Messages 2026

Messages from Brussels

Main Topic 1: WSIS+20 Review Outcomes and the Path to Implementation

Rapporteur: Mark Carvell, Internet Governance Consultant; Izaan Khan, Member of the UK Internet Governance Forum steering committee, Filip Lukáš, CENTR

1. EuroDIG supports practical actions to achieve complementarity between multistakeholder processes, such as the IGF and the national and regional IGFs, and UN initiatives such as the GDC, and thereby avoid duplication in the implementation of WSIS+20 outcomes. Furthermore, building on existing mechanisms within the WSIS structure for coordination, monitoring, and reporting is recommended as more resource efficient for all stakeholders, rather than investing in new processes and parallel structures.
2. Tangible steps to ensure effectiveness include: emphasising specific topics of concern to focus on (such as human rights, connectivity and the Sustainable Development Goals), cross-reporting across appropriate UN and WSIS meetings, encouraging multistakeholder policy labs and partnerships for monitoring, collaboration, and participation in multilateral fora such as the ITU Plenipotentiary, and increasing capacity-building for governmental stakeholders, in order to direct their attention to the right areas to avoid confusion.
3. EuroDIG believes that operationalising implementation of WSIS+20 should be data-driven (leveraging existing databases held by institutions, universities and other organisations) and evidence-based, supported by measurable outcomes, aligned with national and regional needs, and prioritising operational capacity. A comprehensive global roadmap, building on the existing WSIS Action Lines, and mapping actions to specific entities, would serve to ensure effective vision, coordination amongst relevant entities, clarity of purpose and accountability for actions to address priorities.
4. EuroDIG considers it important to resolve confusion about AI governance through promoting cooperation between Internet governance and AI processes, and specifically proposes the appointment of liaisons between the IGF MAG and the Independent International Scientific Panel on AI established by WSIS+20.
5. EuroDIG welcomes the UN decision to accord permanent status for the IGF; and recommends concrete actions now to be prioritised to strengthen the IGF with greater inclusivity including young people; more precision and clarity both in identifying global, regional and national priorities, and in task-setting; and more effective dissemination regionally of its concrete outputs (including those from its intersessional activities, notably the policy networks and dynamic coalitions) that inform policy decision-making processes at all levels.

Main Topic 2: European Approaches to Digital Sovereignty

Rapporteur: Paulo Glowacki, EURid Youth Committee, Izaan Khan, Member of the UK Internet Governance Forum steering committee

1. EuroDIG recognizes that Europe’s dependencies on external digital technologies and infrastructures have created strategic vulnerabilities, including for democratic values. Europe must shape and self-determine its human-centric digital future while maintaining Internet openness, preserving choice of technologies and providers that adhere to open standards and interoperability, while remaining grounded in multistakeholder values and human rights.
2. Digital sovereignty is a cumulative, transformative process that requires action by all stakeholders. This effort should consist of: active industrial policy such as investment in – and the development and scaling up of – trusted European platforms and players in Chips, semiconductors, Cloud, AI, open data; supporting investment in and maintenance of open source infrastructure, interoperability, and alignment of values. This should encourage innovation, while retaining balanced regulatory approaches to key issues like procurement, competition, privacy & cybersecurity.
3. To achieve European digital sovereignty we must take a holistic approach, bringing together national policy multistakeholder efforts under a common European dimension to empower citizens, especially youth. Further, the importance of cognitive sovereignty and ensuring that European residents are afforded the ability to have a digital public sphere should be encompassed by this topic. We note the Cannes Declaration on the Sovereignty of the Mind in this regard.
4. Digital sovereignty should ultimately be interpreted to mean resilient openness and strategic autonomy leveraging Europe’s strengths. Digital sovereignty should not mean isolation, stepping away from global digital cooperation, protectionism or the creation of walls that lead to fragmentation.

Main Topic 3: Trustworthy AI in Public Services: Transparency, Accountability, and Crisis-Resilient Communication

Rapporteur: Milica Vesović, Council of Europe

1. In the public sector, trust is the foundation on which effective institutions and meaningful public service are built. Trustworthy AI is therefore not only about safe technology. It is about safeguarding democratic legitimacy, human agency, inclusion, and public trust. AI should be treated as critical societal infrastructure, alongside healthcare, education, welfare, and civic communication.
2. Equality bodies and human rights institutions are essential to addressing algorithmic discrimination in public administration’s use of AI, especially where information and power asymmetries affect individuals’ ability to challenge harm.
3. Efficiency cannot be the only measure of success in public-sector AI. AI should improve services not only from time and cost efficiency perspective, but also make them fairer, more accessible, transparent, inclusive, and trustworthy, through human-centered design focused on citizens’ rights and needs.
4. Human oversight must be real, not symbolic. Public authorities need the capacity to understand, question, override, and remain accountable for AI-supported decisions. Trustworthy AI is achieved not only through regulation, but also when fairness, accessibility, inclusion, and accountability are built in by design and experienced by all citizens in practice.
5. Human rights-based frameworks provide a foundation for trustworthy AI, ensuring alignment with democracy and the rule of law. Risk-based approaches support practical tools for risk analysis, stakeholder engagement, and mitigation of bias, exclusion, unequal access, and impacts on vulnerable groups.
6. Trustworthy AI requires strong governance, technical standards, interoperability, and digital skills. With hundreds of AI-related standards already developed globally, the challenge is to translate this expertise into practical implementation of inclusive policies. Capacity building efforts are therefore essential to help countries assess their readiness, absorb global expertise, and advance responsible, human-centred digital transformation across sectors and borders.

Main Topic 4: Platforms’ Accountability to Strengthen the Digital Public Sphere

Rapporteur: Murillo Salvador, University of Geneva

1. We consider platforms as a social digital infrastructure of democracy. Yet platforms were not designed to fulfil a civic function. Instead, they optimize engagement, e.g., through the deployment of dark patterns like infinite scrolling. They are not neutral communication and information channels: they distort the public debate by enabling the spread of disinformation. In this context, civil society acting within platform ecosystems, such as fact-checking collectives and other actors, should be supported as key partners in the digital public sphere.
2. We view the loss of cognitive sovereignty is an emerging risk linked to the embedding of AI into platforms. Algorithmic management, from recommendation systems to automated moderation, need to take into account democratic principles from the design stage and not as an afterthought. Provenance and verification mechanisms are crucial as AI-driven synthetic content and identities become more prominent in the digital public sphere, faster than regulations can be deployed. In this context, the deployment of AI tools themselves can go through preliminary steps of testing and sandboxing before reaching the market.
3. Rules do not necessarily hamper innovation. In fact, existing regulation acts as a powerful deterrent for platforms’ worst outcomes in democracies. Participants called for stronger DSA compliance, and here civil society can play a key role as partners for public authorities to make platform operators accountable with regards to the law. At the same time, CoE frameworks provide foundations to expand users’ agency, and international human rights provide an universal basis for users seeking to make platforms take action where no regulation exists.
4. The discussion invites us to move from consumer perspectives towards an understanding of digital citizenship as embedded in platforms. Platform design is a fluid outcome of choices. New business and engagement models should be incentivised, such as community-driven platforms that already exist and perform a civic function. At the same time, alternative forms of democratic engagement should be supported, outside of platforms, including deliberative and multistakeholder formats.

Workshops

Workshop 1 | EUDI Wallet and EU Business Wallet as Tools for Enhancing the European Digital Single Market

Rapporteur: Minda Moreira, Internet Rights and Principles Coalition (IRPC)

1. The European Digital Identity Wallet (EUDI Wallet), scheduled for implementation across all EU Member States by the end of 2026, will be a crucial and free digital identity tool that empowers EU citizens to “take back control”. It enables individuals to choose which information they share and use for online identification and authentication.
   Similarly, the EU Business Wallet aims to address cross-border identification challenges and enable secure, seamless interactions between businesses, public authorities, and private stakeholders, enhancing trust and efficiency across the European Single Market.
2. The EUDI Wallet and EU Business Wallet must become attractive and widely adopted platforms for both citizens and businesses. Their success will depend on their ability to deliver interoperability, trust, security, and ease of use across the European Union. The key challenge is effective implementation, as these wallets can deliver significant benefits to citizens and businesses by reducing complexity, enabling cross-border interactions, and supporting regulatory compliance.
3. To ensure interoperability, trust, and security, European digital sovereignty must be embedded as an open, resilient, and collaborative approach that strengthens strategic autonomy while fostering innovation and cooperation with trusted partners.
4. To maximise impact and adoption and to avoid unnecessary duplication, the EUDI Wallet and the EU Business Wallet should be integrated into existing digital ecosystems rather than creating parallel systems. By combining interoperability, trust, and security, these wallets can become cornerstone infrastructures for Europe’s digital economy and serve as a standard for trusted digital identity solutions worldwide.

Workshop 2 | Information Quality and Integrity – European Approaches

Rapporteur: Smee Cujic, BSoG

1. AI and deepfakes pose a threat to information integrity. “Slopaganda” is increasingly being used during political campaigns to influence voters.
2. Responsibility should not lie only with users but also with media, companies, civil society organisations, NGOs and political parties. Additionally, states, government agencies, and other relevant stakeholders carry a positive obligation.
3. While labelling AI-generated content needs to serve the interest of users, it may fail to address or signal discrimination, unjust influence, social harm, or journalistic integrity. Moreover, AI content is already reshaping public beliefs and labelling it may not introduce greater clarity. It can create bias where unlabeled information is automatically perceived as high-quality or truthful, even when not wholly accurate (“implied truth effect”). At the same time, people interpret labels differently based on their background and level of critical engagement. Finally, we must raise awareness and improve human sense-making of AI-generated content, for example through media and news literacy.
4. User tools for synthetic media detection are fragmented and siloed. Currently, no universal approach exists, causing these tools to fail the moment a user moves a piece of media from one platform to another.
5. Cooperation between states requires a more unified approach. Because AI material is generated globally, vast differences across jurisdictions make it difficult to enforce control.

Workshop 3 | Technologies and Technical Measures to Address Online Harms

Rapporteur: Filip Lukáš, CENTR

1. The ever-evolving nature of online harms requires a multistakeholder collaboration to be tackled effectively. This may take the form of collaboration among industry players, or cross-industry and the government.
2. Intervention on the technical layer by blocking the IP addresses or DNS have significant impact on the availability of online resources, like websites, and cause unnecessary collateral damage without necessarily addressing the illegal content in question.
3. Interventions on illegal content to increase online safety should be proportionate so that the rights of individuals are respected.

Workshop 4 | Advancing Gender Equality in the Digital Public Sphere: Tackling Online Violence and AI-Discrimination

Rapporteur: Minda Moreira, Internet Rights and Principles Coalition (IRPC)

1. Advancing gender equality in the digital public sphere faces some major challenges:
   • Offline gender-based discrimination is often replicated online with changes in speed and sophistication driven by emerging technologies, driving women and girls out of the public sphere, curtailing the diversity of views, and damaging democracy.
   • Lack or limited response of the platforms and the step back from major companies on political grounds makes accountability and enforcement extremely difficult, creating an environment where perpetrators feel invincible.
   • Moderation responses often limit the right to privacy leading to deeper layers of discrimination.
2. The ideal Internet should offer a warm, friendly, engaging and accountable space that creates confidence and engagement without fear. It also fosters an environment of accountability where people speak up against online violence.
3. Multistakeholder collaboration and dialogue is essential to shape a more inclusive digital sphere built on global rules and standards, civil society led capacity-building initiatives, better education, information and preventive measures:
   • International organisations play an important role in addressing digital violence, including through standard-setting, monitoring and international cooperation.
   • Meaningful and evidence-based policy-making and regulation for online platforms need to respect the right to privacy.
   • Technical solutions need the input of those facing discrimination, particularly members of disadvantaged groups and must include safety and equality by design.

Workshop 5 | Internet Standards and Frontier Technologies: Lessons from the Past, Tasks for Today, Choices for the Future

Rapporteur: Filip Lukáš, CENTR

1. European stakeholders should actively contribute to global standard-setting processes aligning regulatory approaches with open, interoperable, and multistakeholder-driven processes.
2. Bridging the gap between standards development and real-world deployment requires coordinated action across Europe and beyond, effective advocacy with decision takers, including market and non-market incentives, e.g. through an ICT procurement process, to motivate deployment by different stakeholders.
3. To facilitate a successful adoption and deployment of standards, it is recommended to pair the standardisation process with the lifecycle of the technology and its societal implications.
4. Strengthening participation in global standards bodies calls for sustained investment in expertise, improved coordination, and support for globally diverse stakeholder engagement.
5. Human rights must be embedded in standardisation processes.

Workshop 6 | Youth Online Safety – Are Social Media Age Bans a Solution?

Rapporteur: Desara Dushi, Vrije Universiteit Brussel

1. Blanket age bans risk oversimplifying a complex issue rather than reducing harms. It is important to fully understand the complexity of the issue which includes and requires among others child participation, hearing all expert voices, learning from international partners, and putting children’s rights at the center. More viable solutions would be an age-appropriate design system, combining safety by design (with more focus on for ex. age inappropriate content and algorithms) with youth voices embedded earlier in the regulatory design and holding platforms more accountable.
2. It is important for policies to also focus on privacy, proportionality and accuracy. We need to continue the work towards harmonizing age verification measures, digital literacy and meaningful engagement with young people themselves. Any measures taken need to be centered around child rights, youth participation, and be harmonized.
3. Technical instruments to implement age bans can be privacy invasive while not guaranteeing for no more harms. There is a need to carefully assess the real-world effectiveness and proportionality of age restrictions. In terms of implementation, the technology is challenging and may negatively affect inclusion and push children towards more dangerous environments. From a security perspective regulating platforms would have a better benefits vs. harms ratio.
4. We should move away from the idea that bans will get rid of everything and change everything. Age restrictions/bans should be considered not in isolation but within current policy and regulatory context, which at European level is multi-layered and includes several national and EU level initiatives. We should be aware of the distinction between regulating access and regulating content.
5. We should be aware that this is a social issue, and the focus should not be on arbitrary age gates, but rather on mitigating the harms that users encounter through attention-exploiting, profit-driven algorithms. Digital literacy and education alone cannot help us.

Workshop 7 | Implementing WSIS+20 Review Outcomes through Collaboration amongst European National and Regional Initiatives

Rapporteur: Mark Carvell, Internet Governance Consultant; Izaan Khan, Member of the UK Internet Governance Forum steering committee, Filip Lukáš, CENTR

1. National and regional IGFs (NRIs) are effective multistakeholder fora for implementing WSIS+20 goals, outcomes and action lines through their outreach and engagement in multistakeholder communities worldwide in support of social impacts. Collaboration amongst NRIs can include sharing best practice and national experience in agreeing priorities and messages, monitoring progress and promoting greater awareness of the importance of Internet governance in line with WSIS goals.
2. NRIs’ key position in the broader Internet Governance ecosystem necessitates the implementation of innovative methods of collaboration. There should be room for experimentation in the formats of exchange and policy experimentation such as cooperative labs on topics such as emerging technologies, AI and online child protection, while preserving the bottom-up model.
3. The workshop also considered NRIs’ experience in developing argument maps which provide comprehensive overviews of specific issues and policy challenges, such as age verification, covering different perspectives in support of policy decisions and geared to achieving positive impacts.
4. It was agreed that EuroDIG should maintain this dialogue on innovative mechanisms and monitor progress amongst European NRIs with periodic reviews.

Workshop 8 | Q-Day Countdown: No More Privacy?

Rapporteur: Nicolas Zahn, Association Swiss Internet & Digital Governance

1. Loss of privacy is seen as the most pressing concern regarding digital security in the post-quantum world by the workshop participants. Q-Day is not a far-distant threat but already a partial reality, as the first successful breaks of encryption using Quantum computers show. And since post-quantum effects almost every aspect of our digital lives, we need to start today. For organizations (public and private) more clarity is needed on where encryption is currently used.
2. Technical standards are only part of the answer. We also need the awareness and resources to help organizations with the deployment of new standards. It will also need to become a part of the mindset of decision-takers, as Q-Day is a structural issue that needs coordinated actions and cannot be addressed on the individual level. In terms of responsibility for the PQC transition, participants are split between governments and service providers.
3. A potential element in a government roadmap could be capacity building for procurement officers to ensure secure-by-design ICTs.
4. Organisations must not wait and start their preparations for the PQC-transition now. Tomorrow might be too late