IGF 2017 - Day 4 - Assembly Hall - Open Mic

>> Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen, for coming to the closing session. May you please all take your seats? So we can start. And then, we can finish a little bit early. Okay. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the closing over the 12th annual meeting of the Internet Governance Forum. We will first have from the host country a closing speech by Ms. Krystyna Marty Lang, ministry for foreign affairs of the Swiss Confederation. Thank you.

>> KRYSTYNA MARTY LANG: Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen. It's an honor for me to be here with you today at this closing ceremony of the 12th Internet Governance Forum. I would like to thank everyone who was involved in the organization of this event, United Nations Department for social and economic affairs, the United Nations Office and the IGF secretariat based here in Geneva as well as my esteemed colleagues from the federal office of communications and the federal department of foreign affairs.

 For the tireless efforts to render this event successful. My special thanks also go to all of you. It was because of you that this platform was filled with innovative ideas. Thanks to you, the IGF has evolved into a relevant policy format. Ladies and gentlemen, the IGF is, indeed, very special and unique event. Its agenda is not developed top‑down by the host country or the IGF secretariat. It is the result of a bottom up and multistakeholder approach.

 The issues that we have been discussing over the past three days have made it on the agenda because you wanted them to be addressed and deemed these topics important. We can be very proud that this meeting allowed for such a comprehensive and inclusive discussion. Not only were we vocal about the social, economic, and political benefits of ICTS and the opportunities they have brought about for each and every one of us. But we have also addressed transnational challenges.

 During the world summit on the information society plus 10 process in 2015, the UN General Assembly decided to extend the mandate of the IGF for another ten years. With this, the IGF stepped into a new second phase. The number of issues discussed and the number of participants has increased.

 In Geneva, we have had over 2,000 on‑site participants from around 120 countries. In addition, through remote participation, which is now an integral part of the IGF, interested people from all over the world were able to join the discussions.

 The ongoing work of the IGF also between the annual meetings supports the global efforts to achieve the sustainable development goals, many of which relate in one way or another to the internet and information and communication technologies.

 I am particularly honored that this edition of the IGF was held in Geneva. An inspiring venue hosting 30 international organizations, hundreds over NGOs and just as many further agencies that work on and with digital issues. I am pleased to say that we have moved a big step forward in strengthening the IGF at the beginning of its second mandate.

 Here in Geneva at the IGF, experts from the multiple fields have met and had a unique opportunity to break the silos, start ‑‑ cross country and cross sector cooperation.

 This allows us to identify new ways to tackle challenges and find new and practical ideas to overcome the problems we all face in the cyber realm. That is why the IGF is in our view the world's most important global platform for a free, open and inclusive dialogue on all aspects of internet and digital governance with all stakeholders on an equal footing.

 Under the title, shape your digital future, you have discussed subjects that influence our daily lives on a political, economic and social level. In over 200 different sessions, you have debated on various topics, such as cyber security and cybercrime, digital human rights, sustainable development and the digital economy.

 You have addressed some of the frontier issues, such as block chain technology, cryptocurrency or artificial intelligence.

 You have come to the conclusion that digitalization has brought about positive developments. It has offered a myriad of new opportunities for societies, businesses and governments. Furthermore, the digital space has become a powerful driver for human rights. Throughout the discussions, it was mentioned that cyber capacity building is crucial and the Geneva initiative on capacity development in digital policy was announced.

 An initiative that aims at harvesting the experience in Geneva and Switzerland and making it available to legal, technical, social and political communities working on digital issues. You have also addressed the downside of new technologies, namely, that they can be used for criminal and malicious espionage or military purposes. And misused to influence public opinion. In addition, the rising number and sophistication of cyber attacks has had destabilizing effects on international peace, stability and security.

 What has reiterated during this IGF is that the governance of the digital space is dispersed across many actors. You have acknowledged that the internet has an infrastructure is a very complex space with only a small central core. Most of the activities and regulatory mechanisms are distributed across the network.

 At the same time, these activities are all interconnected. Consequently, there can't be one single solution or one single actor to find and implement solutions to challenges we face. The dialogue in cooperation between all stakeholders, be it governments, private sector, civil society, academia or the technical community needs to be further developed.

 Only this way will we be able to successfully seize the opportunities cyber space offers and to reduce the risks that it breaks. Many governments have recognized this and have engaged in efforts to approach civil society and the private sector with a view to developing a range of initiatives and processes together.

 When it comes to cyber security, it is sometimes believed that governments have the dominant say in making important decisions. Switzerland doesn't agree with this view. The promotion of overall cyber security needs the cooperation of everyone involved. When looking for common standards and norms, rules and principles of responsible behavior in cyberspace, a focus on governments only may not be the best way to proceed.

 While there are already existing processes on state behavior, there is no coordinated process for the behavior of the private sector and individual users. There is also poor understanding of how the different stakeholders should interact to maintain a secure cyberspace. It is against this backdrop that Switzerland plans to launch an initiative that will examine and clarify the roles and responsibilities. Individuals in cyberspaces as well as the possibilities and limits of their behavior and interaction. We will form the Geneva model for responsible behavior in cyberspace.

 Finally, I would like to share with you some of the so‑called Geneva messages that have been drafted in close cooperation with the host country, the IGF secretariat and the main session organizers. They represent an innovation for the global IGF already tested in other national and regional IGFs.

 They capture key findings that we have gained from the high level and main sessions. Some of the Geneva messages are the following: The ideal future, digital global governance should be value‑based, inclusive, open and transparent. While it is challenging to determine values that can be shared by all stakeholder groups and at a global level, there was common ground in the thoughts that core internet values are and need to stay human‑centered.

 Multistakeholder cooperation is key in making sure that we as a society use the digital space to test the best of our abilities. While the digital future is characterized by uncertainties and facing the unknown is a challenge, relying on long‑term principles, such as accountability and transparency combined with having flexibility and implementing and finding tailor‑made solutions to face new challenges would be the most appropriate way forward. The digital economy depends on the free flow of DATA which should be balanced with DATA protection. Government, private companies and civil society should work together on basic sets of rules but allow aggregation and flows while protecting the privacy of individuals. All the messages are available online on the IGF website and will be included in the host chair summary report. Reflecting the full diversity of opinions on key policy issues and contributing to having more tangible and visible IGF outcomes.

 Ladies and gentlemen, as you can see, a lot of work lies ahead of us. The political challenges are huge, so are the rewards. Free, accessible, stable and secure cyberspace. Let us further use and strengthen the IGF that offers a platform to achieve this common goal. Indeed, for your efforts, and I wish you a good reminder of this conference and a safe journey home.

 

[ Applause ]

 

>> THOMAS SCHNEIDER: Thank you very much. We will now have the IGF2017 Taking Stock and Open Mic session, and it'll be chaired by Lynn St. Amour with Thomas Schneider.

And also on stage is Mr. Armin Plum. The IGF secretariat falls under UNDESA in the UN system.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Chengetai, and thank you to the federation for all of the support over this last year. I think Thomas and I both said we would not make any introductory comments at this point in time but move right into the Taking Stock session. This is where we really want to hear from the community on any matters of importance to you.

 And I might actually just ask once more for those that are sitting towards the back and the far sides of the hall might not want to move into the middle of the room. Certainly, the dialogue and discussion would feel a little more intimate. And you'll actually get to talk to some of your colleagues, perhaps, as well in the interim. So we have three mics in the aisles. We'll rotate across the mics and give everybody a minute to start a queue. Usually, takes just a minute, some brave soul and then they fill up and there we go. When you take the floor, just introduce yourself and the stakeholder group and if appropriate, the organization you're with, as well. You have the floor.

>> Thank you very much. Thank you very much, I had public affairs for the operators association of India, a former member of the Mag, I speak in my personal capacity. I'll keep my remarks well within time. What you believe possibly the best IGF ever as we were working with toward the renewal of the mandate. And then, you realize, this is why you want to be here each time you come to the IGF.

 There is no other platform, and I say this in all trueness of my spirit. When you get to engage with governments, the youth, different voices, what we've really taken away is the IGF's and that only reinforces my faith in the platform when you see this happen year after year, year after year. I've heard conversations on what does the IGF really do? Is it just a talk shop? Is this just a coffee shop? Are we just having conversations?

 I want to reinforce the fact that there are no binding recommendations. It is amazing to see best practice take full form, take this conversation to the next level. What I would also like to see is we've seen over the last year, recent attacks, we've learned more than ever before that government is also an equal stakeholder at the table.

 So the declaration that came out of the commission which talks about not attacking the core internet. And we've spoken to that. If we can reinforce and rearticulate that, that is something I would truly look forward to. Thank you very much.

[ Applause ]

 

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Subi. Renata, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you. This year, we had a meeting of perspective Mag members, this was a great initiative. We need to create transition between the Mag members. It was be great if we could bring back to the stakeholder groups the name from the perspective Mag members, stakeholders have their processes of representation. And it is important that this is respected.

 Still, once more, I would like to congratulate those responsible for this meeting and look forward for collaboration with these actors who are community members, mostly, and it's very important that they continue to be engaged.

 One other point I would like to talk about is remote participation. I have tried to work with this year in the IGF. Unfortunately, a best practice forum in remote participation was not approved. It was approved the BPF for underserved regions. I find it offensive that the name of those who need to be included is actually used for exclusion of a theme that should be more dealt with. It was also proposed that the exclusion remains for years to come. In an orchestrated forever approval of this work.

 Some have opposed this, remembering we need due process and giving the opportunity for choices. The people who need accessibility have struggles. Due to the type in place. Private sector should step up to this and coordinate the extensive work done by the coalition of accessibility and disabilities.

 We should all be happy for that. But we should continue to do more and more. Having the IGF community in mind and not the goals of one type of organization network. Thank you.

 

[ Applause ]

 

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, that's a good reminder, as well. And in fact, we do have Anja who is managing the queue for all of the people that are participating online. So we will rotate through the queue. And Anja will signal if there's somebody online. Vint, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: I wanted to draw attention to the Day 0 events which I found helpful for the remainder of the meeting. But in particular, I wanted to draw attention to the global commission on the stability of cyberspace and their introduction of a notion of norms, which are not necessarily mandated. They're not necessarily regulated. But they certainly, I think, draw our attention to practices that we might all want to adopt. And the particular concern about the core of the internet, the public internet.  I found to be a very important notion to introduce into the IGF dialogue. I want to urge that we continue to pursue paths along those lines. There are things we can take away from IGF and do something about.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That's a very good point. And there are many ways to actually begin producing more concrete outputs, and that's a very key one. Go back over here to this mic. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, Chair. I'd like to compliment everyone for inspiring discussions to participate in this year. So thank you all. This coming forward from a best practice proposal working on the format of the IGF and strengthening cooperation, from Day 0 event and research around it, it was supported by ten different organizations. I'm not going to go into it in‑depth because there will be a report published early next year.

 I want to take two things from it. First, is that people have been asking for more focus on specific topics and a process, at least, on the better prioritization, which allows for interaction and cooperation from different stakeholders that may now not be present. Another thing that came out of it was using other platforms.

 And I think the examples are very good about the global forum presenting itself but also the global forum of cyber expertise reaching out saying how can we use the best practices in a better way by interacting in another way we're doing so far.

 Those are the two main points. And the last thing I would like to say, why is the IGF so bad at celebrating its successes? Look at the best practice, what comes out of it. The results they have and nobody seems to be talking about it or except in a way they don't do anything. The examples are out there, and how can we make sure they're on a website. They're shared through the different stakeholder communities. And please, next year, let the Mag members take a 100% responsibility for the topics they prioritize. Then, they will rain down and trickle down into their community.

 I think there's excellent work being done, and there's ways for improvement. And I hope to be engaging with you all on that later this year. So thank you for this opportunity.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. The gentleman in the middle queue.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: I'm focused on health education enterprise solutions and also the senior leadership of Rotor International. We moved to Geneva linking into the Geneva communities. We're particularly interested in how we use the internet to connect people in dynamic networks while encouraging individuality and promoting growth while also protecting human rights and allowing organizations, individuals and communities to develop in the future.

 And this has been a very interesting event. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Excellent. Thank you. Sir, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello, I work for the private sector. I would like to raise our concern from the private sector on the selection process. Basically, if we look up the numbers, 60% of the worships selected from civil society and the rest is pretty much in dispute among the other three stakeholder groups, businesses, governments and academia.

 Even if we do a further analysis and look for example business workshops that are selected, those workshops are dealing with sustainable development goals, environment, divide, gender, gap and I‑that are relevant for all of us. And we're very happy to address. But also means that businesses are not able to select the topics that are relevant for us which are business‑related issues and we're not able to put the topics across the tables. And if we look at the workshops taking place.

 For example, the workshop ‑‑ surprisingly, all the panelists were from civil society and academia. And we have no government representatives neither business representatives. And I wonder who actually working ‑‑ talking about this with other private sector fellows, they have the same issue, another workshop where basically governments and businesses were not represented in the panels.

 And with it a fast check on the workshops that are the description of the workshops that were available on the website. And many of them did not have any representatives included in the description of the workshops from the business community neither from governments.

 I would kindly suggest or ask the IGFs to look into the workshops numbers and see and do an analysis and have a check that has been a workshop that has been represented all the stakeholder groups. And to finish with a more positive tone, I would like to congratulate for the opening session.

 I think the format this year has been very attractive and very interesting for all. And I would like to recommend to have this format as a best practice and that is maybe improved. I think this has been a great ‑‑ thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: If I could address, quickly, one or two of the comments you made. Certainly, the ‑‑ I'll try and start from the beginning. Certainly, civil society participants do make up the greatest percentage, both of participants here, also of submitters for workshop proposals.

 One of the things the Mag does do when we go through and select, which is a process where we take the 300‑odd workshop proposals, coming back in, having been evaluated against a set of criteria and are aggravated, we actually look at the percentage of selection on a whole host of different criteria. To certainly ensure there's been no imbalance injected in the Mag process with respect to the amount submitted.

 We haven't done positively corrective. We think one particular area is underrepresented. We do look for that, but I don't think the Mag has fully agreed we should do something that much more corrective, if you will. This is a bottom‑up process. So certainly, one way to get more workshop proposals submitted would be to submit more proposals.

 I think we also need to look at how we categorize them by stakeholder. I think often civil society takes a pen, but still very multistakeholder and perhaps attributing them to one stakeholder group isn't perhaps as refined as it could be.

 To the other point about some of the workshops not being fully multistake holder, that's a criteria for a workshop to be selected here.

 So I know I and the Mag and the secretariat would appreciate any specific examples that we can take forward and evaluate and try and understand whether that's something that slipped through our process or perhaps at the end of the day, there was a last‑minute withdraw. It's obviously critically important to us that the workshop sessions we hold here are, in fact, multistakeholder. And I think that hit most of your questions. If there are any other questions, please follow up or send an email. This queue over here.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you. The coalition which is a civil society coalition. I have two comments that I would like to make, also, about workshops. One comment related to the earlier comment about business participants. We organized a workshop and the business speaker, the business panelist cancelled on the day before the registration deadline. And we were frantically finding a replacement. And then, the deadline hit. And we were not dead. It was still a very good workshop.

 But apology to the business community that we did not manage to get that fixed. My comments are that especially when workshops are good and the conversation is good and inspiring, it would be really nice to be able to continue that on into a more long‑term discourse. And I'm finding that challenging. One particular challenge this year is that I still don't know when and where the next IGF will take place.

 And that makes it kind of difficult to talk with colleagues. Will you be there? Can we do a session together? And another idea would be if there's some kind of hosted process that allows you to use parts of the discussion from a workshop to solicit further comments or, perhaps, create a discourse process emerging from a workshop so that something more long‑term happens, which could involve follow‑up workshops or which could eventually reside in the development of a joint paper or whatever. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. Maybe I'll address one of your comments right now as to not leave everyone in suspense. Indeed, we are not ready to announce a host for the 2018 IGF. There were a couple of false starts earlier in the year. We have a number of very strong candidates. Those discussions are progressing. And we're very hopeful we'll be able to announce that in January.

 On the plus side, we have somebody committed for 2019 and we have very, very strong commitments from a number of countries for 2020 and 2021. We've all said before that we would like to be out two to three years with respect to the IGF hosts that would allow the preparatory process towards those discussions. And with the exception of the short‑term difficulties around 2018, we are well on our way and would expect by the middle of next year to have the next two or three actually identified.

 So I hope that answers some of the many questions I know we have been receiving this week. We're working very hard and certainly, very grateful to those countries that are actually stepping up and working towards hosting for next year. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: I am a civil society activist from Iraq. I have a few comments. I will try to say them all very quickly. The first one, I would like to raise my concern about the underrepresentation of the region. Almost, we are the same faces, IGF after IGF. I know that we have problems in our region. The lack of network and neutrality, the ongoing attacks online, activists. But still, the international institutions, the IGF could do more for us. It would be a good idea to create a fellowship scheme that would be specially directed to countries in which we have problems in the lack of access and free internet.

 The second comment is about the ‑‑ IGF. Me, I would like to say that we have not consulted at all. Last year, what process, we don't know. We are not consulted at all. Some other colleagues that I have work connectively in the region. Without any consultation with civil society activists. I want them to know that we are really not they're enemies. We just want to help them. We want to organize better IGF that will address the issues.

 The last comment is about the workshops. Always, what in the global IGF workshop will be placed in the last hour and the last day? Currently next IGF, try to change that. It's not fair for us just to be the last workshop and the last day.

 And I have one thing on behalf of my colleagues who didn't receive the Swiss Visa and didn't make it here. Kindly, when you choose a country, try to see if the Visa is assembly process for people who are coming from overseas. Thank you so much.

 

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. And just point out that the national and regional IGF initiatives are independent and autonomous activities within the IGF ecosystem. If there's something generally we can do with helping to support, we're happy to do that. But those discussions take place within regions or within nations. There are a set of criteria to recognize as an IGF initiative. And that's 3 out of the 4 stakeholder groups involved in the steering committee in the initiative as well as, of course, in the planning of any events. I would hope that certainly helps your discussions going forward. If we can help with any other general information, we're very happy to do that.

 If you don't mind, somebody online, which we will come to just now and then, we'll come back to the queue there. And if I could ask everybody to say their names slowly. Pronouncing them quite carefully, that will allow us to have a transcript that identifies the speaker rather than simply member of the audience. Anja?

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: This is Mike Nelson, cloudflare. And I'm calling in from Washington where I've been watching IGFs all week, usually at 4:30 in the morning. Very grateful to have the chance to participate remotely. I would say there have been some challenges this year, unlike last year, when we ‑‑ and this year, some of the sessions were not broadcast in realtime.

 But when they were, WebEx worked very well, I was able to speak in a number of sessions. I wanted to make a radical suggestion, there's no host that steps forward for next year, perhaps, we should have a virtual IGF and hold it in cyberspace. The model might be what the internet society did with the intercommunity session. Held a 27‑hour virtual video conference. The different chapters and different regions, hosted an hour at a time. We could do the same with the national and regional IGFs.

 And we could, actually, involve a much larger community. We could get a huge amount of attention and also involve higher‑level people that could participate without having to fly to some corner of the world.

 Maybe there will be a host country, but it would host the virtual event rather than trying to convene 2,000 or 3,000 people in one place. Another quick point about remote participation. Might consider having the remote moderators not only follow what's being said online but actually contribute to the twitter updates, try to provide some kind of live streaming where that wasn't being done by members of the audience. The twitter stream has been rich this year. But there hasn't been a lot of back and forth.

 I think the remote moderators could be part of that. I also want to pick up on the theme that we heard earlier about celebrating our successes and publicizing the contributions of the IGF much better. While they have an impact on the small circle of people, they don't have a broader impact that might be had if the media picked up on it.

 Former Mag members like myself might actually be able to push out some of the best results if we had concerted campaign to identify messages and things. The last thing I would early morning the best practice forums to consider is doing some kind of scorecard and comparisons. And really, rather than writing about principles and writing about goals and analyzing the problem, let's actually give letter grades to the different activities that are helping to address the problem elsewhere and highlight the things that are working best. And also, talk about worst practices.

 My last comment is just to have with my frustration that sometimes the IGF workshop process focuses so much on diversity that we have panels that have many accents, we have all of the stakeholders represented, they're coming from different places, and they all say the same thing. And I think we really have a problem because this year, I heard panels where seven people all said the same thing and then, the next day, the same topic, four other people all said the opposite thing. We didn't mix the panels enough.

 This goes to the point that we need to get more business people involved and a little bit more effort to get the technical community involved to make sure we have different viewpoints. And I also think we could do a little bit more to make sure we have some last‑minute additions to the program that addressed the most ‑‑ the lightest issues that have popped up.

 One of the things that caught a lot of attention here in the United States was the riots in Charlottesville, which led to a lot of focus on Neo‑Nazi websites. We had some good panels on that topic, but it could have been that we would've already picked the program and not been able to address one of the hottest topics here in Washington and around the world.

 So, thanks, again, for a great session. Thanks for all the people doing the remote participation, and thanks for a chance to be part of the discussion today.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Michael. And thank you for your dedication, too. It's not the easiest to participant online. And particularly not when you're starting in the middle of the night. Sir, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon. Vladimir Radanovich. I hope it was slow enough. First of all, I really want to thank Switzerland for hosting this excellent IGF, but not only that, but all of the support of the IG process in the years. And I think it's more important in this particular IGF.

 Couple of points. Remote participation. It has been mentioned a couple of times as a former Mag member, I always try to reiterate, this is not just a service, it is really participation. We need to invest more in this process. And I do want to join Mike in thanking all of the remote moderators which did a great job.

 Secondly, and, of course, Switzerland. Secondly, capacity building. We've been talking about it very much. And I want to reiterate one thing, and that is the sessions for newcomers which were organized but never in the previous years we actually managed to do it properly. I think, don't give up, that's the message for the new Mag members, don't give up. Really important. But then, maybe a proposal. We used to have some of the regional, a comprehensive capacity building program. And that's a proposal to try to do in the next year and certainly, when Germany takes over a comprehensive year‑round program, capacity building program with mixed institutions that are doing that. That means, also, we need a financial commitment to do that.

 And this is particularly important. And lastly, the fellowships . In some of the previous years, we had much more opportunities for fellowships. In the recent years apart from a couple of five‑star institutions, we didn't see that much commitment to bring, especially young people, from the developing countries, including governments that's also missing and that's linked to the capacity building progress. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. Sir, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you my name is Salu Mansere. This is my first IGF. Again, I have to go back to where the contributors lamented on the issue of multistakeholder. I came here expecting that there would be a lot more government, a lot more business, and more so the technological area.

 Because in us trying to shape the digital future, we need to have everyone on board. And I think in one of the sessions in which the UNESCO director participated talked about indicators. And that's one thing I'm taking back, for our next IGF in Sierra Leone ‑‑ just as you've heard before, civil society has kind of ‑‑ I wouldn't want to use the term "taken over," but seems to be in larger numbers.

 We would want to ensure in the next IGF we have in Sierra Leone, and ensure we drag in the government, drag in business and the technological society also should be dragged in. Again, my second issue is on the issue of breaching the digital divide. There were a few sessions on that. But one thing that came out in one of our sessions is that there's going to be a ceiling we're going to hit in another year or so. Because if we cannot break that illiteracy issue globally, you cannot get those people online.

 The technology is only for literates. All of this technology focuses on literates and we have to adopt at some point, whether it's UN or others, that's illiteracy is a disability. We need to adopt that and move on. But there's going to ‑‑ thank you very much.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. It certainly has been a goal to increase participation from the private sector from governments and from senior policymakers, generally, for some years now. I think we're making some progress on at least one of those categories. We have a lot more work to do, though. And we are open to any suggestions, programs, ideas. So feel free to send those along. And if I could remind everybody, as well, the first physical Mag meeting should be some time February or March. We start each one over those with a one‑day open community consultation.

 So to send in your ideas to participate in that consultation, to send your ideas in ahead of time to myself or the secretariat will all help inform the work over the coming years. Please, don't hesitate to do that. And don't wait. You can do that now. Or, in fact, get ready for the open community consultation.

 Chengetai has reminded me we have a place for written suggestions to come in, as well. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you very much. My name is Emile, and I work in the European parliament, but currently, I'm speaking on my own capacity. First of all, I would like to thank you all, every person that was involved in the organization of IGF. It was my first IGF experience and I enjoyed it very much. However, I would like to draw everyone's attention on a specific issue that I believe that wasn't adequately addressed during the IGF, during these five days.

 There were some questions raised by the audience and some concerns and I really hope I can see these in the summaries that will be published in the following months.

 So it's about policies being discussed now in Europe and it's about the copyright reform. And I believe the copyright reform as being discussed right now, it affects the core issues of the internet as we know it today, it affects our freedom of expression, our freedom to access information, our privacy, data protection, attacks small enterprises, journalists and the users, most of all. One word only on these, it's in case someone doesn't know already. Article 11 of this reform introduces a new neighboring right for publishers which may cover, also, snippets and hyperlinks and article 15 imposes obligations, an obligation to platforms, hosting content to deploy tools for upload for any upload. That's going online.

 And I believe this should have been addressed more, not only by the audience, but also by the panelists. And that was my only issue. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. Andrea, you have the floor.

>> Andrea Saks: I'm Andrea Saks, and I'm the coordinator for the dynamic coalition on accessibility and disability, and I also am the chairman of the joint coordination activity on accessibility and human factors. ‑‑ in the ITU. And every year, we're always going to have problems with access. Every year, the dynamic coalition on accessibility gets their sleeves up and tries to solve them. And Chengatai's great, Lynn, you understand what's going on. We have made successes.

This is a particularly difficult venue, as we have discovered. But my main concern in deciding to speak at this moment in time was that the raving, the positive raving of WebEx ‑‑ I can't take it. WebEx does not work for blind people. It simply does not. I want to let everybody know that the ITU is testing other tools and we'll make that information available. I think we have to change or give a really healthy nudge to Cisco to say, redesign, do something. We are conscious of the financial implications of this, and I will mention one as an example. Zoom does not cost anything. We're going to help to find a better remote participation tool. We know they generously donate the license.

 But if it doesn't work, it isn't really great. But I do want to say that IGF does listen to us, but the venues make sometimes the choices that we have to make a bit difficult. One of the things I wanted to point out was about Mexico. They had a load of university volunteers that could help. Lynn, you pushed a wheelchair today, didn't you? You did, indeed. If we ever have to be here, again? That we get ahold of every student to do a credit on that to come and help us here. That would be great. We took those guidelines and made them into proper papers in the ITU, we're upgrading those, as well.

 We know that people care in the IGF. And a lot of people have mentioned accessibility and disability in some of the sessions I've said. But everybody's subject is impacted by those people who have a disability of all kinds.

 And I would like everyone in this room to take back to their countries how they can assist persons, get online. And we do include literacy. Because whether you have it from a disease or you never got to go to school is absolutely right. That's a disability. And thank you for the time to say that. Thank you very much.

[ Applause ]

 

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Andrea.

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Andrea, we are going to work with you early next year starting to plan the access issues. Thank you. Yeah.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you my name is Al Kapoles. And this year, we organized the session on the information and fake news. And as it was really a great session. We have youngsters on the panel. You don't know which youngsters get funding to go to ‑‑ or are able to go to such an event as the IGF. That's one of the difficulties I experienced.

 And also, I would like to goal everyone to reach out to their local communities to get more youth involved in their local events. We can all travel to the IGF and be able to participate here. But also, as our local communities, we have to involve them.

 And, for instance, I organized the youth IGF in Amsterdam in collaboration with my university, University of Amsterdam. And we have youngsters talking about the issues we're discussing here. But that was really a debate. Here, we are listening and making some comments. That was a debate on how to move on. That's what we want a debate ‑‑ we can listen, we don't have to travel here to do that. We need a direction.

 That's one of the other points, maybe we can put one of these mics in this room right now, just in every room. So that is ‑‑ it would be more easily for people to participate and stand up and interrupt a little. If you're going to wait for the end of the session, then we've got five minutes period of time to ask questions. And I don't think that will be good for the process.

 I guess, more interaction would be way better. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, it's an excellent comment and something we're all striving for and very much looking for. And clearly, there's room for improvements, still.

 We have an online participant, Anja, are they ready now?

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thanks, Chair (?) I would like to thank you for giving us the hub to Abuja. The stakeholders in the IGF event. I would like to thank you for that. But during this session, the breakout sessions were ‑‑ we were not able to cover the breakout session. And that affected all of us. All we had to the entire (?) As well as to the secretariat in the breakout session.

 Secondly, we would like, as well, to have more encouragement from private sector. And we would like to have more private sector on the remote ‑‑ one again, thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. It's very interesting comments, particularly, your last one. It would be good for the hubs were, in fact, fully multistakeholder, as well. Something more to strive for. Sir, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you. My name is Omar Corera, vice president for the Cuban unit. First of all, I'm very happy here. I want to share with you first because our union is very young. But we have more than 1,000 members, and we have ‑‑ we are proud because the 32% are female and very young people.

 We are working for the site in Cuba. The last October, we had our civil society to increase the development of ICT and how this can improve the society. Isn't it interesting how we work in different ‑‑ the most important idea for IGF? We work in inclusion, we work in cybersecurity. We're working in ecommerce. And it's very interesting for that.

 For IGF, for hubs, for different point of view, for important ideas. And this international ‑‑ we appreciate we still have a lot to do ‑‑ the financial resource allow it. We ‑‑ 5 5 68 municipalities, more than 600 technology centers has been created allowing the access to the internet and education in the use of the ICT. Who has internet access in all education held? Science and innovation system. All in the society. Now, there is the access of the Cuban people are increasing with more than 500 Wi-Fi. And in collaboration with the government to increase to the internet contributing to the benefit of the society. Thank you very much for this event.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello, my name is Noha, and I'm an IGF fellow. And thanks for being open for feedbacks. It would be great to see more young people among panelists, not only in youth‑related sessions and allow them to be heard and not just give them the mic and say, yes, there was a youth participation in the session while they're actually marginalized or kept at the end.

 We need to be heard, empowered and allowed to contribute in policymaking. And I would like to also recommend to provide more fellowships to young people to encourage to select the best candidates and sponsor them to attend the region and global IGFs. And even, allocate a percentage for the delegates to be from young people. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon. I'm going to be speaking French. My name is Fran. I do speak English, but I want to speak French this afternoon because I want to emphasize cultural diversity and linguistic diversity.

 I would, actually, like to respond to the telephonic representative. I think, unfortunately, that he has left. But I hope that the message will get to him. Because I organized the workshop on the undersea cables. And I would like to say that we received invitation for a number of telecommunications companies, we issued invitations to the companies but they did not reply. And the panel ‑‑ I was the mediator, and I stressed the important, the importance of representatives over telecommunications companies, but I think that unfortunately, this representative didn't actually take the floor, then, and I think ‑‑ I think that what has been said demonstrates despite the lack of response that we had when it came to organizing our panel from industry, there is an interest on the part of telecommunications companies. There is interest in discussing this question of undersea cables and the governance of undersea cables.

 Because the absence of transparency when it comes to tariff agreements, agreements on tariffs which deal with these cables and also, the way in which technical companies are involved, it's very important for their voices to be heard. So via this, I would like to address a message to the representative telephonic and/or other telecommunications companies. I would like to suggest that we continue such an exchange and we take advantage of the IGF as an important forum in order to work together to improve infrastructure and ensure universal access. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That's a good reminder to those of us in the audience, in fact, that we do have interpretation in all six UN languages, so you should feel free to make your comments in any of those.

>> My name is Marilyn Cade. I'm a CEO of a small enterprise. And I have a spread business unit called ICT Strategies where I do social enterprise and development work. Only with the small enterprises and associations from developing countries for that particular business unit.

 I'm taking the floor to talk about something that I hope all of you will be very excited to recall. And that is, when we established the IGF, we did so based on paragraph 72 and the entirety of the agenda, which is like speaking Greek to many of you that are new. But I'm going to reference two paragraphs. Not just paragraph 72 in its entirety, but also paragraph 80 which makes reference to local and regional activities.

 When we met in Brazil in the fall 2015, there were less than 60 national and regional IGFs. Working among ourselves, we took the challenge to try to double that number. And I am extremely pleased to say that today, a lot of changes have happened, some more support at the secretariat from our focal point, Anja Gengo who is here monitoring internet participation. We have further to go, but if you have not picked up the great publication that was at the shared booth, I have about 50 copies and would love for you to stop and get one where you can see whether or not your country, if you're not already directly involved, whether your country has an NRI.

 In order to change public policy, and I spent 27 years working in the global communications company and ten years working for a state government in the United States. In order to change public policy, you must talk globally and you must act locally.

 And that is where the national and regional IGFs come in. We are organic, we are consensus‑based, we are bottom up, and we reflect what is going on in our country. We're not perfect because we can't always attract all stakeholders. So we need help and we need to work together. But at this particular session, the NRIs held eight, NRI to NRI interactive sessions. And we held a main session.

 We also had a shared booth in the village. The one sad thing for us was that although we were a main session, the Mag gave us only 2.5 hours, and they split our session with a two‑hour break in between. That is an incredible barrier for NRIs who are not only all volunteers and coming here to the IGF, but they carry the responsibility of representing their community at home. And I hope the Mag will be more sensitive to the NRIs in the allocation of the main session for next year.

 I'm going to make a comment about the two NRI sessions that I participated in and helped to monitor. One on Fake News, Misinformation and Disinformation. And I took a small poll about whether we predicted that we would continue to address this issue in our next NRI. We can't tell you until we do our bottom‑up consensus. But the prediction was we would continue to address this issue.

 I also wanted to report that I moderated a government's open forum at their invitation. A private sector person invited by a government to be moderator of a government‑open forum. I want us to think about how far we've come. And finally, at the end of the access NRI session, the agreement among the group that participated was to work very directly together to try to take up tangible actions that they would each try to implement and trial in their NRI. And then, we would hope to come back together and report to each other on our progress.

 I think that is tangible progress.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Marilyn. And we thank you and Anja Gengo for being continuous champions, as well. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello, I am from Nepal, I am IGF fellow. I come from a very developed country or a least developed country in the world Nepal. And the awareness about internet governance forum in my country is very low. And thus, the PARPG of ‑‑ from my country on IGF is only limited to those community only. The awareness of this forum has to be more wider so that a lot of people, like me, who comes from ‑‑ also participate. And also, to ensure that the IGF is more participating, not only those that have internet, but those who do not have.

 Talking on behalf of my community, I could not agree more with my colleague who just spoke. It is important that youth are also VOD for a resource or do I say a panelist in the forums. Not only in the session which are dedicated to youth, but also important ‑‑ other important issues like women or data protection. Because we do have a lot to contribute. Thank you so much.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I think those are important points. And I certainly hope it's picked up more in the year to come. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon. Thank you for all of the work you've put into organizing the internet governance forum. I'm Julie Pandi. It is important to think about accountability at the IGF, management of the IGF is heavily dependent upon the office of the United Nations Secretary General which appoints in a top‑down process. This has resulted in a composition dominated by government and industry.

 Another way that the IGF is falling short in the inability to provide a clear pathway for discussions that will feed into the work stakeholders do elsewhere. Development of laws and regulation by governments, development of terms and services by corporate and design of software, standards and coders and hackers. While the dynamic collision provide recommendations on critical issues. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. If I can address your first point and if anybody from DESA wants to jump in there, obviously, very welcome to. In fact, the appointment process was more nuanced. It was the government's ‑‑ the Mag is 55 people. Roughly half from governments. They are elected through a standard UN regional process.

 The other three stakeholder groups share the other 55 slots, equal representation between the technical and academic sector, and civil society. Each one of those three stakeholder groups run their own process to make recommendations that, in fact, are sent to the secretary general.

 The secretary general, I think, I've been told relies very heavily on the recommendations. What they try to do and the office of the secretary general is just ensure that there's appropriate diversity, regional and gender, primarily. Some steps were taken this year to make the requirements clear, more clear in terms of the positions that were being vacated. So that those stakeholder groups had a little more guidance as they were, actually, sending their recommendations up to the secretary general's office.

 So there are clearly still improvements we can make in the processes, but it is not top‑down in the sense of the secretary general relies very heavily on those bottom‑up recommendations from the other stakeholder processes.

 And certainly, with respect to your last point about more concrete outputs and recommendations, there is a drafting team that was, in fact, a working group on a multi‑year strategic work program. And that is, specifically, to look at what are some of the possible ways we can do that.

 And, in fact, your colleague is a person leading the drafting team.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: You have the floor.

>>

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you (?) From India. Internet service association of India as well as the board. The first point was about the number of sessions. This has been covered by the other speakers, I won't waste time on that. However, one limited point I wish to make here. Something very constructive. Now, what I felt after attending some sessions where the civil society people were there, they are really concerned, rightly so ‑‑ the general issues, the public faces, especially from the respective governments, which they're voicing very loudly.

 Now, when speaking to some of them, I found that the country's laws which are not comprehensive. My suggestion would be if we can ‑‑ at the IGF level form a working group, draft some standard laws keeping the best democratic institutions ‑‑ and those laws should be on two subjects. That is freedom of speech and right to information.

 And if these laws are circulated, drafted, made and circulated. One, it'll give a document in the hands of the civil society to approach the governments and push them to moving towards world standard laws. And second, when they're sent to the respective governments, I'm sure something good will also come out of that. Thank you.

 

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Are you meaning laws or principles or norms?

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Once the principles have been taken into consideration and laws made on those, they would generally get acceptable across the world. And if they're not getting acceptable, the civil society will have a document to show the governments as to why don't they want to meet the world standards in these two subjects.

 At least, something substantial will come. Some substantial discussion will take place. Because remember, in the end, if laws comprehensively drafted, anyone who then faces illegal arrest or confinement or whatever, the courts will help him because the law is comprehensive and well drafted.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Sebastian, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: I'm glad, not to be the first person not to be speaking English here this afternoon. So my name is Sebastian Bacholet. Thank you. I would like to start by congratulating all of the organizers. I don't come to all of the IGFs, but I have been to some. This one was not so far away so I could get here by car.

 And I didn't have any support from anybody. I am an individual user. And I would like to thank the organizers, and I would like to focus on matters which I thought didn't work so well. It's not to say that everything else has been bad. But what I'm saying, these are the things which I think we should be concentrating on.

 Now, there was a session on the internet of objects. The organizers were not there. I came up to the organized a debate there. I hope someone will take up the discussion. It's not my work, really. But if you want me to do it, you'll have to ask me to. A couple of examples from this morning. A session was supposed to be organized, but nobody came. There was absolutely nobody in the room.

 And the second session I went to at the same time, there was a government there, one government. At least one government was represented to tell us about what was going on in that country and that's it. Not many people there. It was a five‑minute meeting, as a result. And there was nobody present. Apart from me and one other person. There weren't any questions. And we left it to that.

 Now, I know it's difficult to find the attractive subjects and so on. But I do think that we've got to make sure that we have a multi‑player event and that this takes into account the greater part of people coming here and make sure that we don't have this sort of situation where nobody turns up to meetings.

 Once again, thank you very much. The last thing I'd like to say is that we talked about gender in every ‑‑ and every meeting. And this is why I've been wearing a pink shirt. Thank you.

[ Applause ]

 

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Certainly, take those points into the consideration and look through the workshops. And I think it's fair to say, you know, attendance, I think specifically here, on the last day is probably not held by the proximity to year end and upcoming holidays. We'll certainly look more deeply into that and see if there's something else to adjust that. Sir, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello, my name is Alp Tocor. I'm with NetBox. We're a technology‑driven civil society group. And I wanted to give an insight into why, perhaps, technologists have been dropping out of IGF over the last few years. I asked some of my friends. And this has been since 2014 because we have IGF, where we're based. And I got really interesting comments.

 Just before I do that, I just want to back up that remark about the copyrights and having more voices on that. And I especially want to back up the previous comment about accessibility. Accessibility's for all of us. It's not just minority. It's something we all need.

 So the feedback I got from the technologists was really interesting. And I don't think it's been represented so far. The theme very much is technologists ‑‑ people tell them to do things. Other civil society groups tell them to implement things. They're seen as coders. People who provide services.

 But in the real world, technologists are actually building the systems that are creating their own groups and they've run a lot of this work in their own space. To get the technologists back, with we need to invite them as equals and not just as people who will implement the ideas of others because that's making people run away at a massive pace. And they're not just private sector, they're some independent. I think it's hard for independents to participate in IGF compared to other stakeholders. So that's, perhaps, an insight into how we can bring more technologists into IGF.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That was helpful, thank you. Just a quick notice I'm going to close the queue in a few minutes so we have time for all of the speakers that are in queue. And then, some reflections from the host country co‑chair here. And then, of course, at 5:00, we would go into the closing ceremony.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon, everyone. I'm from a Brazilian civil society organization. We and other Latin American and Caribbean organizations gathered here in IGF and we wrote an open letter regarding fake news in elections and we would like to read it for you in order to use well the time and show the diversity of the organizations.

 We're going to split the reading. We are already positioned here. And we won't read the undersigned organizations, but you can read it and endorse the letter even if your organization is not a Latin American one. We will Tweet the website with the #fakenewsIGF2017. I'll start the reading. Open Letter from Civil Society Representatives around Fake News and elections.

 In growing international debates about the so‑called fake news, the undersigned organizations would like to express the strong concerns about possible paths that the framing of the issues, the issue is taking. The terminology has been widely spread in rhetorics from the global north.

 But we cannot import such a concept without taking into account the long history of media concentration and manipulation in Latin American and Caribbean region. Legitimizing the term, as asserted during the internet governance in Geneva. I don't like the term fake news because I think there's a bit of trap in it. We are confronting campaigns of misinformation. So we should talk about information and disinformation.

 They are trying to dissuade us from reading news and thinking. Campaigns of misinformation have been a strategy from traditional media monopolies to threaten and dismantle democracies for years. We cannot just consider years of work for the movement of communications and adopt the fake news terminology of a completely new phenomenon in Latin America. Consider old and new power imbalances concerning media ownership concentration, social media monopolies and political interests, control and manipulate speech within and beyond its borders, open space for serious consequences.

 

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello, my name is Martin Majore from Peru. We are concerned that the adoption of terminology will eventually lead to media monopolies against independent media, community media and independent critical voices as if they were solely the one entitled as possible official fact checkers.

 A trend that might escalate in the same way as a persecution against community proliferated across North America. It will lead to, also, to open space for surveillance, content manipulation and censorship from platforms.

 We have seen testing tools to classify and block what is fake or real or trustworthy. Any ‑‑ furthermore, fact checking partnerships may not take into account that we operate in a context in which platforms have substantial power to manipulate their agreements to prioritize a particular kind of content. That would also be equally misleading even more damaging and obscure as if could not be subject to any oversight.

 This trend becomes even more worrisome in the context of regional elections. It would also lead to surveillance and censorship from governance. Proliferation of loss aiming to activate monitory and delegating fact checking. Therefore, in the role of independent media watchdogs. Brazil has just ‑‑ among others by representative from the army and the diligence to monitor fake news during the elections and have draft bills with the intent to define fake news as false and incomplete content.

 In face of this scenario, we profoundly agree with another concern also spread by Frank Larou. It becomes a perfect excuse to silence or shut down any alternative or dissident voice.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: If I could ‑‑ I'm sorry, this session is really taking stock for the activity that we've all been engaged in here over the last year. So if there's more of the statement, I would encourage you to keep it short so we can get back to the specifics of how we actually improve and advance the IGF.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: It's really the end of the statement. Therefore, reinforcing the universal declaration of human rights, the international coalition empowered by the freedom of expression on fake news, disinformation, propaganda, we would like to reinforce the following principles to guide future conversation about dissemination of misinformation in the environment.

 And I think this is the contribution we can do, actually, with recommendation in a place like this IGF. The human rights to impart information protects ideas that may shock or disturb and it's even not limited to corrective statement. It does not justify the dissemination of knowingly or recklessly false statement by official or state actor or by organizing and powerful private actors.

 States may only impose restriction on right to freedom of expression in accordance with the such restriction on the international level. We know the principles. General prohibition on the dissemination of information based on ambiguous ideas, including fake news or nonobjective information are incompatible with international on freedom of expression. It is necessary to consider various forms of this information in this debate ranging from news without ‑‑ created intentionally for political and economic reasons to unbalance information. The identification in the first case, the first should refrain from taking measures to limit access to our dissemination of digital content, including the automatic process, digital recognition, basic content removal system, which are not transparent in nature, which failed to respect minimum due process standards and restrict access to the dissemination of content. It states an intermediaries should engage to ensure clear and complete information about political advertisement. Over the internet and to promote algorithmic understanding. As well as free, independent and diverse environment including media diversity, which is a key means of addressing this information and propaganda in democratic societies.

 It is the confrontation of ideas, and the existence of open debate. Consider all measures to promote equality, nondiscrimination, intercultural understanding and other ‑‑

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. Please.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Addressing the negative aspect. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. Without saying anything about the content of the statement. This is the one opportunity this community has to give feedback specifically on the IGF program and taking stock. It's really not appropriate and, in fact, it takes away from the time of everybody else in this room to improve a forum they came here to participate in if we have lengthy political statements. I would like to ask everybody to refrain from that and stay with the theme here of taking stock session.

 Nigel, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you very much, Madame chair. Ladies and gentlemen, I will certainly not talk about fake news. My name is Nigel Hixet. In Mexico and in Brazil, I took this microphone, I don't often get the opportunity. It's nice to get the opportunity. And I urge the young people, the younger generation to have passion, to stand up to the beliefs, but to do more, to go outside, not just to speak inside here, but to go and lobby their governments, to go and lobby their businesses, to get their views across.

 And I think they have been doing this. I agree with you, Madame Chair, this is not the place to talk about fake news. We've had the in the IGF. But please, those that feel passionately about the issues, go to their governments. I'm going to say something else, as well, this afternoon. A politician in the UK famously in 1953 went to the podium and said, I'm going to fight, fight, fight for the party I love.

 He was a labor politician when the party was in crisis. Well, I'm going to say fight, fight, fight for the IGF, you love. Madame Chair, and ladies and gentlemen, I think we're at a pivotal point. The IGF is the only true global venue where we're all able to put forward our points. And we must protect it. We must nurture it as Marilyn Cade said. And I don't always agree with Marilyn, it's been a fantastic journey. We've grown the national initiatives. There's lots and lots of dynamic processes going on. And we must protect this.

 But we must also support the IGF not just with rhetoric, not just with words but practical support. We call on the UN to support it. We call on governments to support it. With workshop proposals, governments to support it in the same way. We must grow and stimulate this debate for another eight years. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Nigel. A great deal of energy. I'm going to close the queue now as I announced so we can get through the rest of the speakers here, leave time for the honorary host to make some final remarks and then, again, move to the closing ceremony. We'll go to the queue here in the middle.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon. I'm from Brazil. I'm part of the program promoted by the CGI. I would like to talk about participation of young people in the sessions. We held meetings about our participation and shared our experience.

 And every day, there were reports of unanswered questions, not to mention, the lack of time for debate. I would like to stress that we are not here just for decoration. And we really want to debate. And my suggestion for you are to start accepting more different styles of workshops such as breakout groups and birds of a feather and true workshops that provide a larger portion of time for discussion.

 And if that's not respected, it should be punished for upcoming events.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. That's good feedback. We have been trying to encourage a broader type of session. So the more support we can get from all of you and particularly, in the workshop proposals themselves, the easier that will come about. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is Xenia, I'm from Lebanon, from the government. I'm a Mag member, but my intervention now is related to the IGF process in which I'm involved since many years now. It's just a clarification that the conclusion of the IGF2015, an initiative was launched ‑‑ this initiative started by forming a working group from various stakeholders from 13 different countries. This group worked on the enhancement of the other process in five areas. The objectives, the structure, financing, content and output, media and outreach.

 In parallel, a public survey was launched together commenced from the community. This group's effort in addition to the public consultation resulted in producing a new charter and an updated road map for internet governance. And as of 2018, the new face of the IGF will be fully revised. Several expressions of interest will receive from different countries to host the fifth IGF forum and the second half of 2018.

 It's needed to clarify this issue. It was mentioned. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Good afternoon. My name is Felix. I represent IGF from the democratic respect of Congo. I would like to congratulate you on the diversity. Nevertheless, I would like to focus on the underrepresentation of Africa in the various panels. I've noticed that there has been improvement compared to previous years. But there are still efforts that need to be made to ensure that Africa is properly representative on panels.

 The second issue concerning representation regards central Africa. We've raised this before. And what we can say is that central Africa is sorely underrepresented or even absent. Furthermore, it's the DRC, which is the giant there with a very large population. Countries with nine borders of other countries, but it's completely absent from the Africa IGF. I think that countries like ours should be given an equal footing to express themselves. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: No, thank you. In fact, when the IGF was renewed for ten years in 2015, that was specifically one of the suggestions or comments in the resolution was that we work harder to engage more developing country participation. And it is something we have been trying to do, but we have a long way to go.

 And again, suggestions, comments, always welcome. Martin, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you Martin ‑‑ I really want to thank the secretariat for the excellent preparation and the host for the hospitality and welcome. And without them, we wouldn't have been able to do our work. So my conclusions for the year, a lot of progress has been made, as well. I very much agree that India IGF and thanks to the IGF, the agenda represents what's really at the moment on the public mind. And the growing understanding more here than anywhere else I think that no stakeholders can do this alone.

 I think this is the place to go for all activities to come together that take place in the world knowing this is not the only activity but this is the best platform to bring it together, I believe. So with that, there's also a challenge, a challenge of many sessions and very little time. And maybe there's an opportunity for improvement there to improve cross learning and in particular, for those that relate to each other. For instance, for those that relate organize a pre‑meeting, probably online to make it possible.

 And times before, open invitation, but implicit invitation to the organizers that they'll allow them to align their message and their discussions where possible and maybe a second thing ‑‑ and I know I call upon more volunteer action probably is to have rapporteurs to extract the common themes.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Martin, we're going to go to the queue on the end, the queue is closed with those people that are standing up at the moment. And in the end, Anja, you have a couple of comments from the online participants.

 You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, good afternoon. As far as I'm concerned, the major challenge of security on the internet when we talk about access to the internet, we must talk about security. Sure that users trust the internet. In my country, we are vulnerable to cybercrime. We've had several attacks.

 We would like to take this opportunity to say that the IGF should encourage stakeholders to take part in various issues relating to cyber security at the next forum. We're young, we want to take advantage of internet opportunities, but do so safely. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Mary, you have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you very much. My name is Mary Radumah and I'm from Nigeria. I first want to say, I want to congratulate the Mag of 2017 IGF. You have done a lot of work. You've encouraged people to participate. And when we had our African open forum, the number of Africans that attended was very, very impressive. And we can see improvement. The improvement in effective participation is what you are still looking to ‑‑ and we know by the time somebody said something about compassion building. Probably also have ‑‑ there were too many workshops. And too many of them related. And too many of them almost saying the same thing.

 So we brought for the first time, they will be confused, don't know which one to attend and which one to do. Probably, we look at when you're looking at the workshops, see the ones that are truly related, then you have to do some more work to see that what's the experience will not happen, again.

 I want to mention also some names. I want to mention the chair, Marilyn and Anja, you people have done so well for us in the NRI network. And we're able to have collaborative sessions that brought about a change of views, change of perspectives, change of new things that are happening in other countries.

 But we want to say just like Marilyn said that we should be given a session where high‑level people will come, hear what we are doing and also know that these things are happening at the national level. Finally, I want to say that all workshops, conclusions that will benefit the countries will be anything that is linked to the SDGs. Workshops should also be linked to the SDGs and the UN is also interested in having this.

 Finally, the timing of the IGF. Please, we are supposed to be with the loved ones because this is a holiday period. If it is possible not to schedule the IGF around the holiday period, that would be very, very good for us, thank you very much.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I think your last comment would be supported by everyone who has actually stayed here for the day. Thank you, Mary. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you. I wanted to react briefly to the remarks you made about that statement from Latin America. I generally agree that this is not the place for lengthy statements, but I would say that this particular statement is definitely one that should be highly respected, highly welcomed and highly taken seriously. I'm not from Latin America, I was not involved, but I'm well enough connected to international civil society to know that come up in reaction. What is going on in many sessions here in the IGF where my colleagues from Latin America were justifiably alarmed by something that is not acceptable from their situation.

 It has been mentioned that we need to be inclusive over developing countries. So we really need to take them serious. And when their concerns and their situation is being trampled by discourse which is too much northern based, we need to take it seriously when they speak up.

 So my heartfelt thanks to my Latin American colleagues for having done so. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: It was not comment at all on the statement, just the appropriateness of the venue here. You have the floor.

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, Madame Chair. I'm Darya Marich. I would first like to thank the IGF secretariat and wonderful people from the UN on all of the support for allowing us to do this ‑‑ to deliver this experiment on bridging the digital policy. And showing all of these issues that that we deal with in technology in an interactive way in our everyday lives. We had interesting feedback from people. We would love to hear suggestions for continuing this.

 And we would really love to see things like this happening in future ideas. Broadening the discussion to bring in interactive perspectives to bring in more feedback from the audience to bring in artists, even, in the discussions. Thank you very much for the opportunity.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, it was very interesting. Sir, you have the floor, and Anja, we'll go to you for the online participants.

 

>> AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you. I'm Obit Tenzi from IGF Ilo. I have to say that we have to think about the WI‑FI in the buses in Geneva but Haiti, electricity isn't supplied to all something of a luxury. We have a generation talking about technology in summits. But the majority of people don't understand this at all. Cyber security, smart city, artificial intelligence are the words over experts.

 But they're not useful for Haitians. So I think this community needs committed use of the calls for the internet. We have to make sure that young people can help their communities and ensure the future of the internet.

 I think that the ideas coming out of this forum should commit all professionals to serving their country in their area of expertise. That's what I think. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Anja?

>> Anja Grego: I have a concern regarding the discussions and workshops which took place here during the IGF. Is it possible that such discussions can actually give rise to sanctions from the UN? If certain processes are broken? For instance, the issue of internet shutdowns which was one of the breakout sessions. Does the IGF have the enabling power to recommend a sanction to these countries? Or we are just talking for talking sake. Another comment from the outcome of the IGF should be analyzed. Once all of the discussions at different workshops have been done, actions should be taken based on the outcomes and later in life to see how transformative they have been to look into outcomes that have not been expected.

 And the third comment is it is necessary to address the issue of increasing remote participation. We have seen that participation in the meetings where we have participated, we would like to have statistics of these participations to know in a certain way the situation. Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Anja. I'm going to turn to Thomas in just a moment. But just a brief response to the first question, which I think was really the only question there. The IGF, of course, is not the venue to actually recommend sanctions. I think we can be clear on what good practice looks like and the ramifications of policy choices.

 But what the IGF is good at is driving action out to the appropriate bodies or places where it can clearly be picked up. And then, applied through appropriate practices or other bodies with the appropriate expertise and means.

 Thomas? Thomas is the honorary host country chair, first with Switzerland. He has a couple of reflections on this particular session. And then, we will move to the closing ceremony.

>> THOMAS SCHNEIDER: Thank you, Lynn, and I've listened very closely to the feedback. This is of fundamental importance. We all need to remember that the IGF has been started as an experiment. It still is an experiment that is evolving. And only through constructive feedback people can learn and the process and everything can continue to develop.

 And we also need to, first of all, I need to say as a person who has been participating in the 12IGFs, which is a fortune and has been part of the organizing team this time, there's some reflections that I would like to share with you as a complement.

 It should not be forgotten that it was a courageous decision of those that set the IGF up at that time to set it up as an open‑ended, bottom‑up equal basis multi‑stakeholder forum.

 It took a very wise decision to set it up like this. And there needs to be reflections on how to improve DRK how to further make the IGF more relevant. We tried as hosts to make it as attractive as possible. Make it as political as possible to not focus only on technical issues, but also really underlying the relevance for all of our daily lives all aspects.

 We have tried to introduce some new elements in the way things are done wherever we could together with coordination and the Mag as has been said. For the first time, not had an opening ceremony with a series of 20, 30 monologue speeches of high‑level participants. We have had a president who agreed to have an interactive dialogue with high‑level representatives even with an open mic. And we are quite happy to see how this has worked and would encourage others to go for interactive, also on high level.

 We have proposed to you now these messages that are complementing the chairman summary in order to contribute to having a more tangible outcome, which is not a negotiated outcome. It's just a different format of reflecting the key elements of some key elements of the discussion in a way that people may use them more easily and, of course, we have tested this for ten years in a number of national initiatives.

 We hope this is also contributing to making the IGF more visible, more easily usable, leaving more traces and also interested in having the feedback and improving this. So the message and this is the message also to the next, don't go for the at least common denominator of what you all agree. Try to have a little courage, try to cautiously but consciously test out new things, see how things go. Explain what your intention is with this because this is what drives the process further. We've also tried to use the potential we have in Geneva here to open up ‑‑ many say it's the traveling circus of the same people. We've tried to open this up to other people here in Geneva. To engage with people that are normally not considered to be the core of the IGF or IG community. So also, their outreach in various forms is something you should keep to experiment.

 I'm still wondering why this is happening is the size of panels. If you have sessions with 12 people on a panel or more, the session lasts 90 minutes. This is not really involving the ‑‑ it's not using the potential of the people in the room to have, like, a crowd intelligence discussion and outcome. And at the Swiss level where we have a Swiss IGF, told them the IGF, there are no panelists, we just have two provoking entry statements of five minutes and moderators that discuss with the whole audience. And this, actually, has been well‑received by the participants. And you don't always have the same people speaking and the same people listening.

 And it also lowers the barrier for young and new people to start taking the floor. There are things, also, there with interactivity, IGF is more interactive than most other conferences. There's still room for trying to become more interactive.

 And something that actually this time I realize that what part of the chicken and egg problem. Nigel has alluded to and I would like to thank him for making that point. We all agree that the IGF should be an open bottom‑up MUMT stakeholder process for dialogue without negotiating an outcome. Without reducing the hope for dialogue, not producing negotiated results.

 And then, we see that we have maybe not enough business representatives here. And then, when you talk to business people and the same everywhere, well, we have no resources to come here because there's no outcome that's produced. We have to go to Brussels or something where the decisions are made so we don't have to go to talk and listen.

 There's a mismanagement of expectations and communications. If we think we need if space for dialogue and do not want to have decisions, then we also need to give the resources for people to come and explain why this is important. It's the same with government. When we were trying to set the panels together, the high‑level representatives when we were invited ministers, the question of their advice is how many ministers from the neighboring countries do you have?

 Then you try to explain. Well, we have a panel of maximum 10 people. We can't invite all of your five neighbor countries and you because that would make the panel like 100 people if you take the balance to the end. Also there, if we ranked success of a conference in the numbers of ministers and presidents and CEOs that participate, then the IGF will never be a success because this is not what it's about.

 We have to really work together to communicate differently about what the IGF, what the value added of the IGF is and Marilyn and others have said this. It is a platform where decisions are not taken, but decisions appreciate where agendas are set.

 And this is a unique value. The most open platform we have. Where the easiest for new ideas, new decisions to emerge in this broad environment. And this is something not for free. And what we experience is that governments from developing and developed countries spend millions and millions to organize and businesses spend millions to sponsor non-inclusive based on invitation conferences on IG issues all over the world with millions of money where they invite 100, 200, 500 people with ministers, huge cost for security and other things. And then, they don't have any money to give to the IGF secretariat to fund it properly, to implement all of the nice ideas for improvement that we keep having but we just don't have the resources to actually implement them.

 And that doesn't really make sense to some extent, at least not in my view. We really have to explain to our CEOs, to our ministers, of course, some say, well, we don't need ministers, we done need CEOs. But we need to tell our CEOs or those that they should give the resources so these experts can go. And they should give money to the IGF secretariat that they can properly fund youth participation, remote participation, participation of people with disabilities and so on and so forth. As I said, this is not for free. And also, you find host countries that are willing and able to fund that part of the process.

 We need to communicate differently about what is the unique value added of the IGF in order to get the resources and the attention that we are convinced and I personally am convinced the IGF deserves because of the uniqueness and unique value.

 We all need to continue to work on this in the thinking about how to further improve the IGF. Maybe we need to change the name to something. I'll stop here and promise I'll be very short in the closing ceremony.

[ Applause ]

Thank you.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Thomas. Neither Chengetai nor I sponsored a particular discussion. But at this point in time, the taking stock session is closing and we're moving to the final event of the IGF and that's the closing ceremony and Chengetai will be the master of ceremonies for such session.

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you very much, Lynn. As Lynn said, this is the final, final section of IGF2017. Doesn't mean that it's the end. We do have activities that will still carry on.

 So we're going to have speakers, representatives from the various stakeholder groups to say a few words on the IGF. Our first speaker is Mr. Matthew Rantanen. And he is representing civil society, if he can come up to the lectern, please.

>> MATTHEW RANTANEN: Ladies and gentlemen, Excellencies, colleagues and stakeholders, friends and to make sure I'm recognizing everyone and observing protocols, I'd like to say all protocols observed. I'd like to thank you for the honor in allowing me to speak at the closing ceremonies of this internet governance forum in Geneva.

 I'd like to thank those that nominated me and selected me to participate. I'm here before you today to bring awareness to the global and indigenous communities around the world. It is our goal to ensure that we the indigenous people of the world have a recognized seat at the table in planning, development and implementation of the governance of the technology advances of this resource that we gather to support at this forum.

 I am Matthew Rantanen, I'm Norwegian and Finnish and born inner the United States of America, in which I'm a citizen. I work as the director of technology in the United Nations. And together, we have built a large community network, but more importantly an ISP. It continues to grow and supports the unserved and underserved Native American populations. It is the microwave network served by fiber that is more than 650 miles of lengths and supports 100 government municipalities, libraries, schools. As well as nearly 500 tribal homes. We're continually expanding the network to allow access to all of our 3,000 homes on the reservations and support the surrounding non‑tribal communities.

 We understand to enhance a community is to be inclusive of those that surround you and have some of the same barriers to access. We had to build this network to connect our communities because those communication companies charged with deployed telecom services in the United States have failed to support the most vulnerable population.

 Over the past 16 years of work on this initiative, it has become very apparent that there are barriers to entry for tribes and many other unserved and underserved communities to get the access they deserve.

 This realization has transitioned my work for the past decade to include advocacy for Native American tribes at the federal and state government levels of policymaking.

 I often joke that I'm a babysitter of meetings and I am there to make sure of three things. Native American tribes are not forgotten, Native American tribes are not intentionally excluded and Native American tribes are actually in the decision‑making level of the process. I am proud to say that I am now also doing this for the global indigenous communities of the world at the IGF and ICANN. We presented the concept of the tribal ambassador program which I'm pleased to say it was accepted and further expanded to be the global indigenous program. I attended ICANN60 as an indigenous mentor to the first two indigenous ambassadors. I joined a group of community networking fellows brought here by the internet society allowing us the opportunity to participate and realize the importance for indigenous inclusion at this government's level.

 The internet will fail to be the resource it should be if it does not include all of its people in the development of its future. Indigenous populations fill the governance of the internet should include the most underrepresented voices. These communities are particularly underserved populations left further and further behind with less than 50% of the community connected to the internet, it's far less extreme in the indigenous communities. With the development of more and more video solutions, with gig bit applications in the near future, we're in a constant struggle to support our communities without being recognized in the development process.

 Having worked on the first and second commission in the United States spanning six years of as far as, I have a very strong foundation of understanding on how to implement change and rulemaking and procedures to break down barriers for the vulnerable communities. I have worked with the National Congress of Native Indians.

These resolutions are used to work with the Federal Government to help them understand the needs of the people to further support the indigenous communities that are being excluded from the process. I'm standing before you today ‑‑ the users not being included in the process that is deciding their fate. We are willing and able to contribute and we know our needs. Policymakers have the responsibility to remove barriers to indigenous community networking not imposing the preconceived notions on what they feel the communities need without proper consultation and inclusion of the indigenous people and the decision-making process.

 Policy and governance working hand in hand within indigenous communities to understand the needs is the path to solving this problem. And a last‑minute announcement, we're happy to announce the creation of the internet society, ISOC community essential interest group. Thank you.

[ Applause ]

Tom.

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you very much, our next speaker is Ms. Jianne Soriano. And she is also currently studying international journalism at the Hong Kong Baptist University.

>> JIANNE SORIANO: Good afternoon, distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen, I'm the organizer of the youth internet governance forum Asia‑Pacific. The youngest member of the internet region governance forum. And also a journalism student. It's a great honor for me to speak to you today on behalf of young people.

 I'd like to thank the local host for making us have a successful and fruitful forum. To all of the workshop organizers and speakers who have traveled miles to be here and speak on different issues and topics that are close to us. And mostly, to young people here who bravely participate on a grand scale event.

 Our new ideas, shared realities and active engagement definitely adds a new layer to entire event and eventually to IGF's growth. I started by IGF journey four years ago when I was still in high school.

 Now, I'm about to finish my undergraduate. I went from a newcomer to a local organizer, a regional organizer, to now, empowering others. Over the years, I also witnessed the growth of the youth community in the IGF. During my first time in 2013, I could count the number of young people with my two hands.

 Today, you need a whole room to fit this all. From one youth oriented workshop before to numerous youth panels today. Indeed, youth is no longer in the shadows. The IGF youth community is diverse coming from different regions, backgrounds and interests. But essentially, passionate, driven, and more importantly, the willingness to learn.

 These things make young people an integral part of the IGF. Not only because we're digital natives or the largest end users, but also because we are the future leaders.

 Being young is not a disadvantage, it is a strength. And we know the needs of the internet community and we also have the power to address them. Over the course of the past days, I hear discussions on the challenges of youth. We're passed the problems of youth involvement because of various organizations and groups that support young people to be here that start initiatives and give us a platform to engage in.

 Right now, what we're facing are participation exhaustion and lack of continued motivation. And essentially, how to have continuity. How do we continue the momentum? Essentially, we want our efforts and what we do. We want to see them have results create an impact. And standing here today giving the speech is one of them. And all started with the majority of how young people here started by participating.

 And it's not only about our voices being heard but also how we use our voice and how it's working. Which brings us back to the importance of continuity. In order for your voice to be heard, you have to make noise. But you also have to question how effective is it if you only do it once. Continuity allows for a better collaboration, better capacity building and eventually, better role models through mentorships and tool kits that youth can bring back what they have seen and experienced through the local communities.

 It snowballs and eventually forms into something. As a youth fellow last year, I met a fellow youth from Africa who wanted to start her own initiative. But she shared her difficulties in looking for people to support her. It is through her experiences here at the IGF and shared conversations about what the mission has done. And the model for youth by youth. Inspired her to do something in her own community. Similarly, I met youths here in here who want to start their own movements and see the IGF as a great steppingstone.

 Initiative from youth is important but support from different stakeholders is just as valuable. Because of the discussions are essentially from all parties. And as community, I believe we should help initiatives to take root and ensure capacity building and have various support measures.

 If you support the youth, you are also helping to shape the future of the internet. Perhaps, I may not be the best representation of us all, but I can say the reason I'm here today speaking to you is because I was supported and I was able to still be here today.

 So as a young person, I encourage all youth here. If you see something you want to change and no one is doing anything about it, you can be the one to start something. There are a lot of things that have been done and are currently being done.

 To leave you all with, I would like to ask you how we can continue to grow. Thank you very much.

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Our next speaker is from the private sector, Mr. Bobby Singh Bedi.

>> SUNDEEP SINGH BOBBY BEDI: I'm from the international federation of film producers association. It is a great pleasure to be with you today at the closing ceremony. I'm a content creator, and the content I create is consumed in my country in India. And the rest of the world. This is my third internet governance forum, and it has been the best.

 After various goals that the IGF has. One of the key one is to make sure the internet remains globally and freely accessible. A space where we all have the same right as we have offline. We all need to ensure that the opportunities are available to all. We need to by reduce the divide and ensuring equal access to everyone on this planet.

 Today, nearly 25 years after the internet came into being, half of the world's population is still offline. And half of the number is from India and China despite the energetic progress of the last few years. This has to change.

 We need a serious effort from all stakeholders present in this room, governmental organizations, civil society, academia and private sector, which I represent to ensure that all people be it Africa, Asia and any other continent are truly connected and the benefit from all that is good on the internet.

 And be protected from all which is not. Having reviewed several of the workshops and main sessions over the last three and a half days, I see the combined wisdom seems to suggest that 80% or 90% of the outcome of what seems to be the solution is for the good of mankind. Between 10% to 15% presents threats and concerns which need to be dealt with and have been discussed across the Las Vegas few days. Last few days.

 The one challenge, however, that is different from 20 years ago is that we are no longer dealing with telecom or local content that was for the most part confined to national boundaries at least till the 90s. Internet is global, benefits are global, and the concerns its presents are global. To keep it that way, we need to ensure an ongoing dialogue between the various stakeholders who have an important role to play. This does not mean that individual stakeholders cannot meet to hold discussions without the presence of everyone else.

 The conferences such as IGF will enhance the benefits and reduce the concerns. From a business community's point of view, I would like to underline an often ignored belief. My belief is that the world, including the cyber world strive to be a happy place and that people engage with cyberspace to be entertained and happy. Users log on to consume free high‑quality content that people ‑‑ and to consume user‑generated content that appears and create. Creators of this content, local and universal are as important in this value chain in the other parts and their financial health and creative freedom are as crucial.

 Apart from consuming creative content, users for the internet log on to meet friends, family and colleagues just to share moments of joy and concern and to be informed of the change, good and bad, happening in the world. This demand is what creates the first consumer pull and drives the commerce. Fueling investments and infrastructure. And this is what makes the mighty network and economically viable and effective tool for education, security, health, disaster management and any emerging situation.

 I might add the uncertainties in the social and political world have the potentials of slowing down investments. Investments in infrastructure, in content, in ensuring truly global medium remains global.

 To reduce the uncertainties and to address the misunderstandings, we need to get together all stakeholders of frequent dialogue. This global community has a significant role to play in building capacity and confidence in matters relating to the internet.

 National governments must ensure an environment that fosters fresh investment and innovation in this space. We must also refrain from putting on national rules and regulations on critical issues such as privacy or data flows that have the ability to constrain the internet, truly interconnecting and global characters.

 The line between use and abuse is a fine one. I take this opportunity to treat a stakeholders, and the private sector to respect. The test of effective use of legislation is important. The test of its abuse is critical. The internet is a place to improve the quality of life. It should not be used to intimidate or otherwise impede the quality of life of our brothers and sisters wherever they might live.

 I'd like to thank the MAG, the UN DESA for this outstanding IGF, which like the predecessors has certainly moved the needle on improving collaborations and understanding amongst multitask group towards a better open internet.

 I close with a line from my favorite song by the late John Lennon. Imagine, there's no countries. It isn't hard to do. You may say I'm a dreamer, so come and share this dream. Thank you.

[ Applause ]

 

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Raquel Gatto, manager for the Chapter Development in the Americas for Internet Society.

>> RAQUEL GATTO: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, IGF community, you must remember when the president opened this IGF, what she said to us, to all of us. Be courageous, right? Remember that? So I want to commend all of you, the brave souls that stayed until the very end, including those remote participants that stayed with us through the night. You are all brave. You are probably having family and friends waiting for you at home.

 It's hard to be the last speaker at the last session, but I hope I can give you some thoughts around it. I came a long way out from Brazil to be here with you.

 Here at the IGF, at the very first day, also, I joined the discussion around bringing citizens to the internet governance debate. And among the things that we've had to choose were questions that would boost the citizens into the debate. And one of them was what did the internet do to change your life? And I was puzzled. I realize that the internet didn't change my life. It didn't change my life because it was there. It was there to use.

 So the real question that we should be doing now, we should be having now is what would you do if the internet doesn't exist? And that's a reality. That's a reality for many of us, that are facing shutdowns that are facing disruptions, blocking and filtering. That's certainly something that we need to tackle. We need to see here and we need to bring the solutions. And that's a possible future to all of us if we go on the wrong path.

 If we make the wrong choices. And that's something that reminds me ten years ago I attended the first IGF. It was the IGF in Rio. In 2007. And I heard the wise words. He said, remember that the problems that we see on the internet are the same problems we see on the society.

 So if you look into a mirror and you don't like what you see there, don't break the mirror. Don't break the internet. Keep it on. There are threats that raise our fears, but there is also hope. The internet is a force for good. It's a tool, it's a platform, it's where we can have opportunities. Not only to share information, to build a communities. It's really the place you can find the new society, the new times for the society. But these hopes and fears, people’s hopes and fears are dividing us very clearly on our report launched this year by internet society, the global internet report that I truly invite you to read. It brings us to the fact that we have core values for the internet.

 And they remain valid. They remain what guarantees an open, global, resilient and secure internet. I must say that I remember when the MAG were brainstorming around the title or the theme for this IGF. And Thomas insisted on a few things. And I'm going to share two of them.

 The first one is the word "your" shape your future. That's something that matters to all of us. Each of us. And then, exclamation point. You might have missed that, right? There is an exclamation point there. It's because the IGF calls for action. And that's also remaining for all of us. The responsibility to shape the future, our digital future.

 The technical community and internet society are with you on shaping this digital future. And more. We are strong supporters of the IGF. Nigel has pretty much said a lot about it. But over the years, this forum has demonstrated its value as a neutral forum where all the stakeholders can gather on equal footing to discuss internet issues. It has also grown, evolved and it has developed its ability to deliver the tangible outcomes. To bring the concrete examples, the grass root projects for forums, for example. Let's not underestimate the potential of the IGF, the multiplication of the national and regional IGF, for women IGFs. This type of discussions demonstrates the impact and the value of this model. Can the IGF improve? Of course.

 There is always room for improvement. And we heard that a lot on the last session. And that needs to be taken as a natural step for its evolution. Bringing more voices to the table, including the remote ones, building capacity in our awareness, influencing beneficial policies are some of the areas that needs to be further developed.

 It is my responsibility to do something as part of this community. But it's yours, too. And so, we can only do it together. IGF is about dialogue. It's about diversity. But it's much more. And we should trust overcoming complex challenges. We can't ensure that the IGF reach next level of the evolution. Now, I'm just changing to French to say ‑‑ thank you.

[ Applause ]

 

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Our next speaker is Lynn St. Amour.

>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. All four of those speeches were excellent. And it's a nice way to end the week here. So distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen, colleagues and I certainly hope, friends. I'd like to thank Switzerland for a wonderful IGF.

 And of course, thank you to the United Nations office of Geneva UNOG for hosting us this week and the economic and social affairs for the administrative home for the IGF and everything the secretariat specifically itself does here.

 I'd like to take a moment and really recognize Switzerland. They've been such a strong supporter of multi‑stakeholder dialogue and internet governance since the early days. I hosted the first in 2003. They facilitated the outcome that led to the creation to the working group on internet governance, which led to a definition of governance that exists today. And they supported the creation of the IGF as a result of the second world summit information society in 2005.

 As host of UNOG here and many other IGOs and private institutions that deal with internet issues, Switzerland has a special responsibility to internet governance and have always taken this seriously and always been there. Importantly, they're active, vocal and consistent supporters of the multistakeholder model.

 Finally, the Swiss government was, I believe, the first donor to the IGF's trust fund supporting the secretariat which allowed the startup of the first IGF, which was held in 2006. So obviously, we have very much to thank them for and I would like to give them a round of applause.

[ Applause ]

Also, warms my heart, I spent 22 years here living in Geneva. I've always appreciated just the Swiss approach to so many things. I'd also be remiss, though, if I didn't remind everyone that the IGF was an extra budgetary project under the United Nations under the secretary general, yet doesn't receive funding for the UN budget or the member state contributions. It survives on donations. And obviously, there's much, much more we can do, but it does depend on funding and therefore, of course, contributions to the IGF trust fund are very welcome.

 Now, moving to this year's IGF, we're just finish year two over the ten‑year mandate. And the MAG and the IGF community are working hard to advance key issues. So we, the multistakeholder adviser group, the IGF secretariat and, of course, you the IGF community continue to innovate and many of the core components of the IGF and the IGF ecosystem. While at the same time, we're intensifying our efforts to produce more concrete outputs. Innovation such as the opening sessions, which Thomas talked about earlier, where we actually worked toward a dialogue on a single theme allowing key messages to be pulled from the discussion versus the long series of individuals and often somewhat unrelated statements.

 And we're working hard to introduce more active dialogue and open discussions and all the sessions held here and promoting different and open formats. There's still room to improve there. We captured key messages shortly after each main session for publication on the IGF website to ensure that the communication was easy to spread across the players and actors here as well as outside. And certainly, those will be fed into the usual chair report.

 If I can come to a moment for the intercessional activities, we created more space in the programs for the IGF. These activities are important. As this work continues year round, which allows more in‑depth activities while allowing more progress, more participation on key issues. I'm referring to, of course, the work of the best practice forums, the dynamic coalitions and of the major policy initiative connecting and enabling the next billions.

 And one of it is most impactful outcomes for the IGF ecosystem is the advent of the sub regional and youth IGF initiatives called NRIs for short. While the establishment was not foreseen by the agenda which gives the mandate, it did encourage multistakeholder engagement on national and regional levels.

 Because of this, several countries in regions started engaging stakeholders in their local communities in the IGF processes in organizing more annual IGF meetings at local levels. As somebody said earlier, you talk globally and act locally. So I think the NRIs are making a very significant difference in the advancement of internet issues across the world.

 The current number is 97, there's another 10 in formation, they should be approved very shortly, which is nearly double the number of NRIs in a little over two years. Really phenomenal work. And to that, I think we need to really recognize the support of Anja Gengo and the secretary, she's available 24/7, seriously.

[ Applause ]

Of course, we need to recognize the work of all of the NRIs, as well, and their fearless and tireless champion, Marilyn Cade.

 Coming back to the point to produce ever more concrete outputs. I believe overtime, there's been a qualitative difference in the discussions themselves and in the supporting papers and the reports. Certainly, it's not really about what I feel. I certainly hope that difference has been noticed and is shared.

And at the same time, really sincere that we want to know how those can be improved. So please, suggestions, I think as Thomas said and was said, we need to be a little courageous, we need to figure out where we can push, where we can advance, pilot some things and learn from those that work well and learn from those that don't work well.

 But it's certain that maintaining what we're doing today will not advance our issues here as quickly as many of us would like. So while I believe no one would argue with a need to continually improve, I also think we need to recognize, feel good about, celebrate and certainly promote the value of the IGF as a platform for multistakeholder dialogue as recognized in the agenda. Sometimes, I think we're almost apologetic it's a platform for dialogue. Key discussions such as cyber security, human rights, internet of things, access, they've all been on the agenda since the very, very earliest days for ten, 12 years. And our discussions are also evolving. Today's discussions on cyber security are very different from the discussions of ten years ago. These issues are complex, often very nuanced, they clearly involve many different viewpoints whether that's from different stakeholder groups or national or regional differences. It takes time to understand the different viewpoints and even more time to find commonality.

 I think helping to prove how important discussion and this forum is. At the same time, we've seen real concrete actions come out of the IGF. While it's not a place for binding decisions, it does very clearly inform actions that are taken back to the national and local level. Whether that's taken back through private sector activity or through government, civil society, technical or academic activities. Or through some of the IGF intercessional activities, again, such as the best practice forums or the NRIs. There is clear action being driven from the discussions here and I'm certain we'll continue to evolve productively and positively. There have been a number of discussions over the week where it says advancing issues is a process. We look for commonality, some agreement, perhaps agree on a framework to advance the discussions further or even propose some norms.

 Ultimately, if appropriate, they may become policy. One good example of this is the commission on the stability of cyberspace, which earlier this eke woo, launched a norm on protecting the core of the public internet as the first building block and their efforts to help address cyber security issues. Equally importantly, by the way, the paper was one page. And the norm itself is one paragraph.

 Which is another version of accessibility. So that to me is a clear action oriented output. And I also believe the IGF is the only forum to address cyber security issues in a multistakeholder fashion. Having said that, I would have been happier to have been proved wrong. They have all of those cyber security efforts. Should be much more than largely one stake holder.

 I for one am glad we give way to the complex discussions. I'm glad we had the foresight to establish as a multistakeholder platform for dialogue. It would be a much scarier world without the IGF and the ability to have these debates both here and through the NRIs.

 So with that, I feel I've probably already gone on far too long. I would like to thank the community, the MAG, the secretariat, the host country, everybody that's participated or had any kind of touch on this IGF here over the year. And look forward to progressing some of the activities over the coming years and certainly next year. Thank you very much.

[ Applause ]

 

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you very much, Lynn, and now we'll have the MAG host country co‑chair for 2017 ambassador Thomas Schneider.

>> THOMAS SCHNEIDER: Thank you. And as I said, I be brief. Just one point I'd like to repeat from what I said before. I think we all realized, again, this year that the potential of the IGF is huge. It's unique. But at the same time, it's still not fully used. So we really need more resources. We need better communication about the value of the IGF that leads to higher relevance, more awareness and, again, more resources. And just to quote, again, my friend Nigel, we need to fight, fight, fight, I don't shout this, but I mean it the same way like Nigel did for this because there's no free lunch.

 Somebody needs to work and then things happen. So the second thing is a message to those who are interested but still thinking about saying yes to host the next IGF. Also, to those who haven't started to think about but could also host the next IGF, it is hard work that is true. But actually, in particular, when you look back there are other things that are more important than the hard work. It's a unique experience to organize an IGF. On the one hand, it's a unique experience to organize and achieve something working in a team or in different teams. Sometimes, under difficult circumstances for various reasons.

 But making things happen in the end, that makes you stronger individually as a person with more stress resistance, maybe less doubt, less fears, but whether something goes right, or not, it makes it stronger as a team and you may actually make new friends in these moments. The other thing is, this is amazing. The people that come to you and tell you that they have really enjoyed the IGF, that they have learned new things that they have been ‑‑ they look at some things this is the most important. They will love you at the end of the IGF. And people will thank you also. Ask this is what I'm going to do now and I'm closing with this.

 So first, I want to thank Lynn as the MAG chair. It was a pleasure to work with you we had inspiring and efficient and open‑minded debates and great cooperation. Thank you for this year. Anja, Louis ‑‑ I know you work under severe conditions, again, mainly due to funding and you did a tremendous job. Thanks also to Armin and Stan and everybody else who supported us throughout this year. Also, director General Miller who supported us, also, from the beginning. That includes, of course, technical staff, interpreters, security, the EBU, and in particular, the people from RTS who were extremely helpful and efficient in supporting us. Thanks, also, for offering the visit that many of you have been profiting or will profit from seeing the CERN which is an interesting institution. And an enormous thank to the Geneva Internet Platform. All of the others that I may forget, you were indispensable for us in the preparation and the conduction of the IGF. And we hope you also will be able to support future hosts of the IGF. Thanks, also, for stepping in and organizing the volunteers for the remote participation. We said that before, it's a fundamental element of inclusivity. And thanks, of course, to my colleagues.

 All of the others that supported us. And that also had to bear with me in some difficult moments. Thanks, also, to Patrick and everybody else at the Swiss mission and the foreign ministry. It's amazing and possible that different ministries can work together without competition but actually joining forces and it's really a pleasure to work in a government where you can make this experience that we don't compete with each other, we actually work together. Thanks to everybody at the foreign ministry. And particular thanks to Phillip, other actor general, for your personal commitment and support. And then, finally, thanks to all of you. What we provided you here is an empty shell. You filled it with content, with life, with meaning and with relevance. Thank you all very much.

[ Applause ]

 

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Our final speaker is Mr. Armin Plum from the Department of Economic and Social Affairs. And he's going to give the closing remarks on behalf of the United Nations Secretary General.

>> ARMIN PLUM: Thank you. Stakeholders, participating online from around the world, it is my pleasure to be with you at this unique multistakeholder gathering. On behalf of the United Nations Secretary General, I want to thank the government of Switzerland for hosting the 12th annual meeting of the internet governance forum here in Geneva.

 The United Nations is grateful the advisory group for the guidance and preparing another great IGF. It also recognizes the valuable leadership and vision of the MAG chair. This IGF is the outcome of intensive work of a large group of people. The community worked tirelessly over the past months to prepare and during the last four days to realize the IGF2017.

 Thank you to the organizing team, its numerous volunteers, stuff at UNOG, so many others who have worked behind the scenes to make this happen.

 Key for the further success of the IGF, thank you to all of you. Over 2,000 participants in Geneva and those who joined remotely for your active participation. You make this IGF meeting successful.

 We would like to acknowledge the work of initiatives and their many members that are continue to expand the multistakeholder dialogue in the spirit of the global IGF by convening their own meetings and discuss and address local, national and regional internet governance, channels and opportunities. We should also acknowledge the IGF community and work, channeled through the best practices forums. These are fundamental in the ongoing drive to make it outcome oriented and delivering bottom‑up outputs.

 In delivering safe internet, benefits enjoyed equally in the undeveloped and underdeveloped countries. Bridging the digital divide remains one of the key topics of this year's IGF. Similarly, sustainable development goals continue to provide a framework for dialogue on economic development, human rights, freedom of expression and gender parity online.

 What we see is that the IGF continues to grow as an open and inclusive discussion platform. Its growth is not only measured in the number of people or stakeholder groups who attend this meeting, but also in the ever increasing area of topics that get discussed in the internet governance context. Artificial intelligence, this information, internet of things, virtual reality, these are all new or emerging issues that were explored in this year's IGF. We can expect over the course of the next year, the developments and digital policy will mean this list will expand.

 It's ever critical we maintain the multistake holders’ commitment to improving on the IGF to bringing new voices and ideas. We must ensure that everybody participates in shaping the digital future.

 Thank you all of you for your contributions for another successful IGF. We look forward to working with you alongside over the coming year. Thank you. I'm actually supposed to use together. ‑‑ the gavel.

>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you. Have safe travels home. And I hope some of you will stay a day or two to see Geneva. Thank you very much.

 (Session ended)