and different sectors can buy into that technology. That has continued in other areas of international AI governance as well. We’ve really reflected this in the UN environment. So the Global Digital Compact, we really wanted to reinforce the importance of a multi-stakeholder input. In the UN resolutions, which were agreed in 2024, we wanted to really push that there were flexible and differentiated approaches. And that’s kind of reflective of the UK approach, that in order to get that trust, you need a proportionate approach to governance, and that’s a fundamental recognition. So you get the balance between innovation and safety. Coming to the Council of Europe specifically, though, I think this has been an opportunity for us to really reinforce the UK’s value add in the conversation. So we have taken a sort of very, reflecting on the proportionate amount, a balanced, targeted, agile approach to AI governance. So we look at things sort of sectorally in our regulatory approach at the moment. So allowing different regulators to engage with the technology and regulate technology in a sort of more light-touch approach, ensuring that these all work together and really harness the potential that way. However, we are thinking about sort of building on that and recognizing the role of innovation with our new Regulatory Innovation Office, with a model for responsible innovation, supporting the technology. And this is the sort of approach that we have reflected in the Council of Europe AI Treaty negotiations as well. well to bring us to that point. So the UK was really keen to reinforce the merits of balanced language, so ensuring that there is not too much prescription in the detail, so being too over prescriptive might make it a bit too challenging for a lot of different countries to get on board. So looking at the range of different countries here, I think we recognize that we want a range of different regulatory approaches to be recognized in the Council of Europe AI Treaty, and also reinforcing the importance of new and other countries who are a bit nascent in the regulatory approach to AI to come on board as well. However, I think the importance is balancing that with clarity, and we were really keen to push the point about clarity in text. These are some legal obligations, you know, involving human rights. We want to be really clear that people understand the technology, and that comes back to my point about trust. If you don’t trust, we can’t really capture the technology as well, and I think this was reflected in a couple of really interesting provisions in the convention as well. So a provision on safe innovation, another provision which ensured that research and development could be safeguarded, and wasn’t necessarily always fully in line, and making sure that that can be continued despite or in spite of it at the convention as well, but really making sure that’s crystal clear. And we wanted to make really clear that we could be a bridge as well as the UK, so talking about that proportionate approach to governance, we recognized that all these different regulatory approaches would be needed, and towards the end when it might have looked a little bit challenging to get agreement, we were really keen to be pragmatic, provide a sort of basis in bringing a group of people together on the sort of final throws in the 11th hour of the negotiations, to come together and find those areas of overlap on the more challenging areas, so how we could apply the convention and make sure we could get all the relevant countries on board so that this could be a successful global treaty. So we were really keen to really be pragmatic, to really reinforce those points about trust as well. well, and I think that’s reflective in our international AI governance approaches.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: Thank you very much Mauricio, and indeed it was not easy, and hopefully we get a discussion, a few minutes for discussion also in the end. The idea to make something that holds across time with principles, but also to have it sufficiently clear, but not too over-perspective in detail, was and is not an easy task and will also be a challenge in implementing it. Now I wonder, we would have another very active participant, but apparently, Argentina is a country that was also very active, but apparently the connection somehow didn’t make it across the ocean, but just to say that Argentina would have been an example of one of the Latin American countries that have been participating, there were about 5 or 6 Latin American countries that were already doing the negotiation, active in the work on this treaty. But we’ll see whether we can connect to her later. So with this, we have gone through the panelists, unless I missed somebody, which doesn’t seem to be the case. So we could actually use a few minutes to also allow the people in the room and also online to make comments and questions. We have a mic here, so just stand up and make yourself heard if you want, and we’ll try to have some interaction also with the audience here. Yes, please present yourself and then continue. Well, thank you very much. My name is Dr. Rafael de Lis Aguirre, I’m at the Max Tilburg Center in Germany, and as a member of the scientific community and a developer, what impact do you foresee that such a treaty will have for us and our daily lives coding? Thank you. Thank you very much. This is a very good question. Any of you who wants to reply to this? Allison?

Allison PETERS: Well, thank you, first and foremost, for the question. I think I can only speak for my government, but I also know I speak for several governments here, which is that throughout the negotiation process, with big recognition of the fact that this is a legally binding convention, making sure that the technical community could actually participate and that we had on our delegation technical experts that were leading the negotiations was mission critical. I think for us, and I think my colleague from the UK spoke about this as well, making sure that we have a convention that is technically rigorous, that is practical, that is clear in terms of how it can be used, not just by governments, but also the technical community was really a big priority. I won’t talk about every single provision of the convention, but I think for you and colleagues in this space, you know, one of the key things that that we’re working on now is actually building out a risk assessment framework. And again, we talked, I think every one of the panelists talked about the fact that this convention would be really a sort of shared baseline in systems that may not have an AI risk assessment framework. So in the United States, we have our NIST Risk Management Framework, or RMF, as it’s known by the technical community, that actually helps us do assessments of AI systems and managing risks and putting then in place technically rigorous safeguards that could manage those risks. But other systems don’t have a NIST Risk Management Framework or don’t have risk management frameworks that necessarily harmonize across systems. And so we are actually working to negotiate a risk assessment framework that could be used across the board, whether that be by governments or individuals in the technical community. And if you’re not already tracking that process, we’d love to make sure that you are able to engage and that you’re able to follow the negotiations, because I think for folks like you, that’s gonna be a really important thing that we built out, known as the Huderia. And for us, again, making sure that that tool is technically rigorous, but also practical and interoperable across systems is really top priority in the current moment.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: Yeah. I would just also, yeah, reinforcing everything my colleagues from the U.S. said. And I think another thing to touch upon is in the convention, there is a sort of, I think I touched upon it in my statement as well, but an exemption for research and development. So what that doesn’t mean is it just excludes all and every single form of research and development from the convention, but it creates a sort of a limitation and a safeguard. And in certain conditions, those undertaking certain R&D, which might impact human rights, can continue to do so with the necessary safeguards in place. So that was a really… hotly focused on area that we really try to invest a lot of time so we could make sure that people like in your community Have that space to continue doing things where there might be implications for human rights and Really continuing that as such so that’s a particular area which I think is important to highlight The same with the safe innovation space or creating a space for sandboxing and encouraging different regulations to engage in sandboxing which can Do things safely and in that space really creating the environment for that as well Just just to add to this one one comment and indeed one thing is to have some kind of Harmonization or at least interoperability on legal terms But then if you’re supposed to implement this and of course the convention Because it’s supposed to hold for a few years 10 hopefully 20 needs to be on a very general level And this is why this risk Implement Impact and risk assessment frameworks are so important and the second deliverable that the CHI this Council of Europe committee Is delivering is this Huderia the human rights democracy and rule of law risk and impact assessment methodology The key requirements on a very general level are part of the convention We’ve just adopted there what we call level two document Which is a 20 page guidance and non-binding a guidance document about how to do Risk and impact assessment and next year. We’ll be working on a much more detailed Document with questionnaires and so on they’re going into fairly detailed level in and this is the important thing in cooperation with the IEEE with I EEC the International Electoral Technical Committee with ISO so also to build the bridge between technical standardization institutions that Programmers are probably more familiar with to the legal standardization body, so that’s a very good question. Thank you very much. Thank you next

NIGEL CASIMIR: Hi Thank you Good day, I’m Nigel Casimir from the Caribbean Telecommunications Union, and I’m wondering two things. One is, are there any arrangements for additional countries that might want to accede to this convention? And secondly, given that, you know, it was created, I heard a lot of talk about negotiations and so on, and first in the Caribbean, you know, we would think that the countries that got this thing started would basically be kind of like-minded, so I’m wondering, apart from the processes for additional countries to accede, are there any thoughts about, as additional countries come in, to make allowances for, I don’t know, adjustments to the treaty and that sort of thing? So I guess future processes in general.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: David, thank you very much, Nigel, and good to see you. Very good question. Maybe one word. The Council of Europe has got nothing to do with the European Union. The Council of Europe, as was said, was like the UN of Europe, was created after the Second World War to try and bring peace in a sustainable way to Europe through securing human rights, democracy, and rule of law. It has no economic component, and it has 46 member states now, whereas the European Union, the members of the EU are all part of members of the Council of Europe. And the Council of Europe has this unique opportunity to not just develop soft law and hard law standards for its members, but it can also include others, other countries. We’ve already had 11 in the negotiations, and any member states, any country in the world that lives up to certain standards on human rights, democracy, and rule of law can become a part of the process. We have contact with a number of countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America, that are in contact with the Council of Europe to become part of the process, also to keep working on the Huderia, but also to become a potential future party of the Convention. happy and if you turn around the tall man behind you is working for the Council of Europe, Vadim, he’s willing to get into contact with interested countries or stakeholders from other countries to actually broaden the basis and the example of the cybercrime treaty actually shows that, I don’t know the exact number, but the number of signature of parties is around 70, but the cooperation actually, one is to have a sign and ratify the convention, the other one is to cooperate around the process and there’s way more than a hundred countries that are in contact with the Council of Europe and at least take over some of the elements which helps to interoperability of legal systems and then also the implementation mechanisms across the world. So you’re very warmly invited to spread the message that this is a treaty that is open, that can be and countries can join to become part of the treaty but also to be a part of the wider process on cooperation and exchange of best practice. Yes, David?

AUDIENCE: Sorry about that. Nigel? Yes? Okay, good. Great, great to hear from you Nigel and everything he said plus one. I think the important element, at least from Canada’s perspective, is we were not a member of the Council of Europe so our participation was crucial simply because the concerns that Canadian legislative basis is different from Europe, is different from the EU, and so we had equities we obviously wanted to protect, values we wanted to bring forward in the process. I mean on a personal basis, would I have loved to have seen more observer states, more blocs, whether it be CARICOM or others, participate in the process, the negotiations? Absolutely, but we can’t change that. But what we did to make sure in the process the negotiation was to create a conference of the parties. And so this is sort of, once the treaty comes into force, which is a very low number of member-state signatories and ratifications, it’s an annual process for the members to, the members of the convention to come together and consider the treaty itself. It’s a multi-stakeholder forum, which means participation from the technical community, the civil society, private sector entities, to continue to review. Because inherently we understood that it’s very hard to create international legislation that is future-proof. And so in a sense, whether you are part of the negotiations or not, obviously down the road, you know, a member of CARICOM or CARICOM itself, I mean, being a part now and signing up allows you to be part of the ongoing dialogue. And I think the important element here is the treaty itself is very slim. It’s not very long. It’s not very detailed. It was about, you know, as the expression goes, it doesn’t matter what color the cat is as long as it catches mice. And what this treaty was trying to say is we were just trying to make sure we all understood what the cat should look like, not the color. The color is a national effort. And so, you know, Canada has very advanced regulatory regimes. It’s working on a piece of legislation. You know, other countries on this floor don’t even have legislation or, you know, frameworks are of a different nature. And so the whole point is whether you’re from Asia or from Africa or North America, as long as we adhere to basic principles, your cat can look very different, but as long as it’s still a cat. Thank you very much for this very good picture. Thank you. Next,

LINA VILTREKENE: please. Hello, my name is Lina Viltrekene and I am Lithuanian ambassador for digital economy. I would like to thank very much the Council of Europe, the chair and the panel for having this discussion on this first international treaty on artificial intelligence, human rights and democracy and rule of law. So I intentionally said the long name of the treaty. because the treaty was opened for signature in Vilnius, in my capital, and we are proudly calling this treaty as the Vilnius Convention. Proudly because it was also signed during the presidency of Lithuania to the Council of Europe, and it coincides very much with Lithuania’s priorities during that presidency, including strengthening democracies, including protecting human rights, but also including fighting disinformation. And I wanted to emphasize this important element in the context of indeed alarming rise of disinformation, which really undermines human rights, and particularly of those groups of society that are most vulnerable, like children, like seniors, like people with disabilities. So I just wanted also perhaps to raise a question, how do you see how the Convention could contribute to fighting disinformation, particularly AI-driven disinformation and harmful content online?

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: Thank you very much, and first of all, thank you, Lithuania, for your support, and we’re very happy throughout the process, also as a president of the Council of Europe during that period, also for organizing EuroDIG, the European IGF in Vilnius this year, so we’re very happy that this is going to be, the Convention is going to be known as the Vilnius Convention. On the question on disinformation, there’s one very general reference, which is very fundamental, but it remains on a very general level about states’ obligations to secure the functioning of democratic processes, and it doesn’t go much further. into detail, because this is very difficult. It’s also very different from from country to country how democratic processes are organized. So yeah, any short references maybe on how in your countries you deal with democracy? Maybe Isil from Turkey, do you have a…

AUDIENCE: Thank you. I just wanted to, I think you brought up a really important topic. Disinformation can definitely impact democratic processes and this is one of the things we’re trying to protect with this convention. And as our chair of CAI, previous chair of CAI has mentioned, this is a framework convention so it’s guiding the signatories to adopt measures or laws to prevent issues like this from happening. Well, as you correctly mentioned, the rise of disinformation can actually manipulate public opinion and in turn affect the democratic processes. So this can be something that can be developed by signatories in a more detailed manner in their own legal regimes, I believe. Thank you so much. I think this is one of the problems that your government, our government, we’re all facing this challenge of how AI changes the information environment. I’d first say that foreign interference, disinformation, these are not new challenges. These are long-standing issues. AI does supercharge the ability for actors to use tools. We’ve seen foreign states already using AI tools to conduct information operations in many countries. At the same time, we can overstate the risk of disinformation. We can sometimes see countries use the idea that disinformation… is prevalent to censor political speech so it’s a very careful balance to be struck in terms of saying yes there is a threat to democracy to democratic participation however there is also the risk that it is this this narrative is used to censor free speech so I think a really core obligation on us all is to build trust to build an ability for our societies to critique the information environment to be able to engage in information so that we’re not just believing stories that are out there but this is not an area that governments should dive in too deeply too quickly because I think there is a rush that it can it can be over corrected and in fact we can stifle the information environment in the desire to address this information thank you unfortunately 130 seconds for a listen because time is up we need to free the room I guess and also to the next one’s just 30 seconds I just really wanted to thank Lithuania for your leadership in allowing us to have the signing in your country and to come back to the point that Thomas started with while this is not a dedicated convention on AI exacerbating disinformation or broader information integrity around the globe it does deal with the use of AI systems by public sector actors meaning governments right and so it to the point that Ambassador Dowling made on this delicate balance between both addressing risks of artificial intelligence and safeguarding fundamental freedoms I think we strike that right balance overall in this convention and coming back to the point where we all started I mean this is a shared baseline so as we look to the UN system other multilateral systems where governments are perhaps not striking that right balance and debates around disinformation and broader information integrity having this shared understanding is going to be mission critical as we take forward those negotiations in those systems so while it’s not exclusively dealing with issues around information manipulation I think it’s certainly quite critical that we have this shared understanding to start.

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER: start just finish with one reference to an online question about the relationship or how the Council of Europe treaty can be useful to the bigger global UN environment also helping to implement the provisions from the GDC this is something we’ll have more more sessions on GDC so you’re very happy also to to think about how this convention can contribute to implementing the GDC and as Alison has said and many others have said this is a baseline it this convention will need to be and is already complemented by other more specific soft and hard law that follows the logic of the convention so currently for instance that the Council of Europe does work on the impact of generative AI on freedom of expression on on democratic deliberations in a country this is just one example, so thank you very much for your attention. Yeah, we’ll look forward also to engaging again with countries that are not yet part of the process. You’re very happy to come to me or to Vadim or to anyone that you’ve seen here on the panel. We’re all very, very eager to connect with countries that we are not yet connected about the convention. Thank you very much and enjoy the rest of the day online or offline, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Agreement Points

Importance of the AI treaty as the first legally binding international agreement

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER

Allison PETERS

First legally binding international treaty on AI

Sets a shared baseline for rights-respecting AI development

Speakers agree on the significance of the AI treaty as the first legally binding international agreement, setting a shared baseline for AI governance.

Balancing innovation and safeguards in AI development

AUDIENCE

Allison PETERS

Balances innovation and safeguards for human rights

Harmonizing various international approaches to AI

Speakers emphasize the importance of striking a balance between fostering AI innovation and protecting human rights and democratic values.

International cooperation and alignment of AI governance

Mr Thomas SCHNEIDER

Allison PETERS

AUDIENCE

Open for participation from countries worldwide

Creating mechanisms for shared cooperation and best practices

Aligning national AI regulations with international frameworks

Speakers agree on the importance of international cooperation and aligning national AI regulations with global frameworks to ensure consistent AI governance.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize the need for flexibility in AI governance approaches, allowing for adaptations as more countries join the treaty and as AI technology evolves.

AUDIENCE

NIGEL CASSIMIRE

Adopting a balanced and targeted approach to AI governance

Potential for future adjustments as new countries join

Unexpected Consensus

Importance of ongoing review and adaptation of the treaty

AUDIENCE

NIGEL CASSIMIRE

Ongoing review and updates through Conference of Parties

Potential for future adjustments as new countries join

Despite representing different perspectives (a government representative and an external observer), both speakers agree on the importance of allowing the treaty to evolve over time. This unexpected consensus highlights a shared recognition of the rapidly changing nature of AI technology and the need for governance frameworks to adapt accordingly.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement include the importance of the AI treaty as a first legally binding international agreement, the need to balance innovation with safeguards, and the significance of international cooperation in AI governance. There is also consensus on the need for flexibility and ongoing adaptation of the treaty.

Consensus level

There appears to be a high level of consensus among the speakers on the fundamental principles and goals of the AI treaty. This strong agreement suggests a shared commitment to establishing effective global AI governance while respecting national differences. The consensus implies that the treaty has a strong foundation for implementation and future development, although specific details of national implementation may vary.

Different Viewpoints

Balance between innovation and regulation

Allison PETERS

AUDIENCE

Harmonizing various international approaches to AI

Adopting a balanced and targeted approach to AI governance

While both speakers emphasize the importance of balancing innovation and regulation, they differ in their approaches. Allison PETERS focuses on harmonizing international approaches, while the AUDIENCE speaker (representing the UK) advocates for a more targeted, sector-specific approach.

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around the specific approaches to implementing the AI treaty and balancing innovation with regulation.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among the speakers is relatively low. Most speakers agree on the fundamental principles and goals of the AI treaty, with minor differences in implementation strategies. This suggests a generally unified approach to AI governance, which is likely to facilitate the treaty’s adoption and implementation across different countries.

Partial Agreements

Both speakers agree on the need to protect human rights while fostering AI innovation. However, they differ in their emphasis, with Allison PETERS focusing on establishing a shared baseline, while the AUDIENCE speaker (representing various countries) highlights the need for flexibility in national approaches.

Allison PETERS

AUDIENCE

Sets a shared baseline for rights-respecting AI development

Balances innovation and safeguards for human rights

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize the need for flexibility in AI governance approaches, allowing for adaptations as more countries join the treaty and as AI technology evolves.

AUDIENCE

NIGEL CASSIMIRE

Adopting a balanced and targeted approach to AI governance

Potential for future adjustments as new countries join

Key Takeaways

The AI treaty is the first legally binding international agreement on AI, setting a shared baseline for rights-respecting AI development.

The treaty aims to balance innovation with safeguards for human rights, democracy, and rule of law.

It is open for participation from countries worldwide, not just Council of Europe members.

Countries are taking varied approaches to implementing the treaty and aligning it with national AI regulations.

International cooperation and multi-stakeholder input are crucial for effective AI governance.

The treaty is designed to be flexible and adaptable as AI technology evolves.

Resolutions and Action Items

Develop more detailed risk assessment frameworks for AI systems

Continue efforts to broaden participation in the treaty beyond current signatories

Work on aligning national AI regulations with the treaty’s principles

Establish a Conference of Parties for ongoing review and updates to the treaty

Unresolved Issues

Specific mechanisms for combating AI-driven disinformation while protecting free speech

Detailed implementation strategies for different national contexts

How to ensure the treaty remains relevant as AI technology rapidly advances

Balancing prescriptiveness of the treaty with flexibility for innovation

Suggested Compromises

Creating exemptions for research and development to allow innovation while maintaining safeguards

Adopting a general framework in the treaty while allowing for more detailed national regulations

Balancing clear legal obligations with flexibility for different regulatory approaches

Using a risk-based approach to determine the level of regulation needed for different AI applications

We all see the upsides of AI. We all see the benefits for development, for economic opportunity. But with every new phase of digital technology, we’ve seen human rights, the rights of women and girls, the rights of freedom of speech, democracy jeopardised.

speaker

Ambassador Dowling

reason

This comment succinctly captures the core tension at the heart of AI governance – balancing innovation and opportunity with protection of rights and democracy.

impact

It set the tone for much of the subsequent discussion, with many speakers referring back to this balance between innovation and safeguards.

We don’t want to do anything as it relates to regulation that cracks down on innovation, doesn’t allow that innovation to happen, and so certainly, with this convention, we see a convention that allows us to harmonize various different international approaches to AI, and one that still allows companies to innovate, to be creative, to create new AI systems that help really advance the opportunities as it relates to AI, but also help crack down on some of those risks that we’re talking about.

speaker

Allison Peters

reason

This comment articulates a key goal of the treaty – to create a harmonized international approach that protects rights while still enabling innovation.

impact

It shifted the discussion towards how the treaty aims to strike this balance in practice, leading to more detailed explanations of specific provisions.

It’s not the UN, but at the same time we felt it was extremely important to try to get as many member states from as many regions involved in the process. And so throughout the nearly two years of negotiation we saw a gradual increase not only in the number of participants but in fact signatories, hopefully at the end of the day.

speaker

Mr. Fairchild

reason

This highlights the importance of broad international participation, even for a treaty originating from a European body.

impact

It led to further discussion about how the treaty aims to be globally relevant and applicable beyond just Europe.

Turkey’s unique position, geopolitical and geostrategic position influences its approach to global AI governance. That’s why we have been actively monitoring and participating in international efforts.

speaker

Isil Denemec

reason

This comment introduces the perspective of how a country’s specific geopolitical context shapes its approach to AI governance.

impact

It broadened the discussion to consider how different national contexts might influence implementation of the treaty.

In the convention, there is a sort of, I think I touched upon it in my statement as well, but an exemption for research and development. So what that doesn’t mean is it just excludes all and every single form of research and development from the convention, but it creates a sort of a limitation and a safeguard.

speaker

Mr. Gibson

reason

This comment provides insight into a specific, important provision of the treaty that balances innovation with safeguards.

impact

It led to a more detailed discussion of how the treaty aims to practically balance innovation and protection in its specific provisions.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by consistently returning to the central theme of balancing innovation with protection of rights and democracy. They highlighted the treaty’s aim to be globally relevant, adaptable to different national contexts, and practically implementable. The discussion evolved from broad principles to more specific provisions and implementation challenges, while maintaining a focus on international cooperation and harmonization of approaches.

How can the risk assessment framework for AI systems be developed and implemented across different countries?

speaker

Allison Peters

explanation

This is important for creating a shared baseline for assessing AI risks and implementing safeguards across different regulatory systems.

How can the convention contribute to fighting AI-driven disinformation and harmful content online?

speaker

Lina Viltrakiene

explanation

This is crucial given the alarming rise of disinformation that undermines human rights, particularly for vulnerable groups.

How can the convention be used to implement provisions from the Global Digital Compact (GDC)?

speaker

Online participant (unnamed)

explanation

Understanding this relationship is important for aligning international efforts on AI governance.

How can the convention be adapted or adjusted as additional countries join?

speaker

Nigel Cassimire

explanation

This is important for ensuring the convention remains relevant and inclusive as it expands beyond its initial signatories.

What impact will the treaty have on the daily lives of AI developers and coders?

speaker

Dr. Rafael de Lis Aguirre

explanation

Understanding the practical implications for the technical community is crucial for effective implementation of the treaty.

How can the convention balance addressing AI risks while safeguarding fundamental freedoms like free speech?

speaker

Ambassador Dowling

explanation

This balance is critical for ensuring the convention protects democracy without enabling censorship.

Summary

This discussion focused on the multi-stakeholder model in internet governance, exploring its applicability, challenges, and future prospects. The panelists examined how the multi-stakeholder approach varies across different policy areas and contexts. They emphasized that while there is no one-size-fits-all model, the core principles of inclusivity, transparency, and accountability should be maintained.

The conversation highlighted the need for careful design of multi-stakeholder processes to address specific issues effectively. Panelists discussed the concept of “multi-stakeholder disguise” or tokenism, where processes claim to be multi-stakeholder but lack meaningful engagement or impact. They stressed the importance of not just soliciting input, but also demonstrating how that input influences decisions and outcomes.

The maturity of multi-stakeholder models was explored, with Avri Doria presenting a framework for evaluating the depth of stakeholder involvement, from basic consultation to full implementation and oversight. Participants noted that the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder approaches can vary depending on the issue at hand and the context in which they are applied.

Looking to the future, the panelists agreed that the multi-stakeholder model remains crucial for addressing complex internet governance issues. However, they emphasized the need for continued refinement and analysis of these models to ensure they genuinely serve their intended purpose. The discussion concluded with a call for more research into the effectiveness of various multi-stakeholder approaches and the importance of maintaining good faith participation from all involved parties.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The applicability and implementation of multi-stakeholder models varies across different policy areas and contexts

– There is a need to evaluate and analyze multi-stakeholder processes to ensure they are meaningful and not just “tokenism”

– The maturity and effectiveness of multi-stakeholder approaches depends on factors like participant selection, roles/responsibilities, and accountability

– Multi-stakeholder models are still evolving and need further development, but are seen as important for inclusive policymaking

Overall purpose:

The goal of this discussion was to examine the current state and future of multi-stakeholder governance models in internet policy, exploring how they can be effectively implemented across diverse issues and contexts.

Tone:

The tone was largely analytical and constructive, with speakers critically examining multi-stakeholder approaches while still affirming their overall value. There was general agreement on the need to further develop and refine these models. The tone became slightly more cautionary near the end when discussing challenges like bad faith participation, but remained overall optimistic about the future potential of multi-stakeholder governance.

Speakers

– KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Moderator, from Center for International Economic Cooperation on Internet Governance

– AVRI DORIA: Expert on multi-stakeholder models and evaluation frameworks

– AMRITA CHOUDHURY: Expert from India

– LILLIAN NALWOGA: Expert from Uganda/Africa

– JIM PRENDERGAST: Galway Strategy Group

Additional speakers:

– Audience member from Japan

– Audience member (unnamed) who commented on stakeholder roles

Multi-stakeholder Models in Internet Governance: Applicability, Challenges, and Future Prospects

This discussion, moderated by Keisuke Kamimura from the Center for International Economic Cooperation on Internet Governance, explored the current state and future of multi-stakeholder governance models in internet policy. The session was organized by a research group studying the applicability of multi-stakeholder models to various policy areas, providing important context for the dialogue.

Applicability and Implementation

The panel examined the diversity and applicability of multi-stakeholder models across different policy areas. Contrary to the initial summary, Kamimura expressed skepticism about whether these models could be equally applied to all policy areas, suggesting that multiple different models might be needed for various issues.

Avri Doria, an expert on multi-stakeholder models, emphasized that there is no one-size-fits-all approach, highlighting the adaptability of these models to different contexts. Amrita Choudhury, an expert from India, provided a concrete example of this adaptability, noting that multi-stakeholder models have proven applicable to digital economy issues, contrary to initial doubts.

Lillian Nalwoga, an expert from Uganda, introduced the concept of deploying multi-stakeholder approaches at different levels depending on maturity. She also highlighted the challenges of implementing these models in developing countries, where resources and expertise may be limited.

Evaluation and Maturity of Multi-stakeholder Processes

Avri Doria presented a detailed framework for assessing multi-stakeholder processes based on orientation, participants, and roles/responsibilities. She outlined maturity levels ranging from consultation to implementation and oversight, providing a structured approach to understanding the depth of stakeholder involvement. This framework included:

1. Consultative level: Stakeholders are consulted but have limited influence.

2. Cooperative level: Stakeholders work together but don’t make final decisions.

3. Collaborative level: Stakeholders are involved in decision-making processes.

4. Implementation level: Stakeholders participate in implementing decisions.

5. Oversight level: Stakeholders are involved in monitoring and evaluation.

The speakers emphasized the crucial role of transparency and accountability in ensuring meaningful multi-stakeholder engagement. Jim Prendergast from the Galway Strategy Group stressed that meaningful multi-stakeholderism requires feedback on how input was used, highlighting the importance of demonstrating the impact of stakeholder contributions.

Challenges and Improvements

The discussion addressed several challenges in implementing multi-stakeholder governance. Kamimura raised concerns about “multi-stakeholder disguise” or tokenism, where processes claim to be multi-stakeholder but lack genuine engagement or impact.

Amrita Choudhury stressed the importance of inclusivity and consideration of diverse stakeholders for effective multi-stakeholder processes. An audience member emphasized the need for clearly defined roles and responsibilities for each stakeholder, particularly in decision-making processes.

The panel also discussed the Sao Paulo multi-stakeholder guidelines, which were referenced multiple times as a potential framework for improving multi-stakeholder processes.

Future Prospects and Global Digital Compact

Looking to the future, the panelists discussed the relevance of multi-stakeholder models to the Global Digital Compact (GDC), a UN initiative aimed at outlining shared principles for an open, free, and secure digital future. The speakers agreed on the continued importance of multi-stakeholder models in addressing complex internet governance issues, while acknowledging the need for ongoing development and refinement.

Avri Doria called for deeper analysis of these models and raised an important challenge: protecting multi-stakeholder processes against bad faith actors. Lillian Nalwoga outlined key focus areas for future multi-stakeholder processes, including transparency, inclusion, and accountability, particularly in the context of developing countries.

Conclusion

The discussion concluded with a nuanced view of multi-stakeholder models in internet governance, recognizing both their potential value and the challenges in their implementation. Key takeaways included the need for adaptability of these models to various contexts, the importance of transparency and accountability, and the necessity for ongoing development and protection against misuse.

Kamimura mentioned an upcoming dialogue on multi-stakeholder measurement, indicating continued efforts to refine and evaluate these models. As the internet governance landscape continues to evolve, the effective implementation and continuous improvement of multi-stakeholder approaches remain crucial for addressing complex global challenges in the digital realm.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: as follows. Does the multi-stakeholder model equally fit each of these policy areas? Or are we going to have somewhat multiple different models in dealing with the range of policy issues? And if we have multiple multi-stakeholder models, how can we make multi-stakeholder governance work across the broad range of policy issues? So that’s the basic outline of this session. But let me give you some brief overview of the project behind. As I mentioned, our session is based on the discussion or analysis conducted by the research group under the Center for International Economic Cooperation on Internet Governance. So let me give you some introduction of the project. The research group is a multi-stakeholder group of experts and academics on internet governance research and practice based in Japan. We have members from the government and the private sector, technical community and academia. So we are discussing, the group has discussed this issue for a while since last September, October. And we looked at the changes of the internet governance landscape over the last 20 plus years. Japan hosted IGF last year, so we produced an official report on IGF 2023. Actually later this week, we have a lightning talk session featuring the report booklet on IGF 2023. So if you are on site, please jump in and see what the report looks like. And we also did a comment contribution to WSIS Plus 20 review. And we also examined GDC draft texts and considered its impact on internet governance and its future forecast. We also conducted a session in APR IGF 2024 in Taipei. Our session was titled multi-stakeholderism in the post-GDC era. So during this activity, we came to some kind of, some sense of understanding or conclusion that applicability of multi-stakeholder models may vary depending on the policy areas in question, and needs to be evaluated on a set of criteria so that we can see how effectively multi-stakeholder models work or work or not. So that was the brief overview of the project behind this session. And I talked about the multi-stakeholder concept is referred in a diverse context. Let me give you, let me take GDC as an example. In the GDC, there are a number of references made to the term multi-stakeholder. One example is multi-stakeholder, our cooperation will be multi-stakeholder in paragraph A, K. Or in paragraph 17A, we are going to develop, disseminate, and maintain through multi-stakeholder cooperation. In terms of the digital divide, we have another reference to multi-stakeholder, the term multi-stakeholder in paragraph 27, internet governance. And so the references go on like this. And multi-stakeholder initiatives are also mentioned in paragraph 31A, digital trust and safety. So multi-stakeholder, and there are a number of other references to multi-stakeholder in other policy areas, interoperable data governance, artificial intelligence, and follow-up and review. So we, the term multi-stakeholder is one, but the contexts where the term is referred to are quite diverse. So that’s one point we came to realize. I also mentioned that we have a broad range of policy areas being discussed in the DDC, or broader internet governance context now. In the DDC text, we have connectivity, digital literacy, skills and capacities, digital public goods, and digital public infrastructure. And the list goes to interoperable data governance and artificial intelligence. So we refer to multi-stakeholder models or multi- stakeholder approach in this quite a broad range of policy areas. So even if we say, even if we agreed on the term multi-stakeholder, the actual implementations or adaptability may be quite different. So let me summarize our outcomes of the research group on internet governance. One is expanding scope. So we consider we need multi-stakeholder model because we have fast-changing policy areas. And those policy areas directly affect the life and behavior of people. But with expanding scope, multi-stakeholder model may work better for some issues and not for others. That’s one of our concerns. Another concern is multi-stakeholder disguise. Multi-stakeholder models may take various forms. In idealistic form, multi-stakeholder model may mean multi- stakeholder participation, multi-stakeholder decision-making, and multi-stakeholder implementation. But in some cases, multi-stakeholder may just stop at consultation. So we have to take care of what we call multi-stakeholder disguise. Expanding participation is another concern we considered. For multi-stakeholder models to be fully effective, we have engagement of smaller voices or the voices of the influenced. But how far does participation engagement go? How far should they go? So that’s another concern we have. And if we have multiple multi-stakeholder models, we better have core principles, principles such as inclusion and bottom-up structure. These principles should always be in place while other principles may not. So we may have core principles for multi-stakeholder models, but we also have non-core principles. And finally, long-term goals. What do we want multi-stakeholder models for? from the summary of the discussion we had in the research group on Internet Governance. So we have to evaluate multi-stakeholder models in some way or the other. One way is to look at it from a process point of view. NetMundial plus ten multi-stakeholder statement is one of the guidelines that we can use for evaluating multi-stakeholder readiness of a policy process. For maturity levels, which is presented by Avery Doria, one of today’s speakers, we can look at the multi-stakeholderness of a process from this perspective. There are other researchers presenting evaluation framework for multi-stakeholder models, Palladino and Santanielo, or Pandey, Muller, and Vardy. We realize that people are becoming aware of the necessity to evaluate across different multi-stakeholder models. This is one of the issues we want to discuss further today, but we are also concerned that there should be other elements in evaluating multi-stakeholder models. The works I just mentioned look more of the multi-stakeholder model from a process point of view, but we thought there should be other elements we need to consider in evaluating multi-stakeholder models applicability. One such element is the characteristics of a policy issue in question. Take digital literacy for example, it is very likely that we need multi-stakeholder model, but there are some areas where multi-stakeholder model may not work effectively or efficiently. Digital trust and safety are seemingly less likely that multi-stakeholder model is fully applied and digital economy, I honestly don’t know how MSM, multi-stakeholder model, works. So, even if we are agreed on that we need multi-stakeholder models, there are quite different implementations or applicabilities out there. This is what we want to discuss today. This is the key question. This is the brief overview of the session. I would like to invite Avery Doria, who has done a series of works on the evaluation or maturity level of the multi-stakeholder models. So Avery, you have the floor.

AVRI DORIA: Thank you. I need to share my slides. I think you need to see, yeah, okay, no. Let me see. Okay. And share. Okay. I’m going to talk a little bit about multi-stakeholders. I’m doing a little bit more than just the model because I need to sort of work my way to the model and what it consists of. First, I want to say thank you very much for inviting me to talk about this. Thank you very much for the introduction. And while I may quibble with you about some of the things that you’ve said in the introduction, I very much appreciate it. For example, I tend to believe that a form of the multi-stakeholder model can be used just about anywhere a group of people need to make decisions together. I tend to think that we’re never in a situation of all or nothing in terms of the model. So let me move on to my first slide. Okay. So part of what brought me to this discussion and the context in which I started looking at it was this sort of tussle, this dichotomy. Are we working in multilateral? Are we working in multi-stakeholder? Are there issues that can only be dealt with in a multilateral method? Can multi-stakeholder be used? Do multilateral and multi-stakeholder methodologies, modalities ever work together? Or are they completely incompatible? And basically, this is also part of the question that the Sao Paolo multi-stakeholder guidelines look at it. And sort of sometimes you hear people talk about, well, there really being, you know, continuums in discussions. But you would also hear people that were quite angrily when a multilateral group tried to do a little bit of, you know, stakeholder discussion or stakeholder opening, you know, people would say, no, no, no, that’s not multi-stakeholder because it’s only comments. It’s only, you know, and that sort of rang a bell with me and sort of said, no, if a multilateral process manages to reach out and to stakeholders and start including them, that’s something we need to encourage. We need to understand it. We need to understand its limitations. So anyhow, the two methods are, you know, rather different. The multilateral is sort of the very formal negotiations, whether they’re bilateral, trilateral, multilateral. They work on a basis of full consensus. There’s ratification. Whereas within a multi-stakeholder approach, and that seems to be a word that’s being used a lot, you find that each group that does them, while they’re working on similar principles, tends to develop a different set of modalities, a different set of ways of doing it, diverse decision-making procedures. And this way of doing things has, sometimes we spend almost as much time, I think, talking about the difference between multilateral processes and multi-stakeholder processes as we do actually talking about the specific issues. But anyhow, we have, you know, ICANN, the IGF is a multi-stakeholder body, the IETF, the Internet Engineering Task Force, and the Regional Internet Registry is the RIR. They all have very rich multi-stakeholder models, and yet they’re all somewhat different. And so when you start looking at how do I build something with a multi-stakeholder model or how do I apply multi-stakeholder modalities to the multilateral model, there’s a lot of issues to look at. That’s one of the places where the San Paolo multi-stakeholder guidelines also comes in useful, because they look at modalities, they encourage the notion of application of some multi-stakeholder modalities within a multilateral environment. So it becomes something that has a set of guidelines for how these two very different and constantly tussling models can actually work together. So just a brief slide on this. I will not go into these in deadlines. You know, the NetMundial in 2014 laid out a set of principles, multi-stakeholder, open, participatory, consensus-driven, et cetera. And these have really held through. You know, nobody looks at this list of attributes and sort of says, well, no, that’s not what multi-stakeholder is about. That’s not what Internet governance is about. But what they did put together is a set of guidelines and process steps for how these two very different and constantly tussling models can actually work together. to do it. And I really recommend reading it. And it’s section 3.2 of Netmundial plus 10, which for several pages goes through and gives a set of recommendations. I’ve also really gotten into word art today. I actually took section 3.2 and did that little piece of word art with it. And just, you know, I kind of like the whole idea of a rainbow bridging But anyhow, moving on. So then, so we have people that said, I’m doing something multistakeholder. You’re not doing something multistakeholder. So how do then we deal with it? And that’s where I go back to sort of a definition of multistakeholderism, where it’s the study and practice of various models, approaches, forms of participatory, open and accessible, as human centered efforts. And it is something where many models, there isn’t one model, there isn’t the notion of one model that fits all. As long as you are delivering on these principles, then the model matters less than the fact that you are using some set of techniques to achieve that. So basically, there’s a large set of models and modalities. But when you start then comparing them and looking into them, it’s sort of taking the multistakeholder model. And what we often do is hand wave about it. We sort of say, yes, it’s multistakeholder because, well, because the stakeholders are there and they’re participating. Whereas, taking down to the next level of analysis is start looking at various aspects. I picked three aspects here for an example, but other aspects are quite possible, you know, and like methods of selecting participants, funding methods, geographical, cultural. But the three I’m focusing on at the beginning are orientation. Is your model a bottom-up model, a top-down model, one of those start in the middle and then, you know, do a little bit of up and a little bit of down? Any of those can be used to build a multistakeholder model. They don’t all need to be bottom-up. However, each one of them is going to give you a slightly different model. So being aware of the orientation of the model you look at becomes critical. The next part is participants, the stakeholders, you know, and by the way, we call them stakeholders. There are people that love that term. There are people that hate that term. Basically, this whole notion of calling it multistakeholder is really something that came about during WSIS time. But people have been experimenting, you know, with various forms of this model all the way through the 20th century, and it wasn’t just in internet. You find various usages of the model in different, or the approach in different topics. But when we look at stakeholders, even in our own area, you know, we have the Tunis Agenda, GDC, et cetera, way of bringing in stakeholders and identifying them, you know, there are three, there are four, et cetera. There’s affinity groupings where people of a similar interest gather together to work on a problem, but they have different, you know, whether it’s the plumbers and the electricians, they have different affinities, they look at the world differently, and therefore they bring different approaches. And you have some that organize organizations, and only organizations are members, and others, individuals in the engineering task force. I very much see it as a multistakeholder organization with this umbrella definition, and it’s individuals. It’s not organizations. It’s not memberships and such. So, looking at that, and any time you’re creating a new organization with a multistakeholder model, you have to look at your stakeholders. You have to look at your participants and think about how you organize them, because that will give you a different looking model. And then finally, in this three aspect, there’s the roles and responsibilities. Can you contribute? In other words, can you contribute text? Can you contribute ideas? And are they accepted and used? These all, or are you part of the decision-making processes? Just make recommendations, advice, and you look at any project, you’ll find at different phases of a project, the stakeholders may have different roles. They may have different responsibilities. You can’t look at a large model and say, in total, those are the deciders, and those are, because at different phases of the model, that may come out differently. Finally, getting myself to the maturity models. So, let’s say you’ve done many of these aspect studies, and you start to have an idea of the structure and the understanding. So, then I started looking at, since I didn’t want to exclude someone from multistakeholder modalities, simply because all they did was solicit comments, and then actually consider them. Because soliciting comments and ignoring them, I tend to leave out, and we have seen some examples of that lately. So, that may be a concern. But comments that are really solicited and are considered is really one of the bases on which almost any multistakeholder model and maturity has to be built. But then you move up, and are there standing charter advisory groups who have roles and responsibilities, who give advice, who do analysis, who propose solutions, etc.? Is that something that’s in the norm, that’s in the fixed structure of the organization, the model you’re looking at? Then you get to decision making. Who makes the decision? What role does a stakeholder group have in decision making? And it isn’t just who is the final decider, but decision making is a larger process. And there may be other parts where people contribute to the decision making process, even if they are not voting on it at the very end. But then it goes beyond that. Once you’ve made a decision, and you’ve gone that, and then some group or other goes to implement it, goes to deploy it, goes to take it out into the world and sort of do something, is it being done consistently? Is the decision that was made by one group of people being followed through? Does it work? Does it not work? Does it need to be changed? And then finally, another piece in the maturity is you’ve put all this together. You’ve got comments, you’ve got committees, you’ve got decision making, and you’ve even got implementation reviews. Who has responsibility for oversight of reviewing your model, your approach, and making sure that it works, that makes sure that it makes sense? Is it a bottom-up oversight where the stakeholders themselves are the ones that are doing that? Or is there some sort of deus ex machia, some superior, some UN General Assembly that’s doing the oversight of review and such? So when I’m starting to look at that, and then I start to look at how the various aspects in the previous slide sort of feed into these maturity levels is the way I’ve started looking. So we’re not in a situation that says I’m multi-stakeholder, you’re not. But we start looking at our various levels of maturity within these models and how we can sort of move to a greater maturity in multi-stakeholder models. And I think that’s it. So thank you for letting me go through that rather quickly. These are slides I could spend hours on or just a few minutes I’ve spent/

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you, Avery. So I would like to draw the reflections of the panel. Amrita, would you take, give you some comments on my tone setting or comments by Avery?

AMRITA CHOUDHURY: Yeah, I hope I’m audible now. So yes, I completely agree with what Avery said, and I think she said most of what we would want to say, as in there is no, the multi-stakeholder model has different forms. It can be used in different ways and there is no one size that fits all. And it is practiced in different ways, in different levels. It could be at the consultative phases. It could also be at decision making or even implementation. what needs to be seen is are the right stakeholders there. It doesn’t mean everyone has to be there but the people who are relevant needs to be there. One of the comments which you made initially is, is it applicable to digital economy? Yes it is. For example, if you’re looking at payments which is an integral part of the digital economy, how it is even at the grassroots level the payments are working, whether people are literate and I come from India where digital payments are used, even illiterate people are using. Are they able to use it safely, securely or easily in their own languages that matters. If you don’t take the feedback from them, even if you design it the best of solutions, it’s not going to work. It cannot just be multilateral and I presume it is not applicable in all spheres because we need to go back and see why different stakeholders or participants are necessary because internet today affects each and every one in different ways. So till the time you do not have different people coming and speaking, it’s difficult. For example in AI, there may be software technologists sitting and planning it but if you want the rights perspectives, the privacy by design, the human rights aspect to be built into those systems, you need those kind of people in the room. You also need to have other people, for example the sustainability of people who are looking at energy consumption etc in the room. Obviously you need government, you need social activists or civil society else how would you build a model which is impacting us in a huge way to take care of those things because if you don’t take care of the risks earlier, you will not be able to take care of it later. Similarly when you’re talking about trust and safety, yes security experts can do it, law enforcement can use it but even if at the individual user level you don’t understand what the issues are, you will not be able to take care. Simple example, you have online gaming, children are playing it. You may want to regulate them but do you know what actual issues are or where they are playing it. For example if people who are actually playing games are not there when these discussions happen on digital trust and safety, just governments or regulators taking the decisions may not give the results which you would actually want and obviously you know there was a question I don’t know on the maturity markets. It again depends. There are developing countries who have leapfrogged into technology. For them coming into the conversation, it may take a more longer time to make it more inclusive. For example if I take an example in India, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India has consultations on all their aspects. They have consultations, they put it up transparently on the website and then finally take you know they give their directions or recommendations. But again if we look at some discussions like we had for a data privacy regulation, we had a consultative phase. However how it was used was never known. So I would say even in South Asia it depends upon the maturity of the country or market because they’re still grappling with other issues so it may take time. But I think the Sao Paulo guiding principles are essential. It also gives a checklist to multilateral organizations on what they need to look at if they want to make it more inclusive and they also have it on how the multi-stakeholder processes, what checklist they need to have and they have the process steps also like scoping the issue better, identifying who the relevant stakeholder for that discussion is, engaging them, sharing information because not everyone may be at the same level or even facilitating a dialogue after discussing, sharing it with people. So I think it has 12 such process steps which could be a good, I would say reference point for everyone to look. But yes it cannot be a one-size-fits-all for everything but it is definitely necessary in today’s digital economy.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you, Emerita. Now we have Lilian. Do you have your views on this? Can you

LILLIAN NALWOGA: I have a bit of some true thoughts on your presentation and probably in agreement with what Avri just presented, especially relating to say Africa or Uganda. But just a reflection is I think in one of your, in one of the questions that you raised, one of the points that you mentioned that the multi-stakeholder model works for some issues and not others. I’m a bit, I think also Emerita’s mentioned that. I think I’m slightly in disagreement because if we are looking at the digital space there are quite different issues that come into play. So especially the one that you raised on digital economy and I think Emerita has mentioned some bits of that. So I think depending on the maturity level or the different pockets that Avri has mentioned, I think it should be able to work but the context kind of differs. The other thing that I wanted to point on is the multi-stakeholder disguise. Kind of interesting how you framed it and I like the question, I mean you put the disguise in quotes and this we kind of see it happen a lot where to some it is more of if there’s a consultation then with the multi-stakeholder you know model you know has been affected and this is something that I really find a bit disturbing. But looking at the presentations from Avri on the maturity levels, who starts the process you know is it top, bottom or you know starts you know in the middle, where do we draw the line to say to conclude that this indeed has been a multi-stakeholder kind of you know approach that has been you know taken. So in Africa and in many countries in Africa we have the issue of the multi-stakeholder disguise where you have a few you know kind of a entities or groups for instance let’s say there’s an issue or developing a kind of you know a policy kind of document you’ll find that the policymaker will invite probably to let’s for instance say it is around say cyber security you’ll find that you may have just two entities represented in the initial you know drafting process of say this document. You find the government, you find maybe the private sector, someone in the banking sector and representative from maybe academia and then this will be consultative and fast-forward the policy to be kind of you know adopted. So again when we look at the broader multi-stakeholder model and we say that this is you know the multi-stakeholder you know this is was really a very well conclusive approach. So I think we are seeing lots of this multi-stakeholder disguise and I think if we go back to what Avri may have listed then we may need to rethink on who constitutes to be on the table for us to say that you know multi-stakeholderism has been applied. Reacting also to the other the very first I think in your presentation that you know the selective yes I think I’ve mentioned that. Yes there’s a bit of selectiveness especially if the initial the issue at hand is may consider you know may may bring some tension you know within the within the different actors. So you’ll find like you said digital economy may not may not be needed for you know Mr. Calder approach. So this kind of you know whoever is leading this process that kind of you know looking at it policy issue you know we select this to leave that. But I think that is really something that needs to be put into consideration. It’s a wrong approach, and we are seeing this happening in most of the African countries, even my country where I come from, Uganda. Last but not least, I would like to say that from what captured my mind was in the presentation I’ve mentioned, the different processes and where do we put this all together. The multilateral kind of processes where you see the ITU being active versus those that are pushing for multistakeholder governance model, the ICANNs, the IJF, and all that. The participation we see of certain actors tends to go much in the treaty kind of processes. In most cases, these are kind of selective. They are addressing certain issues. For instance, if you see now the way ITU, maybe we’re seeing so many of our countries in Africa being more present, more active in ITU processes than in these other kind of say WSIS, IJF, ICANN, there’s little of that kind of how do you draw the line. So where is that mix? I think there was some kind of an infinity symbol, how do we put this all together and constitute not to just addressing policy issues one by one. So I have a feeling that this is something we are from where, from Uganda or from Africa, we still are at the point of consultative kind of model maturity. Yes, we have a few consultations. We have a few representatives present. And then we conclude that this is a multistakeholder kind of model approach has taken place. But again, this is really – it is not that inclusive if we are to look at the MSM as has been presented by the previous speakers, mainly on the maturity in implementation tracking – it is still not clear who is doing what. The oversight of the review also, we still – there are issues of how do you track who is doing what, who is responsible. In many cases, if it is a policy deployment, it is very hard to track the review and what informs another review if it is needed. So I would say I think I am in agreement, but also a bit in context on the issue of maybe that we need to leave some issues – some issues may not require the approach. I think the multistakeholder model approach needs to be deployed at different levels depending on where you are in the maturity process. But I think at least consultative and implementation, there has to be some bit of representation from the different actors. Thank you. Thank you, Lillian. It is a pity that you cannot make it online to the IGF, but you cannot make it on-site. So I know you are in a difficult situation. So I hope your luggage will come to you in the end. Okay. Thank you.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you very much for your comment. I mentioned the multistakeholder disguise. I am not sure if it is the right word to use, but I am a bit concerned that diversity of issues – we have diverse issues so that we have different types of multistakeholder models, but if so, we have to carefully design the multistakeholder process to deal with the issue in the right way. So Amrita just pointed out that any policy item has some kind of multistakeholder elements in it. So even digital economy has some multistakeholder elements in it. But how we can evaluate whether the issue is dealt with in a proper way? Do you have any thoughts on that?

AMRITA CHOUDHURY: Thank you. So the first thing is, for decision-makers or even governments who have not taken that approach completely, and it is a multistakeholderism in disguise, which I would call as tokenism. We’ve seen processes like GDC also saying multistakeholder. Personally, I do not believe it was multistakeholder. It was not at all transparent or accountable. So I think the first thing when people, as in governments have a right to decide upon their sovereign interests, it’s absolutely okay. But they need to understand something that, will it be helpful? Are they getting all the issues and all the concerns? Objections doesn’t mean someone is raising an objection for the heck of it. They are raising it because there is a genuine reason also. If you take it into consideration, act on that or don’t act on that, at least take it into consideration, there is a more buy-in from the different, I would say, actors in that ecosystem. So I think if they understand that having a more open approach to get the actual issues, even at a consultative phase, and even after a policy is formed, for example. Many times governments fail is because they took in information only from few select people and during the implementation time, they falter because the buy-in is not there from everyone. And that is where the issue happens. If you had taken a more consultative approach, it would have been much better. And so if they understand the value of it, that is the time they will use it more. Now there was a statement which Lillian made and I do agree with it. Developing countries don’t look at internet governance with that much of priority because connectivity is an issue, health is an issue, getting people jobs is an issue, feeding people is an issue. So will they not look at those issues first and then look at internet governance? For them that is priority. And they will go and talk in those forums where that is priority. So we also have to understand the maturity and these countries have limited resources. So they cannot put in so much of resource. So you have to know how to balance it out. And internet actually provides that leveler thing. So if they can use those things to get more views rather than be restrictive, and I have seen it in my country also at times. People feel worried of what kind of comments they will get. Once people start commenting, people also mature in the way they give comments. So I think these guidelines which Sao Paulo gives, unfortunately all governments have not endorsed it probably because it has not been spread so much. If they go out more naturally, people will not be defensive because each country actually wants to leapfrog, grow and serve their people better. So I think if we can explain it, no it’s not a fancy term, it will help you in the long run to get the results you want. And these are the guidelines which you can work on. You don’t have to create them. And cherry pick whichever you want. I think that would help.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you, Marita. I have one question for Avri. And then we would like to open the floor to the audience. Thank you, Avri. As I mentioned, I am interested in the topic or issue-oriented differences in applying multi-stakeholder models. In your explanation, how topic-by-topic differences are considered. Do you have any thoughts on this?

AVRI DORIA: Yeah, thanks for the question. I think that that is actually a parallel set of issues. I think that it’s one that comes out, for example, when you’re selecting your participants, selecting your stakeholders, that that’s one of the places where the subject matter becomes a big concern, because what kind of specialists do you need? What are the groups? Who is it that’s participating in this? So from one aspect, I say, anytime you want to make a decision in a democratic manner, and you want to make it in a participatory democratic manner, where all the people that have some part of their life involved in this decision get a say, get to participate, then when you’re putting it together, you basically have to look at, well, if we’re going to be behaving in a multi-stakeholder manner on this topic, who do we need? You know, if we’re discussing how to control fire threats within a city, you know, it’s still very much a multi-stakeholder issue, because it concerns the citizens, it concerns the fire department, it concerns emergency services, the government, the volunteers, you know, the people that come through and rescue the burn victims. So you have a great number of people that are all sort of contributing to an event. You want the planning for these things, the understanding, the preparation for these disasters to be done in a way that makes sense to all those that are involved in the doing of it, that have responsibilities for it, that provide the funding for it, that provide the technology for it, that provide the workers that make it happen. So understanding who is involved in dealing with this particular issue allows you to build that participant group, that stakeholder group. Again, depending on the topic, when you’re looking at advice recommendations, do you have scientists that give advice at a purely scientific level, but really don’t care about the rest of it? So how do you design their advice section in? It’s nice that I put these here as simple words, but each one of these has a level that you have to deepen. What does it mean to contribute to a subject in different fields? Is it writing a paragraph? Is it building something? Is it coming up with some sort of template? So each of these things gets looked at, and if you looked at the other parts that I included at the bottom, the other aspects, the funding methods, geographical indicators that makes a difference, where you’re doing this is obviously going to change. If you’re doing it in Africa or you’re doing it in Asia or you’re doing it in Europe, it’s going to have different aspects because people look at the issues differently, so you’ll structure it differently. The cultural aspects of when people talk, how people talk, how they interact, is this being done more locally or is this a regional issue or is this an international issue, is going to sort of direct the kind of structure, the kind of analysis you have to look at in doing it. You know, I didn’t get into it all, the intersectional measures and the diversity elements and all of that, which are different. We have a different set of diversity elements depending on where we’re doing it and what kind of population, you know, the scope of interest. So there are many different aspects. I was really, you know, just trying to keep it sort of at a simple level, but to understand what we’re doing, we got to keep breaking it down into what are the important aspects of the model. And then within each of those aspects for any subject, there’s going to be another set of considerations. So that’s why I come down to it and say, I cannot envision a subject where there isn’t a set of stakeholders, participants, concerned citizens, et cetera. Any number of words, I’m not really hung up on the words, but there’s basically a group of stakeholders that have a concern and whose concerns need to be listened to, need to be understood, needed to be included in the decision making, et cetera. So as far as I’m concerned, it’s a model that can be used in any number of situations, but you got to do a lot of thinking about it to make it work. Hope that answers it.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you. Thank you very much. Now, we would like to open the floor to the audience. If you have any comment or question, please come to the microphone or, yes, just take the mic. Otherwise, Zoom participants will not be able to hear your voice.

JIM PRENDERGAST: Is that? Okay. That’s on. Hi. Jim Prendergast with the Galway Strategy Group. Thanks for the session. Picking up a little bit on what Avri said, I think, and Amrita said, we just need to be cautious about mislabeling processes as multi-stakeholder when they’re not. You pointed out the GDC. All those who are familiar with the model knew right away, this doesn’t feel right. It’s not sitting right. So I think we use that as a teaching opportunity, as an opportunity to educate people about the model, because not everybody’s familiar with it, and particularly in the multilateral space, it’s very new to them. We should encourage them to continue to try and adopt it, but using things like the Sao Paulo principles as a guide, not necessarily as, you know, you have to use all of the principles, but use that as inspiration to better improve the processes, I think is something that we as the community can do to make them better going forward.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you for your comment. Just for your information, I referred to the GDC because I wanted to show the diversity of issues being discussed in the frame of Internet governance. So I don’t think GDC is completely multi-stakeholder model, or I’m a bit skeptical about it. So just don’t get me wrong. Can I jump in with a response also?

JIM PRENDERGAST: And I agree. I think one of the distinctions that I’ve made in looking at the GDC processes is meaningful multi-stakeholderism. You know, asking for input and not reflecting back to the community how the input was used, what portions were rejected, which were accepted, how did you change the direction of the policy? That’s meaningful. You know, giving that feedback to stakeholders, that’s meaningful. Asking for a bunch of comments and then either doing nothing with them or not telling us how you’ve done something with them, that’s not meaningful and that, you know, people are only going to get tired of that after a while and not want to participate. But my point is, it happened, we can learn from it, let’s teach people how to do better going forward so that it is meaningful and it is productive and everybody sees value in it.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you. Adri?

AVRI DORIA: Thank you. Jim just said much of what I was going to add in there. But yes, and in fact, that’s why I had written on that bottom ring, not only consulting, but paying attention to it. And I like your notion of the multi-stakeholder disguise because, a term I had not thought of before, because it does cover that where you can act like you’re doing something that is multi-stakeholder without the follow-through, without it being a meaningful action. So I think that is something to be very careful of. I personally think that if there is a good consultative, and it is paid attention to, and there’s feedback, and is that, even if you don’t go beyond it to what I’m calling the other levels of maturity, then you could still say, yeah, you’ve dipped your toes into the multi-stakeholder, you have had some multi-stakeholder modalities, but the actions that you take have to be genuine. Thanks.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you, Avery. And Amrita, please.

AMRITA CHOUDHURY: Thank you. What I would like to add is, while GDC definitely was not a process which was completely multi-stakeholder, one thing we could look at is at least it tried to get people to respond. But again, one, it was not transparent, it was not open, how consultations were used, and it was not inclusive. A simple example, when you want comments from Global South at a time which is not friendly to them, and I speak from Asia-Pacific, most of the UN consultations were at very odd hours for people in Asia, you had to keep your video on, think of the countries where you do not have that much of internet bandwidth and keeping it on or you will be disconnected it’s not inclusive you will not get people you would not have found so many people from Asia in those calls because that ours were very bad also when people the other stakeholders were making comments the rooms were empty so it didn’t give a very good feeling to the others who were participating online that they were being heard they may have been heard we don’t know because we don’t know how the you know the feedback from everyone was used so I think it is a lesson as Jim said if we can learn it well we will do our business plus 20 negotiations much better

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: thank you very much and is there anyone who can okay there’s a gentleman at the table

AUDIENCE: who cattle can hear me from Japan and I thank you for a very interesting you know debates and and the presentations here so in listening to all of you I was wondering if we can have some global analysis jointly in some way with the people in this room for instance if some of the multi-stakeholder model you know work or not as everybody is you know talking about there are many different models and occasions even outside of a digital world and of course in a digital you know we studied the concept probably around the creation by can in 90s and then through wishes in a process we talked about you know much of this in a context of government but versus non-government and international government organizations dealing with internet issues or not and you know luckily enough I can survive it as it is and that’s a government is only a CAC advisory in a committee are not making a direct decision you know making that’s very important in a fact but IGF model is you know completely different it’s not a decision-making in a body it is just a discussion in a process but at the same time you know we have to look at the good aspect good the result of IGF in for instance people are gathering here listening to others what going on on the rule-making in individual countries and after we go back home and talk internally within the country we create some of the similar laws or even similar debates there that created a lot of opportunity for you know countries to have their own more harmonized you know system on the global basis and you know those are very small you know examples but if you look at the other areas then you know digital there must be some you know discuss discussions going on you know such as SDGs we had in New York in you know September that was more on SDG you know kind of you know debate and the digital was a part of that whether we could you know use multi-stakeholder model you know to other areas I think this is a time we really you know think and you know do a good analysis on a global basis and I think for that purpose everybody you know has to present some of the practices examples what’s going on and probably we should talk to our you know friends working on some other areas and you know if their model or their you know organizational processes are working well or not I think you know using everybody’s maturity model if we you know use more on the maturity and if we you know digest the benefit of those multi-stakeholder model I think you know we can be better off by having you know such example and find out some best practices here and probably at the next meeting we can you know get together and exchange some examples

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: thank you very much so we have some kind of international comparison of various models and various practices we may need to take consider the possibility of doing that kind of research forward thank you very much we have a parallel discussion going on in the chat so there’s a comment from Mark Nottingham it would be interesting to hear reactions to meet the Mueller’s characterization of multi-stakeholder as an empty label that does not describe a governance model and so Avery can you yeah

AVRI DORIA: yes, I’d love to answer it and I’d also like to I miss the gentleman whose name who had been speaking before his name but I’d like to make some comments on that too partly the answer that I put there is I very much agree that at the moment I said you know in effect I think I even said in my presentation we very much hand wave when we say multi-stakeholder because we haven’t done the the deeper diving into what we mean when we say it what are the aspects how do we put them together and such we’ve done a little bit of that kind of analysis but but by and large you know and whenever you see someone new coming into saying gee we’d like to do some multi-stakeholder whose model should we buy you know can can we do the the ICANN model can we do the IETF model and that never works for people because nobody fits anybody else’s shoes that well so so I believe that that what I’m putting forward here and other people are putting forward here is sort of the meat on what is in the model how do we define it how do we identify and to go on to the second gentleman’s and if I apologize for forgetting the name question is I think that’s the next step as we start to and it’s some of the stuff that I’m doing in the background too you know but but it’s just me doing it it’s it’s not a you know organized thing is sort of as these analyses of of what is in the various aspects and how one defines them then to take those and and use them to do analyses on some of our existing organizations some of our existing practices so that is indeed the intent thanks

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: thank you Avri in my understanding Milton’s point is that internet governance is about non-state actors deciding principles and implementing them so to me he he well actually Milton is going to have a dialogue on multi-stakeholder measurement right after this session as part of the giganet symposium so if you are interested please go to the session after after hours but so to me it seems like that Milton is looking at the topic by topic differences in terms of internet governance but maybe ask him later do you have any comments your face just popped up no okay oh okay nevermind sorry.

AMRITA CHOUDHURY: What he mentioned in terms of stakeholder wise accountability is also important because if you’re giving inputs whether you’re accountable for it later is also important and I think it comes with maturity of a model so I think certain things are important because and that whether you’re accountable for it would also come during the implementation part or even the follow-up part so I think looking at it in a broader scope the phase etc is important to actually do it but I think accountability of whoever is the stakeholder is also important

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: thank you very much do you have any other comment or question from the from the audience if not let me give you the final question for the for the speakers so Future, so what should we expect about multi-stakeholder model in the future? So what kind of principles should be shared across policy areas or geographic areas? So what do you see will become of the multi-stakeholder model in near future? Do we keep going on the same thing or do we need somewhat different action? What’s your thought? Amrita, please.

AMRITA CHOUDHURY: So I think whatever terminology you use, all participants who have vested interest or may have, should be there when discussions happen on policies, on issues where their lives are at stake or something is at stake. You call it multi-stakeholder, you call it whichever terminology, it is important. Because if anyone wants a particular policy process to work, you have to have the buy-in of the people. For example, now GDC has been ratified, it has to be implemented. If it has the buy-in of everyone, nation states, companies, technical community, civil society, etc., being a Herculean task, only then will it be able to achieve what it wants to achieve. So whatever terminology you use, you have to have relevant people interested or accountable in the room.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you. Lidian, can you give us your thoughts on the future of multi-stakeholderism? Thanks.

LILLIAN NALWOGA: So for me, just to add to what Amirita has mentioned, it is not just about participation and having people present by taking numbers, it should be more transparency, inclusion, taking stakeholders accountable. So it doesn’t matter if, for instance, if it is at the global level and you are considering the global majority voices and having a few countries represented, and then this is called that we had representation from this particular kind of people from the global majority. So there has to be what kind of contribution are they bringing in place. So right now, the future of the global multi-stakeholder model is really in suspense because it is not just so clear what we really want. Some people really want to continue with the multilateral, having a few people on the table at more of a high level, but I think there has to be inclusive participation, transparency and accountability in what is being discussed, and also the ease of being able to track the outcomes of whatever process or whatever decision that comes out of the consultations.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Avery, one last word, please.

AVRI DORIA: Thank you. First of all, pointing out that it is still, even if it did start in the last century, it still is a very young model. We’re still figuring out. I personally think it is an essential, critical model necessary in any sort of democratic movement we’re going to do. Representative democracy is wonderful, but it doesn’t get the people participating. It doesn’t get them heard. It doesn’t get them understood. So I think that this is a model that we need to keep developing. We need to go doing this deeper analysis. We need to go out and check the organizations that are and continuing to enrich and to make the model richer so that it can be done. And now, pretty much all the way through this, I’ve sort of been almost sounding sometimes like a cheerleader, like I think it’s all easy and it all works, and accountability, for example, is a big, difficult topic. The topic that worries me the most that I don’t even feel that I have a good grasp on and how to deal with it is, even if you’ve got a measure for accountability and you’ve got a measure for who gets to participate and all that, it’s the notion of everybody dealing with the process in good faith. And often, when I’ve seen situations where it looks like, gee, things are really laid out well for this part of a multi-stakeholder process to actually work and deliver something that does respond to the needs of the stakeholders, there are those with less than good faith that throw wrenches in, you know, we use words like disinformation these days. It used to be something else or that. And how the model protects itself against things like that, things like what you suggested, the sort of disguised or the imitation of the model without it being genuine. So that’s one of the places where I’m still very much, but I think going forward, what we’ve got to do is develop the analysis better and we’ve got to start applying that analysis against existing and future efforts. Thanks.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you, Avri. I quite agree with the last point that Avery made. We have to look into what’s below the multi-stakeholder tokenism or disguise or whatever you call it. There is quite a lot of research that will be necessary. So thank you very much. Thank you all. We have still a bit of time, but we better stop it here. Oh, there’s a gentleman raising a hand in the audience.

AUDIENCE: Thank you. When we speak about multi-stakeholder model, we have to speak about the role of each stakeholder. Each stakeholder in his or her role. Suppose we are in a hospital and we have to decide whether to undertake a surgery for a patient or not. Shall the nurse, the administrative staff participate in this decision? No, they will be on the table, but not to decide if we have to make the surgery. For example, the financial people will say, no, he didn’t pay or he doesn’t have any guarantee to pay, so we cannot do it. The nurses can speak about other things related to this patient, but they cannot decide whether to have to undertake this surgery or not. So when we speak about stakeholders, we have to always say each in his or her role.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you. Thank you very much.

AVRI DORIA: Can I comment? Yes, please. I agree, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t have a voice around the table. They may not have the final decision, but certainly the ethicist who’s sitting at that table and looking at whether it is ethical to perform that particular operation on that patient at that point in time. Indeed, the funding may be part of it. If the surgery is not life-saving, but it’s going to put the person in debt for the next 30 years, is that a consideration that needs to be heard? I would actually argue that those people do need a voice. They may not be the final decision. The surgeon and the availability of the surgical team is certainly perhaps a bigger, but even a discussion at that, that looks cut and dry at the beginning, once you start analyzing what goes into making surgical decisions, you’ll find that there’s a lot of stakeholders that are involved in that. And so, I totally agree with you. You need to look at what the roles and responsibilities of each stakeholder are at every phase of a surgery. process. But that doesn’t limit the number of stakeholders necessarily. Thanks.

AUDIENCE: Avri, you are repeating what I said. I exactly said that. I said that they have to be on the table because they have their aspects on the decision. But the medical decision is the role of the doctors. The other parts have their field of their part of the decision. Thank you.

KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you very much. There are many aspects where roles and responsibilities are concerned, so that shows we have a lot of work to be done in the future. Okay, let me conclude this session. Thank you very much. Thank you all for participating. Thank you, Avri, Lilian. Have a good day. Thank you all. Have a wonderful IGF. Thank you. Bye. Keep yourself safe. Very much. I’ve seen you on TV before. We are in the same hotel. We were having breakfast together and you were sitting next to me. I said, I’m in your care every month. He didn’t show his face. He just spoke. I interviewed him on JPNIC a long time ago. His video is still on YouTube. He’s from Tunisia. Oh, really? I don’t know where he’s from, but I’ve seen him a lot. Thank you. It’s really noisy around here. It’s a little dangerous. Is there a music event in the middle? There’s a stage in the middle. That’s interesting. How did you decide to have us there? I think we arranged it. I don’t know what’s going on. There’s a stage in the middle. I think there’s an event going on there. I wonder if the main hall is coming. It’s like this at the exhibition. I agree. It’s more important than the exhibition. But it’s not understood. It’s just a place where we’re interested in. I don’t care what kind of session it is. That’s right. The session we’re doing is like that. IJF is releasing a press release in Japanese. PR Times. Where is it? PR Times is like a release site. I don’t know if it’s the government or the industry. If someone doesn’t do it, it won’t come out. I thought it was because they wanted to promote it. I’m sure the people in Saudi Arabia understood what IJF was like in the past 20 years. But the AI international conference is like a newspaper. In Japan, people think of IJF as a conference. In Saudi Arabia, people think of it as an exhibition. I think it’s interesting that people can see that. That’s right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Bye-bye. Thank you. Bye-bye. Thank you. Thank you. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Thank you. Bye-bye.

Agreement Points

Multi-stakeholder models are adaptable to different contexts

speakers

AVRI DORIA

AMRITA CHOUDHURY

LILLIAN NALWOGA

arguments

There is no one-size-fits-all model; multi-stakeholder approaches can be adapted to different contexts

Multi-stakeholder models are applicable to digital economy issues, contrary to initial doubts

The multi-stakeholder approach should be deployed at different levels depending on maturity

summary

The speakers agree that multi-stakeholder models can be adapted to various policy areas and contexts, including the digital economy and developing countries, with implementation varying based on maturity and specific needs.

Transparency and accountability are crucial for effective multi-stakeholder processes

speakers

AMRITA CHOUDHURY

LILLIAN NALWOGA

JIM PRENDERGAST

arguments

Transparency and accountability are crucial for meaningful multi-stakeholder engagement

Future multi-stakeholder processes should focus on transparency, inclusion, and accountability

Meaningful multi-stakeholderism requires feedback on how input was used

summary

The speakers emphasize the importance of transparency, accountability, and providing feedback on how stakeholder input is used in decision-making processes for effective multi-stakeholder governance.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers express concerns about the integrity of multi-stakeholder processes, highlighting the need to address issues of tokenism, bad faith actors, and disinformation that can undermine genuine multi-stakeholder engagement.

speakers

KEISUKE KAMIMURA

AVRI DORIA

arguments

“Multi-stakeholder disguise” or tokenism is a concern in some processes

Protection against bad faith actors in multi-stakeholder processes is a challenge to address

Unexpected Consensus

Applicability of multi-stakeholder models to various policy areas

speakers

KEISUKE KAMIMURA

AVRI DORIA

AMRITA CHOUDHURY

arguments

Multi-stakeholder models can be applied to various policy areas with different implementations

There is no one-size-fits-all model; multi-stakeholder approaches can be adapted to different contexts

Multi-stakeholder models are applicable to digital economy issues, contrary to initial doubts

explanation

Despite initial doubts about the applicability of multi-stakeholder models to certain areas like the digital economy, there was unexpected consensus that these models can be adapted to various policy areas, including those previously thought to be less suitable for multi-stakeholder approaches.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement include the adaptability of multi-stakeholder models to different contexts, the importance of transparency and accountability in these processes, and the need for continued development and analysis of multi-stakeholder approaches.

Consensus level

There is a moderate to high level of consensus among the speakers on the core principles and challenges of multi-stakeholder governance. This consensus suggests a shared understanding of the potential and limitations of multi-stakeholder models in internet governance, which could facilitate more effective implementation and refinement of these approaches in various policy areas.

Different Viewpoints

Applicability of multi-stakeholder models to different policy areas

speakers

KEISUKE KAMIMURA

AVRI DORIA

AMRITA CHOUDHURY

arguments

Multi-stakeholder models can be applied to various policy areas with different implementations

There is no one-size-fits-all model; multi-stakeholder approaches can be adapted to different contexts

Multi-stakeholder models are applicable to digital economy issues, contrary to initial doubts

summary

While all speakers agree that multi-stakeholder models can be applied to various policy areas, they differ in their views on the extent and effectiveness of these applications. Kamimura suggests that the effectiveness may vary depending on the policy area, Doria emphasizes the adaptability of the models, and Choudhury argues for their applicability even in areas initially thought to be unsuitable, such as the digital economy.

Unexpected Differences

Role of stakeholders in decision-making

speakers

AVRI DORIA

AUDIENCE

arguments

Multi-stakeholder processes can be evaluated based on orientation, participants, and roles/responsibilities

The roles and responsibilities of each stakeholder should be clearly defined

explanation

While Doria’s framework includes roles and responsibilities as a key aspect of multi-stakeholder processes, an audience member unexpectedly emphasized the need for clearly defined roles, particularly in decision-making. This highlights a potential tension between inclusive participation and the need for specialized expertise in certain decisions, which was not explicitly addressed by the main speakers.

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around the applicability of multi-stakeholder models to different policy areas, the criteria for evaluating these models, and the specific focus areas for improving multi-stakeholder processes.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among the speakers is moderate. While there is general agreement on the importance and potential of multi-stakeholder models, speakers differ in their emphasis on various aspects of implementation and evaluation. These differences reflect the complexity of applying multi-stakeholder approaches across diverse contexts and policy areas. The implications of these disagreements suggest a need for further research and discussion to develop more nuanced and context-specific guidelines for implementing and evaluating multi-stakeholder models in internet governance.

Partial Agreements

All speakers agree on the importance of evaluating and improving multi-stakeholder processes, but they focus on different aspects. Doria proposes a framework based on orientation, participants, and roles/responsibilities, while Choudhury and Nalwoga emphasize transparency, accountability, and inclusion. They agree on the goal of enhancing multi-stakeholder processes but differ on the specific criteria to prioritize.

speakers

AVRI DORIA

AMRITA CHOUDHURY

LILLIAN NALWOGA

arguments

Multi-stakeholder processes can be evaluated based on orientation, participants, and roles/responsibilities

Transparency and accountability are crucial for meaningful multi-stakeholder engagement

Future multi-stakeholder processes should focus on transparency, inclusion, and accountability

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers express concerns about the integrity of multi-stakeholder processes, highlighting the need to address issues of tokenism, bad faith actors, and disinformation that can undermine genuine multi-stakeholder engagement.

speakers

KEISUKE KAMIMURA

AVRI DORIA

arguments

“Multi-stakeholder disguise” or tokenism is a concern in some processes

Protection against bad faith actors in multi-stakeholder processes is a challenge to address

Key Takeaways

Multi-stakeholder models can be applied to various policy areas but implementations may differ based on context

There is no one-size-fits-all multi-stakeholder model; approaches should be adapted to different situations

Multi-stakeholder processes can be evaluated based on factors like orientation, participants, roles/responsibilities, and maturity levels

Meaningful multi-stakeholder engagement requires transparency, accountability, and feedback on how input is used

The future of multi-stakeholder models in internet governance requires continued development, deeper analysis, and protection against bad faith actors

Resolutions and Action Items

Conduct more research and analysis on different multi-stakeholder models and practices

Develop better frameworks for evaluating the effectiveness and maturity of multi-stakeholder processes

Work on improving transparency and accountability in multi-stakeholder engagements

Unresolved Issues

How to effectively apply multi-stakeholder models to all policy areas, especially those like digital economy where applicability was initially questioned

How to address the issue of ‘multi-stakeholder disguise’ or tokenism in some processes

How to determine the appropriate roles and decision-making power for different stakeholders in various contexts

How to protect multi-stakeholder processes against bad faith actors and disinformation

Suggested Compromises

Adapt multi-stakeholder approaches based on the maturity level and context of each situation, rather than applying a single model universally

Balance inclusive participation with clearly defined roles and responsibilities for different stakeholders

Incorporate both consultative elements and decision-making power for stakeholders, depending on the specific policy area and phase of the process

I tend to believe that a form of the multi-stakeholder model can be used just about anywhere a group of people need to make decisions together. I tend to think that we’re never in a situation of all or nothing in terms of the model.

speaker

Avri Doria

reason

This challenges the notion that multi-stakeholder models are only applicable in certain contexts, suggesting a more universal applicability.

impact

This set the tone for a broader discussion about the flexibility and adaptability of multi-stakeholder models across various domains.

I think depending on the maturity level or the different pockets that Avri has mentioned, I think it should be able to work but the context kind of differs.

speaker

Lillian Nalwoga

reason

This introduces the idea that the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder models may depend on the maturity of the context in which they are applied.

impact

This led to a more nuanced discussion about how multi-stakeholder models might need to be adapted or evolved based on the specific context and maturity level of the stakeholders involved.

I think we are seeing lots of this multi-stakeholder disguise and I think if we go back to what Avri may have listed then we may need to rethink on who constitutes to be on the table for us to say that you know multi-stakeholderism has been applied.

speaker

Lillian Nalwoga

reason

This highlights the potential for misuse or misrepresentation of multi-stakeholder processes, introducing a critical perspective on implementation.

impact

This comment shifted the discussion towards the importance of genuine implementation and the need for clear criteria to evaluate multi-stakeholder processes.

Meaningful multi-stakeholderism. You know, asking for input and not reflecting back to the community how the input was used, what portions were rejected, which were accepted, how did you change the direction of the policy? That’s meaningful.

speaker

Jim Prendergast

reason

This comment provides a concrete definition of what makes multi-stakeholder processes meaningful, emphasizing transparency and feedback.

impact

This led to a deeper discussion about the quality and depth of stakeholder engagement, rather than just the presence of multiple stakeholders.

Representative democracy is wonderful, but it doesn’t get the people participating. It doesn’t get them heard. It doesn’t get them understood. So I think that this is a model that we need to keep developing.

speaker

Avri Doria

reason

This comment frames multi-stakeholder models as complementary to traditional democratic processes, highlighting their unique value.

impact

This broadened the conversation to consider the role of multi-stakeholder models in enhancing democratic participation and representation.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by moving it from a general consideration of multi-stakeholder models to a more nuanced exploration of their implementation, effectiveness, and evolution. The conversation progressed from discussing the broad applicability of these models to examining the challenges in their genuine implementation, the importance of context and maturity, and their potential role in enhancing democratic processes. This led to a richer, more critical analysis of multi-stakeholder approaches, highlighting both their potential and the need for careful consideration in their application and evaluation.

How can we evaluate whether a multi-stakeholder process is dealing with an issue in the right way?

speaker

Keisuke Kamimura

explanation

This question addresses the need for criteria to assess the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder models across different policy areas.

How can we conduct a global analysis of various multi-stakeholder models and practices?

speaker

Audience member (unnamed)

explanation

This suggests the need for a comprehensive study comparing different multi-stakeholder approaches across various sectors and regions.

How can the multi-stakeholder model protect itself against bad faith actors and disinformation?

speaker

Avri Doria

explanation

This highlights a critical challenge in implementing effective multi-stakeholder processes and maintaining their integrity.

How do we define and implement accountability for different stakeholders within multi-stakeholder models?

speaker

Amrita Choudhury

explanation

This addresses the need to ensure responsible participation from all actors involved in multi-stakeholder processes.

How can we better analyze and apply multi-stakeholder models to existing and future governance efforts?

speaker

Avri Doria

explanation

This suggests the need for ongoing research and practical application of multi-stakeholder principles in various contexts.

Summary

This panel discussion focused on the challenges of misinformation and disinformation in the digital age, particularly in light of emerging technologies like AI. Participants from government, international organizations, and the private sector explored the sources, impacts, and potential solutions to combat false information online.

Key points included the rapid spread of misinformation through social media platforms and messaging apps, which has been exacerbated by AI tools that can create highly convincing fake content. Panelists noted that while misinformation has always existed, its reach and speed have increased dramatically in the digital era. They emphasized that not all misinformation is equally harmful, but some can have serious consequences, such as during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The discussion highlighted the need for a multi-stakeholder approach involving governments, tech companies, civil society, and international organizations to address this complex issue. Suggestions included developing AI-powered detection tools, implementing content moderation practices, and promoting digital literacy. However, panelists also stressed the importance of balancing efforts to combat misinformation with protecting freedom of expression and avoiding censorship.

Several speakers mentioned ongoing initiatives and regulations, such as the EU’s Digital Services Act, as potential models for addressing misinformation. The importance of international cooperation and forums like the Internet Governance Forum for sharing best practices was emphasized.

The panel concluded by acknowledging the challenges of the rapidly evolving digital landscape and the need for flexible, innovative approaches to combat misinformation while preserving an open internet and freedom of speech. Participants agreed that supporting accurate, quality information is crucial in countering the root causes of misinformation.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The rapid spread and increasing sophistication of misinformation, especially through social media and AI technologies

– The need for collaboration between governments, tech companies, civil society and other stakeholders to combat misinformation

– Balancing freedom of expression with protecting users from harmful misinformation

– The importance of digital literacy and critical thinking skills to build societal resilience

– Developing effective regulations and technologies to detect and mitigate misinformation

Overall purpose:

The goal of this panel discussion was to examine the current landscape of digital misinformation, explore strategies and technologies to combat it, and discuss how different stakeholders can work together to address this complex challenge.

Tone:

The overall tone was serious and concerned about the threats posed by misinformation, but also constructive in proposing solutions. Panelists spoke with urgency about the need to act, while also emphasizing the importance of careful, balanced approaches that preserve freedom of expression. The tone remained consistent throughout, with panelists building on each other’s points collaboratively.

Speakers

– Barbara Carfagna: Italian journalist, moderator of the panel

– Deemah Al-Yahya: Secretary General of the Digital Cooperation Organization

– Khaled Mansour: Member of Meta Oversight Board

– Esam Alwagait: Director of the National Information Center Saudi Data and AI Authority

– Natalia Gherman: Assistant Secretary General, Executive Director of the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate

– Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed: Chief Executive, Information and Government Authority, Kingdom of Bahrain

– Pearse O’Donohue: Director for the Future Networks Directorate of DigiConnect European Commission

Expanded Summary: Combating Misinformation in the Digital Age

This panel discussion, moderated by Italian journalist Barbara Carfagna, brought together experts from government, international organisations, and the private sector to explore the challenges of misinformation and disinformation in the digital age. The participants examined the sources, impacts, and potential solutions to combat false information online, with a particular focus on the role of emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI).

Sources and Spread of Misinformation

The panellists agreed that social media platforms have become the primary conduits for the rapid spread of misinformation. Esam Alwagait, Director of the National Information Center Saudi Data and AI Authority, identified these platforms as the main source of misinformation spread. Natalia Gherman, Assistant Secretary General and Executive Director of the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate, highlighted that unmoderated online spaces are major hubs for misinformation and terrorist content. Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed, Chief Executive of the Information and Government Authority in Bahrain, noted that social media algorithms often promote sensational content, exacerbating the problem.

The discussion emphasised that while misinformation has always existed, its reach and speed have increased dramatically in the digital era. Gherman pointed out that influencers with large followings can rapidly spread misinformation, while Khaled Mansour, Member of Meta Oversight Board, observed that a lack of access to accurate information contributes to the spread of false narratives. Specific examples of misinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic and elections were mentioned to illustrate the real-world impact of this issue.

Mansour made a particularly thought-provoking comment, stating, “Misinformation kills. By spreading misinformation in conflict times from Myanmar to Sudan to Syria, this can be murderous.” This remark underscored the real-world consequences of misinformation beyond online discourse, shifting the conversation to focus on its potential for violence and harm.

Technological Solutions and Challenges

The panel explored how technology, particularly AI, can be both a source of and a solution to misinformation. Alwagait discussed how AI and machine learning tools can detect manipulated content, including the use of natural language processing to analyze linguistic patterns. Al-Qaed mentioned existing fact-checking and content verification tools, though he noted these often require user effort.

Specific technologies discussed for combating misinformation included:

– AI-driven fact-checking tools that could flag alarming content automatically

– Machine learning algorithms to analyze linguistic patterns and identify potential misinformation

– Tools to analyze video and audio content to detect manipulated media

– Crowdsourced flagging systems to leverage user input in identifying false information

Al-Qaed proposed the concept of “verify-by-design” tools that could tag information at its source, potentially providing users with immediate context about the reliability of content. This approach could offer a proactive solution to misinformation detection.

However, the discussion also acknowledged that AI technologies pose risks in generating more sophisticated fake content, highlighting the ongoing arms race between misinformation creation and detection.

Regulatory Approaches and Challenges

The panel agreed on the need for innovative regulations to combat misinformation while enabling innovation. Pearse O’Donohue, Director for the Future Networks Directorate of DigiConnect European Commission, pointed to the EU’s Digital Services Act as a potential model for other countries. He argued that regulations should put the onus on platforms to moderate content, suggesting a more active approach to content removal.

However, this view was not universally shared. Mansour advocated for a more nuanced approach, arguing that not all misinformation is harmful and that removal is not always the best solution. He suggested that labelling manipulated content can inform users without removing it entirely, preserving freedom of expression.

The discussion highlighted the challenges of regulating smaller platforms and encrypted messaging apps, which often lack the resources or infrastructure for effective content moderation. The panel also debated the merits of content removal versus labeling, considering the potential impacts on free speech and user autonomy.

O’Donohue raised an important question about the challenges of regulation, asking, “If a government or a regulatory authority decides to step in and decide on what is misinformation and what is not, well then who moderates the regulator?” This comment led to a more nuanced discussion about the balance between regulation and freedom of expression.

Multi-stakeholder Cooperation and Global Frameworks

There was broad consensus among the panellists on the need for collaboration between governments, tech companies, academia, and civil society to address misinformation effectively. Deemah Al-Yahya, Secretary General of the Digital Cooperation Organization, emphasised this multi-stakeholder approach.

Gherman highlighted the importance of international forums like the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in enabling stakeholders to develop unified strategies. She also stressed the need for global cooperation and frameworks to address misinformation on a broader scale.

The panel discussed the merits of global versus regional approaches to regulation. Al-Qaed suggested that regional cooperation could give smaller countries more influence when dealing with tech companies, potentially leading to more effective solutions. There was also a call for more focused global and regional events to develop unified strategies against misinformation.

Balancing Free Speech and User Protection

A recurring theme throughout the discussion was the need to balance efforts to combat misinformation with protecting freedom of expression and avoiding censorship. Mansour emphasised that misinformation policies must balance protecting users and preserving free speech. He argued for solutions grounded in human rights principles, a point echoed by Gherman.

The panel discussed potential unintended consequences of countering misinformation, such as impacts on human rights and freedom of expression. They stressed the importance of considering these factors when developing policies and technologies to address false information.

O’Donohue suggested a nuanced approach, stating, “Not all misinformation can be classified as bad, and that we therefore need a gradual response. And of course, we preserve our most direct and intrusive measures for those content, which is clearly supporting terrorist, criminal, or other dangerous philosophies or content.” This comment encouraged a more refined approach to addressing misinformation, moving away from blanket solutions towards more targeted, context-specific strategies.

Promoting Accurate Information and Digital Literacy

The panel agreed that supporting accurate, credible information is crucial in countering misinformation. Mansour particularly emphasised this point, suggesting that promoting good information could be an effective strategy to counter misinformation at its root.

The importance of digital literacy and critical thinking skills in building societal resilience against misinformation was also discussed. While specific strategies for improving these skills were not elaborated upon, the panel recognized their crucial role in empowering users to navigate the complex information landscape.

Conclusion

The panel concluded by acknowledging the challenges of the rapidly evolving digital landscape and the need for flexible, innovative approaches to combat misinformation while preserving an open internet and freedom of speech. While there was general agreement on the severity of the problem and the need for multi-stakeholder collaboration, differences emerged in the specific strategies and priorities for addressing misinformation.

The discussion highlighted several unresolved issues, including how to effectively regulate smaller, unmoderated online spaces, address misinformation in encrypted messaging apps and private groups, and develop a standardised approach to defining and classifying harmful versus non-harmful misinformation.

Moving forward, the panellists suggested developing innovative regulations, creating public-private partnerships, implementing AI-driven fact-checking tools, establishing ‘verify-by-design’ mechanisms, and organising more focused global and regional events to develop unified strategies against misinformation. The overall tone of the discussion was serious yet constructive, emphasising the urgency of addressing misinformation while also calling for careful, balanced approaches that preserve fundamental rights and freedoms.

Barbara Carfagna: Hello, everybody. I’m proud to be here. I’m an Italian journalist. I’m proud to be here to open this important session for keep our peace in society. Chatbot and Deepfake are transforming cyber threats from spreading disinformation to enhancing terrorist capabilities and as governments and tech companies struggle to keep up propaganda, disinformation, recruitment and operational planning. In the 80s, cyber threats were about hacking into computers to extract information. Then it escalated. In the next following years, you could get into a computer, change the software and cause damage to physical system controlled by it. But now the cyberspace has become a tool not to get information or cause physical harm, but influence public opinion. Terrorists and criminals are exploiting AI tools while warning of the unpreparedness of regulatory bodies, tech companies and law enforcement but to address this emerging threats. Generative AI is easy to use. You can create fake news, but this is an old world compared to Deepfake. We are used to thought that represents something existing, but for the first time in this moment we can produce photos of something that doesn’t correspond to anything true. There are some filters in the system, but jailbreaking is a technique that can trick AI filters and it’s very easy to use as well. Changing the prompt is one of the techniques, so we need stronger safeguards. How to fight against this? This is the purpose of our panel. Focus on content and explaining that it’s fake doesn’t work anymore. An organized campaign with bots and influencers spread the message to millions of people in ten seconds. So focus on the content is not more so useful as it would be in the first phase. One solution is focus on the behavior of the message in real time. This is one of the challenges. Through tools that analyze the spread in social networks. But with our panelists we will have a complete overview from rules, technological side and cultural and educational side. So I welcome our panelists starting from Esam Alwagait, Director of the National Information Center Saudi Data and AI Authority, welcome. Then, Mrs. Deemah Alyahya, Secretary General of the Digital Cooperation Organization, welcome. Her Excellency, Mr. Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed, Chief Executive, Information and Government Authority, Kingdom of Bahrain, welcome. Assistant Secretary General, Mrs. Natalia Gherman, Executive Director of the UN Counterterrorism Committee, Executive Directorate, welcome. Mr. Pearse O’Donohue, Director for the Future Networks Directorate of DigiConnect European Commission, welcome. Mr. Khaled Mansour, Member of Meta Oversight Board, welcome. Mr. Pearse O’Donohue, Director for the Future Networks Directorate of DigiConnect European Commission, welcome. Starting from Mrs. Dima Al-Yahya, what are the most prevalent digital sources contributing to the spread of information today and how has the landscape evolved in the recent years? Starting from Mrs. Deemah Al-Yahya, what are the most prevalent digital sources contributing to the spread of information today and how has the landscape evolved in the recent years? Maybe we can use that mic? I can’t hear. You see, you didn’t read me. Let’s talk. Thank you. Oh, yes.

Deemah Al-Yahya: Well, thank you very much, and it’s great to start a morning with a subject so important and so profound at this point of time, with the increase of not only us celebrating new innovations and the progression of emerging technologies, but also looking at how can we safeguard the use of the internet. We’ve seen that the internet has opened amazing opportunities for prosperity of humans and people, either by increasing productivity to increasing the quality of life. And we do see that the platforms as well, like social media platforms, have been tools to help in finding jobs, as well as education. But then we come to a very big issue, which is the harmful part of the internet and using social media platforms, which is the misinformation and harmful use of information. What is very much alarming as well is that for us to benefit more from AI, for instance, these algorithms are built on existing data online. And that data, if it’s false and fake news, that is a very big challenge in terms of the resources for AI. And this is why we truly see that such issue, when you ask me that question, you cannot pinpoint one independent institution or entity or a person that is responsible for such. It is a collective responsibility from governments to private sector and the innovators to human capital as well and the civil society. And therefore, we have to look at this challenge with a collective eye and a united force for collaboration. And this is why in the DCO, what we have have created is a facilitation of bringing in the governments with the innovators and the civil society to think together, to co-create and co-design initiatives and the way forward to reduce such kind of issue. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Mr. Khaled Mansour, I ask you the same question. So which are the sources contributed to the spread of misinformation today?

Khaled Mansour: Thank you very much. Sabah al-kheir. As-salamu alaykum. Don’t worry, don’t run to your translators. I will speak in English. It’s a week from today that the regime of Bashar al-Assad has fallen down in Syria. And with it came a flood of people coming out from prisons and a flood of images on social media, jubilation, happiness, mothers embracing their sons and daughters in many cases. But in parallel, there was also a flood of lies, rumors, and misinformation, what we call it. And many of our friends, colleagues, politicians, and journalists have swallowed this in a very gullible manner because the main sources of digital spread of misinformation are as old as humanity. Since people started to communicate, there have been lies, there have been ignorance, deception, willful and non-willful. There has been self-interest, exaggeration, biases, et cetera, et cetera. What has changed in the last 15 to 20 years is the exacerbation and the acceleration of this trend. Access. All of us are glued to our smartphones from Bangladesh to Mexico. The flood. I mean, there’s a flood of information all the time. All of us wake up in the morning and first thing we scroll. And the last thing before we sleep, we scroll. Meta alone, on whose oversight board I serve, has 3 to 4 billion users. This means 3 to 4 billion pieces of content immediately. I mean, everything is immediate. Long time ago, in this country, when you write a bad poem and you are bad-mouthing somebody, a month later, he will write a poem in return. Or in the New York Times, if you write a bad op-ed, a week later, there will be an op-ed. Now it’s immediate. There is immediacy, and people don’t wait to check and make sure whether the information they are using are misinformation or not. And technology, as the speaker before me speak, the AI technology makes it even much easier to make misinformation look far more believable. And finally, coordinated campaigns by governments, by corporations, for marketing, and for insidious and nefarious purposes. So it is important to know what is the source of misinformation if we need to address it and address it well. And I think all of us, in various ways, individuals, governments, corporations, are implicated into this. And the main victim, one of the main victims that we don’t really speak about, it’s not that we are deceived by misinformation. Over time, the worse and deeper effect is undermining public trust in information we receive from the media or from social media platforms. Everything appears and becomes fake news. Misinformation, I mean, all of us know, was catapulted into our debates, public debates, et cetera, et cetera, in 2016 in the US, because of the elections in the US. And then for all of us, because of COVID and that high level of misinformation we all had. There was harm, perceived to be harm to the elections, as well as harm. But there’s another very important concern that we pay, we don’t pay attention to, which is the lack of accurate information and good media all around since then. While we are trying to fight misinformation, I’m trying to conclude here, we have to do this by avoiding censorship in repressive environments while avoiding exacerbating violence because I started by the flood of happy images from Syria and the flood of misinformation. Misinformation kills. By spreading misinformation in conflict times from Myanmar to Sudan to Syria, this can be murderous. It’s very important to think that one of the very reasons of the spread of misinformation is lack of access to accurate information, what is currently called information integrity. Information integrity is in trouble and accurate information from credible media sources have declined or faced tough times due to economic reasons. Others also have mounting challenge to analyze, dissect the flood that we already spoke about because there’s a persistent need to cultivate the critical ability. All my good friends, academics and doctors and politicians who believe a lot of the stuff that’s coming from Syria, that’s misinformation, they actually also need to cultivate their ability at reading, understanding and analyzing media much better. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Okay. Thank you. So, what we see, and as I told you in the introduction, is something like if the attacks that before were on infrastructures, now we have in our minds. So it’s very important to understand this, that this is sort of a war field. of battle, this new situation where we are getting in after generative AI introduced this technique does so fast, so fast, can’t make a reason meant on them. So, Mr. Esam Alwagait I’ll get, I ask you the same question about the most prevalent prevalent digital sources.

Esam Alwagait: Sure. So when we talk about misinformation, we have to understand two things. First of all, how fast it propagates. And second of all, the coverage or the reach of this misinformation, because let’s face it, misinformation has always been there. But before it used to be within a limited reach, and it used to propagate much, much, much slower. Nowadays, with the internet, with the social media, misinformation propagates much faster, and almost everywhere. So let me give you some stats by a report or by survey by the UNESCO. 68% of the people say that they get their news from social media. 38% they get it from online messaging. And this is a shocking fact, only 20% they get it from the online media. So it’s obvious that the main source for propagating misinformation is the social media. So what is misinformation or what are the forms of misinformation? I would like to classify it in two parts. The first one is the intentional misinformation, where you have people or groups trying to actively trying to push misinformation. And nowadays, misinformation is not only text as it used to be before. Nowadays, with the help of AI, and there are a lot of tools, you can generate video and audio. And it is so realistic that the average person cannot realize that this is actually fake. So with the combination of AI tools and the social media, we have very dangerous ways of spreading misinformation. And the information integrity is more important than ever it is today. So if you ask me what is the way to spread misinformation, I would say that the main source of spreading misinformation is the social media and online messaging apps.

Barbara Carfagna: Yes. We have seen that now with generative AI, we can build also vertical generative AI. And this vertical generative AI, if you if you go to profile someone, before we could through social media, profile groups, now with generative AI, we can profile one person exactly, exactly with their tastes, and their orientation and desires, and also vulnerability. So it’s like if we have a precision weapon, and capability to build very fast, through a bot, for example, and information and fake information for him. So it’s even more and more convincing. And it is what the experts call super persuasion. You cannot persuade someone like we could do before, but super persuasion. is just for him. So this is, of course, very important for terrorism, for recruitment of terrorists, and that’s why I ask the question to Natalia Gherman, so which are the most prevalent digital sources?

Natalia Gherman: Thank you, and good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Great pleasure to be here, and just as Madam Moderator mentioned, I represent a United Nations Security Council counterterrorism entity, and my office is more focused on the spread of terrorist and violent extremist messaging online and offline. However, there are great similarities on how misinformation, as well as disinformation, and terrorist-related messaging are being created, posted, and propagated. And in terms of changing landscape, I should say that COVID-19 pandemic led, of course, to a massive rise in people joining the cyber space, and the sheer numbers of people using Internet and social media now is staggering. And we’ve also seen an explosion in the number of gaming and social media platforms, messaging systems, and online spaces. So in terms of malicious content online, we in the United Nations highlight that unmoderated spaces are major hubs for misinformation and terrorist content. And these are, first of all, social media platforms and messaging systems with deliberately lax content policies. Then there are, of course, small platforms lacking capacity. to effectively moderate content and hidden chat rooms and sites. And I also want to draw your attention to the rise of influencers with millions of followers. And when combined with algorithms pushing content, they flooded the social media and messaging services with misinformation and worse content. So we are in a time when just a handful of people can seed widespread misinformation. And two trends we in a seated counter-terrorism executive directorate have noted while assessing the member states’ capacities to prevent and counter terrorism. And they are ironically at the opposite ends of the technology spectrum. On the one hand, in dialogue with the member states, we have seen the ever-increasing use of new technologies like chatbots, generative AI and other AI-powered tools to generate and spread terrorist-related content and other malicious messaging. And this has, by the way, led to the creation of credible avatars and also deepfake video and audio used for criminal purposes and for the spread of misinformation and also to incite violence. And on the other hand, we have seen an uptick in so-called old-fashioned technologies like the use of terrorist-operated websites and human support networks to help spread messages to followers across diverse platforms. And these methods rely on hiding content in hard-to-find channels very often and also delivering it to selected audiences. But in both cases, detection, tracking, and countering the threat spread of harmful content is posing to the governments, to the member states, and to all professionals ever-increasing challenges. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you. Mr. Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed, same question, on the most prevalent digital sources.

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed: It’s a great pleasure to be here on this fantastic event. And I would like to congratulate the Digital Government Authority for organizing this and for inviting me to be part of this distinguished panelist. Of course, the technological advancements, being the infrastructure or the connectivity on social media platforms, and the speed of spreading information change the behavior of the society. And many people, instead of going for the information in the traditional media, they use the new channels. I think it’s due to the fact that the behavior of people, they cannot wait. They want instant news to be there. I recall once there was a news which was aired. And somebody called me and said, you don’t know what’s going on. And I said, what was there? He said, you know, this and this happened. And then I told them. And when I looked at it, it was aired maybe 30 minutes ago. So I was late for 30 minutes gap. That, I think, and the reaction of the traditional media and the governments to this change of the behavior and the way that the people are dealing with the news, I think, created this kind of a new way of spreading the misinformation. Because everybody became a producer. And the new creators, being social media activists or many others, became the new producers of the information. The technologies. you know Attributed into that for example they’re good algorithms used by the social media that you know make the information which is more Clickable or more sensational to come on top I think that’s maybe one one reason for the for the misinformation and the other thing is the You know the more that the people try to distinguish between the fake and and the true information Deep fake and AI you know create more sophisticated content and of course the the encryptions of the Social media Platforms make it more difficult because you don’t know you cannot control and who is who is spreading what kind of information is between people themselves the societal and psychological side of it of course that you know many people whenever they Receive an information that’s for them is absolute truth, and then it’s very difficult for you to Try to you know navigate it negate it or you know take the So it’s easier to to convince, but it’s more difficult to Change that minds and of course when the messages comes from your friends and from your network again It’s more credible for you, but that’s that’s another Reason and then the fear and emotions usually spread more often and Economical side that you know the Anything that spreads more and more clickable people will will try to spread that information to get more followers and Sometimes to monetize that that content so that’s I think in and in a summary I think what happened To change the behaviors of the of the society.

Barbara Carfagna: It’s very important this point that once you convince Someone it’s very difficult to make he come back, so you have to act against misinformation and disinformation information networks before with different, of course, different methods and take the problem from different points of view. That’s why I asked the same question to Mr. Pearse O’Donohue and how the rules work for this and how they can change because it’s a technology chain so fast that how can the rule follow the speed?

Pearse O’Donohue: Thank you. Yes. Is this working?

Barbara Carfagna: I can’t hear you now.

Pearse O’Donohue: No.

Barbara Carfagna: Maybe.

Pearse O’Donohue: Somebody turn me on.

Barbara Carfagna: We can. Yes, you can get the mic, sorry.

Pearse O’Donohue: Thank you. And thank you very much for the invitation here. It’s a privilege to speak. We’ve already heard several insightful answers. So I would perhaps compliment that taking a slightly different approach, which is to identify the most prevalent sources. The first thing is to say that it’s simply the volume, the number of different sources that exist that themselves contribute as a whole to the existence and prevalence of misinformation. And that is an issue to do with everything that has been said about its prevalence but also with scope and its range and speed. The second point is that we do at some point have to make a distinction between misinformation and disinformation. But it is the existence of disinformation, which is targeted, untrue statements, facts, even now videos with AI support, to actually mislead the public or individuals. In some cases, that is so obvious that a lot of users are unaware of the more benign but nevertheless nefarious misinformation, which is affecting their choices, which is affecting their daily lives. So we do have to accept that the most prevalent sources are the social media platforms. But I would say they’re particularly those platforms which are not sufficiently moderated, do not have sufficient safeguards in place, in order to identify for, or in some cases, prevent misinformation. And that is really the role when you asked me about rules, is that we have to see what is it that can be done to guide the industry, what is it that can be done to protect the user, but of course allowing the user to choose. And that is very important when we come to an open internet. If a government or a regulatory authority decides to step in and decide on what is misinformation and what is not, well then who moderates the regulator? And that becomes a permanent issue. So the rules have to be focused on allowing the individual to choose, but protecting them from disinformation, from ensuring that the providers, the platforms, et cetera, are actually capable of moderating their content, but that that is done in an objective way, and that dangerous material is actually flagged to the individual. When it comes to terrorist activity, criminal activity, or activity which puts at risk the lives of individuals, such as for example disinformation about vaccines, then of course there is a role for government to step in, but they should put the onus on the platforms to actually achieve that, rather than directly intervening onto the content platforms themselves. So this is the context in which we have these discussions in the Internet Governance Forum, in order to actually stop people going too far, and that we actually have an understanding of how it might work.

Barbara Carfagna: And what should be the key priorities for governments when developing policies and regulation to combat misinformation?

Pearse O’Donohue: Thank you. Well, the first thing is that in a forum like this, the governments must work with the other stakeholders, many of whom are the experts in the running of the Internet, whether it is the tech… technical community, academia, civil society through their NGOs, and of course business, they can learn and work with them. It will always be more effective if it is done in that multi-stakeholder way. But what governments could do, taking their roles and legitimate responsibilities is, as I’ve said, to ensure that the framework exists, that the platforms, the providers of the social media platforms, know clearly what they must do and have put in place sufficient mechanisms of moderation, independent content moderation, but also in the ultimate cases, which hopefully should be relatively minimal, that they have the ability to rapidly take down dangerous material, criminal, terrorist, or other similar material for the protection of individuals, but also that there is a sufficient transparency and redress in the mechanisms that governments or regions put in place so that we can learn from any mistakes that we make. Obviously, we’re not always going to get it right, so that errors or mislabelling can be corrected and redress is effective to the individuals or to the companies or to the groups who may feel that they are being unnecessarily or unfairly censored, and that is a very important part. So again, an independent monitoring is critical, independent of government, academic and other experts who can objectively, independently give a view on the functioning of these processes, but also in some cases actually be the experts the content itself.

Barbara Carfagna: EU as a European Union has introduced the regulation for misinformation in the Digital Services Act. Will other countries follow and make a similar rule like it happened for the GDPR, in your opinion?

Pearse O’Donohue: Thank you. We do think that what we have done can be of interest and of use to other countries and regions. You mentioned the GDPR is a very good example. Perhaps one of the reasons why we could help others to develop their systems is because while Europe and Europeans are major consumers of the major social platforms, most of those platforms are not actually European-based or of European origin. So we have had, shall we say, a different objective than some countries. Secondly, because we have within Europe very different cultures, very different experiences, even the linguistic element is very important actually in this area, that that will help others. It’s not a unilingual system that we have had to put in place and we need to deal with multiculturalism and differences of culture, religion and ethnic tradition. So yes, but in all modesty, as I’ve said before, there is always an opportunity that in one or other area what we do isn’t quite right and we have to address. So we have to learn from our mistakes and we can learn from others. Secondly, of course, for the very reason that we want the internet to be localized to address different linguistic and ethnic cultures, there will always be a need for some modification and adaptation, for example, of the rules that are appropriate for Europe for other countries and regions. But we do feel again in the IGF and other fora that that’s exactly where we can have these discussions so that others can learn not from us but with us from the experiences, for example, of the Digital Services Act as we implement that important legislation and find tools that are appropriate for their case but which will achieve the same objective, which is an open, safe internet where there is free access to information but there is also a clear barrier to disinformation and misinformation. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you. Mr.Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed, what emerging technologies are proving most effective in identifying and mitigating misinformation, and how can their adoption be scaled responsibly?

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed: There are many fact-check tools, you know, by Google and by many others, and even the image and video verification tools. The problem with those tools is that it requires the recipients to put some effort to go and look for each piece of information, which requires time and effort to verify what is going on. And those tools, of course, they’re using different technologies, but, you know, mostly we are changing to use the AI and machine learning. The legislations and the process to make them effective, I think, is the most important thing, because if we cannot identify the source of information, there is a misinformation that is spread around, and then you cannot source who started that. I think that makes it very difficult, because then the harm is there, and then you cannot find out who’s behind that piece of information. And I think if we can introduce the verify-by-design tools, that you know, tag the information, you’re not hiding, you know, or not letting the information going out, but tagging the information, so at least the user can see that tag, and then look at what is the perceptions, let’s say, of the tools about that piece of information. I think that might minimize the harm of the data which is going out. And the government of India, you know, they introduced the legislations with which is a mandate on all the social media platforms to identify the source of information. So that kind of thing, I think, of legislation is required with many other measures that I think we have to collectively work together with the society and the stakeholders.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you. Mr. Alwagait, we have seen, I’ve been in Saddaia, so I’ve seen that study each technology and try to examinate which is the best one for the purpose you have. So what are the emerging technologies that are proving most effective in identifying and mitigating misinformation?

Esam Alwagait: Sure. So to fight misinformation, you have two issues. First of all, how to detect the fake media or information. And the second part, what do you do when you do that? So detecting misinformation, there are a lot of technologies and we have the case of fighting fire with fire. So if AI is used to generate misinformation, then you have AI tools to detect those content. For example, we have machine learning and NLPs that could analyze the linguistic patterns and detect the manipulated text. There are AI tools to analyze video and audio to detect, for example, the pitch of the sound or the facial movement and so on to detect the fake generated content by AI. So that’s detecting it. But the most important part is what do you do? And I think that there should be a collaboration between tech companies, governments, academia and international organizations to come up with innovative regulations to combat misinformation. And when I say innovative regulations, I mean the kind of regulations that does not hinder the innovation. Because we all know that sometimes too much regulations will slow down the innovation and the lack of regulation will allow cases like misinformation. So innovative regulation is a sweet spot where you have this balance between having regulations and enabling innovation. For example, in Saudi Arabia, we worked with the global AI advisory body by the UN to create more regulations for ethical. and responsible AI. We have also established the International Center for AI Research and Ethics here in Riyadh, allowing these kind of regulations and enabling ethical AI. So to combat misinformation, you have the tools detected, but you need to have the regulations that enforces these tools.

Barbara Carfagna: Do you have system to monitor the behavior of the message, the fake message? Because I think that in the speedness, maybe this is the most effective thing to do to stop, because like we heard before, if you have someone convinced you can come back. So how you try to stop the message?

Esam Alwagait: So a lot of social medias, they do have an AI driven fact checking tools, so that immediately when you have the content, it will be flagged based on how active, if there is something alarming, it will have an automatic flag. Other social medias, for example, they crowdsource this. So they would allow the online community to flag this misinformation and provide their ideas about it. So as you mentioned, sometimes the misinformation could be stopped even before it starts using these tools.

Barbara Carfagna: Okay, thank you. So starting from your consideration, how can governments, tech companies, media and civil society work together to create a unified strategy for combating misinformation? I ask you to Mrs. Natalia Gherman.

Natalia Gherman: Thank you. I believe that one way governments, tech companies, media and civil society can work together is to use international mechanisms such as Internet Governance Forum for such purpose. we have this week a fantastic opportunity here in Riyadh to put our heads together and to develop a unified strategy. And the key players must also take advantage of focused global or regional events for that purpose that are many more. And I can bring a very good example in the sense back in 2022, the United Nations Security Council Counter-Terrorist Committee organized a special meeting in India, in New Delhi, that gathered governments of the United Nations, member states, technological companies, civil society, research, academia, media, and all were researching and analyzing a very important issue of misuse of new technologies for terrorist purposes, international capacity building, and of course that all through the lens of respecting human rights. And the outcome of that meeting was the Delhi Declaration, which led to the development of the so-called non-binding guiding principles for all United Nations member states on new payment technologies, unmanned aircraft systems, and of course, information and communication technologies. My office CTAT was tasked with development of the drafts of those non-binding principles. We had to work and collaborate with more than 100 partners from the governmental sector, civil society, academia. And of course, we’ve learned a great number and a host of good practices, lessons learned, and effective operational measures. So… Some of the ideas and suggestions that were put forward by our partners included ways to counter myths and disinformation through digital and media literacy campaigns that still remains extremely relevant, teaching critical thinking skills, and building resilience at all levels of society to violent extremism and to terrorist messages. So there were also suggestions to develop guidelines for strategic communications and counter-messaging algorithms, as well as developing cross-platform reporting mechanisms. And similar efforts, both global but also focused fora and platforms, do help to build consensus and trust among relevant stakeholders. And of course, our aim should be the development of an operational plan to combat misinformation globally. So the United Nations Security Council, as always, took the lead and highlighted the need to develop public-private partnerships through voluntary cooperation to address the exploitation of information communication technologies in no less than six resolutions on counterterrorism since 2017. And in the United Nations, we are increasingly consolidating our cooperation with such partners as Tech Against Terrorism, the Christchurch Call, and the industry-led Global Internet Forum to Counterterrorism. And there are many more other good examples on private and public partnerships. So the key actors could draw on the playbook for countering terrorist narratives online as late as I said in the Security Council relevant resolutions, and also in the comprehensive international framework to counter terrorism narratives. And this framework that the United Nations offers to all member states in the world, lays measures states could take to include legal and law enforcement measures, cross-sector collaborations, and the development of strategic communications among other things. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you very much. Mr. Khaled Mansour, we have also seen that there are some protocols that we are trying to build, like the C2PA or others. Do they work? Or in your opinion, how can we cooperate?

Khaled Mansour: Thank you, Barbara. Let me just take two steps back since I’m the only member of this panel who doesn’t represent the government or multilateral organization. Let me take a different track at how we can have strategies to counter misinformation. Firstly, I don’t think we have to have a unified strategy. I think we are different actors, all of us. Governments have their own responsibilities. Every actor has its own interests, its own set of interests and priorities. Global regimes are not necessarily the only solution. Global transparency, a venue like that, a forum like that is a step in the right direction where we speak to each other but hold each other accountable because at the end of the day, we come from different frameworks. Secondly, people like us in the Oversight Board, and the Oversight Board is a self-regulatory body for meta-platforms. So we are independent, funded by an irrevocable trust from meta. We can tell meta to remove content or to return content that they removed and give them advice. Our guiding principle doesn’t start from safety and protection, it starts from freedom from suppression. That’s a different approach to misinformation. So, we defend freedom of expression as long as it doesn’t undermine the rights of others. So for misinformation to be labeled as such or to be removed, it must be very clear and legitimate laws in place to remove it, not ambiguous definitions to achieve unjustifiable ends and suppress views in the absence of imminent and likely harm. And this is a key word because tackling misinformation, and a lot of misinformation is just harmless, useless, to be left maybe only labeled. But tackling misinformation should be proportional to the likelihood and eminence of harm. That’s a very important distinction that we always have to make. I’m not talking about clear criminal activities, recruiting for terrorist organizations, child trafficking, all of that is clear stuff that should be handled. Because we have to admit there is a balance that we need to make between allowing people to express their views freely and protecting users from harm. Not all misinformation, and I repeat again, is harmful. But when misinformation can incite violence or undermine public safety or directly harm individuals, we need to act. And I would claim this is not the majority of pieces of misinformation. And there are various ways to handle misinformation. Removal is not necessarily the best way to approach it. For example, earlier this year, the oversight board, we told META to leave content in place with a manipulated video of President Biden. We advised META to stop removing manipulated material, that’s video, audio, text, which is manipulated by AI or otherwise, unless the content clearly violates policies. is, again, pornography, child trafficking, terrorist activities, et cetera, et cetera, or violates human rights. Now, it’s important to tell users that this content is manipulated. And our advice, our approach is that Meta should then label that content as significantly altered. This is being transparent with users, with us, and useful without having to remove content. And Meta, indeed, started labeling all AI content that they can detect using tools, like Mr. Alwagait pointed out, using tools to show users understand that this video of that president is actually manipulated, or that video of that candidate in a campaign or elections is manipulated. AI is not the challenge. AI exacerbates, speeds up, accelerates, but it’s not the challenge. States, corporations, and humans like us are the ones who sometimes abuse the system, using AI or using other tools. And our strategies should be focused on fighting, not on fighting these tools, but on actually using them, again, as Mr. Alwagait said, to expose, and sometimes even label, or remove this harmful content.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you very much. So I ask, we had just less than nine minutes. I ask each of you a quick remark, a final message to leave to our public.

Esam Alwagait: Sure. So misinformation is very dangerous. In cases like COVID-19, it costs lives of people. We need to fight it. We need to have this collaboration between the government, academia, the tech companies, the international organizations, to come up with proper regulations to combat misinformation. And I’d like to reiterate our commitment here in Saudi Arabia to work locally and globally to reach to such regulations. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you.

Deemah Al-Yahya: I just wanted as well to build on Her Excellency Natalia’s comment on the differences and how can cooperation help. Before this session, because of the power of platforms like IGF and with the support of Saudi Arabia hosting IGF this year, we conducted a roundtable where we had our member states and also states that were not members to come together. And what we found is that the challenge is similar. The challenges are the same, but the way how to tackle the challenge is different. And by just one seating together, all shared best practices together, which reduced time to expedite solving the problem. And as consensus of all our members mandated by our chair, the Minister of Kuwait, we are going to have another meeting as well, the same to invite private sector and social media platforms to be part of that discussion to create, as His Excellency mentioned, the right regulations and standards that within consensus all member states can adopt and therefore respected by the social media platforms. My message is, let’s continue cooperating and we have to act now, but in a way where we put hands in hands rather than working independently and in silos. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you.

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed: I just wanted to highlight that, you know, not everything is negative with the technologies and what’s going on. The technologies allowed, you know, the globe to come closer and, you know, having a similar information at the right time. So, you know, having a common ground between each everybody. But usually, you know, the governments and the society reacts to the. misinformation only the those that are you know spread most or having a higher impact the problem that the misinformation which goes into smaller groups that doesn’t spread so much in smaller societies or smaller groups that nobody is you know taking care of where it could build to a deeper beliefs on those people and making it much difficult and maybe in the future causing a bigger problems I think that we have to we have to address the other thing that you know countries alone or smaller countries they have a less influence on companies tech companies so this is why I think regionally we have to work together to put the regulations and the mechanisms to combat the misinformation thank you.

Natalia Gherman: I would like to reiterate that the threat posed by misinformation but also by terrorist and violent extremist narratives is rapidly evolving so should the response by the states and all different stakeholders and the states of course have to be technologically agile to understand the nature of the threat and to counter of that but this approach should involve all of the society it has to be a government civil society non-governmental partners academia research and the private sector only in this case we will be success and I also want to draw our attention to sometimes unintended consequences of the effort to counter both terrorist narratives and misinformation when it comes to human rights, freedom of expression, freedom of opinion, also journalism and privacy. And the human rights cannot be compromised. Solutions for the spread of misinformation, illicit content online must be grounded in a share commitment to human rights principles. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you.

Pearse O’Donohue: Thank you. Well, if I may be so bold as to talk in terms of principles, which we have heard here today on the panel. And the first is the protection of the individual, which we must strive to achieve. But the second is the preservation of freedom of speech. And there are times when those two first principles can be perceived to be in conflict. But it’s particularly in the mechanism or the weight of the procedures that we put in place to protect the individual, which can, if misused, actually hinder and block freedom of speech. And blocking freedom of speech, freedom of expression, is itself harmful to the individual as it is harmful to society. So that’s why we have to get it right. So the issue of accountability, a principle, the principle of transparency are critical to achieving the right balance in tackling misinformation. I do agree that not all misinformation can be classified as bad, and that we therefore need a gradual response. And of course, we preserve our most direct and intrusive measures for those content, which is clearly supporting terrorist, criminal, or other dangerous philosophies or content. With that in mind, cooperation is therefore the way of doing things. I do agree that individual countries cannot achieve the same as regions can. And that is one of the reasons why the European Union has acted. And we are very keen to discuss and share in the recognition of diversity with other regions who may seek to achieve the same objectives. And that is bringing me to my last principle, which is that it’s not just freedom of expression. It is the open internet, which is available to all, which is of so great importance to economies and societies throughout the world, which we are here to seek to preserve and develop. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: Thank you.

Khaled Mansour: Thank you very much, Barbara. I think we spoke a lot about misinformation, how to define it, how to counter it, how to deal with it. Let me conclude by talking about good information because supporting good information, accurate media, credible exchange of information is paramount if we are to counter misinformation root causes. And this should be our major objectives as governments, as the tech industry, which is not represented on this panel, and as civil society and content moderators. Because we have to submit that there is a fine balance as Pierce just pointed out. There is a fine balance that we have to make between respecting and supporting freedom of expression and human rights and accurate information on one hand, and how to address harmful, and I underline harmful, imminently unlikely harmful misinformation the other hand. And in reaching a good, fine balance between these two overriding objectives lies the challenge that we all face, even if we have different roads to reaching our objective. Thank you.

Barbara Carfagna: So we had finished at 0, 0, 0, 0. So we are perfect speaker. I give my conclusion that is, as we know, we are facing a real revolution that is not industrial. It’s a human for the first time as humans, we are acting in the world together with artificial agents. The agents are organizing also our lives and they’re acting. with us. In these days, we are seeing for the first time how they act and organize seeing my generative AI can talk with the hair generative AI and they organize a meeting together for us. So this is a huge revolution that we can’t face with the tools we had before. That’s why we are building an ecosystem, a new ecosystem. And it is the governance that can lead an ecosystem, not the single vertical domains. That’s why I thank you once more Internet governance forum for this panel, and also for starting this event with this panel, because this is the most important topic probably we have to afford in building our next society. Thank you. Thank you.

Agreement Points

Social media platforms are major sources of misinformation

Esam Alwagait

Natalia Gherman

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed

Social media platforms are the main source of misinformation spread

Unmoderated online spaces are major hubs for misinformation

Social media algorithms promote sensational content

Multiple speakers identified social media platforms as primary sources for the spread of misinformation, citing their wide reach, rapid dissemination capabilities, and algorithmic promotion of sensational content.

Multi-stakeholder collaboration is crucial in combating misinformation

Deemah Al-Yahya

Natalia Gherman

Pearse O’Donohue

Governments, tech companies, academia and civil society must collaborate

Global cooperation and frameworks are needed to address misinformation

Regulations should put onus on platforms to moderate content

Speakers emphasized the need for collaboration between various stakeholders, including governments, tech companies, academia, and civil society, to effectively address the complex issue of misinformation.

AI and technology can be used to combat misinformation

Esam Alwagait

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed

AI and machine learning tools can detect manipulated content

Fact-checking and content verification tools exist but require user effort

Speakers discussed the potential of AI, machine learning, and other technological tools in detecting and combating misinformation, while acknowledging the current limitations and need for user engagement.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the need to balance protecting users from harmful misinformation with preserving freedom of expression, suggesting that platforms should be responsible for content moderation within a regulatory framework.

Khaled Mansour

Pearse O’Donohue

Misinformation policies must balance protecting users and preserving free speech

Regulations should put onus on platforms to moderate content

Unexpected Consensus

Labeling content as an alternative to removal

Khaled Mansour

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed

Labeling manipulated content can inform users without removing it

“Verify-by-design” tools could tag information at the source

Despite representing different sectors (civil society and government), both speakers proposed similar approaches to addressing misinformation through labeling or tagging content rather than outright removal, suggesting an unexpected alignment on preserving information flow while enhancing user awareness.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The speakers generally agreed on the significant role of social media in spreading misinformation, the need for multi-stakeholder collaboration, and the potential of technology in combating the issue. There was also a shared emphasis on balancing user protection with freedom of expression.

Consensus level

Moderate to high consensus was observed among the speakers on the main challenges and broad approaches to addressing misinformation. This level of agreement suggests a promising foundation for developing coordinated strategies to combat misinformation, though specific implementation details may require further discussion and negotiation among stakeholders.

Different Viewpoints

Approach to content removal

Khaled Mansour

Pearse O’Donohue

Not all misinformation is harmful and removal is not always the best approach

Regulations should put onus on platforms to moderate content

Mansour argues for a more nuanced approach to content moderation, suggesting that not all misinformation is harmful and removal isn’t always necessary. O’Donohue, on the other hand, advocates for placing the responsibility of content moderation on platforms, implying a more active approach to content removal.

Focus of misinformation strategies

Esam Alwagait

Khaled Mansour

AI and machine learning tools can detect manipulated content

Supporting accurate, credible information is key to countering misinformation

Alwagait emphasizes the use of technological solutions to detect misinformation, while Mansour argues for a focus on promoting accurate and credible information as a key strategy.

Unexpected Differences

Role of global cooperation

Natalia Gherman

Khaled Mansour

Global cooperation and frameworks are needed to address misinformation

Not all misinformation is harmful and removal is not always the best approach

While Gherman emphasizes the importance of global cooperation and frameworks to address misinformation, Mansour’s focus on nuanced approaches and preserving free speech suggests a potential tension between global standardization and localized, context-specific responses to misinformation. This difference is unexpected given the general consensus on the need for collaboration among the speakers.

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around the specific approaches to addressing misinformation, including content removal policies, the role of technology versus promoting accurate information, and the balance between global cooperation and localized responses.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among the speakers is moderate. While there is a general consensus on the importance of addressing misinformation and the need for multi-stakeholder cooperation, speakers differ on the specific strategies and priorities. These differences reflect the complexity of the issue and suggest that a one-size-fits-all approach to combating misinformation may be challenging to implement. The implications of these disagreements highlight the need for flexible, context-specific solutions that can balance various concerns such as free speech, technological innovation, and effective regulation.

Partial Agreements

All three speakers agree on the need for innovative approaches to address misinformation that don’t hinder innovation or free speech. However, they propose different methods: Alwagait suggests broad innovative regulations, Al-Qaed proposes ‘verify-by-design’ tools, and Mansour advocates for labeling content rather than removing it.

Esam Alwagait

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed

Khaled Mansour

Innovative regulations are needed to combat misinformation while enabling innovation

“Verify-by-design” tools could tag information at the source

Labeling manipulated content can inform users without removing it

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the need to balance protecting users from harmful misinformation with preserving freedom of expression, suggesting that platforms should be responsible for content moderation within a regulatory framework.

Khaled Mansour

Pearse O’Donohue

Misinformation policies must balance protecting users and preserving free speech

Regulations should put onus on platforms to moderate content

Key Takeaways

Social media platforms are the primary source for spreading misinformation due to their wide reach and rapid dissemination capabilities

AI and machine learning technologies can be effective in detecting and combating misinformation, but also pose risks in generating more sophisticated fake content

A multi-stakeholder approach involving governments, tech companies, civil society and academia is needed to effectively address misinformation

Regulations and policies must balance protecting users from harmful misinformation while preserving freedom of speech and an open internet

Supporting access to accurate, credible information is crucial in countering misinformation

Resolutions and Action Items

Develop innovative regulations that combat misinformation while enabling innovation

Create public-private partnerships and international cooperation frameworks to address misinformation globally

Implement AI-driven fact-checking and content verification tools on social media platforms

Establish ‘verify-by-design’ mechanisms to tag information at the source

Organize more focused global and regional events to develop unified strategies against misinformation

Unresolved Issues

How to effectively regulate smaller, unmoderated online spaces that serve as hubs for misinformation

Addressing misinformation in encrypted messaging apps and private groups

Developing a standardized approach to defining and classifying harmful vs. non-harmful misinformation

Balancing regional/cultural differences in misinformation policies while maintaining a global approach

Mitigating unintended consequences of misinformation countermeasures on human rights and privacy

Suggested Compromises

Labeling manipulated or AI-generated content rather than removing it entirely to balance free speech concerns

Implementing graduated responses to misinformation based on likelihood and imminence of harm

Focusing on behavior and spread patterns of messages rather than just content to identify misinformation

Combining technological solutions with media literacy and critical thinking education initiatives

Misinformation kills. By spreading misinformation in conflict times from Myanmar to Sudan to Syria, this can be murderous.

speaker

Khaled Mansour

reason

This comment starkly highlights the real-world consequences of misinformation beyond just online discourse, emphasizing its potential for violence and harm.

impact

It shifted the conversation to focus more on the serious real-world impacts of misinformation, rather than just discussing it as an abstract online phenomenon.

We have seen an explosion in the number of gaming and social media platforms, messaging systems, and online spaces. So in terms of malicious content online, we in the United Nations highlight that unmoderated spaces are major hubs for misinformation and terrorist content.

speaker

Natalia Gherman

reason

This comment broadens the scope of the discussion to include newer, less regulated online spaces as sources of misinformation.

impact

It prompted further discussion on the challenges of regulating diverse online platforms and the need for comprehensive approaches to combat misinformation across various digital spaces.

If a government or a regulatory authority decides to step in and decide on what is misinformation and what is not, well then who moderates the regulator? And that becomes a permanent issue.

speaker

Pearse O’Donohue

reason

This comment raises a crucial point about the challenges of regulating misinformation without infringing on free speech or creating new problems of authority and censorship.

impact

It led to a more nuanced discussion about the balance between regulation and freedom of expression, and the need for transparent, accountable processes in combating misinformation.

To combat misinformation, you have the tools detected, but you need to have the regulations that enforces these tools.

speaker

Esam Alwagait

reason

This comment succinctly captures the dual nature of the challenge – technological solutions and regulatory frameworks – needed to address misinformation effectively.

impact

It helped bridge the discussion between technological solutions and policy approaches, encouraging a more holistic view of combating misinformation.

Not all misinformation can be classified as bad, and that we therefore need a gradual response. And of course, we preserve our most direct and intrusive measures for those content, which is clearly supporting terrorist, criminal, or other dangerous philosophies or content.

speaker

Pearse O’Donohue

reason

This comment introduces important nuance into the discussion, acknowledging that not all misinformation is equally harmful and suggesting a proportional response.

impact

It encouraged a more refined approach to addressing misinformation, moving away from blanket solutions and towards more targeted, context-specific strategies.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by broadening its scope from a narrow focus on technological solutions to a more comprehensive examination of the misinformation challenge. They highlighted the real-world impacts of misinformation, the complexities of regulating diverse online spaces, the tension between regulation and free speech, and the need for nuanced, proportional responses. This led to a richer, more multifaceted conversation that acknowledged the interplay between technology, policy, and societal impacts in addressing misinformation.

How can we develop innovative regulations that combat misinformation without hindering innovation?

speaker

Esam Alwagait

explanation

Finding this balance is crucial for effectively addressing misinformation while still allowing for technological progress

How can we implement ‘verify-by-design’ tools that tag information without restricting its dissemination?

speaker

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed

explanation

This approach could help users identify potential misinformation without resorting to censorship

How can we develop cross-platform reporting mechanisms for misinformation?

speaker

Natalia Gherman

explanation

This could improve coordination and effectiveness in addressing misinformation across different online platforms

How can we better support and promote accurate, credible information sources?

speaker

Khaled Mansour

explanation

Focusing on promoting good information could be an effective strategy to counter misinformation at its root

How can we ensure that efforts to combat misinformation do not inadvertently compromise human rights, freedom of expression, and privacy?

speaker

Natalia Gherman

explanation

Balancing security measures with fundamental rights is crucial in developing effective and ethical approaches to misinformation

How can regional cooperation be leveraged to influence tech companies in addressing misinformation?

speaker

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed

explanation

Smaller countries may have limited influence individually, but regional cooperation could provide more leverage in negotiations with tech giants

How can we develop public-private partnerships to address the exploitation of information communication technologies?

speaker

Natalia Gherman

explanation

Collaboration between governments and private sector could lead to more comprehensive and effective solutions

How can we improve digital and media literacy campaigns to counter myths and disinformation?

speaker

Natalia Gherman

explanation

Enhancing public awareness and critical thinking skills could help build societal resilience against misinformation

How can we develop guidelines for strategic communications and counter-messaging algorithms?

speaker

Natalia Gherman

explanation

These tools could help in proactively addressing misinformation at scale

How can we better understand and address misinformation in smaller, less visible groups where it may be building deeper beliefs?

speaker

Mohammed Ali Al-Qaed

explanation

Focusing only on widely spread misinformation may overlook potentially dangerous localized misinformation

Summary

This discussion focused on the concept of “leapfrogging” in technology and infrastructure development, particularly in relation to internet connectivity and energy access in developing regions. The panelists, including experts from various countries, explored how nations can skip intermediate stages of development to adopt more advanced technologies rapidly.

Key topics included the relationship between energy consumption and GDP, the importance of reliable electricity for internet access, and the potential for innovative solutions like portable Wi-Fi batteries and solar-powered micro data centers. The speakers emphasized the need for sovereignty in technological development, allowing countries to tailor solutions to their specific needs rather than relying solely on external models.

The discussion highlighted successful examples of leapfrogging, such as Saudi Arabia’s rapid development in the energy sector and Brazil’s creative approaches to expanding internet infrastructure. Panelists also addressed the challenges faced by many African nations in achieving consistent energy and internet access.

A significant portion of the conversation centered on the role of youth and women in driving technological advancement and economic growth in developing regions. The importance of digital literacy, education, and healthcare access through technology was stressed, with examples of how internet connectivity can empower marginalized communities.

The speakers advocated for a “Last Mile Coalition” within the UN Internet Governance Forum to focus on the specific needs of remote and underserved communities. They also discussed the potential for community networks and innovative distribution models to expand access more efficiently than traditional infrastructure approaches.

Overall, the discussion underscored the transformative potential of leapfrogging in bridging global digital divides and the need for collaborative, locally-tailored solutions to achieve meaningful connectivity worldwide.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The concept of “leapfrogging” in technological and economic development, where developing regions skip stages to catch up or surpass more developed areas

– The critical importance of energy access and infrastructure as a foundation for internet connectivity and economic growth

– The role of public-private partnerships and foreign investment in enabling leapfrogging, with both positive and negative examples discussed

– The potential for innovative solutions like portable batteries and micro-grids to provide energy and connectivity to remote areas

– The importance of local ownership, sovereignty and culturally-appropriate solutions in leapfrogging efforts

The overall purpose of the discussion was to explore the challenges and opportunities around providing “last mile” internet and energy access to remote and underserved communities around the world. The speakers aimed to reframe the narrative around these efforts and highlight innovative approaches.

The tone of the discussion was largely optimistic and solution-oriented, with speakers sharing examples of successful leapfrogging initiatives. There was also a critical edge at times when discussing failed approaches or exploitation of developing regions. The tone became more collaborative towards the end as participants shared ideas and made connections.

Speakers

– Jarrell James: Moderator, from East Africa, works on last mile internet access

– Okiki Famutimi: Co-founder of Parabl, from Nigeria, works on internet and energy access

– Conor Colwell: Founder of LiquidStar, works on waypoints and off-grid energy solutions

– Duaa Balawi: Head of Saudi Y20 Youth delegation, from Saudi Arabia

– Raashi Saxena: Works at Parabl, background in telecommunications engineering and internet governance

– Purnima Tiwari: Steering committee member of the Dynamic Coalition on Internet Rights and Principles

Additional speakers:

– Ahmad: Works in the energy sector in Saudi Arabia

– Alex Mora: Network engineer from Brazil, works on research and education networks

– Fouad Rwabuhungu: From Tanzania, works on rural electrification projects

Revised Summary of Discussion on Leapfrogging in Technology and Infrastructure Development

Introduction

This discussion focused on the concept of “leapfrogging” in technology and infrastructure development, particularly in relation to internet connectivity and energy access in developing regions. The panel, comprised of experts from various countries, explored how nations can skip intermediate stages of development to rapidly adopt more advanced technologies.

Leapfrogging and Last Mile Internet

Okiki Famutimi introduced the concept of leapfrogging, explaining it as the process by which countries skip stages of economic development. He provided an example contrasting the gradual progression of telecommunications in the United States with the experience in countries like Nigeria, where widespread mobile phone adoption occurred without the intermediate stage of landline infrastructure.

Duaa Balawi offered another example from Saudi Arabia, describing how the country transitioned from a nomadic culture to industrialization through oil development, challenging traditional assumptions about the pace of economic development.

The discussion then shifted to the Last Mile Internet presentation, focusing on innovative solutions to provide connectivity in remote and underserved areas.

Waypoints Project

Conor Colwell introduced the Waypoints project, which aims to deploy solar-powered micro data centers providing electricity, water, and internet access. Key features of Waypoints include:

1. AI-driven electricity distribution across multiple revenue-generating services

2. Integrated water purification systems

3. High-speed internet connectivity

4. Plans to deploy 100,000 Waypoints globally, potentially impacting about 100 million people

Parabl Project

Jarrell James presented the Parable project, which involves portable Wi-Fi capable batteries serving as gateway access points. This solution provides both energy and connectivity in areas lacking traditional infrastructure, aligning with the leapfrogging concept by bypassing the need for extensive fixed infrastructure.

Energy Access and Economic Development

Jarrell James highlighted the direct correlation between per capita electricity generation and GDP, emphasizing the fundamental role of energy in driving economic growth. He presented data showing that countries with higher energy consumption tend to have higher GDP per capita, underscoring the importance of reliable electricity for economic development.

An audience member pointed out that nearly half the planet lacks reliable access to energy, significantly impacting economic development prospects in many regions.

Internet Shutdowns and Economic Impact

Okiki discussed the challenges posed by internet shutdowns, highlighting their significant economic impact. He emphasized the need for stable and reliable internet access to support economic growth and development.

Community Networks and Caching Solutions

The discussion explored community networks as a means to optimize limited bandwidth for multiple users, potentially increasing the efficiency and reach of existing connectivity resources. Keeks and Conor discussed the potential of caching educational content locally to reduce data costs for upskilling, demonstrating how innovative approaches can address both connectivity and educational challenges.

Y20 Policy Recommendations

Duaa Balawi presented policy recommendations from the Y20 summit, including:

1. Government subsidies for devices like smartphones and laptops for students, particularly in light of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on education

2. Improving telehealth access, especially for women in rural communities

3. Enhancing digital literacy programs to empower marginalized groups

Impact on Women and Marginalized Groups

Raashi Saxena highlighted the challenges faced by women in accessing the internet, noting that they often have limited access to household internet connections. She provided an example of digital literacy programs helping women in rural India use the internet.

Duaa Balawi expanded on this theme, explaining how internet access enables women’s economic participation and access to healthcare information. Jarrell James shared an example of Ethiopia’s women’s health movement leveraging mobile technology to improve maternal health outcomes.

Infrastructure Integration and Partnerships

Alex Mora shared Brazil’s approach of pairing power lines with fiber optic cables, enabling efficient infrastructure development by leveraging existing networks to expand internet access. He also discussed the Brazilian Research and Education Network and recommended attaching connectivity projects to educational institutions at all levels.

The creation of partnerships between research networks and commercial providers was proposed as a means to accelerate connectivity initiatives.

Rural Electrification and Connectivity

Fouad Rwabuhungu shared experiences from Tanzania, where rural electrification paired with 4G deployment is connecting villages, illustrating a holistic approach to infrastructure development.

Conclusion and Future Directions

The discussion concluded with several key takeaways and proposals for future action:

1. A suggestion to create a Last Mile Coalition within the UN Internet Governance Forum to focus on the specific needs of remote and underserved communities

2. The importance of integrating energy access, internet connectivity, and education initiatives for comprehensive development

3. The need for innovative, locally-tailored solutions to achieve meaningful connectivity worldwide

The conversation highlighted the transformative potential of leapfrogging in bridging global digital divides and the importance of collaborative approaches to sustainable technological development.

Jarrell James: I am here. Can you hear me? Anybody named Rashi up there? A Rashi Saxena? Okay. And then a Connor Colwell. They should both have speaker rights. Okay. Hi, can you hear me? Thank you. Okay, Rashi is live. Okay, seems like we are good to go. I’m gonna get situated here. Let’s see if… I can hear myself. Is your radio turned to three? Can everybody hear me? Everybody else can hear me? Okay. Yo, yo, yo, yo. I said a hip hop, a hippie, a hippie to the hip hop. No? There’s too many things dangling from me right now. Absolutely not. My tism is triggered. All right. I’d love to be able to see Rashi and Connor’s face if possible. Rashi, Connor. Nice. Rashi, I think you’re gonna want to turn your volume up more if possible because we cannot hear you. We could barely hear you. Okay. While we wait for our two collaborators online, Rashi Saxena, very big avid personality in the IGF space and the UN space as well. She unfortunately got… Dengue fever, and so was unable to fly from Bangalore. And so we’re going to work with her online. And then we have Connor Caldwell, old friend of ours, but also a deep researcher, collaborator on edge communities, edge grids, and all sorts of crazy things we’re going to get into. So I don’t want to give it all away now. This is our presentation, Last Mile. I need to be able to see a little bit, if that’s all right. Last Mile Internet, the paths for remote communities, almost at edge communities. This is something that’s very important to us. This is something that comes to us from our backgrounds. I come from East Africa, originally. I come from a region that has been shut down from the internet many times due to either natural disasters or extenuating circumstances. I think our longest shutdown was about two years. And my friend here, Okiki, I’ll let him introduce himself.

OKIKI: Testing. Hey, everyone. My name is Okiki. I also go by Keeks. I’ve been working with Jharrel on this project for a little over a year, I’d say. And my connection to this is that I’m from a country in West Africa, Nigeria, that has, despite the fact that it’s one of the larger oil-producing countries, the grid in major cities goes down several times a year to the point where it’s seen as trivial. So yeah, that’s my personal connection. And I really want to basically work on that connection and the relationship between internet and energy access.

Jarrell James: Joined to the left here is Dua, the head of the Saudi Y20 Youth. Did I say that all correct?

DUA: Yes, sir.

Jarrell James: Yes. Dua, I believe you’re Saudi-born, Saudi-raised, and- And you come to the IGF focused on the projected futures that can be made from the youth community here in Saudi Arabia and seeing where your guys’ technological development leads you, correct?

DUA: Yeah, absolutely. And I think just a little bit about me, I’m actually from a very small village here in the kingdom. Although I didn’t really spend much time there, I was born and raised here in Riyadh. However, it was always very prevalent to me that my family back in that village struggled with connectivity and access to internet. Despite the fact that we have one of the fastest 5G networks in the world and the largest accessibility to the internet, there are still some rural areas that unfortunately have not had the access. Hence why I advocated for digital inclusivity and accessibility at the Y20 as the head of the Saudi Arabian delegation. And I think at the Y20, there were a lot of topics that we were discussing and a lot of policies that we wanted to bring to the table. And of course, in a forum as big as the Y20 that harbors 20 G20 countries, as well as nine visiting countries, it was this year in Brazil, there was a lot of things that we couldn’t necessarily reach a common ground on. But the one thing that all of us seem to agree on quite passionately is the imperative that everybody needs to have digital access, especially when it comes to its link to education, to the ability to connect with the rest of the world, to allow people to bridge that divide between marginalized communities and urban nations in that regard. So I’m here to speak a little bit about that and maybe highlight some of the policies that we wanted to advocate for as part of the Y20 group.

Jarrell James: Let’s get into all of that, honestly. I know these headphones are kind of difficult to operate. These are the other two folks that will be joining us. Connor Caldwell, who I mentioned earlier, is the founder of a group called liquidstar.io. You’ll learn about them in a moment. Rashi Saxena, I also mentioned earlier. I don’t know if Rashi is live now, but maybe she wants to introduce herself, and maybe Connor can introduce themselves. Go ahead, Rashi or Connor, if you can. You’ll come through on everybody’s headphones. It’s a very interesting experience here. Rashi, are you available? You are muted, if you are available. Yeah. Sir, can we unmute Rashi and Connor? Make co-host. Hold on. We’re giving you guys some access here. And then, Connor, call well, please, as well. Up top. Right there. Hey. There’s Rashi, smiling face. What’s up? Hi. How are you? Hi, everyone. I hope everyone’s well. Thank you so much for joining in. I think you’re going to want to talk a little bit louder, if that’s okay?

Raashi Saxena: Can you hear me?

Jarrell James: Yeah.

Raashi Saxena: Okay. I’m going to try to be as loud as possible. I hope everyone’s doing well. Yeah, I’m a bit disappointed for not being there in person.

Jarrell James: Rashi, you might want to try different headphones or something. We’re hearing your tones. We’re not hearing your content.

Raashi Saxena: Can you hear me now?

Jarrell James: A little bit better, everybody? We’re getting mixed reviews. Try and yell. Just yell.

Raashi Saxena: Okay. I’m going to try to be louder. Can you hear me now? Yes. Okay, fabulous. Hi, everybody. My name is Rashi. I work with Jarell and Keats at Parabell. I have a background in technology. I’m a telecommunication engineer, and I’ve been working on doing a lot of research on digital governance, internet governance issues since 2018. I made my debut at the IGF in 2018 in Paris, working on internet shutdowns and policy, and I’m also a steering committee member at the IFC. And yeah, I’m excited to be here.

Jarrell James: Rashi, I’m going to go ahead and summarize what you just said. If you wouldn’t mind, could you go into your settings on Zoom for me and check that your input level is turned all the way up? Rashi was saying that she is an avid member of the IGF community. She has worked on all sorts of commissions and policy initiatives by a number of different city-states, a number of different nation-states, and has worked extensively with the Bangalore community around technological innovation and really fostering general, I would say, camaraderie around future endeavors and big thinking. She’s being very modest, but Rashi is also named one of the, I believe, six women to watch by the, correct me if I’m wrong, World Bank, if it’s World Bank or the IMF, one of the two, the guys with the money. And then we have Connor Caldwell up here, who I believe is also capable of unmuting himself. Connor, are you there?

Conor Colwell: Hey, yeah, I’m here. Can you hear me all right?

Jarrell James: No, I think that there’s something about our remote participants that is not coming through at the appropriate volume level. While we have them figure that out, and hopefully we will get that figured out shortly here, let me just do kind of an overview of you as well, Connor, and then when you have your first question, feel free to jump back into it, okay? Okay, sounds good. He came through a little bit louder there, didn’t he? All right, we’ll do a test in a second, but Connor is an avid builder, just a guy who likes to get his hands dirty. couple years in Indonesia and in Djibouti and Jamaica, building out various steps in what’s known as their like waypoints pilots. And these pilots are designed to bring, basically be able to drop a mobile agile grid into any region or in the world, whether that be in a very remote desert or a very high elevation somewhere. I’m going to go on to the next thing. Connor, I hope I did you justice on that. Yeah, thanks. Okay, we heard you. We heard you pretty decently there. Okay. I’m wondering if you can hear me decently as well. Yeah, I think we’re hearing you a little bit better. Everybody? Anyone? Okay. If anyone, if you guys could shut that door back there, that would actually be really helpful, I think, for everybody. All right, let’s assume that I did that correct. Okay, let’s go and we’re gonna just start this off with a little fun exercise. If it’s alright, I’m gonna stand up because I find sitting down and turning around to be difficult. We’re gonna start us off with a little exercise. If you could minimize that chat side, that’d be awesome. So what is the last mile? It’s really hard to like just put ourselves in that experience, you know, especially if we come from regions that are not considered the last mile or a region inside of our own country that’s not considered the last mile. So let’s do an example. You are, what would you do if you ordered an Uber to Disneyland and it dropped you off 10 miles away? Imagine you’re trying to get from your home to Disneyland with your family, LA, Los Angeles, Disneyland, the real one, period. It’s not the end of the world if you don’t make it, but you know, your little community will have a pretty drastic mental health change if you don’t make it at Disneyland. So what do you do if you order an Uber Disneyland and it drops you off 10 miles away? I just can be a little bit of participation if you want, like just throw something out there. I’m sure someone’s gonna be like try and get another Uber, try and get a train, trying a number of different ways to just get a different utility. to get you where you need to go. So interestingly enough like there is a lot of parallels between that and what it means to be in the last mile. You know everybody else on the planet is really hyper connected. You know everybody else is getting mass amounts of money using the internet. You know all these different realities are happening and opportunities are happening for other people and so you’re now sit with a position of like how do I get me and my community to that next five like the last five miles. It’s made it all the way here where you can see the promised land in the court in the distance. How do we get there? And so if you look at the various oh my goodness is it difficult. Hey can you go back? Oh never mind. Can you go back to the beginning? Okay okay so we go to the UN. This controller doesn’t work too well everybody. If you go to the UN you’re gonna hear things like the sustainable development goals for Internet. Everyone has meaningful connectivity by 2030. Meaningful connectivity is defined over there by you know a very long paragraph. It’s not really well talked about the definitions of meaningful connectivity. Who currently has it? It’s mostly the global north. If we look at what their definitions of meaningful connectivity are the framework focuses on four pillars. 4G like speed, smartphone ownership, daily use, unlimited access right? This is a very classic very casual existence for many communities in the global north if not almost all of them. Dependencies, energy infrastructure, regulators, motivated partners. It’s amazing how important that one is and expensive equipment period. So when we look at the development goals of everyone having meaningful connectivity by 2030 we kind of have to acknowledge that everyone has to have these these dependencies taken care of. And so can every region around the world have all of those dependencies taken care of? Not necessarily. and not by their own standards oftentimes. So that’s what we’re going to start getting into is actually what do these dependencies look like for the last mile and what are new solutions and new developments that are being made by us and by others. Let me see, I have other notes here. Rashi, would you like to speak at all in this because I know that you are involved in the UN quite a bit and if you guys, if you, Rashi or Connor, if you guys have anything to say feel free to jump in. I’m just looking at my notes here. Okay, so this next like, this next bit will be a bit of a reprogramming and with like any reprogrammings there might be a lot of questions that come up and I encourage you honestly just to get up at the moment and just ask them or submit them in writing and hand it to my boy Keeks here. I don’t, whatever you need to do. He’s taking avid notes. So let’s go to the next. Ah, here we go. So yeah, it’s the next one. So these are oftentimes connectivity challenges. Deep dive is centralized grids are often brittle. Energy infrastructure is easily destroyed in many parts of the world through natural disasters or whatever extenuating circumstances there may be. Most major utilities are often nationalized but work is outsourced to the private sector. Sponsor nations are for expensive grid infrastructure are limited and often aren’t designed with input from average people. So you have large-scale solutions that affect many, many people’s lives but had very little input from many people’s lives. I’m seeing some head nodding there. I feel like you understand. Or no nationalization, the whole grid starts off at the mercy of outside corporations and lackluster capitalism and I say lackluster capitalism because I enjoy making up terms but there’s not a lot of incentive to create shared goals with the users that these networks are affecting. And so when you have that, you oftentimes don’t have sovereignty and a lot of these regions around in the world that we talk about are looking for sovereignty over their own connection, sovereignty over their own future projections that the GSMA or someone else might be putting out, right? So limited resources for sovereign ownership of major utilities, no ability for utility companies or solutions to be developed or owned by those who rely on them, oftentimes. And ownership of utilities ensures standards. But if there was ownership of those utilities by these local sovereign populations, standards would be improving because they’re shared goals. They’re shared outcomes. And much like the Uber driver, if this thing goes forward, we will see that there needs to be, yeah. So there needs to be physical conditions that allow people to foster for shared outcomes. So if you go to the Uber driver example, that particular Uber driver that you were trying to use to get to Disneyland, he said, I don’t have the same shared outcome as you. In fact, I’m going to drop you off here five miles away. I’m tired. It looks like there’s a lot of traffic. My wife wants me home. The dishes aren’t done. I need to go. And so he drops you off because even though he was there to do a job, he doesn’t have the same shared outcome as you. If you were driving that car and driving your family to Disneyland, you would all have the same shared outcome. And you would get there together. So let’s see. Back one. Nice. Recognizing these deeper challenges is why we coming together, Connor, Rashi, myself, Dua, and others, are really starting to push for this idea of a last mile coalition within the IGF and people that focus as a strategic collective on the reality that is seen and experienced by billions of people around the world and start to actually address these bottlenecks that we see happening. And when you see the bottlenecks that are happening, clearly because of infrastructure, lacking infrastructure, and lacking partners, countries, lacking investments, and honestly, lacking technical expertise and to create the sovereignty for themselves. So, oh my god. So go backwards. Leapfrogging. Do you guys know what it means? Does anyone want to give an example or give some kind of, just somebody summarize what you think leapfrogging is. I’m gonna bring this to you. It’s to to make a leap. Hand to the man behind you. Well, I believe leapfrogging would be to take a step forward and jumping above some of the obstacles that you may find. So you’re jumping above whatever difficulties you’re having. Yes, that is a good overview. Just kind of generality. I think it’d be awesome to hear Rashi or Connor. Do you guys have any thoughts on what leapfrogging is?

Raashi Saxena: Can you hear me?

Jarrell James: Yes, just yell a bit.

Raashi Saxena: I mean, I actually kind of agree with what Purnima mentioned on the chat and I know we have nine participants also in the chat so feel free to also give your suggestions. We do. I’m monitoring it. I would say leapfrogging would be places that have historically been under connected and underserved by by traditional telecom operators and in our case also energy operators. And they don’t necessarily have to be in regions that are impoverished. They could also be in first world countries but just not well connected or and also a lot of that the usual private stakeholders might also not be incentivized because of the limited population or, you know, challenges with terrain, things like that. That’s a long-winded answer.

Jarrell James: I think that’s a great answer. And Purnima, I really appreciate your involvement. I did not see that you had answered that question so adequately.

PURNIMA: I’m here as a steering committee member of the Dynamic Coalition on Internet Rights and Principles.

Jarrell James: Oh, nice. Thank you so much for joining. Glad to have you. I think we have a quick video that helps us tell you what we think leapfrogging is, and hopefully this doesn’t blow out your ears, to be honest. I’m going to walk out of the way. So, Keeks, I mean, you’re from Nigeria. What do you consider leapfrogging to be? How would you define what it means for a region to leapfrog? And what does that actually look like in practice compared to the West? Great question. Leapfrogging, as I understand it, basically what happens when a country skips stages of economic development. When you think about how in the U.S. you had telegrams and telephones and cell phones, you kind of see that as like steps, right? But in countries like Nigeria, for example, you didn’t really have widespread landlines and telephone lines before everyone in the country had a cell phone. So I look at that as leapfrogging, right? You skip steps. But I’m preaching to the choir. JJ, you already know all this. What are you thinking in terms of like how to quantify that? What are some hard numbers for leapfrogging? I don’t know. for me the base factors of a society or people that defines leapfrogging is as simple as kilowatts per hour per person megabits per second per person in relation to GDP per capita and like the greater consumption that you have as an individual and that energy supply meaning that you have access to more internet connectivity on a regular basis and that internet connectivity is all faster more megabits per second the reality is you’re going to be the larger shares of your country’s GDP that’s just how the metrics go and if you look at any developed nation they simply have the highest kilowatt per hour per person to GDP per capita that’s what it means to really be a developed nation when they talk about developing that’s what they’re talking about developing that’s it that’s leapfrogging and it’s an emergent property displayed by china india and others and fucking thailand and this emergent property is taking things the west may have introduced or the west may have nationalized and resold them but saying actually that’s not really going to work for us here’s what we need we’re going to take these parts from you we’re going to do this ourselves see you in 50 years and this is like an endeavor made by many many global south countries that we call leapfrog regions and this endeavor is made earnestly most of the time and originally earnestly but also it’s pretty easy to fucking stop man it’s pretty easy to stop with foreign direct investment uh natural disasters if you do that you just you’ve removed those people from what it means to be a modern society modern societies develop and they thrive and flourish upon the most efficient consumption of energy across the board for the most people and how that energy affects just the general GDP and economic growth of a region year over year you take out the energy grid you take out that cool that’s my boy um so let’s just take a pause here now that like what we’re framing and what we kind of are acknowledging is that there’s plenty of examples of leapfrogging. We’ve seen whole countries like Singapore and others just like dig down deep and completely restructure their entire society around advancement and focusing everybody’s attention on advancement. Now I would actually like to ask the audience and also our own panelists and Dua and Keeks, examples that you’ve seen in your own countries, I don’t know where everyone’s from, but are there any examples you’ve seen in your country of leapfrogging? Like have you seen whole sectors almost change overnight due to maybe greater energy access? Maybe somebody built a hydroelectric dam that suddenly provided a ton of kilowatts to a much thousands or millions of more people? So I mean I would love to just give a little bit of a moment because this is a long workshop, we have to do a little bit of participation. I know you’re Italian? No, where were you from? Huh? Brazil? Please let us know. Do you have any? I met him in the Italian Airport, that’s why I thought he was Italian by the way. We met days ago, I heard him talking about lower radio modules to his friend and I was like what do you know about lower radio modules? Let’s talk. So I’m glad to see that he showed up for the workshop, this is huge. This is how friendships start. I’m gonna bring you the microphone, I would love to hear because I know examples of how Brazil leapfrogged in certain ways, or is leapfrogging. I’d love to hear if you have any examples of your own. No? You don’t know? Can I ask you a question? What is the main transportation route tool in Brazil? Huh? Roads that are used, that have what on them? The large-scale vehicles that are called buses? The main tool of transportation in Brazil is a bus and it’s what moves like the majority of the population from place to place, which also makes your transportation quite slow. The interesting about Brazil is that originally it was an entirely, there was a huge a huge plan focused from a sovereign national level on doing a train system. And there was outside influence that had certain lobbies around developing cars, petrol, those types of things that pushed for the Brazilian population to make buses and roads and cars their main forms of transportation. So in the concept of transportation actually, Brazil almost leapfrogged and then decided to take it a little easy. Can I ask where’s everybody from? If everyone’s from Saudi Arabia, that would be very surprising. I’m gonna start pointing at people. Where are you from? Brazil. Brazil as well, yes, I’m loving this. Oh man, we got lots of Brazilians in here. Do any of you guys have any examples of Brazil leapfrogging?

AUDIENCE: No, I’m just thinking about, but I can’t remember a case.

Jarrell James: Give me some minutes, then I will think more. Okay.

AUDIENCE: I’d like to call on my colleague Ahmad right there on the back, if we can just hand over the mic to him. So my colleague Ahmad works in the energy sector and I believe he could probably speak on some leapfrogging that has been done here in the kingdom specifically in the energy sector and the new renewables.

Jarrell James: So yeah, thank you very much. Just to get a context for the question, so leapfrogging in terms of sustainable energy and development in the transport sector specifically or are we talking in general?

AUDIENCE: In general.

Jarrell James: Yeah, so in terms of energy, we’re looking for alternative energy sources and how we can really translate electricity, which can be abundant in Saudi in terms of solar and wind. Can that be translated into long-term storage? Short-term storage in terms of batteries is something that’s already growing, but the medium and long-term storage in terms of chemicals, storage to chemicals, I think that’s something we’re really seeing developments in there, how you take ammonia, for example, as an energy carrier and transport it internationally. There’s been issues with ammonia utilization. How can you turn it back and crack it into hydrogen, which is what you want to get from it? You get some difficulties with the efficiency, but then how can you use ammonia itself as a fuel? And so there has been a lot of development and leapfrogging in that sense. E-fuels, sustainable fuels, aviation fuels, there’s been a lot of work on developing these fuels that can be used within the existing infrastructure and that can really support the transition. I think that’s one of some of the major efforts that we see happening in Saudi. Shut that door, please.

AHMAD: So that was very, very helpful. Perspective that I had not heard at all do what do you want to speak to that at all or I mean? I have many questions and things to talk about with that But it seems like you definitely knew where we you wanted to go with this

AUDIENCE: I Personally don’t necessarily have a specific take on the matter given that I’m not a subject matter expert by any way shape or form however, I do want to say that it has been one of at least in the past five years one of the most inspirational development stories for me personally to see the the strides that Saudi has made in the renewable energy sector in a very short amount of time and I I think that as Ahmed has mentioned, you know, our existing infrastructure could already be be leveraged, but there’s also you know a push for building new infrastructure for harboring international investments in order to not only develop energy here in the kingdom, but also provide access to neighboring countries through Expanding the national grid and selling electricity and helping, you know support developing nations in that transition as well

Jarrell James: That makes so many things go off in my mind. Let’s start from the first start just real quick I had no idea that you guys were pushing so much into like chemical battery storage and like trying to figure out Where because I mean there’s innovations to be made there like huge innovations to be made there What I’m hearing though is it sounds like Saudi Arabia is aware of we’re a major energy powerhouse now We’ve brought the standard of living up for our whole country like everyone’s doing well, right? We’re all loving it. But like I mentioned in the video, which I think you might buy here right after that It’s actually like for many places around the world that are leapfrogging and they are developing and they are creating these new grids for themselves it’s a matter of Keeping that momentum going and you don’t know how if you can’t keep the momentum going you have to basically accept that There’s a whole population percentage of your community that’s going back They’re going back to the way things were they’re going to lose access and I don’t know how many of you guys have children or have ever dealt with People who don’t like to lose access to things people who like don’t enjoy like once you once you see the promised land You’re not gonna be told to go sit in purgatory. That’s kind of essentially how it is, right? And so the point for a lot of these nation states that have sovereign control over their leapfrogging technologies, is to maintain the standard of living. And like I said earlier, when you have a shared goal, you make sure the whole family gets to Disneyland. Like you’re trying, and where you have outside corporate influence oftentimes is like, well, if we get 20% of everybody, if we had 20% of the population at Disneyland, 20% are going to have a great time, right? Like that’s all that matters. And that’s where you want to see sovereign developments and neighborhoods, essentially I say neighborhoods, nations that are neighbors being like, oh, look what Saudi is doing. Look what others are doing. We can actually work together and create a non-monopolistic approach to energy that is sustainable. So it sounds like what we’re saying here is, Saudi Arabia going towards solar is its plan for leapfrogging its own community, its own entire community, everything from the internet to cars, to basic household critical needs. Do the panelists have any thoughts on that or any questions for Ahmed, Connor or Rashi? I know Connor, you have, Connor has worked extensively with solar energy and has built all sorts of things. I could show you his credentials real quick. It might help everybody. See, we’re going to go all, we’re going to skip this part for a second. Don’t read it. Ah, there we go. Sir. Wow, this controller hates me, I’m going to be honest. Everybody stop looking at the head, the head, all right? Here we go. This should be it. Can you click play? Connor, I’m going to do a little overview right now. Feel free to talk afterwards. In 2018, we saw a problem. Nearly 1 billion people lack access to electricity, water and internet. Traditional mini grids. only address one of these needs, requiring expensive wires and serving only people nearby, limiting their potential payback, struggling to make money because they only sell electricity. So we got to work on prototyping a better solution. Waypoints. Waypoints are solar-powered micro data centers that reimagine mini-grids using AI to efficiently distribute electricity across multiple revenue-generating services. They don’t just provide electricity, they unlock its potential. Waypoints change sunlight directly to electricity, generating revenue from multiple sources, renting batteries, selling clean water via atmospheric water generation, providing internet access via Starlink, hosting AI training and computing services, storing data, and running cloud-like services. No electrons are wasted. So how do those local communities use waypoints? They use the electricity to power fans, to power lights, to power commerce, and to power the party. The waypoints also use that electricity to deliver more electricity up to 15 kilometers away from where they’re located with electric bikes, allowing for better price discovery and increasing the range of electricity access, enabling people to charge phones who might be far away. Globally, for the first time ever, individuals, companies, and local SMEs can access the waypoint’s micro data center hardware to run and fine-tune AI models. Okay, so I’m just going to pause us there. Maybe this is helpful to go back. Come on now. Conor, I’ll let you give some, I guess, color to that, but I think with regard to Achmed’s statement, I think that was a good time to show that there is obviously a ton to be done with solar, and when we talk about sovereignty earlier, and how does a community really leapfrog, they have sovereignty. sovereignty over their electric grid. They have sovereignty over their connectivity. They have sovereignty over the steps that make a proficient and efficient population inside of a nation-state. Then, like, these types of solutions, what we’re talking about here with the waypoints, is dropping this into a region and allowing those communities to run the waypoints. Going into, we’ve been going into universities, talking to people who are like PhD students in electrical engineering and telecoms, and it’s like, hey, you, would you like to man and operate this thing? We’ll do some training, and as we, as I know, Conor, I’ll let you speak for yourself, but there’s a lot to be said about connecting communities that are many kilometers away from each other through technology like this. Conor, do you want to jump in here and see if you can talk? Yeah, just talk a little bit louder.

Conor Colwell: Okay. Yeah. No, thank you. I mean, there’s definitely a lot to talk about regarding that. I mean, I think, suppose one interesting angle to follow up on the previous thing is, yeah, I mean, when I think of leapfrogging, the example that comes to mind immediately is, I suppose, like what China, how China just skipped the whole desktop computer and went straight to laptops, tablets, and mobile devices. So, I think that that from like a technological perspective, it’s pretty interesting. I mean, just to follow up with the comment on, I suppose, like Saudi skipping or skipping ahead to renewable energy, I think the point there, I suppose, I see a lot with leapfrogging is that it usually involves an entrenched incumbent technology or infrastructure layer that is, you know, probably was like best thing in the world when it got installed. But then, like since then, technology has moved forward and or the, you know, the existing incumbent was extremely expensive or like resource-intensive to put in place and so that’s what has prevented it from like entering a lot of different communities or ecosystems like globally or slowed it down but then when a new technology comes along it’s able to like skip a lot of that in part because the infrastructure from the incumbents isn’t already there which you know usually usually that there’s sort of I guess more pressure to slow down that change if the infrastructure is already there or it just requires a replacement of it but in certain areas where there is no infrastructure that that makes it like sort of a very good opportunity to put the latest technology in and skip ahead so yeah that’s that’s all very interesting yeah for a while

Jarrell James: I think you spoke a little bit about the no worries I think let’s pause there for a second I don’t want to give Dua and Keeks a chance to talk about their own regions and I want to give you guys also a chance can anybody tell me what the average megabits per second is at your house where you live like how fast is your internet I don’t know I want to say 130 anyone anyone topping 130 are we topping 130 fiber is pretty nice I mean if we take it back I’d be curious Brazil what is your what is your megabits per second average hundred you are you both live in cities correct yeah as well yeah okay do you guys know the megabits per second of your rural communities by chance average I do know them I do know it like two three yeah it’s about two to ten for some of the rural communities Saudi Arabia is making very large strides towards trying to connect those in more rural communities I think it’s ninety eight point six percent density on five megabits per megabits per second, trying to move it up to 10 megabits per second. In Brazil, the average megabits per second of the cities is quite high for about 40% of the people. And then when you get to below that, when you get to the other 60%, even in the cities, you are ranging between 5 to 20 megabits per second. And then in the outer areas, obviously the rural communities, actually it’s really, really cool. There’s a lot of people who have, there’s not a lot of people, there’s a lot of people who are really interested in that. The value proposition of a Starlink is making a lot of sense, but not in the way that many of us would think. And I’ll pause there because I’ll go into that in a second, about how we’re seeing cultural evolvement, cultural evolution around Starlinks and satellite internet. But I want to give you an opportunity. In Nigeria, what’s your guys’ average megabits per second? And what’s your average grid per person, kilowatts per person?

AUDIENCE: Oh, kilowatt hour per capita is, it’s definitely below a thousand. It’s strange because, right, it’s an oil producing country, but for some reason, the electricity is cheap because it’s just so unreliable that people are just using generators all over the place. In terms of megabits per second, I mean, I was there last year and I averaged maybe like five megabits per second on like a good day in a part of town that didn’t have a ton of people in it. But even there, people were walking around with multiple phones just because you could have service in your house and then you go to work and whoops, you got to pull out the second phone just because the cell phone provider that works for your house just does not have coverage 20 minutes away from where you work.

Jarrell James: Yeah. Any other countries that aren’t Brazil or Saudi Arabia or Lagos or Nigeria? Anyone? You’re Brazilian as well? I’m glad that all the Brazilians showed up. Nice. Feel free to join if one of you wants to join up here. You’re a cybersecurity expert. We can make something work. But I think when I think of megabits per second in rural communities, I’d be curious how many of you know what a community network is? Like the concept of a community network? You do? Nice. Do you want to define it, or do you want me to define it and just tell people that you said that? So my friend here is mentioning that a community network is oftentimes one, two, three, four gateways, which are the access points to the greater internet. And these gateways can be like star links. They could be fiber internet. But you’re taking these gateways, and then you’re spreading that signal across many devices and many unique users. And those unique users, while all using the same bandwidth, are actually being optimized with a protocol that’s saying, OK, you have this much bandwidth use coming from this person, this person, and this person. We have three gateways, so let’s call them three star links. How can we optimize making sure that that guy’s loading his video, those people are texting their family, and that person’s FaceTiming their mom? So that’s where a community network and community network algorithms really come into play. And oftentimes, if you actually put the infrastructure in place to make a self-sustaining community network, it’s actually faster, and the connection is better than sometimes if you just have a single fiber connection because of the way that protocol sharing goes and the way that package data can be transported across a network. So also, Rashi, stop me if there’s any good stuff coming into the chat. I was going to give you a moment to talk about community networks and anything you’ve seen in your experiences. I know you’ve been traveling all over Africa right now, and you’ve been traveling, and you have a lot of experience inside of the continent of India. Want to know if you had anything to say, or if there was anybody in the chat before? goes on now they have 100 megabits per second and they’re vibing they’re chilling but it’s actually one guy who bought a Starlink package one guy and he runs a cafe or he has a house and there’s hundreds of people coming to his house or his cafe and they’re just kind of sitting around operating off of a honor system of like oh we’ll give you like 10 cents per hour 20 cents per hour something like this and it’s just a cash or digital cash honor system right but it’s because one man or one person one woman could afford a Starlink and so the cultural evolution of the entire community wasn’t oh that’s your Starlink that’s not my Starlink the cultural evolution of the community was oh we’re a community network of people already before the internet got here you bought a Starlink that’s our Starlink like we’re all gonna be a part of this and so there’s actually a lot of interesting opportunities to instead of going at it from a classically Western perspective where it’s like every single house is gonna have to have a Starlink your car has to have a mini Starlink your house like your fourth other house has to have a Starlink or about no I live here my people live here I’m here I just need this meaningful connectivity standard which with the folks that we were talking to in Brazil and you can I feel like you guys invalidate this whatsapp it was like we would talk people like oh yeah are you using the Starlink to like watch Netflix and are you using it for this and that and this and it’s like no we’re just what’s happening everyone in the world at all times we’re sending voice memos like candy it’s just that that’s what we’re here to do and so we can talk about the use of cultures in the way they evolve around connectivity as a form of leapfrogging because once again you’re able to kind of redefine and deprogram your expectations you’re not trying to be the United States you’re not trying to be Britain or something like this you’re trying to be Brazil and you’re just trying to go online so for example I don’t know does anyone have any thoughts on how Singapore leapfrogged? It’s a little bit different Singapore leapfrogged in a different way, obviously they have fast internet, but they decided they were going to be a technology powerhouse. They were going to be a financial technology powerhouse. They burrowed deep on one leverage point, one aspect. Instead of saying, oh, we’re gonna try and create all these different sectors, we don’t have the land to create all these different sectors. What we do have is multinational partners and we have strategic leverage to push all our resources into a financial technology sector right next to Hong Kong. And that was a big move for them, but it’s also like what you see Taiwan doing, where they burrowed down deep on processors and superconductors and different computing modules that were needed for all of the major Western nations. And so we are talking about, oh, like energy, we’re talking about, oh, access to internet, but also leapfrogging is taking the sovereignty of your own community and your own resources and saying, hey, everybody, we’re gonna focus on this for 50 years and we’re gonna see everybody else later. And I want to give a chance, can you go to the Zoom? Rashi, keep me honest on this chat. I feel like Purnima has probably got, yeah, three chats in there. Can you bring up that chat for a second? I don’t have any responses from the chat yet. Okay. Oh, 160 megabits per second. Purnima is in which country? Purnima, so India is actually quite large.

AUDIENCE: So Purnima is, I think, based in Northern India, but Purnima would be able to tell you exactly where she is in India.

Jarrell James: Okay. Delhi, nice. So yes, another urban center, another urban core. I would like to, don’t make me do this. Passwords. Now I wanted to try to pivot to the kind of outside multinational stakeholder corporate influence that can come into how a country can leapfrog. And there’s both positive and there’s sometimes negative examples. Would you mind? Going back to the presentation. Third parties and leapfrogging, positive examples. I think, sorry, I think there’s a lot to be said about giant contracts like NAFTA, right? NAFTA being a large contributor to GDP of most North American countries, but at the same time Mexico, by being a part of NAFTA, was able to start bringing in multinational stakeholders from its neighboring countries and developing its own city grids and its own infrastructure around connectivity and energy. They had better access to deals around energy providers. They had better access to taxes and all these sorts of things. And I think another positive example would be South Korea. South Korea, out of a defensive position to some extent, we don’t need to go in all that stuff, but they had outside stakeholder access to the United States. The United States financial development sector got there and was like, hey, do you guys want dynasty families that run the hell out of a smartphone company or run the hell out of a fashion clothing company or all of these things? Let’s try and make that happen. And you see real sovereign development of these sectors because they made strategic deals with outside parties and multinational stakeholders. You can see some negative examples in Brazil, like I mentioned earlier. You guys should have tons of trains by now. You should have high-speed trains. You don’t. You have buses. And that was because the petrol lobbies of other countries were very interested in selling you their petrol and selling you their cars. And how long does it take you? Hey, what city do you live in? Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro? Huh?

AUDIENCE: Brasilia.

Jarrell James: Brasilia. Nice. What’s the nearest city to you?How far away is that by car?

AUDIENCE: From what?

Jarrell James: From Brasilia.

AUDIENCE: From Brasilia, I guess 500 kilometers, something like that.

Jarrell James: When you drive in a car, it’s about three, four, five hours?

AUDIENCE: No, I guess it’s like 12 hours, 10, 12 hours.

Jarrell James: Monetary advantage, would you say? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so a train would have evened that playing field. A train would have provided quick, fast transportation for everyone. Everyone would have been in the same Uber car.They would have all got to Disneyland at the same time. That’s kind of what we’re talking about when we say negative examples. And you can see this in the energy sector. You can see this in the communications, telecommunications sector intensely. I would be curious to know from the positive examples, some stuff from Saudi Arabia. I know that you guys have, what you said, energy sector and all this stuff. Feel free.

AUDIENCE: I want to call on Ahmed again to take us back to Saudi history and how the Saudi Aramco Oil Company came to be, because I think that’s a very good, positive example on the topic. So if we could just have a mic handed over to Ahmed, that would be excellent.

Jarrell James: Ahmed, if you want to chair, you guys get up here. Well, I’m chairing from this side, so that works too.

AHMAD: So in terms of collaboration with third party countries, so with the history of Saudi and how oil was first discovered in Saudi, that was late 60s, early 70s. And a lot of the work was done through U.S. collaboration. California Oil Company was the name of the company. And then Saudi started getting involved in collaborating with them and buying shares over time until it became Saudi Aramco, which is Saudi American company. So Aramco is, this is the history of how Aramco grew. And then that became the sovereign company that handles the energy sector within the country. So this is in terms of the positive third party and leapfrogging. And I think in terms of potential for future leapfrogging, what we’re seeing in collaborations, in terms of bringing technology. and having the collaborations in NEOM, in Riyadh, you see a lot of growth, a lot of people coming in from outside with their funding, with their technologies to grow the region in this sense. I think this is also another positive example that we want to collaborate further on and learn also from other countries and how well and how bad they did it as well.

AUDIENCE: And I think just adding on what Ahmad said and maybe also touching on a concept you mentioned earlier on maybe finding shared and mutual interests. So you mentioned in the Singapore example, land was very much a limitation and one thing we have very abundantly here in the kingdom is land. And especially when it comes to foreign investments in whatever field it may be, whether it’s an energy, whether it’s an advanced manufacturing, Saudi Arabia has a lot of let’s say incentives to offer to foreign investors, hence giving them the opportunity to try and explore different regions when it comes to expanding their portfolio. But also I think the Middle East as a region in general is a very central region in the sense that it connects you to Europe, it connects you to Africa, it connects you to Asia. So from a strategic point of view it’s also a very lucrative opportunity for foreign investments to come here and move their businesses to the kingdom.

Jarrell James: The stability being a huge factor of that. Stability of energy grids, like the deterioration of the resources that outside parties would be depending on is not likely. It’s a high likelihood it will be stable, which is oftentimes by design and oftentimes the opposite is also by design. So I want to give on that topic, could you turn it back, or no sorry, leave it here. Connor, I know you’ve spent, Connor has spent a really long time, many times in Djibouti pioneering these waypoints, working with the Ministry of Energy in Djibouti and working with a number of different stakeholders on building out a waypoint with rentable batteries that are providing about six charges for a cell phone, and if you look at the kilowatts per hour cost of charging a smartphone in many of these countries, it is orders of magnitude higher. than charging a smartphone in any of the developed countries. The concept of charging a smartphone is your gateway to the rest of the world. So if that costs a lot of money, you are going to automatically gravitate towards solutions that offset that cost for you. Because you need a critical, it’s a critical need. So Connor, your experience with, maybe you would call this neutral development, outside development in Djibouti. What is, what did you see there? How is it structured with the government and outside parties? And then what did you see from a cultural standpoint on how the Djiboutian people responded to the waypoint that had Starlink attached to it?

Conor Colwell: Yeah, hey, thanks. Yeah, I mean, basically, so that project was with USAID and then also with the Djiboutian Ministry of Energy, as you mentioned. So I think, I think in terms of like, so that project, we mainly focused on electricity access and water. And I think the, I guess a couple breakthroughs that we noticed. One was that, yeah, once there was access to energy, cell phones were definitely the primary, like, choice of charging. That was what everyone wanted immediately, which I think goes to say that internet access is super valuable. Just communication, access to information, and also access to media and like, I guess just like views of the outside world. That’s definitely the most popular use of electricity immediately, besides like comfort from fans and lighting, things like that. And so, yeah, like you were saying, it’s, once that’s available, it’s pretty difficult to like, to bring that back, or reel that back in. So… You’re saying once Pandora’s box is open? Yeah, especially with electricity, it’s like, you know, people want more. electricity as soon as they get a little bit of it. And I think it’s always changing because we now have much more efficient devices, so you don’t actually need a huge amount of electricity, but then at the same time, now we have AI that consumes huge amounts of electricity, so it’s always changing. And to the other point for the breakthrough that we noticed, working with the Djiboutian government, we were able to, at the end of our pilot, generate enough revenue to, I guess, economically support the ongoing operations and maintenance at the waypoint, which we learned as we were going through this process that that’s actually a hugely difficult thing, because a lot of microgrids are installed, they don’t have a proper business model for economic sustainability in place, and so they usually end up not being able to sell anywhere near the amount of energy that they generate to the community, and then they end up falling into disrepair. And so working with the ministry there, that was sort of a breakthrough moment almost for them as well, because they said that they’ve not been able to basically solve this problem themselves, and then they haven’t been able to find a private sector company that has been able to do that as well.

Jarrell James: Which it sounds like you guys were really focused on entering into a space, figuring out what the critical need infrastructure was like, figuring out what people actually wanted and how to provide meaningful steps to create what might be called meaningful connectivity or meaningful foundation for leapfrogging. So that is kind of where it takes us nicely into this question. I know we all saw a slide earlier on what meaningful connectivity was. Does anyone remember what it said? It was 4G speeds, access all the time, you had to have above 20 megabits per second, like these are all expectations of what meaningful connectivity is going to be. So can we do the next slide please? Okay, so when it comes to meaningful connectivity, I think what happens with that term, and this is no critique of that term or the communities that made it, but I think what it does, it still does a bit of an other. It does a classic other where it’s like I have far more meaningful connectivity and you have meaningful connectivity and I’ve done my job. And when we do that, we look at the language that is used to talk about these communities and we often see stuff like Global South and we don’t think that that’s taking into account the right potential of these places. These are places with far more resources than anyone really realizes. These are places with the fastest growing populations. These are places where the hustle, like I don’t know how many of you have met Nigerians, but I’m gonna go ahead and probably bet they’re probably harder workers than you, a lot of them. Like the hustle factor that comes into these regions by just, as Connor said, getting a little bit of access. Once you get enough power that you can start to make, you know, money or charge your phone consistently and you’re communicating via WhatsApp or whatever consistently at, let’s say, 5-10% more than you were last week, what part of you wants to go back? No part of you wants to go back. So you start to make demands of your region that, hey, like, let’s pick this up a second. Let’s leapfrog a little faster, which as Connor, I don’t think you mentioned, but I’ll embellish for you there. Connor was not mentioning that, like, the Ministry of Energy worked with them, but also then the police departments started renting batteries. The police departments were not being provided enough energy by their own governments to do their jobs. or charge their phones or charge any of their devices. So then you had these subsidies coming where the government themselves started to rent these batteries because like Connor mentioned, nobody had come in as a private company and actually managed to solve the problem and create a revenue model that that had an equitable exchange for the Djiboutian people. And I mean I think if we all know anything about this land the scope of Djibouti there is a there’s a bit of a culture around coming in and just doing what you want. So what’s the future of leapfrogging for many? Well I think we should ask ourselves questions right now. Are private businesses and government actors effectively achieving the connectivity SDG metrics like all of them? Because the UN has only hit 17% of its SDG goals with only five years left on the clock till 20 to 30 and meaningful connectivity has actually gone backwards not forwards. We’re seeing more internet shutdowns, we’re seeing more natural disasters that are destroying grids, we’re seeing those grids in turn destroying the connectivity infrastructure, we’re seeing a lot of push towards really low upward mobility tech jobs wherein these people are becoming oftentimes in Kenya we could have an example where the second they get meaningful connectivity it’s not meaningful connectivity in the sense that maybe many folks in the West would have it where it’s like oh I have jobs opportunities coming my way. It’s oftentimes put into developer sweatshops what I call them and as a developer and engineer I do believe I can say that because what you have are people who do all the work to learn Lagos Nigeria is a really good example learn programming they get a laptop through the programming school that they’re attending that programming school brings on a thousand people gives them a thousand laptops across the board and then the top hundred people are chosen to join the programming like boot camp and then when they graduate that means that those hundred people get to keep the laptops 900 people don’t get to keep laptops they go backwards they go back in time right but when they get those jobs or when they get the the work workshops, then they’re working for outside corporations, like OpenAI. 60 Minutes has a really solid segment they just did on OpenAI. Sir, can you turn this back on? OpenAI, they have a really good segment, I encourage you all to look it up, on how OpenAI is using Kenyan labor to do data labeling inside of Nairobi and paying people very minimal wages. In case anyone’s wondering, I would like to continue watching. And this is kind of where we see development going for communities around leapfrogging or people who get that base, that base level foundation. It’s like, cool, how can you be a tool for multinational corporations that have never heard of you or heard of your region or anything to do with you? Is there like a button I need to push? Because I will. Are we, is this, am I getting the hook right now? I think I have 40 minutes left. Let’s, I think I don’t really need the next slide for what goes here, is now we’ve talked a lot about connectivity and I want to like hand things over to Rashi real quick here, because I think it’s awesome to talk about connectivity and the infrastructure that goes into it and the energy demands and really building an understanding behind like, okay, unless you have something to plug a modem into, it doesn’t matter that you have the modem. If your energy doesn’t turn on, you can’t have internet access and these are parallel relationships. Now if we acknowledge that we’re doing that and we’re creating a foundation for people to build on by acknowledging those dependencies in that critical access, what are we actually insulating and what are we protecting and how is that providing any value to the community? That might be the next question we have. And so I think I’ll hand this over to Dua and Rashi, if we can get them back on. Sir, is there two seconds? I don’t think, I would imagine that the people… who are online and participating are not able to hear me right now, so it’s pretty pointless of me to ask them questions. No, I can’t hear you. I can only hear you in pockets, actually. You can hear me in what? I can hear you in pockets. In pockets. Okay. Well, then, let’s see if you can hear this in a pocket. Let’s talk about women’s, the existence of women in a connected community versus a non-connected community, and the safety around community. Did you hear that? Yes.

Raashi Saxena: No, I did. I did. It is. So, we do, in India, in many parts of the world, we do have, I would say, gendered access to the internet where you have low income households. Can everyone hear me?

Jarrell James: Yes.

Raashi Saxena: Okay, great. So, we do have a lot of households that usually have access to one internet connection, and what usually happens is that you have women who probably will have or get access to their side of the activities in terms of any tasks or even their businesses once the internet has passed on from the man to the child and then them. A lot of women also, as I said earlier, use it for informal businesses. We’ve seen this in parts of Northeast India and Northern India to carry on their businesses or to carry on their work and have internet shutdowns. And again, internet shutdowns in India don’t happen for a few hours. Some of them can be as long as over 100 days, 50 days, 40 days. Someone who is, for example, advocating for internet connectivity wants to send in a report or someone has committed to an order that they need to fulfill or even with telemedicine facilities during COVID especially, having frequent internet blockades erodes that. And there are very frivolous reasons for internet shutdowns in India. Someone shut down the internet in India because there was a university paper leak and someone was caught shooting. So, I think there really need to be ways in which how internet can be given. There are some interesting programs that are there on ground with Google, Internet Saathi, where they’re doing very interesting digital literacy programs on how to understand internet and how to train women to use internet in rural communities. I think they’ve trained around 5,000 or 6,000 women across states in the northern parts of India. There are also some interesting programs that are now taking place for cyber scams as well. But yeah, it’s usually women to women and women also are more likely not comfortable going online because of a lot of the cultural aspects, I mean, women like staying indoors and sometimes their freedom of speech and expression could get curtailed by, you know, of normal behavior online, so women are more culturally sensitive towards taking part in online activities. Of course, there’s interest, they have cultural and mobility challenges, but there is a lot more to gain in terms of all the remote opportunities and I’d also like to talk about how the internet can also be an equalizer for a lot of persons with disabilities as well.

Jarrell James: Okay, let’s pause there. I think, yeah, there’s a lot to digest there, but essentially, if I can summarize it well for you there, it’s the great equalizer, I love that you said that, it is, I think for what if you are getting properly deprogrammed here, I think we’ll have to admit that the internet is the great equalizer and megabits per second decide how much of that pie you’re actually able to get involved in, and so actual internet speeds and density and access is the great equalizer. We talk about the great equalizer, which I think we could actually open up to the floor here, is, like, obviously consistent meaningful connection is the basis for billions of dollars of local GDP unlocking, and we can give you some graphs on that. We’re going to skip that, because we’re already running out of time. So this is a really easy format to understand here. The correlation, which you can’t see the bottom here, but our source is from the website Our World in Data, a phenomenal website, go and check it out, but this is per capita electricity generation versus GDP per capita for whole continents. and the countries that are within those continents. And so if you look at South America, 1992 through 2022, we have only Paraguay, with its outside influence from the United States, managing to get above 5,000 kilowatts per person. And 5,000 kilowatts per person means that you have larger share of the GDP, which I wish we had the interactivity of this up, but I don’t have control of my laptop, so you’re all gonna have to take my numbers for what they are in my head. But the average about, if you have between 4,000 to 5,000 kilowatts per person, your average GDP per capita is somewhere around 22 to 32, $34,000 per person. And if you have, I think if you look at, we’ll go to the next one, but countries that are in the 500 kilowatts per person area, it’s like their national GDP is $1,000 per person per year. And it’s like their share, if you have 500 kilowatts per hour going to you, you’re getting a much smaller share of your country’s GDP than the person who has 100, 150 megabits, and let’s say 5,000 kilowatts an hour. Like they are most likely a 50K salary person per year. Here we have Oceania, which we also see under 5,000. And then you have the two more Western countries chilling hard at 10K, 10,000 kilowatts an hour. And so if we go to Africa, or sorry, North America and Asia, we have this interesting, same thing. You’re gonna see United States, all these folks way up here, the British colony of Bermuda, Aruba, they’re all right here, right below the 10,000. And then everyone else all the way down to Honduras and Belize are chilling at under 5,000, closer to about 1,000 kilowatts an hour. And so when you look at this data and you look. at how Kyrgyzstan and United Arab Emirates and Qatar and Bahrain, they’re all on the upper side of Asia and South Korea is there as well. South Korea got there because of outside, like we were talking about, positive multinational stakeholder support and that put them on par with a lot of these Arab states that had, like you were saying, Ahmed, mass influx of energy and efficiency by the population to develop their energy sector. And by doing that you have these states suddenly leapfrogging far beyond, like you were saying, what year were you saying that the first California oil was? Like 1962? Early 70s. So I’m pretty good at history. We were in South Korea long before 1970s and we were in Japan and we helped build up those those nations, the United States did. And yet since South Korea, with all that support, is on par with Saudi Arabia. You leapfrogged past a lot of that initial development that the United States was doing for South Korea and now you’re focused on, obviously, oil and they’re focused on cell phones. Go ahead.

AUDIENCE: One thing to note, I think that’s really worthy here, the infrastructure was not really existent before that. So really the infrastructure was built with the energy transition, so that really helped with reaching up to the higher level. There were no constraints on the infrastructure early on. So I think that really is…

Jarrell James: Are you saying the cities themselves weren’t built?

AUDIENCE: Yes, the cities, the infrastructure, everything grew with this. And I think just adding on what Ahmed said, you know, going back to Saudi history, we’re very much a nomadic culture, right? We were sons and men and women of the desert, we had our tents, our camels, that was our main means of transportation. So really oil has leapfrogged us all the way into industrialization and has allowed us to… It changed our culture. Exactly, it changed our culture, it has led us through into urban development and has changed the way that Saudis live and experience their lives today.

Jarrell James: That’s actually quite beautiful. I hadn’t really given that a lot of thought. I knew that you are nomadic people by nature, but I obviously didn’t play that into my cultural riffing. We could talk about, interestingly enough, actually in that video that I showed early, we talked about the destruction of the grid, right? We talked about natural disasters and other things like that. Well, by 2022 we’d all had seen Afghanistan going through its own troubles and like through the United States exiting. And Afghanistan, major oil production company, major energy developing country, was probably far right up there with Oman and Saudi Arabia and those other folks. But because of what happened, and like I mentioned in that video, leapfrogging is a privilege and it’s a right for many folks, but it’s also like a weaponized halt. Like you can revert a whole country if you take out the energy grid. That’s just the fact. So you can read any war history, you can read any strategy book of societies throughout mankind. Take out the energy grid, you take out the progress of that community. And so I think it’s really important to look at that as we see the rise and falls of civilization and create more global awareness around that. Hey, if we want to do meaningful connectivity for people, we should probably have meaningful energy resources. And there’s no way we’re gonna get to that by 2030 unless there are meaningful energy resources. Huge, huge that you guys are doing batteries and you’re thinking about sharing batteries and that battery technology with others, because I think that’s massive. That’s something that we’re all gonna need. If we look at Africa, it’s not great for us, gotta be honest, gotta be honest. We’re not doing great over there. And there’s a lot to be said about why that is. I don’t think I should go into it, but I’m not. But I think we all know there’s a lot to be said. This is gonna skip, come on. We want to see that move, yeah. So let’s just break it down, overview. North America GDP per capita, $63,023. Energy consumption per capita across the region, 54,651 kilowatts an hour per person. Is Europe 38.5, Europe 45,997. East Asia, 19,000 195 and 19,917 kilowatts an hour. There’s a direct correlation here with this with the disattachment and plus trust me there’s plenty of people that know that. So I don’t think we’re gonna do this part. We’re gonna go back real quick. I want to give Connor and yourselves as well the opportunity to discuss like okay Connor you’ve done small infrastructure plans. You’ve done like little grid deployments. You’ve started to like help people recognize sovereignty over their grid and you’ve seen what happens when people like start to get excited by that. I would love to know what your thoughts are around actually scoping out and building that vision much bigger. I think a lot of the folks here if I was you I would feel this way. I’d be like well that’s a really cool thing that whippersnapper is doing. He’s putting shipping containers with solar panels on the ground in some communities. Seems like they’re renting out a couple hundred batteries. That’s a really fun initiative. I’d love to see that the year end. But I don’t think that’s where we’re coming from and where like Parable and Liquid Star and working on the projects that we work on are coming from. These are pilots that we are designing and strategically building to scale and focus on how it can scale and what it means to create sovereignty in that way. So I’d love to give Connor the opportunity to speak and Karneema I’d love to hear from you as well around your energy consumption and megabits per second kind of thoughts because it sounds like you have a lot to say and I’ve really appreciated that you’ve gotten into the chat. Yeah thank you.

Conor Colwell: Yeah I mean maybe take it like a little step back and explain because you know there are a number of different companies out there that have been putting like energy generation systems and containerized form factor and sending them around the world. I guess one thing that we do very specifically different from all that is that we’re very much focused on I guess just like how efficiently can we convert a raw kilowatt hour from any source ideally sustainable and in our cases it’s all solar. But how can we convert that raw kilowatt hour into as many tangible useful things for humans. So I guess traditionally with a lot of the microgrids out there right now and I think I mentioned before why a lot of them fail is because all they do is make electricity and then you have to sell that to the community and that requires wires and like all this stuff and then it also requires the community to have things to consume that electricity which you know if you just have a feature phone to begin with you could work your way up to I guess more appliances and stuff but it’s not going to start there so the economic model kind of breaks down. But yeah I mean like our broad goal is really not just like how we can solve the energy aspect because like you know that we completely see as like foundational to like uh all all sort of I suppose you could say civilization to some extent I mean maybe it’s a comp it’s some some combination of energy plus raw resources plus information and those three things allow you to build almost anything. But uh but yeah I think our our goal is is uh it’s mentioned a few times but you know we would like to see about a hundred thousand waypoints built and distributed around the world um that we estimate could impact about 100 million people. I mean that is roughly looking at the you know the raw billion or so folks who don’t have access to electricity and then the two to two and a half that don’t have access to clean water and also internet. And so yeah we’re we’re kind of taking like a I don’t want to say double leapfrog approach but um we’re looking at like the complete like sort of system changes uh when it comes to like how infrastructure um has been done in the past. I mean if you look at if you look at dense city centers not saying we’re trying to like reinvent how cities are done but um it’s a super tangled web of uh wires and and pipes and and all of this and many points along those that web for leaks, inefficiencies like electrons being lost, water being lost, like fuel even being lost. And so we’re kind of trying to rethink entirely the model of not just how that those resources are distributed to communities, but how they’re like, you know, what you can actually like generate and create on site with just like baseline electricity. So yeah, to your point, JJ, I think we’re really, we’re really trying to, I mean, approach a variety of problems and using the technology that is available now, which I know is entirely possible. Like this is the thing, like all of this is possible now, it’s just a, I guess, a matter of motivation and coordination together and coordination. Yeah.

Jarrell James: And I want to pause there and speak to coordination because I think like you guys are hearing like yeah, LiquidStar with waypoints, charging stations, trying to create droppable energy infrastructure and currently people are excited by that and they’re traveling to the waypoints because the waypoints have star links at them that the people at the waypoints like LiquidStar need that internet access to maintain their service and connection to their outside partners. But now you have people, instead of using the delivery service and dropping the battery off with the bike guy to take it back to the station, they’re like, I’m going to walk the 1.5 kilometers to that waypoint because they have a star link and I’m going to get all my internet activity done there for the day, for the week, whatever I need. So I was a big supporter of LiquidStar earlier. I run a treasury that is a grants foundation that gives out grants with some friends and we were excited by LiquidStar like three years ago. My own region in East Africa got shut down from the internet for about three years and I realized it might be interesting to go talk to my friends over there in Djibouti about a little something something. And what we realized is if people are willing to walk all the way to the waypoint just to have access to electricity, there might be something to be said about inventing for the first time ever for some reason, a Wi-Fi capable portable battery. portable battery that has the ability to be a Wi-Fi access hub itself and so if we pair those things together people are renting this battery to charge their phones six or seven times in a couple days and they’re also using it as a gateway access point and by using that that’s what I call a parable and yeah I made it look cool because I really think it’s important that the Global South or what we call leapfrog regions actually starts to have the ability to own its own design language like it shouldn’t look like it’s an NGO product going to the leapfrog regions it should look like something that represents the creativity and the capacity of those people and so this was something this is a prototype we made my friend Keeks here and I co-founder of parable and we were giving you like the blueprint we come from these regions we are admittedly quite westernized we went to school and college in the United States and we have the audacity to think like Western tech users and Western tech entrepreneurs and what we do also have is the perspective that we care about a certain community of people and we recognize that those communities of people are about 2.3 2.6 billion people large and the amount of people that have lack of energy access is a huge portion of that same community right so there’s ways to pair these struggles together and actually I’d love to hear from you Keeks on this I think who you were the numbers on energy access of the populations of the planet I think it was sorry the 40% of people yes

AUDIENCE: So I believe it was 47% of the planet doesn’t have reliable access to energy consistent energy you start consistent energy and when you look at that that ends up being billions and billions of people right and when you consider the I mean obviously the humanitarian issue there where lack of access to reliable energy could mean okay there’s a power outage How do you, let’s say there’s a power outage, somebody gets hurt, how do you navigate to the nearest hospital? How do you contact family members, what have you? And then when you kind of like zoom out and look at it from an economic perspective, right? Every day, there’s a NetBlocks, I believe is the website, and NetBlocks cost calculator to see on a per country basis if the internet is shut down, which usually comes hand in hand with a power shutdown, how much money is lost from that country’s GDP, and it’s always eight to nine figures per day. And when you take that into consideration, the lack of consistent and reliable access to energy becomes not only a humanitarian issue, because usually when somebody’s pulling the plug, it’s so that somebody can’t report a bad thing being done, but it’s also an economic issue where if people don’t think that the access to energy is going to be reliable, it’s difficult to upscale, right? It’s difficult to turn the router on, it’s difficult to basically imagine.

Jarrell James: Speak to upscaling. I think that was gonna be my next question anyways. So I think from a Nigerian hustler perspective, and who, could you turn that mic off? Because I think we’re getting background noise. Thank you so much. Speak to that, the upscaling part, because that’s a really big part of what we’re focusing as well at Parable and LiquidStar and our combination here is like, how can we make an internet cafe out of an individual, essentially? And how can one individual with a parable have 16 connections from other people’s devices to his parable, and then that person is now enabling for upscaling throughout their community? And I think as a Lagotian and Nigerian, I think that you have a lot to say about hustle culture.

AUDIENCE: Yeah, so I didn’t go to school formally for engineering, unlike Jarrell, but throughout my career, I’ve kind of just worked my way up. But to speak broadly to upscaling. the way that a lot of the waypoints work currently is that in addition to, you know, water generation, energy generation, they’re looking at ways to basically say cool, let’s use this excess energy for compute, right? So they’re they’re setting up micro data centers within these waypoints and in addition to that they’re looking into long-term ways to cache, to cache content, right? And when you’re thinking about caching content in the context of upscaling, you could hypothetically look at the list, you can basically find and select a curriculum and find the videos tied to those curriculums and say cool, people want these jobs in this region. Instead of having people basically redundantly pay for the data to restream and watch these videos, you know, ten, hundred, several thousand times every month, you can just cache those videos and say cool, you’re going to this URL on YouTube, let’s just redirect you to a local intranet that you already have access to through the waypoint and that way you don’t have to pay for the extra data tied to this, but you can still upscale, right? You can still watch the videos, you can still learn, you can still go through the curriculum, get the, study for the certification, get the certification, learn a code, get that job.

Jarrell James: Tap in on that. And that’s where, and I’d love to kind of hear your side from like the Saudi perspective as a youth, as a youth leader and seeing that hustle culture come up in your own community, but to Keeks’s point here, it is the reality of realizing that you’re working every single day of your life to get a little bit of internet connection so you can learn a new skill like bricklaying or something like along those lines and then you could make a little bit more money so that you can be online to learn a little bit more and to get a different upskill. And so when you look at why they do this in regions that don’t have the money to be spending on data and watching the same video over and over again, if you spend 15% of your weekly paycheck on watching one video seven or eight times in some capacity in some regions, that’s always going to be the barrier for leapfrogging and upskilling for you. So when we look at these communities, we have to accept that much like Marshall McLuhan had said in the in the 70s, like challenge the assumptions with which your infrastructure or your reality is built. And like when we talk about these communities, they’re challenging, oh wait, why don’t we redefine what edge caching is? Why do we take the more Western or Northern perspectives on accessing information banks? And I think the most realistic thing that we see in our own lives around that is the library. Like we’ve removed the community aspect of the library in many societies by replacing it with the online experience, but the online experience isn’t there consistently for everyone. So I’d love to hear from you and then Rashi, as we start to, we’re getting about 20-15 minutes left, and then we’re gonna do 10 minutes left and we’re gonna open up for questions. I would love to hear from you too, and specifically on women as well, that are hustling and creating upskill opportunities for them. So it’s like, how does the internet play into this and what is the reality for you in that game?

AUDIENCE: Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, I’m gonna speak on youth and women interchangeably because I’m not sure if the people in the room here know, but almost 60% of all Saudi nationals are under the age of 35. So the entire nation can be lumped into the category of youth, more or less. And I think one key thing that I’ve noticed, especially across this year, you know, interacting with youth groups right here in the kingdom, is that they’re very hungry for success, they’re hungry for educating themselves, and most importantly, they’re hungry for making an impact. And you see these kids, they’re 16, they’re 17 years old, and the internet has given them the ability to connect with a much wider network of people all around Saudi Arabia, but also all around the globe to launch initiatives, NGOs, startups. I remember I was at an event a few weeks ago and this 17-year-old is going, like his company is getting bought out by this big entire, yeah, this big thing, and I’m like, wow. I need to turn up the pace. So yeah, there’s a lot of incredible things that are happening, and of course, they’re all being enabled through the internet, through AI, and through this existing infrastructure. And of course, I would love to see that knowledge transfer happen to regions here in the Middle East, specifically when it comes to regions in North Africa or regions that have been disproportionately impacted by war and international conflict, in order for us to further support those communities in achieving meaningful connectivity.

Jarrell James: You’re saying like regional coalitions. Yeah, I love it. That takes us back to the beginning, why we believe there should be a last mile coalition inside of the UNIGF. Rashi, I’d love to hear from you. Rashi runs the, I believe it’s the TED chapter, the TEDx chapter, and the Bangalore chapter for the World Economic Forum. She is responsible for fostering a ton of Indian entrepreneurs and youth that are trying to come up and make something of themselves.

Raashi Saxena: Oh, thank you so much, TJ. I’m no longer with the TEDx chapters anymore, but I am, yes, I am a part of the youth-centric chapter, just called the Global Shapers, and every year they have an election, and I am the chapter head at the moment. I see a lot of opportunities, not just for youth, but for women when it comes to the internet, especially in India, where women are the workforce. We still have a huge gap when it comes to women at the workforce formally in India. It’s a lot, surprisingly a lot larger than many surrounding countries we are neighbors with. I will always say that given how, yeah, we as women are very flexible and having access to basic means of the internet can, there are a lot of creative ways in terms of livelihoods that one could honor. So, of course, economic well-being, social well-being, political well-being is necessary. I would also say that there are very interesting programs navigating through the digital literacy of it. We live in a world of scams which have which have deteriorated our financial systems and sectors across the world. You know there are organizations that specifically work on how people can bypass phishing scams and how you can be safe online, how people can use VPNs and a lot of actors are of course also doing a lot of sensitive work so how can you protect your own identity online. Some of the some of the very eminent work that’s done by whistleblowers across the world. I feel like there’s there’s a lot to be done with access yes but then there’s also work has to be done after that in terms of how does one become literate with you know enabling this ecosystem and how do you pay it forward. On that note I’d love to kind of transition us

Jarrell James: into the Q&A because I think what you’re talking about is something that I think there’s a lot of people here from the youth 20 movements and there was many Brazilians that were here from Y20 and I think when we talk about people being under 35 the majority of the population in Saudi Arabia my own region Ethiopia and Nigeria for keeks the youth are running things like the youth are the large population that’s coming up they have the technical know-how and so I’d love to hear from everyone here on like policy outcomes that you can see around the Y20 folks leading the connectivity conversation and we have about 10 minutes left so I’d love for anyone and everyone just to kind of get involved and I would actually ma’am over there in the corner. I’d love to hear from you. You’ve been avidly paying attention, locked in the whole time. So at some point we’d love if you had a thought. But yeah, I’d love to start with you.

AUDIENCE: Yeah, sure thing. So I think, like I opened in this discussion, are the policies that came out of the Y20 that were related to digital inclusion and digital connectivity were widely agreed upon. There was no need to negotiate. There was no need to lobby. We were very much all in agreement that that is of the utmost importance for all G20 countries, as well as the nine visiting countries that were hosted this year. And I think on the policy recommendations that emerged, one was on government subsidizing smartphones, laptops, and tablets, particularly for students. And I think that emerged out of, you know, COVID-19, things moving to remote education, and how a lot of those communities were disproportionately affected, given the fact that they didn’t have access to internet, and therefore did not have access to education for the majority of the two years of the pandemic. So that was one of the things that we wanted to look into.

Jarrell James: The same happened in the United States, where you suddenly, because of the pandemic, saw that there’s actually leapfrog communities living within the United States.

AUDIENCE: Exactly. And you can also see that now, now that kids are back in school, those same children are, you know, not necessarily getting the best grades, they didn’t necessarily get the right baseline. So it’s, you know, you might think it’s not really that big of an impact. It was only two years where they were behind on school, but they really missed out on some very fundamental concepts that have impact, that will continue to impact them in the future. So that was one. And I think another one that we really wanted to focus on was telehealth, particularly for women in marginalized and rural communities, because when it comes to reproductive health care and having the right access to information on how to take care of your baby, what you need to eat, it’s really important to kind of support those communities and give them the right level of information. And that doesn’t necessarily happen through brochures or papers, you know, they need continuous access to the internet, they need to have the ability to answer crucial questions immediately and effectively in order to protect their health and safeguard the health of their children. So those were maybe two of the key themes that emerged out of the Y20 discussions this year.

Jarrell James: I love that. There’s actually a ton of historic precedent to that. I mean, my own country of Ethiopia… Ethiopia, our birth rates were one in four died. When I was born, one in four is gone. And by 15 to 20 years later, there was a women’s health movement called I think the 100,000 Women March, where without connectivity, you had 100,000 women going from village to village not 100,000, but 10,000, really, going from village to village, telling women, don’t have babies this young or don’t have babies back to back. It is very detrimental to your health. There is a best way to feed your child. And if you look at Ethiopia between the years of 1992 to 2015, 2010, somewhere around there, it’s like they go from bottom 15% to top 15% of birth rates. And it is the education of women. So I mean, I’m fully, I fully believe that like just and to the greater point of Keeks earlier, and yourself, the hustlers of all of these cultures are women. Like in Tanzania, Ethiopia, East Africa, I’ve been all over and I’ll tell you, like when we go and do distributions of parables, we are looking towards populations of women to distribute the parables to. The economic capacity and the responsibility there is unmatched in the hunger. We have a few minutes left, and I’d love to hear from any of y’all on any of the topics you want.

ALEX MORA: Hi, I am Alex Mora. I am Alex Mora from Brazil. I am actually working and living here in Saudi. I just want to leave some words about everything I heard today. It’s fantastic projects you have. And from the perspective you mentioned on like having the internet as an equalizer, I think one crucial point to equalizing the lives of everyone along with the internet access and connectivity and bringing power to everyone is to put education in everything. Because that will be the transformation of every society, of every community. So if you manage to find a way to put, to attach all your programs. projects to educational, like primary schools, secondary schools, higher education, everywhere you land that project of power, it will be, I think, the best to make things like leapfrogging the lives of everyone to make them getting better value from that. Just to mention my background, I came from 19 years in the Brazilian Research and Education Network. I am a senior network engineer. I work with network engineering projects, internet access, internet architecture. And I am in the membership team of the GNA, which is the group of volunteers formed by professionals from research and education from all the countries in the world. And we have a mission to bring international collaboration for research and education everywhere and help meet humanity’s challenges. And we want to ensure that technology, infrastructure, investments of all partners and participants are utilized to interconnect research and education networks on a global scale. So I’d like to bring this to your attention that there are other groups of volunteers working on things similar like you do. And we are pretty much working on a similar fashion. We have work groups. We have engineers. We have researchers. We have people looking to solutions like you are to bring access to connected and disconnected people.

Jarrell James: Stick around then, because I want to talk to you.

ALEX MORA: And yeah, like our friends from Brazil, we’ve been doing a lot of things in Brazil that are very creative. For instance, the research and education network there made a public partnership, public private partnership with support for government. They made sure that everyone understood that education and science are not competing with incumbents or providers. So they managed to have agreements, for instance, that’s an amazing job, to power grids in the country. They have fiber optics running across the country through the power line. and one pair of that fiber can be shared, so most of the national Brazilian research and education backbone today runs on top of that infrastructure of the power grid lines of different regions in the country and they managed to bring the backbone capacity to 100 gigabits per second to connect higher education and now they are connecting the primary level in secondary, so schools, universities, everyone is benefiting from that and then also the project in the commercial providers there in Brazil, they also have managed to make agreements with commercial providers, so they are swapping capacity, they are swapping dark fibers and they are bringing access to low interest communities or places where the incumbents don’t have the incentive, the monetary incentive to bring access and then with that sharing capacity and sharing dark fibers, they managed to bring access to research and education to connect schools, to connect universities and they are also making good business with the commercial providers there, the small ones from Babrint.

Jarrell James: I want to tap into that real quick and then give someone else a chance to also respond, it sounds like you would like, sir could you give it to him? Thank you. What he was saying with the fiber lines and the power lines together, I mean in Brazil it’s forest, there’s a lot of forest, if you’re gonna deforest something, you’d rather not do it twice, so from a stakeholder perspective on the people doing the infrastructure, the decision to pair those two utilities quite closely in the dark fiber makes a lot of sense, that’s what I’m hearing as well and I want to just real quick, all of Wikipedia could probably fit on, if any of you have like a little stick in your pocket, it’s like eight gigabytes or whatever, all of Wikipedia can fit on that, like this is what we’re talking about and the perceptions, the assumptions we have around the internet is that that can’t fit on. on it, that Wikipedia is some giant database that has to be maintained by some internet gods. Sir, introduce yourself and let us hear what you have to say.

FOUAD RWABUHUNGU: Thank you very much. My name is Fouad Rwabuhungu. I’m from Tanzania, I just mentioned my country now. I’ve learned it, I love Tanzania. Thank you very much. And I want to talk about the story of leapfrogging in our country. It’s basically on rural electrification, where we collaborate with the World Bank, European Union. They are helping us to do the rural electrifications. But at the same time, we use the universal funds to deploy communication 4G sites to the village. So almost all villages are now covered with electricity, but the issue now is connectivity. But that’s done through the collaboration between the World Bank and the European Union.

Jarrell James: Oh, no, we’re actually talking to your technology minister right now. We’re trying to get a pilot going in Tanzania.

FOUAD RWABUHUNGU: OK, OK, that’s fantastic. I think he was in Riyadh, maybe I still hear him.

Jarrell James: Hey, you go ahead and throw him my way.

FOUAD RWABUHUNGU: OK, thank you very much. That’s my short story.

Jarrell James: Well, thank you all. This has been awesome. I really appreciate everybody coming. This has been a really solid showing by Brazil and Saudi Arabia, thank you. This is what we’re talking about. We’re talking about the parallel relationships between energy and connectivity, and we’re talking about ownership and sovereignty by taking those utilities for what they are and taking leadership when it comes to those developments for your own regions. We believe in leapfrog regions, and we think that everyone should take a moment to stop letting themselves be called the global south and maybe start letting themselves put themselves in that mindset of, oh, we could go beyond the West. We could take this further than the West has taken this, and that’s what it means to leapfrog. Thank you to everyone. Thank you to Dua. Thank you to Keeks. Thank you to Connor and Rashi up on top. Purnima as well. Thank you. And to everyone that participated we’re gonna be around here for a moment And we’ll be here for the rest of the week. We’d love to talk

Agreement Points

Importance of leapfrogging for technological and economic development

OKIKI

DUA

Jarrell James

ALEX MORA

Leapfrogging allows countries to skip stages of economic development

Saudi Arabia leapfrogged from nomadic culture to industrialization through oil development

Leapfrogging requires challenging assumptions about infrastructure and development

Brazil leapfrogged in internet connectivity, skipping landlines and going straight to mobile

Multiple speakers agreed on the significance of leapfrogging as a means for countries to rapidly advance their technological and economic development by skipping intermediate stages.

Correlation between energy access and economic development

Jarrell James

AUDIENCE

There’s a direct correlation between per capita electricity generation and GDP

Nearly half the planet lacks reliable access to energy, impacting economic development

Speakers highlighted the strong relationship between energy access and economic development, emphasizing how lack of reliable energy access hinders economic growth.

Need for innovative last-mile connectivity solutions

Jarrell James

Conor Colwell

FOUAD RWABUHUNGU

Community networks can optimize limited bandwidth for multiple users

Portable Wi-Fi capable batteries can serve as gateway access points

Waypoints provide solar-powered micro data centers for electricity, water, and internet

Rural electrification paired with 4G deployment is connecting villages in Tanzania

Multiple speakers presented innovative solutions for last-mile connectivity, emphasizing the need for creative approaches to bring internet access to underserved areas.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the importance of improving internet access and digital literacy for women, particularly in rural areas, to enhance their access to healthcare information and economic opportunities.

DUA

Raashi Saxena

Focus on telehealth access, particularly for women in rural communities

Women often have limited access to household internet connections

Digital literacy programs are helping women in rural India use the internet

Both speakers highlighted the importance of integrating internet connectivity with education, either through infrastructure projects or device subsidies, to empower youth and enhance learning opportunities.

ALEX MORA

DUA

Attaching connectivity projects to educational institutions at all levels

Government subsidies for devices like smartphones and laptops for students

Youth are leveraging internet connectivity to launch initiatives and startups

Unexpected Consensus

Importance of local content caching for education and cost reduction

AUDIENCE

Jarrell James

Caching educational content locally can reduce data costs for upskilling

Community networks can optimize limited bandwidth for multiple users

There was an unexpected consensus on the importance of local content caching and optimization for education and cost reduction in areas with limited connectivity. This approach challenges traditional assumptions about internet access and content delivery.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement included the importance of leapfrogging for rapid development, the strong correlation between energy access and economic growth, and the need for innovative last-mile connectivity solutions. There was also consensus on the importance of improving internet access for women and integrating connectivity with education.

Consensus level

The level of consensus among speakers was relatively high, particularly on the fundamental issues of leapfrogging and the importance of energy and internet access for development. This consensus suggests a shared understanding of the challenges and potential solutions for improving connectivity in underserved areas, which could facilitate more coordinated efforts in addressing these issues.

Different Viewpoints

Approach to leapfrogging

OKIKI

DUA

Jarrell James

Leapfrogging allows countries to skip stages of economic development

Saudi Arabia leapfrogged from nomadic culture to industrialization through oil development

Leapfrogging requires challenging assumptions about infrastructure and development

While all speakers agree on the concept of leapfrogging, they emphasize different aspects and approaches. OKIKI focuses on skipping economic development stages, DUA highlights Saudi Arabia’s rapid industrialization through oil, and Jarrell James stresses the need to challenge assumptions about infrastructure and development.

Unexpected Differences

Focus on energy vs. internet connectivity

Jarrell James

FOUAD RWABUHUNGU

There’s a direct correlation between per capita electricity generation and GDP

Rural electrification paired with 4G deployment is connecting villages in Tanzania

While both speakers discuss infrastructure development, Jarrell James emphasizes the importance of energy generation for economic development, while FOUAD RWABUHUNGU presents a more integrated approach of combining rural electrification with 4G deployment. This unexpected difference highlights the varying priorities in different regions.

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around the specific approaches to leapfrogging, the prioritization of energy vs. internet connectivity, and the methods for improving digital access and education.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among the speakers is moderate. While there is general agreement on the importance of connectivity and development, speakers offer diverse perspectives and solutions based on their regional experiences and expertise. These differences in approach could lead to a more comprehensive understanding of the challenges and potential solutions for last-mile connectivity and leapfrogging in various contexts.

Partial Agreements

All speakers agree on the importance of improving connectivity for education, but they propose different methods. DUA suggests government subsidies for devices, Jarrell James proposes community networks to optimize bandwidth, and ALEX MORA advocates for attaching connectivity projects to educational institutions.

DUA

Jarrell James

ALEX MORA

Government subsidies for devices like smartphones and laptops for students

Community networks can optimize limited bandwidth for multiple users

Attaching connectivity projects to educational institutions at all levels

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the importance of improving internet access and digital literacy for women, particularly in rural areas, to enhance their access to healthcare information and economic opportunities.

DUA

Raashi Saxena

Focus on telehealth access, particularly for women in rural communities

Women often have limited access to household internet connections

Digital literacy programs are helping women in rural India use the internet

Both speakers highlighted the importance of integrating internet connectivity with education, either through infrastructure projects or device subsidies, to empower youth and enhance learning opportunities.

ALEX MORA

DUA

Attaching connectivity projects to educational institutions at all levels

Government subsidies for devices like smartphones and laptops for students

Youth are leveraging internet connectivity to launch initiatives and startups

Key Takeaways

Leapfrogging allows developing countries to skip stages of technological development and potentially surpass developed nations

There is a strong correlation between energy access, internet connectivity, and economic development

Last mile connectivity solutions like Waypoints and portable Wi-Fi batteries can help bridge the digital divide

Internet access has a significant impact on marginalized groups, particularly women and youth

Policy interventions and public-private partnerships are crucial for expanding digital inclusion

Resolutions and Action Items

Proposal to create a Last Mile Coalition within the UN Internet Governance Forum

Plan to deploy 100,000 Waypoints globally to impact about 100 million people

Initiative to distribute Parable portable Wi-Fi batteries, focusing on women as key economic drivers

Suggestion to attach connectivity projects to educational institutions at all levels

Unresolved Issues

How to achieve the UN’s goal of meaningful connectivity for all by 2030 given current progress

Balancing the involvement of multinational corporations with local sovereignty in infrastructure development

Addressing the potential negative impacts of leapfrogging, such as job displacement or cultural shifts

Ensuring long-term economic sustainability of community-based connectivity solutions

Suggested Compromises

Partnering with existing power grid infrastructure to deploy fiber optic networks, as done in Brazil

Using community networks to optimize limited bandwidth across multiple users

Caching educational content locally to reduce data costs while still providing access to information

Collaborating with international organizations like the World Bank for rural electrification while using universal funds for communication infrastructure

Leapfrogging, as I understand it, basically what happens when a country skips stages of economic development. When you think about how in the U.S. you had telegrams and telephones and cell phones, you kind of see that as like steps, right? But in countries like Nigeria, for example, you didn’t really have widespread landlines and telephone lines before everyone in the country had a cell phone.

speaker

Keeks

reason

This comment provides a clear and relatable explanation of the concept of leapfrogging, which is central to the discussion. It challenges the assumption that all countries must follow the same linear path of technological development.

impact

This explanation set the stage for the rest of the discussion by providing a framework for understanding how developing countries can rapidly advance technologically. It led to further exploration of specific examples of leapfrogging in different countries.

So in terms of energy, we’re looking for alternative energy sources and how we can really translate electricity, which can be abundant in Saudi in terms of solar and wind. Can that be translated into long-term storage? Short-term storage in terms of batteries is something that’s already growing, but the medium and long-term storage in terms of chemicals, storage to chemicals, I think that’s something we’re really seeing developments in there, how you take ammonia, for example, as an energy carrier and transport it internationally.

speaker

Ahmad

reason

This comment introduces the complex technical challenges and innovative solutions being explored in energy storage and transportation. It demonstrates how leapfrogging isn’t just about adopting existing technologies, but also about pushing the boundaries of current technological capabilities.

impact

This comment shifted the discussion towards more specific technological innovations and their potential impact on energy infrastructure. It led to a deeper exploration of how countries like Saudi Arabia are positioning themselves at the forefront of energy technology.

Waypoints are solar-powered micro data centers that reimagine mini-grids using AI to efficiently distribute electricity across multiple revenue-generating services. They don’t just provide electricity, they unlock its potential.

speaker

Connor (via video presentation)

reason

This comment introduces a concrete example of an innovative solution that addresses multiple challenges simultaneously – energy, connectivity, and economic development. It illustrates how leapfrogging can involve creating entirely new technological paradigms.

impact

This presentation sparked discussion about practical implementations of leapfrogging technologies and how they can be designed to meet multiple needs in developing communities. It led to further exploration of the economic and social impacts of such technologies.

We live in a world of scams which have deteriorated our financial systems and sectors across the world. You know there are organizations that specifically work on how people can bypass phishing scams and how you can be safe online, how people can use VPNs and a lot of actors are of course also doing a lot of sensitive work so how can you protect your own identity online.

speaker

Raashi Saxena

reason

This comment brings attention to the often-overlooked challenges and risks that come with increased connectivity. It highlights the need for digital literacy and security alongside infrastructure development.

impact

This comment broadened the discussion beyond just infrastructure and access to include the importance of education and security in the digital realm. It led to consideration of the holistic approach needed for successful technological leapfrogging.

For instance, the research and education network there made a public partnership, public private partnership with support for government. They made sure that everyone understood that education and science are not competing with incumbents or providers. So they managed to have agreements, for instance, that’s an amazing job, to power grids in the country. They have fiber optics running across the country through the power line.

speaker

Alex Mora

reason

This comment provides a concrete example of successful collaboration between public and private sectors to improve infrastructure. It demonstrates how creative solutions can overcome traditional barriers to development.

impact

This comment shifted the discussion towards practical policy solutions and the importance of collaboration between different sectors. It led to consideration of how similar models could be applied in other countries.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by progressively deepening the understanding of leapfrogging from a general concept to specific technological innovations and practical implementations. They broadened the scope of the conversation from purely technological considerations to include economic, social, and policy dimensions. The discussion evolved from defining leapfrogging to exploring its manifestations in energy and connectivity, then to considering the challenges and opportunities it presents, and finally to examining concrete examples and potential solutions. This progression allowed for a comprehensive exploration of the topic, touching on theoretical concepts, technological innovations, social impacts, and policy considerations.

How can we create more global awareness around the importance of energy resources for meaningful connectivity?

speaker

Jarrell James

explanation

This is crucial for achieving the UN’s connectivity goals by 2030 and ensuring sustainable development in leapfrogging regions.

What are the potential applications and impacts of chemical battery storage technologies being developed in Saudi Arabia?

speaker

Ahmad

explanation

This could be a key factor in enabling sustainable energy solutions and supporting leapfrogging in developing regions.

How can we develop and implement policies to subsidize smartphones, laptops, and tablets for students, particularly in light of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on education?

speaker

Dua

explanation

This is important for ensuring equal access to education and preventing long-term negative impacts on students from marginalized communities.

What are the best strategies for implementing and expanding telehealth services, particularly for women in marginalized and rural communities?

speaker

Dua

explanation

This could significantly improve access to healthcare information and services in underserved areas.

How can we better integrate education into connectivity and energy access projects to maximize their transformative potential?

speaker

Alex Mora

explanation

Combining connectivity initiatives with educational programs could enhance the overall impact on community development.

What are the possibilities for expanding the model of using power grid infrastructure to deploy fiber optic networks in other countries?

speaker

Alex Mora

explanation

This approach has been successful in Brazil and could potentially be applied in other regions to improve connectivity.

How can we further develop and scale the concept of community networks and optimize bandwidth sharing algorithms?

speaker

Jarrell James

explanation

This could provide more efficient and cost-effective connectivity solutions for underserved areas.

What are the potential applications and impacts of portable Wi-Fi capable batteries (like the Parable) in leapfrogging regions?

speaker

Jarrell James

explanation

This technology could significantly improve internet access and energy availability in remote areas.

How can we better leverage youth leadership and initiatives in driving connectivity and technological development in leapfrogging regions?

speaker

Dua

explanation

Given the large youth populations in many developing countries, their involvement could be crucial for successful leapfrogging.

What are the best practices for implementing digital literacy programs, particularly focusing on cybersecurity and safe internet usage in developing regions?

speaker

Raashi Saxena

explanation

As connectivity increases, ensuring safe and effective internet use becomes increasingly important.

Summary

This discussion focused on the adoption and maturation of artificial intelligence (AI) in organizations. Dr. Lamya Alomair began by providing a historical overview of AI development and its potential applications across various industries. She emphasized the importance of understanding AI’s core philosophy and starting with key projects to drive adoption.

Abdullah Alshamrani then presented findings from a survey of 650 organizations implementing AI. He highlighted that only 10% of surveyed organizations were considered AI-mature. The discussion revealed that generative AI has significantly impacted overall AI adoption, pushing organizations to upskill staff, increase AI implementation, and focus on AI governance.

Key challenges in AI adoption were discussed, including lack of trust, business alignment issues, and difficulties in demonstrating AI value. The speakers emphasized that 52% of AI projects never reach production, and piloting an AI project takes an average of 8 months.

Four main lessons for successful AI adoption were presented: implementing a scalable AI operating model, focusing on AI engineering practices, prioritizing upskilling and change management, and establishing robust AI governance. The speakers stressed the importance of building strong foundations rather than chasing the latest AI trends.

The discussion concluded with advice on improving self-confidence in AI development and the need for continuous upskilling to keep pace with rapid advancements in the field. Overall, the speakers emphasized the critical importance of a systematic, foundational approach to AI adoption for organizations aiming to become AI-enabled across multiple business units.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– Overview of AI history and development

– Impact of generative AI on overall AI adoption in organizations

– Challenges in implementing AI, including high failure rates and long pilot times

– Key practices of AI-mature organizations, including hybrid operating models, AI engineering, upskilling, and governance

– Importance of focusing on foundational elements rather than “shiny objects” when adopting AI

Overall purpose:

The goal of this discussion was to provide an overview of AI development and adoption in organizations, highlighting both the opportunities and challenges. The speakers aimed to share insights on how to successfully implement AI based on surveys of mature AI organizations.

Tone:

The overall tone was informative and instructional. The speakers maintained a professional, authoritative tone throughout as they presented research findings and recommendations. There was a slight shift to a more conversational tone during the Q&A at the end, but it remained largely educational in nature.

Speakers

– Abdullah Alshamrani

Role: Executive partner at Gartner

Expertise: AI adoption, organizational AI maturity

– Dr. Lamya Alomair

Role: Acting on the WT ship of technology foresight and digital economy at NCIT

Expertise: AI, technology foresight, digital economy

– Audience

Role: Attendees asking questions

Additional speakers:

– Dr. Laila Umayyad

Role: Co-host from NCIT

Expertise: Not specified

Expanded Summary of AI Adoption and Maturity Discussion

Introduction:

This discussion featured Abdullah Alshamrani, Executive Partner at Gartner, and Dr. Lamya Alomair, Acting on the leadership of technology foresight and digital economy at NCIT. The speakers provided insights into AI development, its impact on businesses, challenges in implementation, and best practices for successful adoption.

Historical Context and Foundations of AI:

Dr. Lamya Alomair presented a comprehensive historical overview of AI development from the 1950s to the present. She highlighted key milestones such as Alan Turing’s test, the first robot at General Motors, and the recent development of ChatGPT. Dr. Alomair emphasized the importance of understanding AI’s core philosophy, explaining that cognitive systems form the basis of AI, with machine learning and deep learning as subsets. She stressed the significance of AI in improving human cognitive abilities, framing it as a transformative technology that enhances our thinking capabilities.

Dr. Alomair also discussed the importance of use cases in AI adoption, presenting a formula for successful AI application: Use Case + Data + AI Algorithm = Value. She emphasized that organizations should focus on identifying valuable use cases before implementing AI solutions.

Impact of Generative AI:

Abdullah Alshamrani presented findings from a survey of 650 organizations implementing AI. He highlighted the significant impact of generative AI on overall AI adoption, noting that it has led to:

1. A rapid rise to prominence in organizations

2. Increased focus on AI upskilling and governance

3. A doubling of AI adoption in organizations over the past two years

Alshamrani provided specific statistics, including that 45% of organizations have adopted or plan to adopt generative AI within the next 12 months. This surge in interest has pushed organizations to upskill staff, increase AI implementation, and focus on AI governance.

Challenges in AI Adoption:

The speakers identified several key challenges in AI adoption:

1. High failure rate: 52% of AI projects never reach production

2. Long pilot times: An average of 8 months to pilot an AI project

3. Lack of trust in AI systems

4. Business alignment issues

5. Difficulties in demonstrating AI value

6. Data quality problems

7. Technical implementation challenges

8. Cost considerations, particularly for generative AI

Alshamrani emphasized the significance of the 52% failure rate, noting the substantial resources invested in AI projects that ultimately fail to deliver value. He also highlighted that only 54% of AI projects move from pilot to production, indicating a significant gap in successful implementation.

Best Practices for AI Maturity:

The discussion revealed that only 10% of surveyed organizations were considered AI-mature, applying AI across multiple business units and processes. Alshamrani presented four main lessons for successful AI adoption:

1. Implementing a scalable AI operating model:

– Adopt a hybrid model with centralized capabilities working alongside business units

– Develop reusable AI components and design patterns

2. Focusing on AI engineering practices:

– Establish robust pipelines for AI development and deployment

– Manage AI projects efficiently from conception to production

– Create reusable components to accelerate AI development and reduce costs

3. Prioritizing upskilling and change management:

– Implement AI literacy programs across all organizational levels

– Focus on both technical AI skills and broader AI understanding

4. Establishing robust AI governance:

– Address trust, risk, and security concerns

– Develop comprehensive frameworks for responsible AI use

– Include elements such as AI principles, risk assessment, and ongoing monitoring

Alshamrani stressed the importance of building strong foundations rather than chasing the latest AI trends or “shiny objects”. This approach was deemed crucial for organizations aiming to become AI-enabled across multiple business units.

Future of AI and Continuous Learning:

Dr. Alomair emphasized the importance of staying updated with AI developments and the need for continuous upskilling in AI. This sentiment was echoed in an audience question about improving self-confidence in AI development. Dr. Alomair advised starting with small projects, collaborating with others, and continuously learning to build confidence in AI development skills.

Conclusion:

The discussion provided a comprehensive view of AI’s transformative potential while highlighting the practical challenges of implementation. It encouraged a balanced and nuanced understanding of AI’s role in business and society, emphasizing the need for a structured approach focused on foundational elements and realistic expectations. Both speakers stressed the importance of continuous learning, strategic implementation, and robust governance in achieving AI maturity and success.

Key Takeaways:

1. AI adoption has doubled in organizations over the past two years, driven significantly by generative AI.

2. Only about 10% of surveyed organizations are considered AI mature.

3. Major challenges in AI adoption include high failure rates, lack of trust, business alignment, and data quality issues.

4. Key practices for AI maturity include implementing a hybrid operating model, focusing on AI engineering, prioritizing upskilling, and establishing robust governance.

5. Organizations should focus on building strong foundations for AI rather than chasing the latest trends.

6. Continuous learning and upskilling are crucial for individuals and organizations to keep pace with AI advancements.

Abdullah Alshamrani: Okay. Abu Khalid, you’re done? Okay. Bismillahir Rahmanir Rahim. Assalamu alaikum. Assalamu alaikum. Assalamu alaikum. Good morning, everyone. It is my pleasure to, to IEF, of course, and to this session, and myself, a co-host here, Dr. Laila Umayyad from NCIT, acting on the WT ship of technology foresight and digital economy. We’ll be delivering very interesting, has the foundation of AI, as well as some of the qualitative and quantitative data related to what mature organization AI, or what AI mature organizations are doing in that space. By way of introduction, my name is Abdushamani, an executive partner in Gartner, and without further ado, I will hand over to Dr. Laila Umayyad, who has an immense experience in AI domain, and we’ll be going through the first section of this presentation. Go ahead, doctor.

Dr. Lamya Alomair: Thank you, Amir Abdullah. Now, I’m going to talk about today. I will start with the question, which is, do you think technology can help? And do you think AI can help? When I start this, I will talk about the industrial revolution. When the first industrial revolution comes, it helps us with the steam engine, people to move around. And then when the second industrial revolution comes, with the electricity, it helps people to see even at night. And the third industrial revolution, with the communication and electronics, it also helps people to communicate all over the globe. So all the three industrial revolutions help our physical ability. But with the fourth industrial revolution, there is one more ability that comes with AI. It improves our cognitive thinking. So here, what I’m saying, that with AI, our cognitive ability is moving. So before, always we said that from the history, you can understand what will happen in the future. So, I will just talk about very brief history about AI. So everyone think AI started very soon? No, AI started in 1950, okay? When a mathematical professor, Alan Turner, was thinking, if the computer can think like human. So this is the starting point, 1950. So he trained the computer with information, and also he bring a human, and then he asked a couple of questions for this computer, and a couple of these questions for a human, and then he give a judge the answer of these two individual, computer and a human. And then, guess what? This judge could not distinguish between which one come from a computer, and which one come from human. In this moment, Alan Turner said, okay, that means that computer can think like a human. Then in 1955, John McKenzie in a conference, he launched the name of AI. After that, moving to the first robot, which was in General Motors. So, in General Motors factory, they don’t want to touch the chemicals, so they start with the first robot. So in 1961. After that, I just want to introduce you to the grandmother of Chad DBT, it’s Aliza. In MIT, in 1965, they have Aliza, which is the first chatbot. It was simple, but 25 years later, we got our Chad DBT. So Aliza is the grandmother, what I say, for our chatbot now. And then, you can see like around 25 years, there is nothing moving in AI. And then in 1997, IBM have this program called DEEP2, which is this program, beat the chess champion in the chessboard. So since then, IBM, they start doing these changes and they start to know that, okay, let’s do another champion. In 1999, in the lab of MIT also, one professor, she had the first promotional robot. So they merged the AI with the robot, so they got the first promotional robot. After that, Google started doing the self-driving car. And just to let you know, how important is the data for this and how to be on it also. Very mature when you use it. When they use it, they train it for only white people. And then when there’s a black guy who want to drive this car, it did not drive because there is missing data. This is where ethics coming and maturity of the data. And then, maybe some of you know the Jeopardy game. In 2011, IBM, they got the, what’s the word? The program that beat the Jeopardy champion. Then they continue doing, Google, they do also the DeepMind, another program. In 2017, there is a breakthrough in machine learning for skin cancer and also retinitis. So they start also the field of health here. And then in 2020, OpenAI, they launched the beginning of the Jeopardy game, which was an NLP, a natural app, which is going to the six and try to find the magic. And everybody remember 21 when Corona hit us and we need a vaccine, we need a good vaccine. So using AI, that’s why we can get the vaccine quickly. In DeepMind, AlphaFold, the protein structure can be predicted very quickly with the protein structure. It was taking like 10 years to have the sequence of the protein translated using the biophysics and then have the structure and then try to find drug discovery. But AlphaFold, it predicts the structure of protein very quickly and then the discovery of drug discovery. Also, we’re very proud to say that in 23, we had Alam, which is from Zadaiya, which is an authority and also they are improving now. Saying all of this huge history, we want to predict the future. We want to see what this will take. And at the same time, we try to learn from the journey before for having a new future. That’s why today me and my colleague, Engineer Abdullah, will try to give you a sample how to be a mature in applying this. So everyone is asking, what is the definition of AI? There is plenty of definition. But let’s say here, it’s a cognitive system, as I mentioned in the beginning. Cognitive system is a natural or artificial system that’s connected together, taking all this information and data and translate it to an output that mean something, understand, something we can get information from it. Something that decision maker can make the decision. Underneath this whole information, the artificial intelligence, again, it is a program algorithm that’s connected together, that’s getting all this information and have something analyzing, coding, and everything. This AI, after we say cognitive, and then the artificial intelligence, after that, there is a machine learning, which is a subdivision of AI. The machine learning is how to teach the machine with all this information. So we get all that data, and then we get this machine learning. Underneath this machine learning is N and V, which is analysis. So in the machine learning, there is different deep learning also. It’s the same as machine learning, but it has a different layer. All of these have a support application who creates optimizing system, N and V is the name for the tractor, but all of these is dependent on one view to understand the problem of the piece of AI, which is the cognitive system. So all of this can be created, and we can see any user group of this AI, either this is one of these machine learning, or having two or three, or having two or three of this machine learning. So next, we will have a look at a little bit more information than what we are here, and we are looking forward to… I forget about AI, about the elements of AI, about how to start it, about how to mature it. So, when we go and see, okay, what is the prioritization that can be in the business field of the government here? We just give you an example here. Government entity, or operational excellency or accomplishment of the government. When we look to AI, there’s customer experience, which is how we make the best of the government, how we put the customer in different segments, how we can plan our brand in different ways. When we go to operational, this is where we have how to manage, how to maintain, how to maximize the trust that we have. When we see business elements planning, programming, this can help us. And then, look at the function of how we can align with different companies, different organizations, different governments, how we can monitor it, how we can follow the signals that happen. All this, that can AI help us, is again the question. The new business here, I know it will be having some, creating some new rules, new rules, new rules, new rules, creating some new jobs, removing some jobs, but really, the new business will be, if we study it very well, it will be having a great impact. So, again, the AI can help us. I will just try to explain one example today. So, if you’re asking us how we can have the best and the most quality, maybe the machine learning. I told you about the machine learning. The machine learning is the computer algorithm that you give it some data and it will learn. So, if we give the data, the machine learning can give us any alternative that we want. And then if we apply the business model, how we find the business model, that’s what we can take, okay? Using the pool-based system, to make it according to divide and see who is the business, by understanding the rhythm that we are. And then, how we can optimize the inventory and making the, optimizing it, even if it means, decrease and lower the cost, make the benefit of all the information. So, all the AI can help us, okay? Now, let’s see how the campus can be optimized. So, the most important point here, when I talk about how to optimize the production quality, because we are caring about quality, we know that using AI can increase the quality. So, how does it mean we buy, embed it, analyze it, then try it, and then we teach them what is the pieces that maybe need failure. We can’t get it out. This is 60% of the failure. And then, I wanna use it to, so how we can analyze it. There are 20,000 things that can be analyzed. For example, if you take your cost for maintenance, okay, and then, for one piece, and then there is another one, you would analyze it using AI, and then you need another piece of maintenance. So, if we see the time, we have to be prepared. It is just going and coming. So, using the AI will reduce the time that we need to be prepared. Quality of time in the website, worldwide, with the 50,000 and 140,000, 1,400, 1,400, 1,400, this is very important, you know? And then, also, we are trying to make our life easier. We don’t want that any medicine, any services, all this will reduce time, and it will, the quality of our life, the quality of life will be reduced. And, I’ll tell you one thing. What I learned from education and biology is that we need the right formula for having the correct, applied framework. It is not easy to apply AI. It’s very difficult. That’s why we say it’s very helpful. I love it. It’s very helpful. That’s why we have it as well. So, the use, and referring to the use case, we have to study use cases very well. Not any use cases, I mean, the use cases that give us value. We understand it now. And, then, it’s very, very important. So, I usually say, with the booger, booger virus, they don’t know how to use a booger mask. It is not that, it’s not that easy for them. So, after care, it’s very, very important. So, nobody can do jobs if they are not dealing with them. Then, the disease, the disease. I usually say, there is a tsunami of disease. Okay, but how do you deal with it? This is very important. So, it’s very important to know about it, to have it, so we understand. So, these three, and number four, is very important, but I did not know that it’s gonna make the AI, make these things, the first one is the link, the second one is not. Having the graphical part, all of these have to make that, people can’t apply it very well. So, then, we understand that we need the right tools. And, then, we have to have the right government experience. All of these cases are government experience that we need to govern our disease. So, this is the formula that we have to use. And, then, we’ve got to have a body to do this. So, AI, you have to be having this body. This body, the upper body. So, we have to find a body. He is a little bit of a body, and he is a little bit of a body. This is the ability, you can see, how this community can choose from zero to one, and all of our problems that we have to solve. So, this is bad, you know. We have to do this, and we have to find a solution to this. Find my, you know, this is my operation, and how is this? So, we don’t know, if I, for example, tell me, tell me which one is not, and we can use this one. This is an example of the, we can do that way. And, it can be applied in any industry, okay? You have to, so, going down here, you can see that, four point, yeah, industry, personalization is very important. What they mean by personalization? Everyone has different choices, different needs, needs, so, this is very important to work on it, in AI. All of these, the prices, the importance, all of this, all of this, all of this, I have to work on it first. I cannot work on this with the people in AI. I cannot work with anyone else. I will keep on building this in my mind, but I will work on it. So, it’s very important to concentrate where to start. Where to start, first of all, it’s very important to understand this, to understand the core philosophy, and also to have a place where to start, to start in the five important projects and then, we’ll continue. And now, I leave you with my colleague, Dr. Ibn Abdullah, who will continue this presentation, and I’ll wait at the end for any questions.

Abdullah Alshamrani: Thank you, doctor. So, hopefully, you’ve learned, the foundational AI techniques, which are not really enough to apply AI within your organization. You need the five elements that Dr. Lamia talked about, and we’ve done some analysis in the market. We went out and surveyed 650 organizations around the world who are adopting AI in general, who excel in applying the AI techniques and apply the AI practices within their organizations. And we tried to even filter out these 650 organizations to understand what are the common practices really, really make organizations and AI mature organizations. So, out of the 650 that we surveyed, only 10% ended up to be AI mature organizations. And we’ll go through a lot of the learnings and a lot of the teachings that we’ve gotten out of this survey. So, basically, what we’ve done is a practical and qualitative approach to understand what the organizations are doing in the domain of adopting AI. So, we need to understand one thing. Then AI, generative AI, ChadDBT, in particular, came out end of 22, it really made a big splash. It really moved the needle forward when it comes to general AI adoptions. Why? Because a lot of expectations, a lot of hype, and a lot of value received out of applying general AI within the organization settings in general. So this splash had some sort of fripple effect on the whole AI adoption in the organization. So basically, it did not focus only on gen AI, but it also touched every other general AI technique as has been highlighted by Dr. Lamia in the previous section. And you can understand the numbers that are being displayed in this. So we’ve done this survey almost every year for the past eight years. And gen AI was not really a technical or an AI technique that we’ve highlighted as top ones. However, during last year, it came out of the splash, and one of the impact is to move from no applications within organizations to the highest used AI technique within the organization. As you can see, it actually compared to every prominent and famous AI technique, whether it is related to machine learning, NLP, optimization techniques, and others. So it came number one within the use of organizations, and it had a ripple effect on everything else as has been noted previously. And to understand this a bit more, I’ve sliced the remaining sections of the presentation to three parts. The part where gen AI, or the part that demonstrate where gen AI has really made an impact in the overall AI adoption, then the part that talks about the challenges related to overall AI adoption, particularly gen AI in specific, and the last one is to dissect the common practices around AI adoption within the organizations. So the top three impacts that were generated from gen AI in particular was focusing on upskilling, AI upskilling in the business itself, in IT or AI savvy sort of staff and associates within the organization. So this is number one. And the second thing is pushing the needle when it comes to AI adoption to next level, right? So gen AI had a splash around AI adoption in general. So because gen AI is focused and can provide value in specific use cases, but it does not provide value in every single other case. You need to use a plethora of AI techniques similar to the ones that were described by Dr. Lamia and the top AI within the previous slide. But most importantly, and it became non-negotiable, the AI governance itself, because it deals with sensitive AI or sensitive data itself, and it has become the center of the universe when it comes to AI policies around the world. So here in Saudi, for example, we have the personal data protection law that governs, that has a lot of governance mechanism when it comes to data related to AI itself. Aside from that, we have also the AI outline or the gen AI outline or guidance from SADAIA itself to give insights on how you should use gen AI and AI in general responsibly within your organizations. And as you can see from these three items, I mean, they are intertwined. Each one of them will impact the other. So the AI adoption entails that you upskill your team. And the more AI adoption that you have within your organization, the more care that you need to do when it comes to AI governance itself. So you cannot deal with one of them in isolation from the other, because they are really intertwined and impacting each other. Sorry about the delay, but the clicker here is not really the best AI technology in the world. But basically AI has a chain reaction when it comes, or gen AI in particular has a chain reaction when it comes to overall AI adoption within the organization. You know, the number here is very interesting. Since two years ago, AI adoption has doubled, has really doubled. We’ve received, we’ve understood that AI adoption gone from 1x to 2x within the organization, applied in multiple data or multiple business units as well as multiple business processes. This tells you that AI is becoming more and more and more stream and organizations are serious about it. Okay, in 22 or 23, they’ve been piloting, but in 24, they have been scaling. And that scalability is related to the 2x that I have been talking about. And one of the things that increased the adoption of gen AI in particular was embedding gen AI capability within the general application landscape. So if you have a CRM, for example, it is not uncommon to see a gen AI sort of capability within the CRM to help the normal user to try and digest many of the processes related to a very complex CRM, let alone the data that is hosted within the CRM itself. So basically, gen AI became a forcing sort of function when it comes to AI adoption. In fact, you see it more used within embedded applications comparing to isolated or standalone chat GPT or gen AI functions. And everything in between is outside really the embedded application. So basically, if you want to really, or the key lesson that I’m trying to say here, if you want to really push the needle when it comes to gen AI in general, let alone AI adoption in specific, you need to think about adopting AI techniques within the general business applications in your organizations. And this is basically what we’ve seen. If you work in software engineering, for example, or you work on orchestrating enterprise applications, the enterprise application strategy has moved away from only being composable and only being reusable to include the embedded intelligence. And embedded intelligence is nothing but including the functionality of AI models, whether they’re gen or normal, within the enterprise application landscape itself, just to make them more powerful, more impactful, and easier to use for normal users. As I said in the beginning, you know, gen AI has really made a big splash when it comes to AI adoption in general. However, it really, you know, verified that we need to stand humble when it comes to the general AI adoption, and it is forcing us to mature, you know, to higher stages with the plethora of challenges that we’re facing in the journey itself. And this is, and you know, some of the challenges I will go through in that section. And before I go through, you know, the details of these challenges, I wanna display two, you know, very interesting data points. So you need to understand that the journey toward AI maturity is not easy. You know, it is very challenging. It is very, it continues to be complex as we stand today, and it is very costly to organizations. And you know, one of the things that we noticed from our survey this year is that AI projects, on average, never go to production. They don’t see the light at all. 52% is not an easy number. 52% is a very large number. You know, you take an AI project, you pilot it for, you know, a number of months, as we will see in the next slide, then you ended up in throwing it, why? Because you could not really realize a break-even sort of point when it comes to the cost and value of these, of running these AI models or scaling them later on in production. So 52, this means, you know, it’s like tossing a coin, right? You don’t know whether it will succeed or it will fail. And the other data point that I wanted to talk about is the length of piloting, you know, a normal AI project itself. So in the previous, you know, survey, 23, it used to be seven months. It’s gotten worse this year with Gen AI, which makes, you know, things or organizations in general more frightened to take part of Gen AI and general AI adoptions within their organizations. They need to understand that in order to succeed, you know, in their pilot, and in order to succeed in the scalable aspects when it comes to AI adoption, they need to focus on different things as we will see in the next section. So, 52 is prone to failure and 8 months just to pilot an AI project, at the end you don’t know whether it will go to production or not. revolution that came before it. You need to understand the AI technique and club it with the AI value or the use case value for the organization. Without maximizing the end result of that sort of formula, you will not be able to actually say that we are AI enabled organizations at all. As you can see here, you know, the barriers are very, you know, lack of trust when it comes to AI, lack of business alignment, lack of data, lack of confidence in technological aspects of AI, especially for those who come maybe from certain countries where cloud is not really enabled there, provided AI models and AI capabilities are better in cloud, you know, environment comparing to local environment. And definitely talent is a big thing, but most importantly estimating and demonstrating AI value is the biggest challenge for organizations and it goes hand-in-hand with the previous two data points that we described, you know, 52% fail and it takes eight months to roll out a project from pilot to production. And if we focus on gen AI in particular, you know, you will see commonality between the gen AI and common AI adoption in general, but you know, the top ones related to technical implementations and cost of running gen AI and this year we’ve seen more reliance on thin ops, for example, techniques, especially for those who are acquainted about cloud computing. I mean they need, you need thin ops capability in place just to help you, you know, navigate the costs related to AI consumption and usage and without a doubt talent became also one of the top gen AI and this is where, you know, the gen AI literacy or AI literacy programs come to resolve that sort of challenge as we will see in the next section. So as I said in the beginning, you know, we’ve surveyed 650 organizations, right, and we’ve learned many data points related to their practices when it comes to AI adoption. And we filtered out the high maturity organizations which came out to be around 9-10 percent. So out of 650, you only have 65 organizations that are mature when it comes to AI adoption in the world. And we’ve learned, you know, four main lessons when it comes to AI adoption and scaling AI adoption within the organization. But before we go through these four main lessons, I want to highlight what maturity actually means when it comes to our analysis to the data points that we collected. So basically, to establish the maturity definition, we need to understand that the common or the AI mature organizations applied AI across several business units and processes. So it’s not enough to roll out a fraud management solution or model within production. You need to focus on customer intimacy, operation, you need to focus on predictive and preventive sort of scenarios, and this is related to different business units, let alone different business processes itself. And you need to understand that maturity as well means that they have deployed more than five AI use cases. Most organizations are still in the beginning of when it comes to AI journey. They are still piloting only one use case. The mature organizations, they’ve gone beyond that and deployed already five AI use cases in production. And they’re not in the early stages of that deployment. These AI adoption models and use cases have stayed in production for at least two years in average, which should have generated a lot of value for the organizations that use them. So we, based on the analysis that we did for data, we understood that AI mature organizations focus on the bottom, as you will see in the layer of that paragraph or that diagram. So basically the bottom forms the foundation of AI mature organizations relating to the operating model that is being used to scale AI within the organization, related to AI engineering practices and pipelines that are, that should be put in place, and definitely upskilling because we’ve learned in the previous surveys talent is a major issue. So upskilling is one way to resolve that gap in the organizations as well as change management, and definitely the governance aspect which focus on trust and risk and security management in general. So the ones on the top, whether it is related to the AI use cases, AI trends, the next big thing, and the AI models that are open in flux when it comes to announcements, you know, this is something you should not be focusing on if you want to really mature your journey when it comes to AI. You need to focus on the foundational elements as we will go through in a moment. So as I said, you know, AI, you know, in the previous diagram, the ones on the top are really shiny and you need to shy away from shiny objects when it comes to AI, and really be laser focused when it comes to the foundational and fundamental components of AI that will help you to really scale and reach the five use cases, different business units, and business processes, you know, hopefully reach two years production when it comes to AI adoption. But if we if we talk about the scalable AI operating model, and I am conscious of the time, so I’ll try to speed up, you know, when it comes to the operating model, you know, scaling AI requires different AI operating model. I mean, previously central teams may have succeeded to maybe pilot AI in the organizations, but in order to really scale it, you need to think about hybrid model, where very central AI capabilities need to take place, but they work in tandem and in collaboration with other, you know, business units within the organizations in a very specific and governed sort of manner, while the budget, when it comes to AI, you need to think about that mature AI organizations, you know, distribute the AI budget across different sort of business projects instead of being concentrated on one or two projects. And this is one example of, you know, hybrid operating model. As I said, there are central, you know, team that has the central capabilities related, for example, to AI strategy, AI architecture, and, you know, some of the subject matter experts when it comes to AI domain, but you also have the edges, the business units, the business processes where many of the innovations are being adopted, and in order to adopt that, you need to upskill the team, as we will see in a moment. But there is no one-size-fits-all, so every hybrid model will differ from one organization to other, but at the same time, you need to shy away from centralizing everything in one domain and think about, you know, what makes sense when it comes to hybrid in your organization. And AI engineering, if you come from software engineering background, for example, you need to, you will definitely relate to what I’m saying, what I’m going to say now, because you will, in software engineering, you have the pipelines that helps you to, you know, develop and design specific components and rolling out in scale to production, right? Same with AI. I mean, you need to have a mechanism to help you manage AI design and deployment end-to-end within you know, in a very automated fashion in your organization. Without building these sort of fundamental components in organizations, you will not be able to scale, you know, every AI model that you adopt within the organization. So the main focus for AI engineering in general, dedicated AI team, well-matured AI organizations should double down in AI engineering capabilities and practices within the organizations, right? And you need to understand that these AI engineering practices and capabilities will help you even, you know, ready your data when it comes to AI. adoptions. Gen-AI or normal AI? Traditional AI using the different AI techniques that we talked about earlier. And again, you know, mature organization doubled down in AI engineering and you can see here the top AI engineering practices relating to testing, developing AI solutions, and deploying AI solutions. If you focus on the developing AI solutions you will relate to the composable and reusable sort of components that you need to lay down if you want to really become serious when it comes to AI adoption in your organizations. Now it is, it is even more difficult to get it done. Okay, so basically AI design patterns are very similar to software design, software engineering design patterns. You, if you don’t come from that field, they’re nothing but Lego blocks, right? Lego blocks you could connect them like this or like that to actually come up with a specific shape that you have in mind. But basically AI design patterns help you to bridge the different use cases with the right AI solution architecture that you have in, that you want to build for your organization. And I’ll have one example in the next slide. So this example relates to clopping, you know, what we call retriever research model or RAG, retrieval augmented generation, with the general, you know, gen AI large language model. So basically, retrieval augmented generation happens to serve multiple use cases within the organization, whether related to customer intimacy or operational excellence or other sort of scenario like employee productivity or others. But basically this, you know, component here could be reused across many other AI adoption techniques and scenarios within the organization and you could clop it with the right LLM model that you could employ for the specific use cases that we, you want to really scale in your organization. But basically, you know, build that as a Lego component or as a reusable sort of component will help you to adopt other use cases in your organizations. And the third sort of teaching from the survey that we’ve done is the focus on upscaling and change management. So upscaling alone, you know, focusing on the AI associated should not be your only concern. You need to think about how you could, you know, adopt AI literacy programs within the overall organizations that help, you know, every associate within the organization understand the capability of AI and how they could use AI in their context. And this is where gen AI literacy or AI literacy programs could help. But definitely change management and we will see in a moment, you know, how change management techniques and activities could help you maximize the value related to your organizations across different, you know, spectrums and domains. So as we see here from that case study, basically this, you know, case study or the lesson that I want to highlight in this case study is that you need to be systematic when it comes to upscaling your associates within the organization. I mean, you should not focus only on the pros who use and reuse and create AI models or become really, you know, strong prompt engineers, but also focus on the bigger sort of group that may not really need advanced capabilities when it comes to AI, but they need moderate sort of capability. But the general, you know, associate having online courses that could be distributed across will help you to really reach every single associate within the organization. And basically, you know, that layering sort of systematic approach when it comes to AI literacy or adopting AI in your organization is very important to reach out more people. And again, change management is very important and change management, you know, techniques will help you to maximize the business outcomes when it comes to cost-saving, risk management, customer experience, or even productivity for employees. Without the right change management applications, you will not be able to reach very high, you know, sort of impact when it comes to the different, you know, values when it comes to business outcomes. And the last thing that I want to focus on is AI governance in general. And basically, AI trust, risk, and security management is one of the frameworks that we often highlight in Gartner, and it basically focuses on the fact that governance is being applied by diverse roles. AI associates or AI savvy people will not help you to reach high AI governance. You need to think about the different dimensions and different food or different perspective that needs to be put in place by these diverse diversity of roles. And the budget authority, especially when it comes to AI privacy and security, is very important. I mean, they need to be owned by a central unit that helps you to adopt the governance mechanism that is related. And business impact, when it comes to breaching or enabling AI privacy, is very important. So again, I mean, the AI tourism and or AI framework will help you to apply the governance mechanism, utilizing different components in the AI tourism technologies, and connecting with AI systems and the organizational governance practices that you have in your organization. And the last thing, you know, I just want to highlight is that AI adoption phases of maturity. And often, we focus on what’s, you know, above the surface rather than, you know, build strong roots that will help you really mature with time and reuse these components as you go. And this is just, you know, a rub to everything that I said and everything that Dr. Lamia said, you know, the opportunity is big when it comes to AI adoption. And you need to pick the right AI models using the right formula that was described earlier, you know, and the four lessons that I’ve gone through, whether it is related to picking the right operating model, a hybrid in that case, and utilizing AI engineering and upskilling literacy and the literacy program, as well as investing in AI trust and security management in general. This is very important to really, really push the needle forward and become an AI mature organization. Thank you very much. We’ll stay around if you have any questions. Any questions? Yeah, go ahead. No, it’s fine, because the people on the web, they need to hear you, but I can’t hear you now. Go ahead. Well, basically, they focus on the next big thing. They focus on the shiny object rather than on the fundamentals. I mean, you need to really focus on the fundamentals and, you know, instill and root out, you know, the different foundational components in your organization. Without this, right, you may be successful in one AI use case. You may be successful in one AI specific business process or business unit, but you will not be able to really scale different AI models across the whole organization. So, basically, AI maturity, it relates to AI maturity. If you want to really become, you know, AI-enabled organization in different, you know, regional and different business units, you need the foundation. So, they do not focus on the foundation. Yeah, it’s fine, it’s fine, we can hear you.

Audience: How can we improve our self-confidence? Like, even for AI engineers, I have some friends who are doing some projects for me, how to use metamorphosis. So, they are basically developing AI to develop AI. So, how can we improve our self-confidence in AI?

Dr. Lamya Alomair: Very great question. Upscaling ourselves is very important, as I mentioned before. Your question is very great, that how we can upscale faster, that doesn’t happen. I am really glad that this question has come in. Actually, usually, when you look at what is happening, usually, I’m looking at what is next. So, just keep continuing what you’re doing. Yeah, I know. There is a book I was reading that says the future is faster than what you do. Really, the future is faster. So, we have to upscale ourselves in the area that we have.

Agreement Points

Importance of AI foundations and fundamentals

speakers

Dr. Lamya Alomair

Abdullah Alshamrani

arguments

History and Foundations of AI

Focusing on AI engineering practices and pipelines

summary

Both speakers emphasized the importance of understanding AI foundations and implementing fundamental practices for successful AI adoption.

Need for continuous learning and upskilling in AI

speakers

Dr. Lamya Alomair

Abdullah Alshamrani

arguments

Need for continuous upskilling in AI

Prioritizing upskilling and change management

summary

The speakers agreed on the critical need for ongoing learning and skill development in AI for both individuals and organizations.

Impact of generative AI on overall AI adoption

speakers

Dr. Lamya Alomair

Abdullah Alshamrani

arguments

Generative AI’s rapid rise to prominence in organizations

Increased focus on AI upskilling and governance

summary

Both speakers highlighted the significant impact of generative AI on accelerating overall AI adoption and increasing focus on related skills and governance.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the technical foundations of AI, with Dr. Alomair focusing on cognitive systems and Alshamrani on engineering practices, highlighting the importance of understanding and implementing core AI concepts.

speakers

Dr. Lamya Alomair

Abdullah Alshamrani

arguments

Cognitive systems as the basis of AI

Focusing on AI engineering practices and pipelines

The speakers shared the view that continuous learning and adaptation are crucial in the rapidly evolving field of AI, emphasizing the need for ongoing skill development and change management.

speakers

Dr. Lamya Alomair

Abdullah Alshamrani

arguments

Importance of staying updated with AI developments

Prioritizing upskilling and change management

Unexpected Consensus

Challenges in AI adoption

speakers

Abdullah Alshamrani

Audience

arguments

High failure rate and long pilot times for AI projects

Building self-confidence in AI capabilities

explanation

While Alshamrani focused on organizational challenges in AI adoption, the audience question about self-confidence unexpectedly highlighted a personal dimension to these challenges, suggesting a broader consensus on the difficulties faced in AI implementation at both organizational and individual levels.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement centered around the importance of AI foundations, continuous learning, the impact of generative AI, and the challenges in AI adoption.

Consensus level

There was a high level of consensus among the speakers on fundamental aspects of AI adoption and development. This consensus implies a shared understanding of the critical factors for successful AI implementation, which could guide future strategies and policies in AI development and adoption.

Different Viewpoints

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

No significant areas of disagreement were identified among the speakers.

difference_level

The level of disagreement appears to be minimal or non-existent. The speakers presented complementary information on AI adoption, challenges, and best practices without contradicting each other. This alignment in perspectives suggests a cohesive understanding of the topic at hand, which may contribute to a more unified approach to AI implementation and maturity in organizations.

Partial Agreements

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasized the technical foundations of AI, with Dr. Alomair focusing on cognitive systems and Alshamrani on engineering practices, highlighting the importance of understanding and implementing core AI concepts.

speakers

Dr. Lamya Alomair

Abdullah Alshamrani

arguments

Cognitive systems as the basis of AI

Focusing on AI engineering practices and pipelines

The speakers shared the view that continuous learning and adaptation are crucial in the rapidly evolving field of AI, emphasizing the need for ongoing skill development and change management.

speakers

Dr. Lamya Alomair

Abdullah Alshamrani

arguments

Importance of staying updated with AI developments

Prioritizing upskilling and change management

Key Takeaways

AI adoption has doubled in organizations over the past two years, with generative AI driving increased interest and implementation

Only about 10% of surveyed organizations are considered AI mature, applying AI across multiple business units and processes

Major challenges in AI adoption include lack of trust, business alignment, data quality issues, and difficulty demonstrating value

Key practices for AI maturity include implementing a hybrid operating model, focusing on AI engineering, prioritizing upskilling, and establishing robust governance

Organizations should focus on building strong foundations for AI rather than chasing the latest trends or ‘shiny objects’

Resolutions and Action Items

Organizations should implement AI literacy programs to upskill employees at all levels

Develop reusable AI components and design patterns to scale AI adoption across the organization

Establish a hybrid AI operating model with centralized capabilities working alongside business units

Invest in AI engineering practices and pipelines to manage AI development and deployment

Implement comprehensive AI governance frameworks addressing trust, risk, and security

Unresolved Issues

Specific strategies to reduce the high failure rate (52%) of AI projects

Methods to shorten the long pilot times (average 8 months) for AI initiatives

Detailed approaches for estimating and demonstrating AI value to overcome adoption barriers

Concrete steps for organizations to transition from piloting to scaling AI use cases

Suggested Compromises

Balancing centralized AI capabilities with distributed implementation across business units through a hybrid model

Focusing on both technical AI skills and broader AI literacy across the organization

Combining off-the-shelf AI models with custom solutions tailored to specific organizational needs

With the fourth industrial revolution, there is one more ability that comes with AI. It improves our cognitive thinking. So here, what I’m saying, that with AI, our cognitive ability is moving.

speaker

Dr. Lamya Alomair

reason

This comment frames AI as a transformative technology that enhances human cognitive abilities, positioning it as the next step in human progress.

impact

It set the tone for the discussion by emphasizing the profound impact of AI on human capabilities, leading to a deeper exploration of AI’s potential and challenges.

Gen AI, or the part that demonstrate where gen AI has really made an impact in the overall AI adoption, then the part that talks about the challenges related to overall AI adoption, particularly gen AI in specific, and the last one is to dissect the common practices around AI adoption within the organizations.

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

reason

This comment structured the discussion into key areas, providing a framework for understanding the complex landscape of AI adoption.

impact

It guided the flow of the presentation, allowing for a systematic exploration of AI’s impact, challenges, and best practices in organizational settings.

52% is not an easy number. 52% is a very large number. You know, you take an AI project, you pilot it for, you know, a number of months, as we will see in the next slide, then you ended up in throwing it, why? Because you could not really realize a break-even sort of point when it comes to the cost and value of these, of running these AI models or scaling them later on in production.

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

reason

This insight highlights the significant challenges in implementing AI projects successfully, challenging the notion that AI adoption is straightforward.

impact

It shifted the discussion towards a more realistic view of AI implementation, emphasizing the need for careful planning and value assessment in AI projects.

You need to focus on the foundational elements as we will go through in a moment. So as I said, you know, AI, you know, in the previous diagram, the ones on the top are really shiny and you need to shy away from shiny objects when it comes to AI, and really be laser focused when it comes to the foundational and fundamental components of AI that will help you to really scale and reach the five use cases, different business units, and business processes

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

reason

This comment emphasizes the importance of focusing on foundational elements rather than being distracted by trendy AI applications.

impact

It redirected the discussion towards practical considerations for successful AI implementation, encouraging a more grounded approach to AI adoption.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by providing a comprehensive view of AI’s transformative potential, while also highlighting the practical challenges of implementation. The speakers moved the conversation from theoretical possibilities to concrete strategies for successful AI adoption in organizations. They emphasized the need for a structured approach, focusing on foundational elements and realistic expectations, rather than being swayed by hype. This balanced perspective encouraged a more nuanced understanding of AI’s role in business and society.

How can we improve our self-confidence in AI?

speaker

Audience member

explanation

This question addresses the psychological aspect of working with AI, which is important for AI engineers and practitioners to effectively develop and implement AI solutions.

How to upskill faster in AI?

speaker

Dr. Lamya Alomair (in response to audience question)

explanation

This is crucial for keeping pace with the rapidly evolving field of AI and ensuring professionals can adapt to new developments.

How to effectively implement AI literacy programs across an organization?

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

explanation

This is important for ensuring widespread understanding and adoption of AI technologies throughout an organization.

What are the best practices for developing a hybrid AI operating model?

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

explanation

Understanding how to balance centralized and distributed AI capabilities is crucial for scaling AI adoption across an organization.

How can organizations improve their AI engineering practices and pipelines?

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

explanation

This is essential for efficiently managing AI design and deployment at scale within organizations.

What are effective strategies for AI change management?

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

explanation

This is important for maximizing business outcomes and value realization from AI implementations.

How can organizations effectively implement AI governance frameworks?

speaker

Abdullah Alshamrani

explanation

This is crucial for managing AI trust, risk, and security across diverse roles and perspectives within an organization.