Agreeing on the Messages – 2023
21 June 2023 | 14:30 - 15:30 EEST | Main auditorium | 
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Consolidated programme 2023 overview / Agreeing on the Messages
Agreeing on the Messages and Wrap up
Messages are compiled from each Maintopic and this years Focus areas #risks, #resilience and #hope and form the main output of the annual EuroDIG. The messages are presented to the global Internet Governance Forum that is convened by the United Nations with a view to contributing to global, other regional and national debates on Internet governance. Find the messages from 2022 as a reference here.
Reporters from the Geneva Internet Platform will be assigned to take notes and to formulate the messages that:
- relate to the particular sessions and to European Internet governance policy
- are forward looking and propose goals and activities that can be initiated after EuroDIG (recommendations)
- are in rough consensus with the audience
These Messages are finalised after the event by the Org Teams on our Commenting Platform.
We strongly suggest that all session organisers and Focal Points participate in the process of agreeing on the messages, because this delivers the outcome of their work. Session organisers are free to make a summary for the wiki in addition.
Video record
https://youtu.be/BrmH4NTvnAY?t=17883
Transcript
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This text, document, or file is based on live transcription. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART), captioning, and/or live transcription are provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. This text, document, or file is not to be distributed or used in any way that may violate copyright law.
>> THOMAS SCHNEIDER: ... Having said this, let’s move to Andrijana Gavrilovic and the messages where we will go through and you will have a chance to comment. Thank you.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Actually, Thomas was supposed to announce me as well and Andrijana Gavrilovic, of course.
And which camera should I look? In this one, right? To see me.
Andrijana Gavrilovic was supposed to be here in person, but circumstances made it impossible for her to travel but latest since the pandemic, we’re a good team also working online. I will be your voice in the room and Andrijana Gavrilovic will lead us to the messages that she took. I would like to one more time, we did it at the beginning already, to explain a little bit how the messages will be drafted. We believe that a very crucial moment of our conference, and Andrijana Gavrilovic has followed all of the sessions online and took notes and she will try to prepare or propose some bullet points, what could be the most essential things. It is not about writing a report of this conference, it is really about getting the key messages out of this room, to the policymakers, to the community and elsewhere, and to the Global IGF, of course.
You here in the room, you are asked to let us know if you have strong objections with what she’s bringing forward. We are not supposed to discuss every little detail and every little word, I mean, sometimes a word matters but you should think wisely if you really need to insist that a word needs to be changed, that a sentence needs to be changed. It is rather about do you disagree or agree with them in general. Can you live with it? This is what we call a rough consensus.
At the IGF consensus is built by humming, as loud as the humming goes, it goes through or not, I was told! We’re not doing the humming. We would like to invite those who have objections towards what Andrijana Gavrilovic will present us to go to the open mic and take the floor or to make yourself visible in our Zoom chat and if you feel uncomfortable with speaking via Zoom because your mic is not in order, then Virginia will be happy to read it out.
Otherwise, you’re also invited, our remote participants to speak up and they will be given the floor just as Andrijana Gavrilovic has now. I would just now give over to you now, hand over to you now and maybe you can also say a few words how you came to that point to come up with the messages.
The floor is yours.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC:
Thank you, Sandra.
Greetings everyone, good afternoon, I think it is for all of us.
I’m very sorry that I can’t be in Finland with you, I’m certain I would look better because as you can see, I’m very green on that screen! As long as my audio works properly, we should be able to get through this without any major issues.
Let me first start with saying that the GIP has been the official reporting partner for EuroDIG for quite some time now and we’re happy to be the official partner this year as well.
We have been reporting from digital policy event, major digital policy events, including EuroDIG since at least 2015. The aim of the report is to help stakeholders hold parallel debates, understand current and future issues and explore topics in more depth. Also we aim to bridge the existing gaps in stakeholder participation and overcome barriers created by policies.
This year, we have, of course, had to upgrade as many of us did with the dawn of generative AI, so we have made a change in how we do what we do. This report is hybrid. That means that the report from the discussion, there will be a report from the discussion, it will be provided by the AI platform which we call DIPLO ChatGPT, it is specific artificial intelligence solution designed to explore the capabilities of advanced natural language processing technologies. It is combining state-of-the-art text, information retrievable, tech generation and text to voice models to create specialized high performance tool for diplomatic, policy reporting. We put it in action in May for the U.S. Council, so it already debuted, and the reports from EuroDIG will follow a similar structure. I’ll share a link in the chat for the perusal of our online participants. I won’t share my screen at this time, so we have more time to go into the messages. I did say hybrid at the beginning. And that’s exactly the human crafted part of report, messages.
The messages will be made available in matrix, by topic and focus area. My team and I took notes, and we have formulated between one and three bullet points, mostly two to three bullet points per subtopic, and I’ll be reading out vertically for the purpose of agreeing on messages by consensus.
The organizing teams will then finalize the messages in the following days.
As Sandra Hoferichter said, we’re aiming for a rough consensus, so please bear in mind that the messages do still need to be edited or grammar and language. If you spot something that’s glaringly wrong, please feel free to point it out and we’ll make a change right here on the spot.
Without further ado, we start with main topic 1, impact of war.
Yesterday we discussed in subtopic 1 shattered neutrality and the Internet at crossroads of war and geopolitics. Our first message is that technology has brought new aspects of warfare, but we need to keep in mind that at the core are the people with their democratic rights.
Our second message is that revoking CCTDL is technically wrong because the global Internet is what holds our societies together. Talking to Friends working and entertainment, the Internet was at the heart of that, a stewardship role is to remove geopolitics from such equations.
More needs to be done about constraining propaganda condition tent on the Internet. The DSA, the AMA will be helpful in the area.
I will take a pause at this point and if there is a need for me to read anything out again, I will gladly do so.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Maybe it is good to share the screen so everyone can kind of read through with a you have just said? We have it on the script here, but that goes up rather quickly.
If you could enlarge it a bit? Oh, yeah, a bit enlarged maybe, and then we are – wonderful, that should be fine.
As was said, we’ll go through them by topic now. That was the main topic from yesterday, impact of the war, where we had three subtopics, and these are the messages that she would suggest. I give you a moment to let it sink, to reiterate. I would also invite particularly those who were in that session to comment on it. I see a hand over there.
Adam.
Maybe we should introduce the catch mic.
>> I would generalize that second paragraph to say something different rather than CCTDL and ICANN, something more specific around the importance of the global single Internet which certainly was something that was mentioned, and I guess generally agreed upon.
I can’t think of wording at the moment. I think it is a bit overly specific sitting there.
Thanks.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Someone seconds in the room? Even more? Yeah. I can see – I can tell you, there is agreement in the room to what Adam just said.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: I will make a note for the organizing team to make it more general. We’re not against it as it is, but we have to generalize it a little bit. I can say we can go ahead with how it is and leave to the organizing team who are, of course, the most familiar with this topic to make a suggestion, how would that sound?
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Maybe it would be good if you just take notes, bullet points for yourself because –
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Yes.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: This process where we agree on the wording, that will be then done on the commenting platform.
To explain the audience in the room who has no idea what our commenting platform is, the commenting platform for these kind of messages is only to do the final edits in order to get the grammatic, the typos right, and if something comes up in this discussion here to find agreement there.
We should be sure that we leave the room with the same idea.
I would suggest that it is indeed a topic, an issue for our commenting platform and this will take place next week then.
Over the next week.
I see there is a comment from online.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Yes. Would point out that also revoking address space is similarly problematic as revoking a TLD, and then there is a disagreement with Adam, that the story was much discussed, proposal maybe worded so that it talks about cutting physical connections or routing as well.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: There is disagreement on what the room – okay.
Let’s give the time to take notes.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Notes taken.
Thank you very much for the comment.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I think you have also the comment in the chat since you’re on Zoom?
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Let me see.
We had a comment saying we should remove geopolitics from the message since it is not really possible. At the rate we’re going, I think we’ll have a great message, all right. Note taken.
Thank you Mr. Nelson for the comment.
Let me ask all participants in the line and online, obviously I see that we have some different opinions on the second paragraph.
Are there different opinions on the first and third paragraph?
>> I just want to point out this is a good example of using deep word Internet for two different things, the second bullet talks about the communications fabric that many of us on the technical side call the Internet, and the third bullet is purely about the content layer, which is something that exists on top of the Internet and may or may not need regulation. It is actually two different things and using the word Internet for the same thing has been confusing for a long time.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: That’s indeed the case. We just had a discussion with colleagues about this, what we understand on the Internet. I think we need to be a bit more precise on what we are speaking about, do we speak on the content layer or on the technical infrastructure layer in our messages.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: I believe this one was about the technical infrastructural layer.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: That should be with more precise.
>> On the second point, yeah, the question of the Russian, whether to revoke them, that’s, of course, the concrete case that brought this theme and to IGF actually in Ethiopia. I think that the point is – actually it is a larger question. The question is really whether geopolitical stress test that is now going on in the Internet, whether the Internet actually can be kept as a neutral ground for communication or will that eventually, if geopolitical situation gets worse, will that actually be disrupted in one way or another. As I said, this was the case in point, but actually the question is much, much larger.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Thank you very much.
I see there is agreement.
Andrijana Gavrilovic, is this enough food for thoughts to come up with a new suggestion then later on on the commenting platform?
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: I do believe it is, yes.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay.
Then I suggest we take the second paragraph to the commenting platform on our newsletter and our social media platforms. You will be able to get the direct – and also on our website – to get the direct link to the commenting platform on the commenting platform you have to register, it’s word pressed based instrument, it is – how would you – not an app. So data protection should be around it. You will have one week to make your comments on the platform, what Andrijana Gavrilovic will suggest next and then we’ll finalize it at the end of the first week of July. That was the plan.
I see you have it in your hand.
>> Yes. From Electronic Frontier Finland.
Maybe the revoking CCTLD is technically wrong, it could be reworded for ease fragmenting the Internet.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Thank you.
Please take also note of that comment. And we have the transcript as well. So we have all of the material that we need.
Is there someone on remote?
>> Not at this point.
>> Thus constraining propaganda refers only to specific propaganda like the one from Russia or should it include propaganda from other countries as well? Like China, or in some cases also Western governments?
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Since no other country is mentioned, I think it refers to propaganda as such, and not to a specific one.
>> I think we have the second on fragmentation, I wouldn’t put that in to everything else, maybe we can put – I think we’re getting into wordsmithing along with all the people online, this will not go anywhere, I think we have to have a row dust discussion somewhere online on how to fix this and make it work.
>> SANDRA: Okay.
Let me ask the question, the other way around, is there something in this message that you are missing, where you say, hey, this was actually discussed and it is not reflected here, that could make the message a bit more stronger?
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I don’t remember what else is coming up, but related to propaganda, the media literate side, we will never get rid of all propaganda on the Internet.
There is agreement in the room. Anything that we should add? Anything that should be mentioned? Then I would consider this a rough consensus for the messages on the first main topic and the three subtopics. Thank you very much.
Then please let’s go – are you ready, do you need a moment?
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Completely ready.
I’ll review the transcript, and the reporting of this session afterwards and I’ll make sure to include all – I took notes, of course, but I want to make sure to include everything properly that’s been said.
I suggest we move to topic 2. Yes.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay. Super.
Let’s go to the second part, subtopic 2, navigating challenges and strengthening –
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Ukraine’s and European infrastructure.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Yes.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Only one message this time around, it was the most strong one, Ukrainian operatives are seeking to share their unique experiences in responding to destruction, threats, other things in the wider community, a call of action was made with the best operation taskforce urging the community to help document Ukrainian experiences and turn them into practical guidelines. The guideline also cover areas such as rebuilding efforts, increasing resilience, creating future proof infrastructure.
We thought this message could be very important because documenting the experiences has been something that’s been mentioned in multiple sessions and not only in this one.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: So the floor is yours.
>> SANDRA:
>> Thank you very much.
I would like to add that the Ukrainian resilience is impossible without worldwide cooperation and help and support. Unfortunately, we have very good lessons of such cooperation and not very good lessons and it can’t be analyzed.
Thank you.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Other comments? One over here?
>> I think this bullet looks very good as is, maybe it could be broken down into a couple of separate bullets, but I’m all for this.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Making two paragraphs out of this one, good idea.
Objections?
>> For example, the last part, these guidelines, that could, for example, be a separate bullet.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I think we’re fine with this one.
Let’s go to the third subtopic, I was a bit confused, I thought the other one was – all three subtopics. That’s a long one!
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: That is a longer one. Of course, we can shorten it. I have been informed reliably by my note taker that this part was an elaboration of the first part, perhaps that’s something that we can exclude, but let me first read the first draft and then we can make the decision together.
Promoting and upholding Human Rights, democracy, rule of law is and has been the best defense against aggression and author different, to protect people in times of crisis there must be proper standards and approaches before the crisis. In addition, the institutions and other key stakeholders need to be properly prepared to combat hate speech and build resilience against disinformation. Then we have the elaborate part which says a clear legal framework is required to provide public authorities, law enforcement, media, Internet provider was a comprehensive, collaborative approach and specific criteria for evaluating, moderating, prosecuting incidents of hate speech. Also a multistakeholder coalition is needed with an increased role of Civil Society organizations that are well placed to support other institutions in the fight against hate speech.
>> SANDRA: The other message is when reporting, especially times of crisis, it is essential to keep international standards, rule based approach and respect for the basic principles, one should always get to the bottom of the information and adhere to basic values and principles when evaluating the information, asking questions is the best way to protect democracy.
Over to you in the room and online.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: So my first impression is we definitely need to shorten the first paragraph because otherwise that’s not a message any more, that’s a bit long.
Content wise, I invite you to comment.
>> I’m confused of the overemphasis on combating head speech when the headline is protection in the time of crisis and also given that hate speech is not necessarily a crime, that the mitigation is enforcement without in that message being balanced by any consideration given to free speech.
Thank you.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: A comment in the back? It was the same? Okay. There is agreement that we should more go along the line of protecting citizens instead of combating hate speech.
>> I second what the previous speaker said and I think part of the problem is that the paragraph is so long and the details that follow in the gray section leads us to think it is only about hate speech which I don’t think is the case, I think that the point here, it is that we need to promote and uphold Human Rights, democracy, rule of law, and we need to have proper standards and approaches before the crisis breaks out. We need to be prepared.
I think that the first part for me covers it, and if a concern is about Freedom of Expression, then it is preparing to combat hate speech, including that which crosses the criminal threshold, something like that, I would want to emphasize that hate speech in general is a problem, even if it is lawful, it is still awful and very dangerous.
I would suggest just delete the gray and it may address the concern.
My point maybe to connect to the second one, it is I think we need to say something about protecting journalists or the media sector in times of crisis. For me, it is not only about the information, the proper – it is the actual people that are targeted are at risk and things like that, shrinking space for media and journalists to do their work, I think something like that also, and there are standards on how to protect them. I think that we need to do a shoutout for the work and protect them.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I guess you can take notes on that part.
>> I think that the first part is missing the recognition of the tension between combating hate speech and disinformation and protecting the Freedom of Expression of people, which includes criticizing the governments even in times of crisis. This is too much like – we need to stop hate speech, I think there should be a condition that still we need to preserve the ability of citizens to say what they think, even if it is not in line with their government, which is what characterizes Western countries in this respect.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: All right. I feel there is at least agreement in the room on what the changes could be. I think that’s also a matter for the commenting platform and Andrijana Gavrilovic will come up with new suggestions and you have a week to see if that is what captures our feeling. Right.
Good.
Then let’s go to main topic 2 now, fragmentation.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Yes. Let’s start with subtopic 1, understanding the risks of Internet fragmentation, before I move to subtopic one, I would like to point out that we as Rapporteur, we write down what’s been discussed and if the community wants to draft a new message at this point in this wrap up we have, of course, nothing against it, but we do need to say that what you see on your screen is what has been discussed in these days.
So going to subtopic 1, main topic 2, understanding the risks of Internet fragmentation, different governments, actor, stakeholders have different perspectives as to what Internet fragmentation is, and it is crucial to address the risks that come with it rather than trying to define it, regulations imposed by governments that fragment the Internet, whether intentionally or not are preventing the Internet from being an open space, explaining the nuances of the fragmented Internet and the unclear type of intervention imposed by regulations are among the concerns that need to be addressed to prevent Human Rights violation.
The second message is geopolitics is yet another concern as the fundamentals of the Internet can endanger the technical nature, as content has unintentional effect on the technical level becoming intentional, the call of action is to enhance the communication between the governments and the education on Internet Governance. This interestingly enough brings us back to the second message that we have heard today, that didn’t really inspire consensus.
Let us see how this one will go.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Thank you.
We have already one coming to the mic.
>> Lars again chairing the IGF. On the first point, I’m in agreement with almost everything but the very last bit, it is not just Human Rights violations that are the issue, it is actually breaking the Internet that’s the issue as well.
I think the end result, and that was made clear in the keynote. So I would want to sort of highlight that that is actually the danger here.
On the second bullet, yes, enhancing communications between government and cross government education, this is useful, we need to generally have a stronger dialogue between governments and regulators and the technical community can explain what the implications of some of those policy choices are. Again, Andrew ran through the Internet Society sort of impact analysis thing which I think is a good example of something that could be done and guide regulations in that direction.
I don’t know quite how to capture this but that’s what I want to put out there.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Thank you.
>> I have two problem was the first point.
The first one, it is the central paragraph on the regulations imposed by governments are too general. There are regulations imposed that fragment the Internet because apparently any national aggression is fragmenting the Internet but actually they’re aimed at keeping the Internet open, with regulations, digital market sector, trying to prevent competition and openness, so I think that it is too general. It really depends on the individuals. You should make this – there are some regulations, that needs to be – it needs to be less general.
The other thing, that I remember, at least one of the panelists had spoken up on fragmentation by private sector, I don’t see anything about it in this message.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: There is one behind you.
>> Did it cover you?
>> I was going to reflect on the issue of not only government but also corporations and it was mentioned a few times already with the panel on walled gardens. Yeah.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Anyone else in the room? Okay. I think that is a third paragraph that needs a little bit more work on it and goes also to the commenting platform.
I didn’t follow it, does she include everything that you said? No?
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: No. Definitely a matter for the commenting platform.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay. Super.
The first one actually, not the second.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Sorry, I heard you say the last part.
All right, let us move on. Yes.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Yes.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Subtopic two, Internet fragmentation, what’s next. The Global Digital Compact, we’ll call it DGC from now on has began defragmentation and started the communication on this matter, the stakes are shaping the protocols, promoting global discussions through platforms like the IGF and open and competitive digital markets are crucial to combat the Internet fragmentation and digital divide emphasizing that content policies should align with international Human Rights principles to ensure a unified Human Rights based approach.
To be fair, this sentence might have to be broken down a bit.
And the other message is there is a need for harmonization and cooperation among stakeholders to understand the causes of Internet fragmentation. We should rethink the Internet fragmentation discussion and not compete with business interests and make sure that the technical aspects are addressed.
Over to our audience.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: One is coming to the stage.
>> I feel tempted to sit in the first row.
On the first bullet, right, so the IGF has no mandate to shape Internet protocols. Internet protocols are developed in a multistakeholder Summit, mostly in the IGF and ITU, the IGF is not the forum for that standardization. That’s just wrong. We need to remove that.
There is also a lot of other things I want to say but global geo compact, I don’t know if I can make it up on the spot but I would sort of encourage us to recognize that coordination as it has been called out as something that’s supposed to be encouraged here has actually been happening for decades, at least in the technical community and with individual governments and regulators. I mean, the Internet Society, IGF, others, ICANN, other, TLDs, all of these entities are decades old and have coordinated for decades. It is good that the UN recognizes that coordination is helpful when it comes to development of the Internet but it is a little bit disappointing to see that they seem to see a void here where it doesn’t really exist. Right.
So those that have done this for a while are engaged in it. I don’t quite know how to reflect that, that is my top level point.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: It is obvious what you say about the IGF, this is not a space to shape Internet protocols so that needs to be more specific and also the other comment I think can be included.
Any objections? Anything in general on the messages? Okay. No disagreement in the room.
Please go ahead.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: We are moving to subtopic 3 and we’re wrapping up essentially main topic 2 with this, how can the Global Digital Compact prevent Internet fragmentation, we should encourage them to embody higher ideals and other UN process, focused on real global challenges like diversity, development and multilingualism. This is a particularly strong message I was told from this session.
The positive element of the GDC process should rely on the understanding that it does not end with the completion of deep dives, the necessities continues stakeholder engagement with regional or national IGFs, remain actively involved in the implementation and realization. The EuroDIG community must be committed to ensuring that the GDC goes beyond a mere statement and initiates the process of actionable commitments, accountability and transparency involving all stakeholders.
Our last message for this subtopic is rather than duplicating existing efforts, the GDC should complement the work of organizations like ICANN or the IGF, the existing structures and the multistakeholder approach in the UN should be leveraged as they have provided specific responses to the Secretary-General call included in addressing fragmentation while acknowledging the need for their evolution to effectively address challenges and ensure outputs. (Reading too quickly for correct translation).
Over to the audience and participants, of course.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Comments? Thank you very much.
I think that this third bullet, we should not focus on ICANN or the IGF, because what I think that the panel wanted to focus, the audience, so all the participants that participated in this meeting, is that existing structures that exist nowadays, it is not – we’re not envisioning ICANN or IGF only, it is the UN bodies and organizations and beyond that. I think that the main message should be rather than the existing efforts or existing bodies or something else, I don’t know, I didn’t go back on that, but the thing is here, that the GDC should complement or update or – I don’t know. Not to focus and to mention entities for the time being.
I think that the divide is too sensitive and not – I don’t think it is good now to mention any entity.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I see there is agreement to that comment.
There is a comment over there, maybe you could –
>> I would be hesitating because I think the GDC has the potential to stop the current Internet Governance and I don’t think there is an agreement that we think this should be done.
I think we should emphasize that as a multistakeholder approach should be kept and should not be replaced as a GDC and maybe we should rather mention the multistakeholder approach which is in there, and we should make sure – if we delete the organizations, I think we should really emphasize it is a multistakeholder approach should not be replaced by a GDC approach that’s actionable because multistakeholder approach is not actionable, having an actionable approach will automatically have a tendency to replace multistakeholder approach so we should point to the risk I guess.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay. I think this is not in contradiction what was said in principle. One can be deleted to be less specific but the multistakeholder approach should be underlined in this message. This is what I get out here.
>> Sandra, maybe a solution, the multistakeholder approach within the UN should be leveraged it says now, if you take out within the UN then it is the broader multistakeholder approach.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Good point.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: On the other hand, decide have a comment online saying the specific is better if EuroDIG does not support IGF, who will?
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Maybe put it in practice like the IGF or like ICANN.
>> Absolutely agree with the comment on chat. We are part of the IGF process and already we skipped IGF in the previous phrase. I think it is a mistake not to mention.
If we can eventually add WSNS if you want to be democratic, at least IGF has to be there.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: A comment on this?
>> Ana: I think that we have to be very straight to the point, that IGF should continue to exist and that the global digital compact can be something different as an agenda within our Common Agenda for sustainability, et cetera. This should be phrased in order that IGF should not not be touched and should not even be – should not evolve for something as we know what I’m talking about.
So IGF should be mentioned as something that should continue because it is a unique process that led to the NRIs, that’s something huge, and so I don’t know if it is the GDC should complement the work of human bodies and organizations, I don’t know if it is the right thing to say about the GDC.
It is a new agenda, so it is not – not a new agenda, but an updated agenda of the risks of what’s at stake, what we have to discuss nowadays, so that’s okay. It should not lead to a discussion that only involves the governments.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I have the feeling that there is kind of a little discussion here in the room, how we frame it. I think everyone wants to achieve the same, the question is how we frame it. I would also suggest that goes on the commenting platform and invite you to finalize this paragraph.
>> Maybe I can help with the framing, because this is, of course, nothing new. Maybe we should also think of the wording, it is not that fortunate, maybe we should say that the GDC and in particular in its implementation should build on the existing structure that has been created by the World Summit on Information Society, including the IGF and this fora should be used for the follow-up and to strengthen, so on. I would avoid words like complement and I would also try to make it – yeah. You can then leave integrated the existing structures including multistakeholder but if you mention the IGF, then that that is obvious, you may not necessarily mention ICANN, that may put them in a special light. But if you refer to the existing institutions that have been created by the WSIS and thereafter, explicitly mention the IGF as one of the key ones, then anything that the GDC does or alludes to in the future should be using that framework, that may be the message that you want to give.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I think that’s on the record, I saw agreement in the room and welcome up with new phrasing.
In the interest of time, let’s go to the last main topic, digital platforms.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: We have the longest messages here, but you all seem to be in a good mood and you all seem to be well rested. As long as you need me to be here, I’m available today.
Let’s go to subtopic one, the real risks navigating me investors as a next generation of platforms, the innovation and the lessons we have learned so far make it crucial to establish governance for virtual world, this will enable them to be open interconnected spaces that are accessible and secure for everyone, neglecting the governance aspect of future virtual world on a global scale could lead to excluding communities controlled by select few. By collaborating with global stakeholders and utilizing existing non-governance structures – we’ll change this – like EuroDIG, ICANN, IGF, we should aim to build upon shared interests and make progress together.
I suggest we say existing structures here.
It is imperative we persist in engaging in the discussion regarding the metaverse even as it gives way to the permanence of AI, although the metaverse may not be a prevailing topic of conversation it is of utmost importance that we prioritize the governance aspect. To foster a constructive trajectory we must contemplate the network framework in advance of widespread meta verse utilization. When addressing the implementation and enforcement of Human Rights it is crucial to prioritize reaching a collective agreement before considerations of implementation and enforcement, the key aspects is to unite on a global level and acknowledge the corporate lead governance is inadequate, it should be a shared space belonging to everybody and it is imperative for us to establish the principles that will enable this inclusivity. The last message for this, in our physical existence we navigate the room of digital tools and it is vital to recognize the tools are meant to serve and support us, the human being, and our goal should be to ensure that the virtual world remains in service to analogue world harmonizing both spheres for the benefit of humanity.
I would stop there.
Let me just scroll back so that you can see all of the messages and over to you. Thank you.
I can make a first comment. It is way too long.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: I agree.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I also understand that it is was today’s session and you didn’t really have time to go a little bit deeper in this one. For instance, sentence like the very first one, the rapid pace, it was just a description of what is the status now, we could possibly delete. I suggest that this paragraph will be kind of shortened, but I ask you or I invite you to let us know if you agree to the content of this.
A comment in the far back.
>> Thank you. I am from the national research institute and I was the focal point of this session. I would just like to make one comment that maybe in this first message it would be important to highlight that metaverses are not something that came out of nowhere, but they are in fact the next generation of the existing social media platforms, so there is a continuity, so, of course, there will be new challenges, also regarding governance, but it is not something totally new, we have this continuation in the development from the existing Internet, existing platforms to the web free zero to the metaverse, maybe it would be good to highlight in this first message.
Thank you. Other comments?
>> I would build on that comment, since it is not completely new, the governance aspect is not new either. Maybe we can remove a bit of emphasis on the governance aspect, the governance needs to be adapted, but it is not that these systems would be without governance because all the existing governance of social media will apply to them.
So maybe we can – when we cut down, we see the governance aspect being emphasized in every paragraph. We could reduce quite a bit there. Okay. Point taken.
Any other comments.
Seems to be not the case.
Let’s move on to the next subtopic.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Yes. We’re nearing the end.
The subtopic 2 on European Union digital transformation, challenges, technical impact and emerging opportunities.
(Reading too quickly for transcription).
cover most of the risks imposed by existing technologies such as the cyber resilience act in the making to protect the cybersecurity of digital aspects. Cybersecurity is not absolute, it is always about risk management and reducing vulnerabilities depending on the software, what should be born in mind, it is nodded about regulatory implementation but also compliant, requiring companies to be equipped with fulfilling the certification requirements for vulnerabilities which may be challenging for non-profit organizations and academia among others who may not have the funds to complete them.
The last message for this subtopic is that it is imperative to ensure that people are educated on the fundamentals of technology and a deeper understanding of how technology works. Considering that the technology is changing and evolving it is essential to ensure that people in the technology industry are always updated and educated on the new risks that may appear.
Over to you.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Back to the room.
There is one comment. Thank you.
On the third topic, I was under the impression that what had been discussed as well was the importance of educating general population on technology and the risks throughout the entire lives, lifelong learning education, which is currently not really present in the topic.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: We have added end users next to digital technology industries, I believe that would adequately for now cover what’s been –
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: There is agreement from the commenter.
>> Second point, certification, it is not a sufficient solution for cybersecurity, right. Certified software, hardware can still have vulnerabilities, and for many parts, especially for the Internet protocols, there isn’t actually any standardized certification available.
So I think this is a bullet, this number, it really over emphasizes this as a solution here, I think this is something that we need to dial down.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: That needs to be more precise.
>> ANDRIJANA GAVRILOVIC: Well the message says cybersecurity is not only about regulation but also about compliance. We thought it was well balanced but we’re open to any suggestions as to how to rebalance the second message.
>> I think for number two the issue onsetter occasion is that it is tied to the signer resilience act that must certify certain things and so how do you go about certifying that you’re compliant with what’s regulated? I know it is a rather slippery slope when you look at certification, what are you certify, how you’re going to do it, who is going to do it.
In looking at that regulation, it was a requirement. What’s that all about? I think that’s what some of the panelists tried to pull out, was it is a requirement, there are a lot of options, but what option is the right option to take?
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: I also feel that here we have a mutual understanding but we need to frame it in the right form that the message gets outright and I would also suggest to put that on the commenting platform.
Any other comments? One comment in the far back?
>> Thank you very much. I think that we could add should – don’t know which bullet but we can add or underline the democracy and transparency, it is also very important. We had a great panel today about democracy and this is a good place to add and highlight this issue.
Thank you.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay.
Good.
I think then we’re done with this part.
Let’s go to the last one.
We are running over time already. We are.
Right off the bat, I know the message I’m going to read is very long, but it is very specific to the specificity, non-specificity, that’s something we have discussed, this message may also be completely removed if we decide to do so.
Message number one on platforms and infrastructure for democratic discourse, (reading too quickly for correct translation). – has the potential to provide an alternative, overcoming concerning features of dominant social platforms such as surveillance, capitalism, the economy and digital colonialism. Yet, there is still a number of questions and challenges that need to be addressed such as sustainable financing and the lack of scalable business models.
Message number two, the specific points has a Nordic approach to the democratic – (reading too quickly).– and for concrete actions, and can be applied to countries and regions beyond the Nordic region, especially to smaller countries and language communities, the first action considers Nordic as the united democratic region supporting implementation and giving a shared voice in the E.U. and toward digital platform, the second relates to enhancing digital literacy while highlighting the diverse, credible digital platforms and communities emphasizing alternatives to large online platform, and the fourth is about open and informed public debate and giving public service media a strong digital mandate including online presence, content creation and development of platforms.
The last one emphasizes public oversight of big tech platforms and continued monitoring of the State of Nordic digital democracy.
End message number three, the last one, it is important to remember that the surge in large language models such as ChatGPT and other possibilities to create synthetic text creates are greater pressure on content filtering and a much needer need for transparency, it is estimated you that by 2026 90% of the content can be actually synthetically created. The tech companies need to adopt clear, transparent content moderation policies that prioritize accuracy and accountability with clear procedures for removing harmful content. Companies must also ensure their content systems and rules are fair, transparent and easily accessible in user language.
Let’s start.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Also way too long. Needs to be reworked.
Let’s discuss the content of it.
>> Hello. Thank you. So I pick on the second one, I agree with what Sandra suggested, this needs another editorial pass, we have to accept that this is the latest session and there was little time to deal with the editor, of course.
The second in particular, it is just an remuneration of the points provided by the presentation. I would feel very uncomfortable endorsing that fully like it is suggested there, endorsing that presentation from the side of EuroDIG.
To make that a message, it would have to be different than this report from the presentation.
Thank you.
>> SANDRA: The point is basically this is a keynote, a presentation on a specific topic but should not be a message in itself, it was not discussed or –
>> The way it is framed right now, again, I made that remark about editing times, no blame on the editor of course. Again, I would feel uncomfortable endorsing that keynote or that presentation on the side of EuroDIG.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay. Any other comments on that session – not on that session, that message.
It looks like we have at least content wise more or less agreed on the messages, I urge you again to participate in the commenting platform next week. They will be available early next week, and we will ask the workshop organizers to submit your messages also until the 25th, which is Friday, this week, and they will also be available on the workshop messages, there is still flexibility because we’re not discussing them here.
Then hopefully, by first week of July we will have all of the messages ready, first on the website as we promised a new format as a matrix to read them horizontally and vertically and then we’ll produce the messages as a brochure like the ones you could see outside from the previous years.
I think that with this, we’re coming to an end.
Thomas, I need you again to help me to thank our numerous people that helped us making the conference.
Unfortunately, a couple of them in particular from our host team had to leave already.
So the only host who is in the room is our dear founding EuroDIG member. Would you like to come? He was basically the one who had the idea of inviting us here and he said it already on the first evening, it is his alma mater, which I could see there is almost a tear in your eyes when you mentioned that you are actually very glad that we are all here.
Thank you very much.
>> Thank you.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: It was a pleasure working with you and being here.
>> It was a pleasure working with you again and I don’t know if the University is present, but my thanks to the University for accepting us here and being the host.
Thank you.
>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Okay! Please stay here.
Since you just mentioned the University, we had indeed a lot of back wind from the University, you all see them here in purple t-shirts, I would like to ask all of the volunteers to come to the stage.
I must say, since the pandemic, there was a shift of responsibilities, so the Secretariat is more or less now also in charge of – come here, take the stage, it is yours.
Al.
We are as Secretariat a small group of people for in the first time in reposition to work with a huge team, that needs to be briefed, and they understood really quickly that they have done an amazing job in helping us, everyone I guess for the first time and I heard rumors that they may come back to another EuroDIG or YOUthDIG and I hope you will enjoy the bottle of wine from the region I’m coming from, it is a very small region, a special one, the Misen area, so thank you very much.
Then, of course, I would like to thank everyone from the EuroDIG Secretariat, the core of the core, is not in the room, I think he’s already setting up the next meeting, please come to the stage.
Elizabeth.
This year, we had an extended team of Secretariat, which (listing names).
Please, come to the stage.
Of course, not to forget, Andrijana Gavrilovic, if you swish on the video again online, we’ll make you a speaker view on the big screen. Is Andrijana Gavrilovic still online.
There she is. Wonderful! She’s there! Wonderful.
I can’t call them all to stage, then we couldn’t hear each other anymore, so our technical team with us since the pandemic, we met during the pandemic because we were in trouble, we needed someone who could do a virtual conference and they could not do any music events because nothing happened, so we met, we stayed, so the four year Now, and it is truly a pleasure to work with everyone.
And also, not to forget, it was mentioned here during the conference, who is actually taking notes all the time, this is a team of international captioners who are sitting across the world and are managed by Caption First which has headquarters in U.S. and we’re working with them also since many, many years, they are doing a great job, so thank you very much to Caption First as well. I know you can hear us.
This is it, we’re a little bit late, that’s typical, but I would like to thank you for staying in the room, even for the last session, and I hope we will see each other on the next occasion, wherever that is, and I wish you a nice evening and a good journey home.