WS #271 Data Agency Scaling Next Gen Digital Economy Infrastructure

Summary

This workshop at the Internet Governance Forum focused on scaling next-generation digital infrastructure to enable greater data agency and create a fairer data economy. The discussion was organized by Project Liberty Institute and centered around their Fair Data Economy Task Force recommendations, which propose redistributing economic power from centralized platforms to individuals and communities.

The panelists presented concrete examples of alternative digital infrastructures already operating at scale. Sujith Nair from FIDE described the Beckn Protocol, which enables interoperability in India’s digital commerce through an open network serving millions of users, including taxi drivers and small businesses who can retain control over their data and pricing. Wes Biggs explained how the Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP) creates universal social graphs and identity systems that allow users to port their data between applications without being locked into single platforms.

A key theme emerged around the importance of demonstrating tangible value to users rather than expecting them to understand technical concepts like interoperability or decentralization. The speakers emphasized that successful adoption requires meeting people where they are and building on existing social structures and relationships. Sujith Nair illustrated this with examples from India’s digital infrastructure projects, such as embedding QR codes in textbooks to create educational portals that teachers and students could easily access.

The discussion also addressed governance challenges and the need for inclusive participation in designing these systems. Wendy Seltzer highlighted the importance of participatory design that includes diverse perspectives and lived experiences, not just technical expertise. Jean-Bertrand Azapmo from the African Union emphasized that governments alone cannot build the necessary infrastructure and that multi-stakeholder partnerships with private sector investment are essential, particularly given that many countries spend more on debt payments than they can invest in digital infrastructure.

The conversation concluded with recognition that scaling these alternative infrastructures requires systemic change across four areas: entrepreneurship and new business models, next-generation digital infrastructure, policy innovation, and strategic capital allocation. The panelists agreed that this represents a multi-trillion dollar opportunity that could significantly contribute to sustainable development goals while ensuring digital sovereignty and data agency for individuals and communities worldwide.

Keypoints

## Major Discussion Points:

– **Fair Data Economy and Alternative Digital Infrastructure**: The discussion centered on moving away from centralized platform-based models toward decentralized protocols that give users agency over their data. Examples included DSNP (Decentralized Social Networking Protocol), Beckn Protocol, and other alternatives that redistribute value and control from big tech platforms back to individuals and communities.

– **Scaling Technical Solutions Through User-Centric Design**: A key theme was bridging the gap between technical innovation and user adoption. Speakers emphasized the importance of meeting users where they are rather than expecting them to understand complex technical concepts, with Beckn Protocol’s success in India (200+ million transactions) serving as a prime example of making interoperability valuable to everyday users like taxi drivers and small shop owners.

– **Interoperability as a Core Enabler**: The panelists discussed how interoperability between different protocols and platforms is essential for breaking network effects that keep users locked into centralized systems. This includes technical interoperability as well as governance frameworks that enable cooperation between different stakeholders.

– **Multi-Stakeholder Investment and Systemic Change**: The conversation highlighted that scaling alternative digital infrastructure requires coordinated action across four pillars: entrepreneurship and new business models, next-generation technical infrastructure, policy innovation, and strategic capital allocation. Government investment alone is insufficient, requiring private sector and philanthropic participation.

– **Global Perspective on Digital Infrastructure**: Speakers addressed how digital public infrastructure could unlock 3-13% GDP growth for emerging economies, with particular focus on Africa’s digital transformation strategy and the need for inclusive governance that represents diverse global perspectives and technical sophistication levels.

## Overall Purpose:

The discussion aimed to explore how alternative digital infrastructures and protocols can be scaled to create a “fair data economy” that gives individuals and communities more control over their data and digital lives, moving beyond the current centralized platform model toward more distributed, interoperable systems.

## Overall Tone:

The tone was consistently optimistic and collaborative throughout, with speakers building on each other’s ideas rather than debating. The conversation maintained a forward-looking, solution-oriented approach, combining technical expertise with practical examples of successful implementations. While acknowledging significant challenges in scaling these alternatives, the overall sentiment was one of possibility and momentum, with concrete examples demonstrating that these concepts are already working at scale in various contexts.

Speakers

– **Sarah Leif**: Project Liberty Institute (moderator/host)

– **Paul Fehlinger**: Project Liberty Institute, Fair Data Economy Task Force coordinator (online participant)

– **Sujith Nair**: CEO and co-founder of FIDE, member of Fair Data Economy Task Force

– **Wes Biggs**: Vice President and Chief Architect of DSNP and Frequency

– **Wendy Seltzer**: DSNP advisor, co-chair of DSNP governance working group

– **Jean-Bertrand Azapmo**: Principal advisor to the African Union Commissioner for Economic Development, Trade, Tourism, Industry and Minerals, member of Fair Data Economy Task Force (online participant)

– **Xianhong Hu**: UNESCO representative (online participant)

– **Audience**:

**Additional speakers:**

– **Veronica**: Youth Pirate Party of Sweden representative

# Scaling Next-Generation Digital Infrastructure for a Fair Data Economy: Workshop Report

## Introduction and Context

This workshop at the Internet Governance Forum, organized by the Project Liberty Institute, examined how next-generation digital infrastructure can be scaled to enable greater data agency and create a fairer data economy. The session featured Sarah Leif from Project Liberty Institute as moderator, alongside panelists Paul Fehlinger (Fair Data Economy Task Force coordinator), Sujith Nair (CEO of FIDE), Wes Biggs (Vice President and Chief Architect of DSNP and Frequency), and Wendy Seltzer (DSNP advisor and governance expert). Online participants included Xianhong Hu from UNESCO and Jean-Bertrand Azapmo from the African Union, though technical difficulties prevented Jean-Bertrand from joining until near the end of the session.

Sarah Leif opened by explaining Project Liberty Institute’s “North Star” of giving people “voice, choice and stake in their digital life,” setting the stage for a discussion focused on practical examples of alternative digital infrastructure that preserves user agency while achieving meaningful scale.

## The Case for Digital Infrastructure Transformation

Paul Fehlinger articulated the fundamental problems with current digital economy models, arguing that existing business models and infrastructure create negative externalities affecting market structures, societies, and democracies. He emphasized the need to “rewire the data economy to build a better ecosystem that works for all actors with people having agency over their data.”

The Fair Data Economy Task Force, whose recommendations were published nine months prior to this workshop, proposes a fundamental redistribution of economic power from centralized platforms to individuals and communities. Fehlinger outlined four key areas requiring coordinated action: entrepreneurship and new business models, next-generation digital infrastructure, policy innovation, and strategic capital allocation.

Sarah Leif reinforced this perspective by highlighting how digital infrastructure design fundamentally affects whether economic power becomes concentrated or distributed, and whether innovation is stifled or encouraged.

## Concrete Examples of Alternative Digital Infrastructure

### The Beckn Protocol: Interoperability in Practice

Sujith Nair presented the Beckn Protocol as a compelling example of how alternative digital infrastructure can achieve scale while preserving user agency. The protocol enables interoperability by allowing consumers and providers to transact without being locked into single platforms, giving users control over their data and revenue streams.

The protocol has processed over 200 million transactions across multiple sectors in India, including transportation, retail, and education. Nair provided practical examples of the impact: taxi drivers who can now control their own pricing and data, and small shop owners who can participate in digital commerce without surrendering control to platform intermediaries.

Particularly noteworthy was Nair’s example of embedding QR codes in textbooks to create educational portals. This approach leveraged existing social infrastructure—the widespread availability of textbooks—rather than attempting to replace existing systems. As Nair explained, “We don’t think about society rising up to the level of technology. It’s the other way. We think about taking technology to the level where the society operates.”

### DSNP: Decentralized Social Networking Infrastructure

Wes Biggs outlined how the Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP) addresses the limitations of centralized social media platforms. DSNP avoids single points of failure and creates consensus mechanisms where no single entity can override the system.

The protocol provides key capabilities including long-lived identity, attestation features, universal social graphs, and social content that can be ported between applications. Biggs emphasized that DSNP maintains the ability for anonymity and pseudonymity online, allowing users to maintain multiple personas across different communication contexts—a crucial feature for protecting user privacy and autonomy.

## User-Centered Design and Adoption

A central theme throughout the discussion was the importance of designing technology around user needs rather than expecting users to adapt to technical complexity. Sujith Nair articulated this principle clearly, noting that users don’t care about technical terms like “interoperability”—they need to see practical value in their daily lives.

This user-centric approach challenges common assumptions in the decentralized technology community about the need for user education on technical principles. Instead, the speakers advocated for hiding technical complexity while preserving user agency and control.

Wes Biggs supported this perspective by emphasizing the need to “create languages where people can express what usefulness means to them and translate that into technical protocol choices.” Sarah Leif acknowledged the ongoing challenge that most users remain on centralized platforms despite available alternatives, indicating that the scalability problem extends beyond technical capabilities to user experience and value proposition design.

## Governance as a Techno-Social Challenge

Wendy Seltzer introduced crucial perspectives on governance, emphasizing that “building sustainable interoperable systems requires aligning incentives across all ecosystem participants, not just technical solutions.” She advocated for participatory design that recognizes expertise in multiple forms, arguing that lived experience is as important as technological or legal expertise in creating equitable systems.

Seltzer framed the challenge as fundamentally “techno-social,” requiring attention to social and economic incentives alongside technical specifications. This perspective challenges traditional hierarchies in technology development and suggests that genuine inclusion of diverse stakeholders is essential for creating equitable systems.

An interesting point emerged around the sequencing of governance and adoption. Sujith Nair advocated for an adoption-first approach, suggesting that demonstrating value to users should precede formal governance structures, which can then be developed to stabilize successful implementations.

## Investment and Economic Models

Paul Fehlinger highlighted the critical importance of capital mobilization, noting that “nothing works without money” and emphasizing the need to mobilize smart capital across private markets with innovative financing mechanisms. He called for creating centers of gravity for impact-focused entrepreneurship that rethinks value distribution and creates new business models.

When Jean-Bertrand Azapmo was able to join the discussion near the end, he provided context from an African perspective, noting that digital public infrastructure can unlock significant economic value. He cited examples like M-Pesa in Kenya to demonstrate how private sector leadership can drive successful digital infrastructure development, particularly important given the resource constraints facing many governments.

## Technical Implementation and Privacy Considerations

The technical discussion revealed key principles for designing scalable alternative digital infrastructure. Both DSNP and Beckn Protocol demonstrate how interoperability can be achieved while preserving user control and data agency, enabling users to port their data and relationships between applications.

A question from Veronica, representing the Youth Pirate Party of Sweden, raised important concerns about preserving anonymity rights in interconnected systems. The challenge of maintaining separate digital personas across different contexts while enabling interoperability represents an ongoing technical and governance consideration that requires careful balance between connectivity and privacy.

## Regional Perspectives and Implementation

Xianhong Hu from UNESCO raised questions about institutional design, asking whether governments should create new institutions for data agency and stewardship or expand existing data protection authorities. This reflects the broader challenge of balancing data protection with harnessing data’s economic potential.

The discussion suggested that government roles should focus on creating enabling environments rather than direct infrastructure provision, though the specific institutional mechanisms for supporting fair data economy development remain an area requiring further exploration.

## Key Insights and Remaining Challenges

The workshop demonstrated both significant progress in developing alternative digital infrastructure and substantial challenges in scaling these solutions. The concrete examples of Beckn Protocol and DSNP show that interoperable, user-controlled digital infrastructure can work at meaningful scale.

Several implementation challenges remain unresolved, including specific mechanisms for bridging existing alternative solutions, strategies for overcoming network effects that keep users on centralized platforms, and detailed approaches for mobilizing private capital at scale.

The speakers agreed on fundamental principles including the need for user agency, the importance of user-centered design, and the necessity of multi-stakeholder collaboration. However, time constraints prevented full exploration of regional variations and detailed discussion of specific implementation strategies.

## Conclusion

This workshop highlighted the potential for alternative digital infrastructure to create more equitable data economies while demonstrating that such systems can achieve meaningful scale. The emphasis on user-centered design, inclusive governance, and sustainable financing models provides a foundation for continued development of fair data economy solutions.

The examples presented show that success requires meeting users where they are rather than expecting them to understand complex protocols, building on existing social structures rather than replacing them, and creating immediate practical value while preserving long-term user agency. The path forward requires continued collaboration across technical, governance, policy, and financing domains, with particular attention to ensuring that solutions serve real user needs rather than abstract technical ideals.

Sarah Leif: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to all onsite and online participants for this workshop where you’ll hear a great set of speakers. We have both online and onsite today. We will dedicate a few minutes at the end for direct exchanges so you can already get ready and prepare your questions and remarks. Digital infrastructure. This is what we’re here to talk about today. Digital infrastructure underpins the economy of today, but also the economy of tomorrow. From broadband network, data centers, cloud services to protocols and standards that ensure interoperability of tech platform services and system. How digital infrastructure is designed affects the degree to which economic power is concentrated or distributed, how innovation is stifled or encouraged and prosperity is available to the many or to a few. The stakes for digital infrastructure have never been higher. Rapid advances in technologies, in particular, generative AI, are not only transforming the nature of work and everyday life, but also it is redefining the meaning of sovereignty on the individual level, but also for communities and countries across the globe. So making data agency is all the more necessary. And at Project Liberty Institute, we are guided by a North Star, giving people a voice, a choice and stake in their digital life. And a technical solution to allow such a scenario need to be built, scaled, but also, most importantly, adopted. So our common grounds between the IGF theme this year is building, building sustainable and responsible innovation, building digital. trust, resilience, and so on. And the good news today is that we have many builders around the table. Builders of alternative digital infrastructures, of protocols, of business models, of governance approaches. And all of what we are doing, and which you’ll hear about today, resonates with what we call the Fair Data Economy, and particularly the Fair Data Economy Recommendations. They were developed last November by Project Liberty Institute and its impressive task force. So I will now hand it over to my colleague Paul Fellinger to kick off the discussion and tell us more about this concept of a fair data economy. And Paul will be online today.

Paul Fehlinger: Hello, greetings to all of you. Good morning. I wish I could be there in person in Norway on this 20th anniversary Internet Governance Forum. So the Fair Data Economy Task Force is really a foundational initiative for Project Liberty Institute. The task force launched its recommendations about nine months ago at the Project Liberty Summit that took then place in Washington DC. And it followed six months of really intense international multi-stakeholder work. And the Fair Data Economy Task Force is composed of 18 distinguished members, spanning all stakeholder groups, international organizations, governments, innovators, entrepreneurs, investors, builders of technical infrastructure, as well as leading academics, and even Darren Acemoglu, who won last year the Nobel Prize in Economics. In total, the task force spanned members from 10 countries all around the world. And as Sarah said in her opening remarks, the current status quo of the digital economy has negative externalities, on-market structures, on the very fabric of societies and, well, our democracies. And to a large extent, this is linked to the business models and the underpinning infrastructure that enables it on the internet. And the current status quo is not really great for entrepreneurs. It is not really great for people and users of technology. And it’s really not great for majority of investors either. So the question is, how could we rewire the data economy? Can we build a better ecosystem that works for all different actors? And how can we build a better data economy where people have agency over their data that is on firm economic grounds that can scale? So to do this, the task was published its blueprint for innovation and growth across four areas, next generation digital infrastructure as a key enabler, business model innovation and entrepreneurship, policy innovation and capital allocation. And we are very pleased that we have in this distinguished panel that you will get to know in just a second, two members of the Fair Data Economy Task Force. We have with us today Jean-Bertrand Azapmo, who’s the principal advisor to the African Union Commissioner for Economic Development, Trade, Tourism, Industry and Minerals. He should be online, but he is not online yet. So we will see if he can join us momentarily. So I would like to start and give the floor to Sujith Nair Nair, who’s the CEO and co-founder of FIDE. And in many ways, FIDE is implementing already in the market at incredible scale in India, what the Fair Data Economy Task Force has been talking about in its recommendations, which is business model innovation really powered by next generation digital infrastructure. So Sujith Nair, I would like to start with you and give you the floor. Can you tell us a bit more about the back end? And how it embodies this approach of a fair data economy and what is the role of the infrastructure protocol backend in enabling a better data economy?

Sujith Nair: Thank you, Paul. So backend essentially, of course, is an open protocol that embodies interoperability fundamentally. This idea of backend protocol was to an attempt to reimagine how in an online economy we move value, how we put people, communities, and businesses at the center of their own sort of economic, social, commercial lives by giving them agency on how they hold and keep data and share data, but more importantly, translate data into value. So backend protocol does fundamentally allow a transaction, exchange of value, how you express, discover, engage, contract, and fulfill an offtake value between any consumer and a provider. As actors, how do you do that? And it’s an imagination that tries to make a departure from this very incumbent thinking of a platform-based movement of value. In fact, what you see with the platforms and marketplaces as we are seeing today, and it’s a rapid sort of evolution in the last two decades, is a way for both consumers and providers to be necessarily on the same platform managed by one platform intermediary and in the pretext of discovering, sharing goods and services or any form of value on that platform, you have this model of both having to be on the same platform, operated as a closed platform and allowing the value to remain on the platform as a capture of value rather than a free flow of value. So from a fair data economic principles, what Becken protocol does is fundamentally unlock that agency for any consumer and provider. It could be a taxi driver. We have about half a million taxi drivers in India, not necessarily on these big ride-hailing platforms, but use Becken to, A, discover rides and service those rides and keep the entire revenue to themselves. There is no big commissions by the intermediate platforms because there’s no such platform using Becken protocol. It’s an open network where everybody brings their end of the node to this and the drivers also get to have the holdership of their own data. Today when the drivers have to move from one platform to the other, they don’t have access agency to keeping their data, be it their ride reputation or ride history and things like that. Becken protocol allows you to port that data to any other platform and continue from the new platform they’ve opted to be part of. So this ability to retain holdership of data, expressing data and services, goods and services, and ability to discover parties who would like to do transactions business with you and therefore amplify your economic value of the work and the services you offer is essentially a way of thinking with Becken protocol. And that’s how we are trying to bring some of this fair data economic principles making into the fundamental architecture of how we think about value exchange happens in an online economy. Paul, back to you.

Paul Fehlinger: We’re still waiting for Jean Bertrand to join it. I hope he doesn’t have major technical problems to connect, but maybe, Sujith Nair, can I ask you the question, sort of, what for you is the main takeaway and message to the entire ecosystem gathered here at the Internet Governance Forum worldwide, the builders, the investors, the entrepreneurs? the consumers, the policy makers that came out of this intense international multi-stakeholder work that we did together in the Fair Data Economy Task Force. Yeah, sure. I think one of the remarkable outcomes of that effort is how we have seen agreement on some universal principles of how we think a fair data economy of the future should operate, the principles of moving agency to the ends, allowing, like I said, peoples and business to be in the center and not the big platforms, and reimagining the possibilities of how we create value. When we take this departure from having these models of lone heroes as big platforms trying to solve problems for the whole of humanity, but this idea that with these principles you can distribute that ability to solve, distribute that agency, and allow everybody to participate in their own way, retaining their agency and autonomy, for me is something fundamental. And it’s heartening to see there are protocols like the DSNP protocol of Project Liberty, Beckham protocol, all of them aligning to those principles and vision and taking that forward. Of course, it also is a wake-up call to see how we need to do a lot more beyond the formulations of the principles that the task force has put together, but to put them into practice and drive. Civil society, market players, policymakers all come and fundamentally think about this as the core central principles of how we think about the evolution of the online economy and make it contextually relevant to the varying needs and cares of different regions. I’m here in Oslo also to have some conversations around the whole coming opportunity and the challenge of energy transition and what does it mean to to make countries in Africa and India and in Europe sort of build reliable, secure agency and energy independence as an individual, as an economy. And these are some of the conversations which also fundamentally need to bring aspects of fair data principles into the conversation for how we think about future of energy. I mean, I’m trying to make an example out of energy, but the idea is that it’s so fundamental that it cuts across multiple sectors, not just commerce, not just some part of digital payments, but more foundational aspects of our society like access to energy. So I think it’s a very pertinent set of principles that we must consider in all walks of life as we become increasingly digitally native in our lives. Yeah. Thank you, Paul. Thank you so much, Sujith Nairh and all of you at the IGF. You can find the recommendations of the Fair Data Economy Task Force on the website ProjectLiberty.io. And Sujith Nairh, you gave the perfect segue. This is about scaling next generation digital infrastructure for data agency, which is the title of our session today. And with this perfect segue, I want to give it back to Sarah on site in Norway to continue the discussion and introduce us to our next speaker. Thank you very much, Paul.

Sarah Leif: So you mentioned actually, Sujith Nairh, and thank you for that, the DSNP. So I’d like to hand it over to Vice President and Chief Architect of DSNP and Frequency, Wes Biggs. We talked about transparency. We talked about redistributing value. We talked about giving people more power over their data. So it seems that data agency is probably the core component and the common ground that we’re talking about today. And it seems also that data agency is a core architecture principle of the decentralized social. networking protocol. So Wes, could I turn to you and to tell the room here in person and online how technically does the DSNP work? How does it embody this principle of data agency for its almost two million users today?

Wes Biggs: Thanks Sarah and great to see everyone here. As you mentioned I’m a technology architect and contributor to DSNP, consensus seeker perhaps with our diverse set of technologists, academics, civil society advisors working on the protocol. It is a protocol stewarded by the Project Liberty Institute under an open governance model that I think you’ll hear more about. And the origin of DSNP is really the realization, and I think this is very much tied to this fair data economy piece, that the web 2.0 model which did great things for people, connect people in new and fundamental ways, but it was mediated always by centralized platforms. And those platforms have been designed and optimized to extract the value of the network effects that are created in these systems by the participants. So from a fundamental point of view, DSNP is about taking the network effects out of the network and sharing that value between all the stakeholders that are participating. And to do that we start at the very low level, at the protocol level, where we want to talk about not applications but how systems can communicate with one another on a fundamental level. And that means data and the operations on that data and how that flows across connected spaces. We start with DSNP by challenging that simple assertion of the centralized system. And I’ll quote from the specification, to ensure decentralization, a DSMP system must avoid having any single point of failure, and must avoid having any single entity that can override its consensus mechanisms. So we talk about a consensus system, which is a technical term that has evolved very rapidly over the past decade or so. You fit blockchains and other systems within that, public permissionless blockchains, for example, and it creates a system where no single business, company, computer is in charge of the way the system operates. Starting with that fundamental principle, we can build things on top of that. We can build affordances for starting with identity, and identity being something that can be long lived for users of social networking services. It can be human friendly, it doesn’t have to be a cryptographic wallet that everyone has to remember their password for. It can be, however, cryptographically strong with these systems in order to provide control and agency over the data that is then attached and accumulated with this identity over time in the public space. One of the core things that comes quickly after identity is this idea of attestation, the idea of having verified attributes that can be part of one’s identity in the social spaces, and that might be professional credentials, that might be simply proof of your own humanness versus an AI or a bot. These things can go into the protocol, and then we move to more abstract ideas that underpin the social fabric that we’ve seen across lots of different applications, but in unconnected ways. We want to create a universal social graph. that can establish connections that are long lived outside the context of one application that can then be ported and used interoperably between many applications that participate using the same protocol. That social graph can be, you know, your friendships, your connections, your followings on social media, and those are all now relationships that can live on outside the life cycle of any particular application that you use to access your social network. And finally, there are affordances around social content, social media, that we’ve seen across all the varying and often quickly evolving areas of social media as well, so this is not fundamentally just about text or video or anything like that, but a protocol for any of those types of communications that we want to connect our social networks with over time. And really, you know, overall this comes back to this economic principle that we are allowing, with this protocol layer, an innovation of economic models for the applications that participate in the social networking sphere, and that can move away then from a focus that drives toward always an ad tech surveillance model, so there’s value exchange for all the participants involved.

Sarah Leif: Thank you very much, Wes. So, with the example of FIDE, with Backend, with DSNP, and all those protocols, and there are many others that are existing, I’m thinking of the AT protocol and others, these examples exist. They’re in practice, and people can use them. So, many alternative governance models, technical innovation, they’re today available for use. However, it seems that most users are still kind of stuck on the platforms of the centralized digital economy. So let me turn over to Wendy. Wendy, as a DSNP advisor and the co-chair and the chair of the DSNP governance working group, you’ve been thinking about these questions of governance a lot for these last years. I have a more governance and technical question at the same time for you, which is how can we bridge all these solutions that are existing somewhere on the ecosystem, but somewhat not scalable enough to gather enough users? What’s missing today for this solution to truly collaborate better to represent this scalable alternative to a centralized digital economy? Is this something that we’re doing wrong or something that we’re still not doing about this?

Wendy Seltzer: Thank you very much, Sarah, and thank you to our hosts and everyone here. I think it’s tempting to answer your question with the universal computer science answer. Take a hard problem, add another layer of abstraction, and you have the answer. So among all of the existing protocols and places where people are today, you could say add another layer above of an interchange layer, add standards for data exchange among them, import and export of data, make regulation to enforce the availability of those. You might get there, and there’s promising work in standards development for interoperability. There’s promising work from regulators thinking about how to make platforms provide for their end-users, for the individuals, the ability to take their own data and have control of where they express it. And there’s work in cooperation frameworks, governance frameworks, to think about what would it take to give people confidence that when they took their data from one platform to another, they would be able to preserve the terms they wanted for that and not just be turning it over to different terms of control by another proprietary system. And yet, I think we need to look at this as a techno-social challenge, that it’s not just a matter of building interoperable tech and the people will come and the solutions will come out of that. It’s also a matter of figuring out how we as society and as builders of ecosystems will align the incentives so that there are stable configurations that preserve interoperability. And one of the values of these multi-stakeholder dialogues is as opportunities to find solutions that serve the needs of the various participants in the ecosystem. It’s not enough for the end-users to be supplicants to businesses saying, please, please give us our data. they should also be able to present themselves as as customers, as collaboratives, as communities on equal footing to say we bring value to the ecosystem by our participation there and we will only bring it on terms where we have the privacy that we expect, the autonomy to enforce terms of our choosing and it it’s easier to say that than to do that it requires organizing it requires cooperation and and you know it’s it’s not as easy for for individuals as simply taking an app that’s offered to them in the App Store and for free advertising supported and saying go ahead but it’s a matter of building toward a more empowering experience long term. So I think in the you know in the work that DSNP is doing in the work that others are doing to help build sort of empowered end-user participation in in governance to find cooperation and collaboration to find cooperation experiences that recognize the value of commercial incentives the value of individual autonomy, the value of non-commercial and social interchange, the value, the interests of government participation, the interests of technical and scientific development. And we can work toward frameworks that have a longer term sustainable interoperable data interchange.

Sarah Leif: So interoperability is also a big part of the response towards scaling those digital infrastructure that we’re talking about, especially because network effects are really strong out there. And they’re probably one of the main reasons why we’re not able today to bring most users into a technical solution that protects better their data, better their privacy, and so on. So Sujith Nairh, to what extent is this component of interoperability particularly important for you to beat the network effect? You’ve been talking about already millions of users on Beckon. How do you work with that kind of component on top of data agency?

Sujith Nair: Yes, and Sarah, if you allow me to sort of use the remarks from Wes to sort of build on as a way to answer your question on interoperability. And I think some very interesting remarks from Wes on the idea of this natural tendency, this urge for us to think about this abstracting and creating protocols and putting this sort of very elaborate formal governance structures around that idea of a tech protocol idea. And it’s one thing, therefore, to sort of bake interoperability as a principle into the technical designs. but to the point that Wes is in, and I fully echo with that. When we started the Beckham Protocol effort as a foundation about five years ago, we had this urge to sort of build this protocol, build a global community around governance of the protocol, and then talk about, and then think about seeing, okay, how do we make this, put this in work, and let people see value? But one of the sort of the early sort of, when I retrospectively think about right now, wise things we could do is to not wait for the governance and the protocol to actually take off. We actually put the idea of interoperability in the hands of people. It’s very remarkable that in the very early years of Beckham, you don’t normally expect taxi drivers to talk about protocols. But when they see that, when I got a call, literally got a call from a few of the taxi drivers in the city of Bangalore from the unions, and saying, we understand the protocol because we live the problem. We live the problem of not having this power of interoperability to amplify agency because we are stuck in these big walled gardens of ride-hailing platforms, and they onboard us as partners, but now they treat us like as if they are a boss and go through what they have to make us go through. I think then they said that for me, the value of Beckham Protocol was to give me that sense of control about where I want to be, how I make myself discoverable as a taxi driver to a rider in the city and offer my own terms of price and be fair in that process, and then let my own ability to serve the customer with the ride be the reason why I get recognized for more rides and build trust as a service provider. And that idea of that value, discovering that value with this principles of interoperability, for me would be the first significant step we should think about. And the interoperability… for me has to be seen as value in the eyes of those beholders, right, whether it’s taxi drivers. Today, we moved on, we kind of expanded that ability to perceive value with this idea from taxi drivers to about 200,000 small mom-and-pop shops in India. It’s operating in 1,000 cities. We have about close to 1 million SKUs available from goods and services available on one big, massive, interoperable open network of commerce in India called ONDC, Open Network for Digital Commerce. I think of it like India’s own commerce, open internet, and not a platform. And every day, we see conversations around how it is unlocking value for people whom it matters. We have a small list of artisans able to ship products to customers thousands of miles away at a very low cost of the things we talk about, customer acquisition, customer transaction servicing, and able to therefore expand their business. And we are able to do that to find a girl child in the remote part of India, find scholarship, just to be taking an exam, online exam, finding scholarship through the same network, discovering financing support, opportunity to find jobs. So, one of the things about interoperability is to think about how we can straddle value in multiple layers and let users see value. Most often, the perception of value comes from the exact service they operate and they get stuck in these apps. But you need to put interoperability as a core value manifestation in the ads. You work from the value backwards to why interoperability is a way to unlock that vis-a-vis the other closed platforms. So, that’s one of the things. And we have realized that by driving adoption. more than formalizing governance. We were able to achieve a lot more articulation for why interoperability is useful. And now, given that we have a fairly reasonable scaled adoption in India, we have done over 200 million transactions on this protocol. We now realize that it can now stabilize, protect those investments that users and the user platforms are making onto this protocol. And to stabilize that and give it a more consistent evolution, we are now formalizing some of the governance structures around it. So adoption preceding governance, value enablement and value articulation and visibility is one of the things we think about how interoperability has to reach the people. Sometimes otherwise we just keep losing this conversation in a more techno and a policy circles, but how does it matter in the hands of people is something that I think is a very important aspect of how we talk about interoperability and demonstrate interoperability.

Sarah Leif: So that’s very interesting because we often hear that in all those technical alternative spaces, especially the decentralized web community, the open source community, often the technical aspiration and assumption are sometimes disaligned with what users are actually expecting. Many people from that community are often expecting also users to have a certain level of technical ability and to understand things that is part of their language only. And so there’s often this obstacle to scalability. So you touched on this and you showed exactly that all of these technical terms are actually translating into usefulness in the daily life. And you could go back on this, but I would like to hear also Wes on this specific part. How do we go beyond those obstacles? of technically assuming people have a certain level or ability to understand technically what is a decentralized social graph, for instance, in the case of DSNP, or what is even interoperability? How do we demonstrate the value to them? I think Becken has done a great job at this. What is the perspective of DSNP on that front?

Wes Biggs: Yeah, it’s a great question. I think Sujith Nairh made that point really articulately, that people are not wowed by these terms. You go out in the street and say, do you want interoperability? Do you want a data agency? That’s not top of mind. Perhaps to me, because I’m a technologist, but not everyone is thinking about the usefulness of the internet in those terms. I think it’s interesting to look at how these alternatives have evolved as well, and in the social media and social networking space, things like the AT Protocol and Blue Sky, the Mastodon and Fediverse community. Many alternative models have been pioneered by essentially marginalized communities that have had strong needs for safe spaces unmediated by centralized controllers. There’s almost a natural suspicion of interoperability in some of these spaces as needing to give something up, because historically, that’s been the case. It’s been a choice between reach and scale of this big room idea of social media on one hand, and then data agency and control and the ability to express oneself authentically on the other. That’s also a very constraining way of thinking about a choice of communication modes. That’s created challenges of interoperability and bridging across both the protocols, but also the content communities, the spheres of content that we think about when we interrogate the internet. we are we’re good at navigating that spectrum as human beings in our real life so we’re used to having spaces of all different sorts of sizes that we can participate in you know from a family space to a classroom to our towns and communities and you know public public speaking and spaces as well so you know I think there’s a real challenge when we think about you know these technical affordances and how how do we take them mainstream and I don’t mean that in simply just creating one big space but how do we create a way to connect this social graph that underpins things like DSMP and and utilize that in a very useful way across the many spheres that I participate in and you participate in so if an empowering protocol can give access to all these levels of control and details and so on you think about this very complicated machine and and how do everyday internet users then operate that machine that’s you don’t want to you want to meet people you know where they are and where their understanding of how they can extract the usefulness from these platforms can be and I think there’s several ways to do that obviously you need that underlying underlying you know kind of protocol and governance layer that’s going to protect that ability but I think strong defaults and nudges at the intersection of the user experience and the protocol are very important there you need to create an environment that kind of naturally fits the way people are used to interacting and communicating and and I think there’s a real opportunity there as we move forward in the agendic AI era to help translate these human needs and the ability for humans to express how they want to participate in these spaces and translate those into the technical choices that are embodied in these protocols so I think it’s about creating languages where where people can express what usefulness means to them and have that you know embodied and expressed as it goes down the stack to the protocol level.

Sarah Leif: I’m very interesting about one thing and I’ll hand it over to Paul after this but I would like to ask the three of you especially if you have different opinion that might be interesting. Do you think in an ideal world that users should know about all this technicalities and about the protocols and know we’re very excited about all these things here because we’re basically internet nerds or is it completely fine if they don’t know anything about it but yet they have the transparency maybe to have a look if they’re interested in it. Is there like a strong vision that you have on the level of technical savviness that your users would need to have to use the protocol?

Sujith Nair: I think if I can speak for everybody here I don’t think there’s a difference in the view but I think I would like to bring certain nuances from my own experience as to how does that translate into a real executable you know action on ground to sort of allay those concerns we have with this old technical aspects, fine aspects of interoperability and putting it to work. I think one of the principles and I speak not just about our efforts with backend protocol which has been a five-year effort as a foundation FIDE we’ve been working on across 15-20 different sectors using the value of interoperable peer-to-peer transaction protocol that backend is but I also speak from the experience that we have garnered over the last 15 years of doing some population scale open interoperable infrastructure designs in a country like India touching a billion people through multiple times five so six different transformation projects we had our friends talking about in the other panel a few minutes ago and I think what one of the principles we have learned from that is very very important is A, interoperability is a very natural tool to solve for complexity at a population scale. You know, how do you distribute that ability to solve and allow people to come up with their own contextually relevant cares and solutions to fulfill that care needs interoperability. But to make that happen, we don’t think about society rising up to the level of technology. It’s the other way. We think about taking technology to the level where the society operates. And I’ll give you a few quick examples of how we have manifested that. You know, during the COVID time, of course, all the public-aided schools did not have digital infrastructure to get students back to schooling, whether it’s from the confines of their home during the pandemic. And it was very natural, like with a typical, you know, Valley startup or a Bangalore tech startup to think of, well, let’s build this cool app and get everybody online and get into these online screens. But one of the ways we thought differently about how technology made society is to ask this question about what is already abundant in the society around which we can think of technology. And it was very obvious for us to know that what is abundant are the textbooks. It’s been there for generations. It’s something that everybody keeps and carries. It’s a key sort of a medium of interaction between the pupil and the teacher. And the pupil and the teacher is the relationship, that societal relationship of trust that comes with pupil and teacher is abundant. So why don’t we use that abundance and think of technology around it? So instead of building this big app, what we have done is to create a very, very simple, interoperable QR code, you know, with a digitally signed QR code and plant it in the textbooks. Think of this as a digital portal from that area of abundance, from that area where the agency is already available for the students and the teachers. And what was remarkable is that, you know, to this portal, of course, we could bring them access to a whole other lot of content and teaching mechanisms and methods and learning, whether it’s from Khan Academy or any other such tools, who it allowed market to also participate on that portal rather than trying to do their creating say siloed platforms. They came to that QR code enabled infrastructure for them to offer more learning content. And just to complete this anecdotal example, what was truly remarkable in that experience is we started seeing the scans not happening during the day, during the schooling hours, but in the nights. And we are seeing those scans in the night because we discovered that for the first time, the teachers who are generally incapacitated and lack motivation to prepare for their classes were actually scanning content themselves to access to new contents, new pedagogy styles from other teachers from the community and actually use that to teach better. And it immediately allowed for it to be a teacher capacity building tool. Same infrastructure, but we could see unforeseen value. And that’s where we thought technology is meeting the society and not the other way. And I can give you many more such examples we have discovered. India could have gone the credit card way for the scale that it is. It could have done another 60 million, this big clunky POS machines as a way to drive electronic payments for safety, security and creating your data exhaust for your own agency. But we did not go for this big clunky machines. We started printing QR codes and said, what is the abundance here? The abundance is everybody’s going to have a mobile phone in India and India has 900 million smartphones. So we said, rather than making this complicated technology go at scale, we make the scale with technology itself work at scale, not scale what works. And we put this QR codes and you put mobile phones in today with UPI, which is the other example of a protocol that we built in India before back in does about 18 billion transactions per month. We did that. We got there in eight years. So this way of thinking about putting technology at the where you can meet the society already is how we should think about technology design in the first place. And we believe in this principle of not scaling what works. like scaling an Uber for the rest of the world to actually think like internet of what works at scale and then manifest value in areas where there is enough societal abundance of trust and relationships and use that to harness technology to unlock more value. So these are some of the things about, like I said, a little nuance and long winding answer, Sarah, but thank you for giving me this opportunity.

Sarah Leif: No worries. I’m also super happy to see that Jean-Bertrand has joined us online and you already start mentioning examples about functioning at scale digital infrastructure that brings value to citizens. So I’ll hand it over to Paul to hand it over to Jean-Bertrand.

Paul Fehlinger: Thank you. And Jean-Bertrand, I’m very happy that you can connect. Can you hear us correctly? We don’t see your video feed yet. If you can unmute and just tell us if you’re. Maybe we give Jean-Bertrand just a few more moments so that he can talk from the perspective of the African Union Commission about this, how to scale next generation digital infrastructure for more data agency. I wanted to, I love the discussion about how to create incentives. Jean-Bertrand, are you there?

Jean-Bertrand Azapmo: Wonderful. I hope my video will also pick up. We can hear you well. We see your virtual background. We don’t see you yet. Okay. Perhaps give me a few more minutes. I may switch the device. Okay. Let me try and fix my video. Yeah. Sorry for that.

Paul Fehlinger: No problem at all. We hope Jean-Bertrand can join us. This is part of the beauty of remote participation. So I was really fascinated listening to the remarks about the incentives. You talked a lot about the user incentives and the design, user-centric design of technology, which I believe is so important. I want to share a bit of this ecosystem, this systemic thinking approach that emerged from the Fair Data Economy Task Force. Because the core question was as well the same that we discuss here of how can we scale this new approach, this next generation approach to a digital economy. And the answer is on firm economic grounds. And for this to work, we need not only product market fit in the design of things, but we need to really think systemic. And the systemic sort of actions reside on four pillars that I mentioned in the beginning. And I just want to dig a bit deeper because I think it’s very important to visualize this almost like a system with small clock wheels that have to be turned almost at the same time. There’s not a re-sequencing of one after the other. All has to happen at the same time for this to work, is what the Fair Data Economy Task Force said. The first thing is on entrepreneurship and new business models. What is right now still missing a bit in the world is centers of gravity for impact-focused entrepreneurship that rethinks the value distribution that gives birth to new, very innovative business models that blend economic growth with data agency. So we really need to think about how to create those new centers of gravity of entrepreneurship to innovate at the business level. the business model level. We talked a lot about next generation digital infrastructure and here again it’s very important to probably, this is what the Fair Data Task Force told us, to think about it like a foundational step. So there are digital ID systems, there are data architecture pieces and very important protocols like DSMP, like Beck and like others to enable the widespread adoption and drive this mainstream impact. And in addition at the same time we also need policy innovation and frameworks because what is needed is the regulatory enabling environment. So what we need is forward-thinking policies that one, safeguard data ownership, that give, defer the right to data agency to users or also businesses, corporate actors, while stimulating innovation and competition to create really a high-performing digital economy that has a sort of leveling the playing field to allow new market entrants with new ideas that really have this product market fit and correspond to this desire of users for better technology with powerful and scalable business models that allow them to really reach mainstream adoption. And the last piece of the puzzle is something that especially at the Internet Governance Forum is not a topic that is talked about a lot, which is a shame because it’s very important, which is strategic capital allocation. Nothing works without money. So we really need to find ways to mobilize smart capital across private markets. There’s also a part of public investment especially on digital infrastructure projects the government has to play a part, but how do we also mobilize private market capital, venture capital and other forms of capital to scale high potential fair data economy ventures and enabling technologies at the infrastructure level. And how do we complement this by more innovative financing mechanisms? So, I really invite all of us to think about it in a systemic way. And with this, I want to see if Jean-Bertrand… Fantastic, we see you. So, without further ado, I want to hand it over to Jean-Bertrand with the question of what are your key takeaways as a member of the Fair Data Economy Task Force from this effort? And what role does digital infrastructure and data agency play on the African continent and for your digital strategy in Africa? Jean-Bertrand, can you hear us?

Jean-Bertrand Azapmo: Hello, yes, I hear you. Yes, I think everything is almost perfect now. Hello, can you hear me?

Paul Fehlinger: Perfectly.

Jean-Bertrand Azapmo: Can you also see me?

Paul Fehlinger: Yes, we can, Jean-Bertrand.

Jean-Bertrand Azapmo: Yes, sincerest apologies. I think I messed up the time zones. You know, I travel from at least to South Africa for this G20 meetings and I completely got lost in the middle of these various time zones. But I really want to thank you, Paul, and thanks to the Project Liberty Institute for organizing this session on such an important topic at the 2025 Internet Governance Forum. It was indeed a privilege to serve as a member of the Fair Data Economy Task Force established and facilitated by the Project Liberty Institute. on Fair Data Economy, alongside, as we all know, 17 other distinguished task force members with great minds, including Professor Teron, who, as most of you know, is one of the 2024 Nobel Economic Prize recipients. And we were given the chance, the unique opportunity, to really reflect on how to create the conditions to unlock the multi-trillion dollar opportunity that the digital landscape represents, actually. And you will agree with me that with the acceleration of AI economy, which basically relies and builds on the same public digital infrastructure, you will agree that it was actually a very forward-looking exercise that was initiated by the Project Liberty Institute back then. So, really, thanks, Paul, and thanks, Bell, you know, all the great mind behind this project. Now, there were some, there are some very important recommendations in the work we did, and most of which actually resonate with the digital transformation strategy for Africa that we are championing at the level of the African Union. And it’s also part, there are some elements of it in the AI for Africa that South Africa is championing as part of its G20 presidency. So, everything is coming together. And the key question, there are some key questions, you know. The first one is the recognition of the gaps that we are still experiencing five years into 2030, which is the target date for the sustainable development goals. There is the recognition of the fact that digital public infrastructure carries an immense potential that could really help unlock some of the economic growth that we need to be able to achieve the SDGs. There are some estimates but let me just give you this one from Harvard University. It says that digital public infrastructure can unlock value equivalent to 3 to 13 percent GDP with an average improvement which means additional 6 percent improvement for emerging economy. Now, just to put it into perspective, Africa needs 7 percent, 7 to 10 percent of economic growth over a period of 30 to 40 years to achieve emerging market status. So, if we were to, you know, implement to invest and be able to reap the benefits of public digital infrastructure, you can see that we will be able to reach those targets in a very short period of time because if you accumulate 13 and 6, you’re basically at 19. If you make an average of it, you’ve got what you need to be able to unlock the immense opportunity that, you know, the digital landscape offers and now the digital economy. Now, the issue is our government cannot do this alone because we are also living in an era where close to 3 billion people or 3.3 billion people to be very specific according to Antart, live in countries that spend more on debt interest payment. So, they therefore do not have the resources to be able to invest in digital public infrastructure. This is the dilemma. We know what digital public infrastructure will help achieve, but the government are constrained. What does that mean? It means a new approach is needed. This is where multi-stakeholderism really holds a great potential. And looking at multi-stakeholderism, it’s not really based on, you know, just some philanthropic. No, it’s based on self-enlightened interest. It is to say the businesses themselves, they stand to benefit from investing in digital public infrastructure, because it will then help unlock all these potential that we are talking about. And the private sector will be the first beneficiary. So we are actually saying in the context of the digital transformation strategy for Africa, in the context of the AI initiative for Africa, let us invest massively in digital public infrastructure because of the immense potential that it holds, but also because it will help create a win-win situation for all the stakeholders. The businesses, they need to continue growing. And the only way to grow is to invest in those places that are lagging behind. So what is the alternative? The alternative is a fragmented world. The New York Times Magazine released an article that clearly shows that AI is creating a two-phase world, the half and the no half. So the question is, do we want to continue entertaining it? I think the platforms like the Internet Governance Forum actually provide an opportunity to reflect on what needs to be done, building on the work that the organizations, institutions like Project Liberty Institute are doing, and say, let’s choose the right answer. Let’s not aim for, you know, a divided world where we have people sitting at the periphery of the system and people, you know, that are moving at a regular pace. The consequence will be continued growing nationalism that we are witnessing because there would be a lot of people that are disenfranchised and this is not happening only in the developing world or in the least the most impoverished countries. No, these gaps are also in some of the developed countries. So there is really a need to focus on delivering a digital public infrastructure that works for everyone, that is sustainable, that is inclusive and that can really help the world move towards achieving the SDG, at least getting closer because, you know, today it’s very clear with 17% of the SDG on target there is very little we can do, but at least if we do the right thing we can close the gap a little bit and then going forward we will be able to do more. So let me stop here for now, Paul, and looking forward to either the next round of interventions or, you know, contributing to other aspects of the discussions. Thank you and sincerest apologies once again for the mess up, yeah.

Paul Fehlinger: Very happy that you could connect, Jean-Bertrand. I hand it over back to Sarah Leif in Norway. Thank you very much, Jean-Bertrand. I

Sarah Leif: think you made it clear that scalability won’t be achieved without substantial investment and I wish we could talk about investment much more and we would need probably another session dedicated only to this, but that’s a substantial and a key component of also the scalability of digital infrastructure. But you also mentioned something that interests me is that it needs to work for After Wendy’s response, I’ll open the floor to everybody in person, and we’ll start with the first question online after Wendy. So, Wendy, over to you.

Wendy Seltzer: Thank you, and I’ll try to keep it short so that we can get to those questions, even though it’s a deep and challenging question, because I think we reach for the essence of participatory design and governance, and to be building with the participation of those who are affected by the systems and ecosystems. And as was referenced earlier, we have people who are at all levels of technological sophistication, all levels of engagement with the technology, those who are designers and builders, those who are users, those who are not yet users because they don’t have access to the technology, and finding ways to include all of those perspectives and give people real options for participation and not just the semblance of inclusion. It’s a real challenge. And so I think, you know, what we can try to do is to work progressively and to ensure that, you know, the structures that we’re constructing are as inclusive as we can make them to represent the experiences of participants from all walks of life. It’s important in participatory design to recognize that expertise can take a variety of forms and that lived experience of a particular background is as important as technological expertise or legal expertise to making an equitable techno-social construction that works for people. But we also recognize we can’t do everything at once. And so building a sense of temporary-ness in the early stages, recognizing that while we can try to do the best we can at inclusive governance, when people come and say they are not yet represented, being open to hearing from them and expanding to be more inclusive is important. I think the… where there are, you know, resource inequities and imbalances. We need to start by being conscious of that and taking extra steps that what we’re designing isn’t just, you know, enshrining an existing balance of power but making space for those who don’t have, you know, the same economic advantage right now. And that’s not just an altruistic perspective. You know, it’s, you know, if we’re really talking about how we grow the data economy, it’s looking to people who will be participants if given opportunities. And, you know, those have to be real opportunities. It’s not just the opportunity to be a consumer, but the opportunity to share ideas, to be entrepreneurs, to be social entrepreneurs, and to participate in governance. So those are some of the principles that I put in place and, you know, we’re working in places like the DSNP governance frameworks to put those into action and I hope we’ll have opportunity to engage more on that in questions and answers.

Sarah Leif: Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you, Wendy, for those final insights. So I’d like to ask Xianhong from UNESCO to ask her question. She is online and then we’ll take your question in person. We’ll take them together and then we’ll ask the panel to respond to it as well as you, Jean-Bertrand, if you’re still with us. So Xianhong, the floor is yours. Thank you, Sarah. And

Xianhong Hu: thank you, Paul. Actually, congratulations for having successfully raised this important aspect on the data economy, which I didn’t see much debates at IDF, because we’re talking about the data governance from more political angles. So that’s really such a value added to the entire IDF. And as you know, we are here working with other governments. So what strikes me is that what do the panelists think that this can imply or the implications for the governments? What should they do? I mean, in face of this, such a multi-trillion dollar data economy for sustainable development prospect, but also facing so many risks and challenges. And what should we do for governments? Because in the past years, in my work, I’ve been promoting maybe a more conservative approach that data protection, protecting rights, privacy, but maybe we didn’t put equal attention on the harnessing the potential of data. But now the data is new opportunities for any country to want to prosper in the digital age. And at the institutional level, I mean, the capacity building, I mean, the new approach, as you just touched upon, what do we should do? Because to my knowledge, we had already having maybe 120 countries who have created their data protection authority. If we want to make sure the government cannot miss this opportunity, can put in place the right framework and regulation or policy strategy to encourage this digital infrastructure development and the economy, can we recommend them to create new institutions for the kind of data agency or data stewardship? Or should we also encourage the existing data authority to expand, enhance their capacity to cope with the challenge of the data economy? That’s my question for you. Also, I appreciate the panelists in terms of geographic diversity. If you can share more about the regional perspective, that would be also useful for me. I imagine that the situation and the challenges in Asia and Africa, Latin America, might be quite different stories. So thank you. I really look forward to learning more from you. Thank you.

Sarah Leif: Thank you, Xianhong. So we have very government-oriented questions for the panel. Could you please introduce yourself and then ask your question? And then the panel can take Xianhong’s question and your questions. Yes, thank you.

Audience: My name is Veronica. I am with the Youth Pirate Party of Sweden. And I have a question that’s not very governmental, more a philosophical question about the future of social networking. I and my party recognize the wills of many people to want to remain anonymous online. And I wonder with the advent of this, for example, DSNP, the future of an interconnected internet where, for example, your workplace may use the same account as your political opinions on a different social network. Is there any plans to go forward to recognize the right for people to want to remain anonymous on this new internet? Thank you.

Sarah Leif: Thank you very much, Veronica. Thank you, Xianhong. So two questions, two very different yet complementary questions, I believe, one technical and one philosophical and one more governmental. To the panel, you can go ahead knowing that you have three minutes left to respond to all of this. Who would like to go first?

Wes Biggs: I’ll go first to address Veronica’s question. And from a DSMP perspective, I think it’s important to maintain that ability to have anonymity or pseudonymity online and not not just in in kind of a social communication space, but in all aspects of how we engage online in in a digital economy as well so I think there are affordances within the DSMP protocol and many others to do that to not be bound to a single identity to be able to have multiple personas across different aspects of what we do and I think it’s also important to distinguish that from say a governmental identity, which I think is appropriate for certain uses, but not necessarily for all the spheres of communication that people want to participate in

Sarah Leif: Maybe Jean-Bertrand for the governmental question if you want to take that one

Jean-Bertrand Azapmo: Can you hear me? Yes Yes Well, thank you so very much for those comments and questions. What is very clear, like I said, is that there is only that much the government can do, but there is what they can do. For instance, what we are doing in Africa, we are laying the foundation, the legal foundation for you know, digital public infrastructure to expand and for the digital economy to thrive. For instance, we had the what is known as the Malabo Convention on data protection, which was there. Of course, it needs to be updated and to take into consideration the evolving environment. We recently, as last year, our heads of state adopted the AFCFDA African Continental Free Trade Area the other elements of what would be considered as a conducive enabling environment. You know, in some instances for digital public infrastructure, you need even physical infrastructure itself. So, the government needs to put in place other legislations, ancillary legislations that are needed. There are also instances where it’s just to guarantee, you know, the investment to provide the necessary guarantees for investment to step in and deploy the resources that are needed. But what is very clear is that whether governments in some places can do it or not, we still see the opportunity for philanthropics, for the private sector to step in. And this is on account of, you know, the huge opportunities that are there and that they stand to harness if they were to invest. Now, if you just take digital public infrastructure as a road, you know, all of us, we use roads every day without Realizing That Someone Builded It, It’s Only When It’s Not There That All Of A Sudden We Realize That Oh It’s Actually Critical. So I Think In Areas In Sectors Like Minerals There Are Examples Of You Know Public Private Partnership To Build Public Infrastructure This Can Be Replicated In The Digital In The Data Economy. We Have Like I Said Private Sector That Have Gone Alone Or Solo To Do It. The M-Pesa Revolution In Kenya For Instance It Was All Private Sector Led.

Sarah Leif: I’m Sorry Jean-Bertrand, I’m Very Sorry We’re Out Of Time. There Was Also A Question Online That We Didn’t Manage To Respond To. So This Just Prove Also All The More How This Conversation Is Important And How It Needs To Include Everybody In The Discussion. So I Wanted To Thank You All So Much Because We Have To Leave The Room For The Next Session Unfortunately. But We Can Definitely Continue This Discussion. As We Mentioned You Can Go On ProjectLiberty.io And You Can Find The Fair Data Economy Recommendation. You Can Also Find Our Recent Digital Infrastructure For Data Agency Report. And Later Today At 2pm For Those In Person We Will Have A Closed Door Session To Continue And Deep Dive On Those Discussions. So If There Is Anybody Interested In Joining Please Come To Us And We Will Make That Happen. And In The Meantime Please Join Me In Thanking This Wonderful Panel Today And Thank You All.

Agreement points

Current digital economy model is fundamentally flawed and needs transformation

Speakers

– Paul Fehlinger
– Sarah Leif
– Sujith Nair

Arguments

Current digital economy has negative externalities on market structures, societies, and democracies due to existing business models and infrastructure

Digital infrastructure design affects whether economic power is concentrated or distributed, and whether innovation is stifled or encouraged

Beckn protocol enables interoperability by allowing consumers and providers to transact without being locked into single platforms, giving users control over their data and revenue

Summary

All speakers agree that the current centralized platform-based digital economy creates harmful concentrations of power and negative impacts on society, requiring a fundamental shift toward more distributed, user-controlled systems.

Topics

Economic | Infrastructure | Sociocultural

User agency and data control are fundamental principles for fair digital economy

Speakers

– Paul Fehlinger
– Sujith Nair
– Wes Biggs
– Wendy Seltzer

Arguments

Need to rewire the data economy to build a better ecosystem that works for all actors with people having agency over their data

Beckn protocol enables interoperability by allowing consumers and providers to transact without being locked into single platforms, giving users control over their data and revenue

DSNP provides affordances for long-lived identity, attestation, universal social graph, and social content that can be ported between applications

Building sustainable interoperable systems requires aligning incentives across all ecosystem participants, not just technical solutions

Summary

There is strong consensus that giving users control over their data and digital identity is essential for creating a fair data economy, with multiple speakers advocating for protocols that enable data portability and user agency.

Topics

Human rights | Infrastructure | Economic

Technology should be designed around user needs rather than technical complexity

Speakers

– Sujith Nair
– Wes Biggs
– Wendy Seltzer

Arguments

Technology should meet society at its level rather than expecting society to rise to technology’s complexity

Users don’t care about technical terms like ‘interoperability’ – they need to see practical value in their daily lives

Need to create languages where people can express what usefulness means to them and translate that into technical protocol choices

Participatory design must include expertise from lived experience alongside technical expertise to create equitable systems

Summary

All speakers emphasize the importance of user-centered design that prioritizes practical value and accessibility over technical sophistication, recognizing that users need to see tangible benefits rather than understand complex protocols.

Topics

Development | Sociocultural | Infrastructure

Multi-stakeholder collaboration is essential for scaling digital infrastructure

Speakers

– Paul Fehlinger
– Wendy Seltzer
– Jean-Bertrand Azapmo

Arguments

Scaling requires systemic approach across four pillars: entrepreneurship/business models, digital infrastructure, policy innovation, and strategic capital allocation

Building sustainable interoperable systems requires aligning incentives across all ecosystem participants, not just technical solutions

Multi-stakeholderism based on enlightened self-interest can drive investment in digital public infrastructure

Summary

There is consensus that successful scaling of alternative digital infrastructure requires coordinated efforts across multiple stakeholders including government, private sector, and civil society, with aligned incentives rather than relying on any single actor.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic | Infrastructure

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers advocate for a pragmatic approach where implementation and value demonstration come before formal governance structures, with examples from developing countries showing successful private sector-led initiatives.

Speakers

– Sujith Nair
– Jean-Bertrand Azapmo

Arguments

Adoption should precede formal governance structures – demonstrating value to users first, then stabilizing with governance frameworks

Examples like M-Pesa in Kenya show private sector can lead digital infrastructure development independently

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic | Development

Both emphasize the importance of preserving user privacy and anonymity rights in interconnected digital systems, allowing people to maintain separate digital personas across different contexts.

Speakers

– Wes Biggs
– Audience

Arguments

Protocols should maintain ability for anonymity and pseudonymity online, allowing multiple personas across different communication spheres

Need to recognize and protect the right for people to remain anonymous online in interconnected internet systems

Topics

Human rights | Privacy and data protection | Digital identities

Both speakers see the private sector as a key driver of digital infrastructure development, with business incentives aligned with social impact through new economic models and value distribution approaches.

Speakers

– Paul Fehlinger
– Jean-Bertrand Azapmo

Arguments

Need centers of gravity for impact-focused entrepreneurship that rethinks value distribution and creates new business models

Private sector stands to benefit from investing in digital public infrastructure due to immense economic opportunities

Topics

Economic | Development | Infrastructure

Unexpected consensus

Governance should follow adoption rather than precede it

Speakers

– Sujith Nair
– Wendy Seltzer

Arguments

Adoption should precede formal governance structures – demonstrating value to users first, then stabilizing with governance frameworks

Participatory design must include expertise from lived experience alongside technical expertise to create equitable systems

Explanation

This represents unexpected consensus between a protocol implementer and a governance expert, both agreeing that formal governance structures should be built after demonstrating practical value to users, rather than the traditional approach of establishing governance frameworks first.

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Development | Sociocultural

Technical complexity should be hidden from users while preserving their agency

Speakers

– Sujith Nair
– Wes Biggs
– Sarah Leif

Arguments

Users don’t care about technical terms like ‘interoperability’ – they need to see practical value in their daily lives

Need to create languages where people can express what usefulness means to them and translate that into technical protocol choices

Most users remain stuck on centralized platforms despite available alternative solutions, indicating scalability issues

Explanation

There’s unexpected consensus among technical implementers that users should not need to understand technical concepts to benefit from them, which challenges the common assumption in decentralized technology communities that user education about technical principles is necessary.

Topics

Infrastructure | Sociocultural | Development

Overall assessment

Summary

The speakers demonstrate remarkably high consensus on fundamental principles including the need for user agency, the flaws of current centralized systems, the importance of user-centered design, and the necessity of multi-stakeholder collaboration. There is also strong agreement on practical approaches like demonstrating value before formalizing governance and hiding technical complexity from users.

Consensus level

Very high consensus with no significant disagreements identified. This strong alignment suggests the fair data economy movement has achieved substantial conceptual unity across different stakeholder groups (technical implementers, governance experts, policy makers, and regional representatives). The implications are positive for coordinated action and scaling efforts, as the main challenge appears to be implementation and adoption rather than fundamental disagreements about direction or principles.

Different viewpoints

Sequencing of governance versus adoption in protocol development

Speakers

– Sujith Nair
– Wendy Seltzer

Arguments

Adoption should precede formal governance structures – demonstrating value to users first, then stabilizing with governance frameworks

Building sustainable interoperable systems requires aligning incentives across all ecosystem participants, not just technical solutions

Summary

Sujith Nair advocates for adoption-first approach where governance follows after demonstrating value, while Wendy Seltzer emphasizes the need for governance frameworks and aligned incentives from the beginning to ensure sustainability

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic | Infrastructure

Unexpected differences

Limited disagreement on fundamental approaches despite different regional contexts

Speakers

– Sujith Nair
– Jean-Bertrand Azapmo
– Wes Biggs

Arguments

Technology should meet society at its level rather than expecting society to rise to technology’s complexity

Digital public infrastructure can unlock value equivalent to 3-13% of GDP, which could help Africa achieve necessary economic growth for emerging market status

DSNP challenges centralized systems by avoiding single points of failure and creating consensus mechanisms where no single entity can override the system

Explanation

Despite representing very different regional contexts (India, Africa, global protocol development), speakers showed remarkable alignment on core principles. The lack of significant disagreement between regional approaches was unexpected given the different economic and infrastructure contexts they represent

Topics

Development | Infrastructure | Economic

Overall assessment

Summary

The discussion showed strong consensus on fundamental principles with only minor disagreements on implementation approaches, particularly around governance timing and stakeholder coordination strategies

Disagreement level

Very low level of disagreement. The speakers demonstrated remarkable alignment on core principles of data agency, interoperability, and the need for systemic change. The few disagreements were primarily about tactical approaches rather than strategic goals. This high level of consensus suggests either a well-aligned community of practice or potentially indicates that more diverse viewpoints were not represented in the discussion. The implications are positive for advancing the fair data economy agenda, as there appears to be strong foundational agreement among key stakeholders, though broader stakeholder engagement may be needed to surface additional perspectives and potential challenges.

Partial agreements

Similar viewpoints

Both speakers advocate for a pragmatic approach where implementation and value demonstration come before formal governance structures, with examples from developing countries showing successful private sector-led initiatives.

Speakers

– Sujith Nair
– Jean-Bertrand Azapmo

Arguments

Adoption should precede formal governance structures – demonstrating value to users first, then stabilizing with governance frameworks

Examples like M-Pesa in Kenya show private sector can lead digital infrastructure development independently

Topics

Legal and regulatory | Economic | Development

Both emphasize the importance of preserving user privacy and anonymity rights in interconnected digital systems, allowing people to maintain separate digital personas across different contexts.

Speakers

– Wes Biggs
– Audience

Arguments

Protocols should maintain ability for anonymity and pseudonymity online, allowing multiple personas across different communication spheres

Need to recognize and protect the right for people to remain anonymous online in interconnected internet systems

Topics

Human rights | Privacy and data protection | Digital identities

Both speakers see the private sector as a key driver of digital infrastructure development, with business incentives aligned with social impact through new economic models and value distribution approaches.

Speakers

– Paul Fehlinger
– Jean-Bertrand Azapmo

Arguments

Need centers of gravity for impact-focused entrepreneurship that rethinks value distribution and creates new business models

Private sector stands to benefit from investing in digital public infrastructure due to immense economic opportunities

Topics

Economic | Development | Infrastructure

Key takeaways

The current centralized digital economy creates negative externalities and concentrates power, requiring a shift toward fair data economy principles that give people agency over their data

Technical solutions like Beckn protocol and DSNP demonstrate that interoperable, decentralized alternatives can work at scale – Beckn has processed 200 million transactions in India across multiple sectors

User adoption requires meeting people where they are rather than expecting technical sophistication – technology should adapt to society’s level, not vice versa

Scaling next-generation digital infrastructure requires a systemic approach across four pillars: entrepreneurship/business models, technical infrastructure, policy innovation, and strategic capital allocation

Digital public infrastructure can unlock 3-13% of GDP value, making it crucial for developing economies like Africa to achieve growth targets

Multi-stakeholder collaboration based on enlightened self-interest is essential since governments alone lack resources to invest in digital public infrastructure

Interoperability and data agency must translate into visible daily value for users rather than remaining abstract technical concepts

Participatory governance must include diverse forms of expertise, including lived experience alongside technical knowledge

Resolutions and action items

Continue discussions in a closed-door session at 2pm for interested participants to deep dive on the topics

Refer participants to ProjectLiberty.io for Fair Data Economy Recommendations and Digital Infrastructure for Data Agency Report

Demonstrate adoption before formalizing governance structures – show value to users first, then stabilize with governance frameworks

Create legal foundations and enabling environments for digital public infrastructure development

Develop centers of gravity for impact-focused entrepreneurship that rethinks value distribution

Unresolved issues

How to bridge existing alternative solutions to achieve greater collaboration and scalability beyond individual protocol successes

Whether governments should create new data agency institutions or expand existing data protection authorities to handle data economy opportunities

How to balance data protection with harnessing data’s economic potential across different regional contexts

Specific mechanisms for mobilizing private capital and innovative financing for digital public infrastructure at scale

How to ensure anonymity and pseudonymity rights are preserved in interconnected digital infrastructure systems

Regional differences in challenges and approaches across Asia, Africa, and Latin America were requested but not fully addressed due to time constraints

Suggested compromises

Technology should meet society at its current level rather than expecting users to become technically sophisticated

Balance between providing technical control/agency and creating simple, intuitive user experiences with strong defaults

Combine private sector investment with government enabling frameworks rather than relying solely on either approach

Allow multiple identity personas within protocols to balance connectivity with privacy/anonymity needs

Start with demonstrating practical value to users while building toward more formal governance structures over time

Sometimes otherwise we just keep losing this conversation in a more techno and a policy circles, but how does it matter in the hands of people is something that I think is a very important aspect of how we talk about interoperability and demonstrate interoperability.

Speaker

Sujith Nair

Reason

This comment cuts to the heart of a fundamental disconnect in tech development – the gap between technical capabilities and real-world user value. It challenges the common assumption that technical excellence alone drives adoption and highlights the need for value-first design.

Impact

This shifted the conversation from abstract protocol discussions to concrete user experience considerations. It prompted Sarah to directly address the ‘technical savviness’ question and led to deeper exploration of how to bridge the gap between technical innovation and user adoption.

I think we need to look at this as a techno-social challenge, that it’s not just a matter of building interoperable tech and the people will come and the solutions will come out of that. It’s also a matter of figuring out how we as society and as builders of ecosystems will align the incentives so that there are stable configurations that preserve interoperability.

Speaker

Wendy Seltzer

Reason

This reframes the entire discussion from a purely technical problem to a complex socio-economic challenge. It introduces the critical concept that technology alone cannot solve adoption problems – social and economic incentives must be aligned.

Impact

This comment elevated the discussion beyond technical specifications to systemic thinking about incentive structures. It influenced subsequent speakers to address governance, economic models, and multi-stakeholder approaches rather than just technical features.

We don’t think about society rising up to the level of technology. It’s the other way. We think about taking technology to the level where the society operates… what is abundant are the textbooks… So why don’t we use that abundance and think of technology around it?

Speaker

Sujith Nair

Reason

This fundamentally inverts the traditional tech development paradigm. Instead of expecting users to adapt to technology, it advocates for technology to adapt to existing social structures and behaviors. The textbook/QR code example provides a concrete illustration of this principle in action.

Impact

This comment provided a practical framework for thinking about technology adoption that influenced the entire panel’s perspective on scaling solutions. It demonstrated how successful digital infrastructure can leverage existing social abundance rather than trying to replace it.

Close to 3 billion people or 3.3 billion people… live in countries that spend more on debt interest payment. So, they therefore do not have the resources to be able to invest in digital public infrastructure. This is the dilemma… It means a new approach is needed. This is where multi-stakeholderism really holds a great potential.

Speaker

Jean-Bertrand Azapmo

Reason

This comment introduces stark economic realities that constrain government-led digital infrastructure development, particularly in developing nations. It reframes the scaling challenge from a technical or adoption problem to a fundamental resource allocation and financing challenge.

Impact

This shifted the conversation to acknowledge the critical role of financing and multi-stakeholder approaches in scaling digital infrastructure. It grounded the discussion in real-world economic constraints and highlighted why traditional government-led approaches may be insufficient.

We really need to find ways to mobilize smart capital across private markets… Nothing works without money. So we really need to find ways to mobilize smart capital… And how do we complement this by more innovative financing mechanisms?

Speaker

Paul Fehlinger

Reason

This directly addresses the elephant in the room – that all the technical innovation and governance frameworks are meaningless without adequate funding mechanisms. It challenges the tech community to think beyond building to consider sustainable financing models.

Impact

This comment forced the discussion to confront the economic realities of scaling alternative digital infrastructure. It highlighted that technical solutions need to be coupled with viable business models and investment strategies to achieve meaningful scale.

It’s important in participatory design to recognize that expertise can take a variety of forms and that lived experience of a particular background is as important as technological expertise or legal expertise to making an equitable techno-social construction that works for people.

Speaker

Wendy Seltzer

Reason

This challenges traditional hierarchies of expertise in technology development and advocates for genuine inclusion of diverse perspectives, not just token representation. It suggests that technical expertise alone is insufficient for creating equitable systems.

Impact

This comment reinforced the theme of user-centered design and influenced the discussion toward more inclusive governance models. It provided a framework for thinking about how to genuinely include diverse stakeholders in protocol development and governance.

Overall assessment

These key comments fundamentally shifted the discussion from a technology-centric conversation to a holistic examination of the socio-economic challenges of scaling alternative digital infrastructure. The most impactful insights challenged common assumptions in the tech community: that technical excellence drives adoption, that users should adapt to technology rather than vice versa, and that governance and financing are secondary concerns. Sujith Nair’s practical examples from India provided concrete evidence for these alternative approaches, while Wendy Seltzer’s framing of techno-social challenges provided the theoretical foundation. Jean-Bertrand’s economic realities grounded the discussion in global development constraints, and Paul’s emphasis on financing highlighted often-overlooked practical barriers. Together, these comments created a more nuanced understanding of what it actually takes to scale fair data economy solutions – moving beyond protocol specifications to address user value, economic incentives, inclusive governance, and sustainable financing models.

How can we bridge all these solutions that exist in the ecosystem but are not scalable enough to gather enough users? What’s missing today for these solutions to truly collaborate better to represent a scalable alternative to a centralized digital economy?

Speaker

Sarah Leif

Explanation

This addresses the core challenge of scaling alternative digital infrastructure solutions beyond their current limited adoption to compete with centralized platforms.

How do we work with interoperability to beat network effects when most users are still stuck on centralized platforms?

Speaker

Sarah Leif

Explanation

This explores the technical and strategic approaches needed to overcome the powerful network effects that keep users locked into existing centralized platforms.

How do we go beyond the obstacles of technically assuming people have a certain level of ability to understand decentralized technologies? How do we demonstrate value to users who don’t understand technical terms?

Speaker

Sarah Leif

Explanation

This addresses the user experience challenge of making complex decentralized technologies accessible and valuable to non-technical users.

Do you think users should know about all the technicalities and protocols, or is it fine if they don’t know anything about it but have transparency to look if interested? What level of technical savviness should users need?

Speaker

Sarah Leif

Explanation

This philosophical question explores the balance between user empowerment through technical understanding versus seamless user experience that abstracts away complexity.

What are the implications for governments in face of the multi-trillion dollar data economy? What should governments do regarding institutional capacity building and new approaches?

Speaker

Xianhong Hu (UNESCO)

Explanation

This addresses the policy and governance challenges governments face in supporting fair data economy development while protecting citizens’ rights.

Should we recommend governments create new institutions for data agency/stewardship, or encourage existing data protection authorities to expand their capacity?

Speaker

Xianhong Hu (UNESCO)

Explanation

This explores institutional design questions for how governments can best support fair data economy principles through appropriate regulatory structures.

Is there any plan to recognize the right for people to remain anonymous on interconnected networks where workplace and political accounts might be linked?

Speaker

Veronica (Youth Pirate Party of Sweden)

Explanation

This addresses privacy and anonymity concerns in interconnected protocol systems where different aspects of users’ lives might become linked.

How can we mobilize smart capital across private markets and innovative financing mechanisms to scale fair data economy ventures?

Speaker

Paul Fehlinger

Explanation

This addresses the critical funding gap for scaling alternative digital infrastructure and fair data economy solutions.

How can we create centers of gravity for impact-focused entrepreneurship that rethinks value distribution and creates new business models blending economic growth with data agency?

Speaker

Paul Fehlinger

Explanation

This explores the ecosystem development needed to support entrepreneurs building fair data economy solutions.

How do we align incentives so there are stable configurations that preserve interoperability in techno-social systems?

Speaker

Wendy Seltzer

Explanation

This addresses the governance challenge of maintaining interoperability when different stakeholders have competing interests.