G20 agrees to act against economic cyber-espionage and respect privacy

At the G20 meeting in Antalya, 15-16 November, the Leaders have agreed “that no country should conduct or support ICT-enabled theft of intellectual property, including trade secrets or other confidential business information, with the intent of providing competitive advantages to companies or commercial sectors” (Article 26 of the Communiqué). This was accompanied with the agreement that states should protect privacy and abstain from “arbitrary interference of privacy, including in the context of digital communications”. The role of the UN GGE in developing norms of behavior in cyberspace, and especially its 2015 report, was recognised and emphasised, which may signal the continuation of GGE in 2016 as well.