The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> CHERYL MILLER: Hi, everyone. Hi, everyone, can you hear me? I'm sorry, this is my first time wearing earphones with a microphone so apologies. I want to thank you all for coming here today. This session is multistakeholder cooperation in an era of increased protectionism. We have a panel full of experts and I'm really excited to dive right in here and here from them. I really would like this to be an interactive session and I want to encourage you to ask questions so there won't be any long speeches or anything like that here. What we're hoping to achieve in this session is an understanding of internet governance and more broadly digital governance and hopefully discussions around a tentative roadmap for a community engagement and an understanding of collaboration between civil society and the technical community my name is Cheryl Miller and I'm the vice president for digital policy for at the U.S. Council for International Business. For those who are not familiar with USCIB we are a business association that promotes the voice of business in a multilateral business.
And so what I'd like to do now is I'd like to allow the panelists to each introduce themselves, and then we'll dive into some questions to get the conversation started so thank you so much and if we start with you, Veni, that would be great.
>> VENI MARKOVSKI: My name Veni Markovski.
Based in New York I have a lot of the U.N. agencies, U.N., ITU and others.
>> JORGE CANCIO: Hello, I'm Jorge Cancio, Swiss government.
>> I'm a senior advisor on institutional relations at internet society.
>> JASON PIELEMEIER: Hi, I'm Jason Pielemeier I work with an organisation working on free expression. In the tech sector.
>> Good mornings, I'm Ann.
>> I'm from Meta platforms.
>> CHERYL MILLER: So, I think for the benefit of some of the newcomers in the room I will just say a couple of words just with respect to the history of WSIS and IGF. So, the world summit on the information society is coming up for its 20-year review.
And through this process, you know, it really laid out and established the multistakeholder model that we have today and it helped to create the Internet Governance Forum, it helped to create the community on science and technology for development, CSTD. You may be hearing all these acronyms and I know it can be overwhelming so we'll do our best to spell out those acronyms as we go along. The first I would like to ask our panel, what regulatory or political trends are undermining stakeholder governance today and how are they affecting global cooperation? Who would like to jump in first? Veni?
>> VENI MARKOVSKI: Thank you for volunteering me. I was hiding here but you saw me nevertheless. I don't know that we can talk about, I mean we have, ICANN has a legislative tracking which we do at every ICANN meeting. ICANN coordinates the domain system, the IP addresses, protocol parameters on the internet. And we have three times a year we have public meetings and they're all accessible. You guys can go and take a look at it including on our tracking. I would say that sometimes governments take decisions to regulate or govern one another aspect of the internet without think to having consequences that this might lead to and sometimes this might lead to fragmentation at the technical level so we earlier today Curtis, our president and CEO spoke at the opening of the IGF and mention that had we were talking about coordination.
Not centralization of the functions that we do and the way it makes the internet work so I think it's important to actually understand that it's better to talk to the technical experts before drafting or passing any legislation because once it's passed it usually takes a lot of time to fix it. I can give an example from my own Bulgaria where in 1999 the government introduced licensing for internet service providers and it took a whole case at the supreme court to get rid of it. The urge here is to make sure that they use the stakeholder amount when discussing issues and ICANN is limited to talk about the technical aspects of the functioning of the internet so we are looking always at is the DNS working around the global. Are the IP addresses working and as long as they're working whatever else is being governed and regulated on top of that, that's up to another country to decide because they have the jurisdiction in their borders. Thank you.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you. Did I see someone else? Come on in.
>> I find myself every morning waking and up feel a sense of uncertainty, insecurity, discombobulated. We got to be very honest that the fact that we're trying to think about multistakeholder cooperation in a time that is a shift in geopolitical order the last three decades of international rule based order are right now at a conjunction where I'm not sure what the answer is going to be a few years down the line. There's an uncertainty, a competition globally and we do not know the outcome of that and it is impacting the multistakeholder and an increase around us and this leads to an erosion of trust. The definition of trust of partners I think I can speak for my own country on this is changing the combines of uncertainty, competition, uncomfortable truth that we do not know the future we're going into is making cooperation incredibly hard and what I hope for me IGF this year will be a sense of what can we meaningfully do to continue and drive some of this forward? What does meaningful inclusive effective multistakeholder governance look like in a world that was fundamentally different than it was last year when we met at IGF.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you, I would agree with that, I sit on the multistakeholder advisory group which is the MAG and we've been having conversations around this as well. Conversations around the value of the IGF and how we can support this and support the multistakeholder model throughout. Tatiana did you want to add.
>> Tatiana: Thank you mainly go back to what Veni was talking about and start from this perspective. There is a tension, especially in the current geopolitical climate between southern states and the borders and them trying to navigate this climate.
And tension between state and sovereign borders and the open interoperable and globally connected internet. And when Veni was talking about regulation especially regulation on the top of this network, we can recognize the states do have very valid concerns. For example, about security, safety of their citizens, online harms, crime, as well as their autonomy. Their ability to represent their citizens, to protect their citizens but again as Veni said the way states address these concerns could harm the global interoperability and connectivity. Perhaps sometimes even in inadvertently as unintended consequence and in this way what I see is a trend that is hampering the multistakeholder model on a global level and connectivity is the focus of national and regional sovereign policies, regulations, and it's not only about effecting the internet. It also effects the global cooperation because when you are focusing on your territory you're losing this global picture. And this tension cannot be resolved just by saying, okay, let's ditch the multistakeholder process, let's go to more national intergovernmental multilateral regulatory process so we must work together in this multistakeholder fashion to address these threats and to address them transglobally and while we're addressing those concerns globally, they're valid concerns, they're legitimate concerns.
We have to preserve the global connectivity and interoperability. So we can have safety, we can have safe security and at the same time we can have open and globally connected internet. Thank you.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you and Jason I know G and I has been doing a lot of work around this, what are your thoughts?
>> JASON PIELEMEIER: Thanks really building on what everyone else has said already and maybe to pull out a few regulatory trends. I think the concerns, the legitimate concerns as Tatiana was articulating for addressing harms on the internet are well understood and there's a recognition that sovereign states will in certain circumstances need to take steps to address those harms. A challenge is that where states try and address those harms in imprecise or disproportionate ways, they end up not only creating impacts within their own jurisdiction for their own citizens but they create impacts across the internet because of its interoperable, interconnected nature. Examples like network walking or even network shutdowns, you know, attempt to take censorship deeper and deeper into the technology stack are sort of examples of that trend. On the other hand, there are more appropriate, more proportionate efforts that have been, that are being developed, the digital services act in the EU, the online safety act in the UK, these are not perfect but they do at least attempt to address the content layer of the internet.
In a way that recognizes that not every platform has the same business model, not every platform has the same risk profile, the same user base and so they center on risk management frameworks that allow for a degree of flexibility and those approaches I think have more promise and do less damage to sort of the fundamental layers of the internet architecture. But they too are now being politicized, right? And we're seeing an attempt to brand, you know, common sense, good faith efforts to regulate as censorship themselves and it's not to say that there aren't concerns about how these laws could be misused and unfortunately we have seen high level political figures in Europe, you know, articulate a desire to use regulation in ways that we would consider inconsistent with the regulatory frameworks themselves but by and large these are good faith efforts to try and address legitimate concerns and the fact that they're becoming politicized and getting caught up in these broader geopolitical headwinds is of real concern because if these efforts can't succeed then I am afraid we will see the more far reaching the more disproportionate efforts prevail and that will do more damage to the interoperable global internet.
>> CHERYL MILLER: This makes the business environment particularly very difficult. Flavia from Meta's perspective how is this having an impact?
>> FLAVIA ALVES: Yes, I think some of my colleagues made this comment here and I think the most impactful for us is the impact of goals for data localization, digital protection in general. That can result on censorship but having us, having to reform or reduce or just respond to requests for reduction and removal of content on our platform in a speed process that can actually result in censorship that is something that is actually impacting the global network in a way that is a result of the internet fragmentation, obviously so getting back to the point every other colleague here made, a comment on how it is important to take into account the digital severity asks and see how it impacts on fragmentation but how can we go back to the principles and bring back the importance of the participation in this conversations. We had providers and platform to discuss these issues and I think we should take the opportunity that we have now to readdress how to connect on those matters with the stakeholders on the ground. Technical community has an important factor in expertise to talk on issues just like business with this connection or what is actually doable in our, for us to respond and how should we be protecting an open and interoperable and free internet.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you and Jorge, did you have thoughts?
>> JORGE CANCIO: Yeah, maybe too many to put them in 90 seconds or in two minutes.
I think we are living in a time of contradictions. And which is paradoxical in many ways. So we had some years ago this report from the high level panel on digital cooperation which was called cooperation in an age of digital interdependence and at the same time we have the mounting geopolitical tensions, the different interests and of course much more political attention to what formally twenty years ago was much more technical subject than... you see that at all levels and it doesn't make our life easier but I wouldn't see linear evolution or just a linear path of development. There are many contradictions. It depends on the level, where you are talking about. It depends on the subject you are talking about. It depends on what the national stakeholders or the national government is doing about it. So just to mention some examples of course we have for instance the more technical management of the internet and here we talk about ICANN for instance and I have here Veni to my right and what we see is much more attention from governments to things like DNS abuse. To the malicious use of some of the elements of the DNS where ICANN has a role and at the same time, we see the ICANN model where it takes time for people to address and not all incentives are set right to deliver.
Because political attention means that also the political people who are accountable are made responsible if there are no results. That's also something the technical community or the people, the community that is participating in ICANN has to take into account as a legitimate concern. So, it's not just the top-down decision of government officials who have no clue about the issue. It's really about things that effect the people. And I think I am optimistic on the possibility of these multistakeholder organisations in communities to deliver. Then you have other, for instance, AI, which is the topic of attention in many places during this forum.
And you could say, okay, has there been a move for top down regulation of AI? Now there are many contradictions, there are different positions all across the globe. At the national level. But for instance, the first international let's say binding legal document on AI which was developed by the Council of Europe was very much based on a multistakeholder process so we see how the... there are contradictions in some places you can push the multistakeholder approach. In other places you have a pushback. So, it depends very much, it depends also on us and I think that brings us also to the next topic maybe to WSIS+20 we're seeing what happens when you have a weak process. When you have a process where multistakeholder's just a lip service something not really felt.
And we have an opportunity to learn from that and to improve things based on that learning and to make the multistakeholder approach in the WSIS+20 review much more powerful.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you. I want to pause there, is there anyone from the audience who would like to ask something or add something? Come up to the microphone. Please tell us your name and where you work and all that good stuff.
>> AUDIENCE: Can you hear me? All right, my name's Milton Mueller, I'm with the internet governance project at Georgia Tech there's kind of a missing link or an elephant in the room that you're not talking about. I think Mia raised it sort of by implication and I think Flavia raised it and it's an issue of trade. The protectionalism and the fragmentation and the sovereignty are about different parts of trade. Do you have to conform to completely different regulatory patterns? And you're so focused on multistakeholder cooperation but the fact of the matter is that trade issues are negotiated by the multilateral organisation.
Do you think it's possible for the multistakeholder model which is not really a model as we know but do we think that civil society and others could participate in WTO negotiations, could we infuse that process with multistakeholder participation the way we have, let's say in ICANN and the IGF? That's my question.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you that's a great question Milton and thank you for helping to flesh out the conversation. Would anyone like to take a stab at the answer? Mia? You go first.
>> Name is AnnMarie but it says Mia there.
>> CHERYL MILLER: That was confusing at me.
>> Mia is sitting down here right now. Anyway.
>> CHERYL MILLER: You're welcome to change your name.
>> For me questions I don't answer go to Mia after.
For the answer to your question, technically yes. How effective is the World Trade Organization tackling what is a huge transformation of open trade. I come from a company that is free marketeers and we are not naive in where the world is headed. In that sense it is critical to not think of the idea of multistakeholder internet governance going on over here where we're all about free open internet which let's be honest that's not how the world already looks today that is a vision. It's a vision that we firmly stand by and with EU presidency that we're going to be assuming in five days from now, fourth of July, that will be the same vision that we will be pursuing through WSIS and all the other multilateral bodies but we have to be realist that the world is heading in a place of more protectionism where trade is no longer a kumbaya place for us but one with a lot of tension and how to maintain a free open internet because it is a prerequisite for the facilities of our communities. We had a discussion about this earlier today. How do we take that into the domain. This is Mia entering over here. Any questions, she is really the ‑‑ it's even better, right? So just to say ‑‑
>> She can't hear what you are talking about.
>> An Marie: Which makes it better. This is a question of how do we maintain and preserve the model as much as we can in a radically different world at least for the next couple of years. I don't have the answer. I have a promise from the Danish government that we will try to do as much as we can on infusing the multistakeholder model that we think worked well not only for internet governance but across the board but it's not an easy play.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Veni I think you want to ‑‑
>> VENI MARKOVSKI: I think this is much better.
>> FLAVIA ALVES: When it comes to trust. I think definitely there is, there are conversations on the bilateral level. There are conversations on the EU‑US level, there are governments in the WTO and other national stakeholder fora such as the OCD and that is not only an economic issue but also a privacy security issue that we need to be careful and balance how we do the safeguards in privacy at the same time as in law enforcement and others. I think there's an excellent work called the trusted government access data flows. And that was an input from not only privacy agencies but also law enforcement agencies and the OECD got input from civil society and there was an agreement on how to approach data flows but secure data flows at least among those countries that are from OECD. This work continues at OECD. But above all, what I believe there is also a discussion at the U.N. level process which we believe should really be taken by other bodies that are more experts of this such as the OECD. The other I understand the conversation is very member state driven not even us as private sector we participate there so I think in my expertise vary in this field I would encourage us to go back to the trusted government access but then move away from only governments discussion on this.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you. Are there any questions online? No? Any other questions in the room before we move forward? Picking up on that point on trusted government access we have the WSIS+20 review. We have the implementation of the global digital compact which came together last year. Right? How can we leverage the WSIS+20 review and the GDC to reinforce trust? Is that possible? Can it reinforce inclusion and can it reinforce cooperation and digital governments.
>> VENI MARKOVSKI: I want to start because I have to go in ten minutes. I think it's important to take the good things from the GDS. This is the text about internet governance and use anytime the WSIS+20 review. We've seen already with the elements paper published last Friday that that language is gone completely. Actually, the language that is there goes back to 2002 maybe? '03 and the other thing that we have to have as a lesson, the Secretariat is way better in managing the WSIS+20. They have multistakeholder cooperations. We're hopeful that the co‑facilitators are taking notes and are going to use the WSIS+20 to show how this could be implemented to the limit of course of the General Assembly rules of procedure.
Because we know from the WSIS+10 ten years ago that there are certain requirements that the governments will never change for that particular process.
Because they cannot be changed just for this process, they have to be changed for every other process and so we're hoping that this is the way they work now we've also it's important to see how the relations between the WSIS and the GDS will be formed because even though for example there was an agreed language in the GDC about the importance of the IGF later last year in the ICT exhibition discussions on the General Assembly this went back to before it. So, for those of you who are listening and who are in the room, please understand that the U.N. processes are very complex and sometimes very complicated and even though we have the good desire to provide our factual information, how the internet works and what is good in the processes so far, it's not necessarily that the governments will take this and will not decide to change it. So, it's a very complex process. The ICANN community I think had, and the broader internet community had a call with the paper because they were expecting some support of the multistakeholder model, some support for the technical community, and now there's nothing but text. There is a lot of areas that we would be contribute to try to persuade the government to take the good language from the GSC. Thank you.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you and Tatiana.
>> TATIANA: Yes, thank you, just zooming out a bit. Rather than looking at the text and records and shaping, I would say that how the question is posed, right, reinforcing trust, reinforcing cooperation. We cannot reinforce trust. We cannot reinforce cooperation if we don't put multimedia approach in the core of these processes. Transparency and inclusion at the core. And Jorge, you said, you used the words lip service, right? To this inclusion should not just be talking for participation.
I think it is important for stakeholders to see how their input is actually taken into account, for example, in the WSIS review process and transparency is very much at the core of this as well. And here we can for example leverage the net one guideline where, which is a very good reference and secondly and I think that it's, everybody's talking about this, right? Let's not duplicate the processes but I would add something to this. Not only, not duplicate the process, let's not create alternative vehicles or alternative process to what we already have. This would also allow us to avoid duplication as much as possible. Because very few stakeholders if any, have resources to follow all this multiple complex process Veni was talking about, complexity of the U.N. process and not only to follow but also resource to contribute to this multiple duplicative trust so in this regard and I heard some discussions already having in here.
How the IGF and national and regional initiatives can be leveraged as a good vehicle for continuing the WSIS for strengthening in the WSIS implementation and the promise of the WSIS but also being used as a vehicle for the GDC implementation. Within the WSIS process. Again, they are very well‑positioned to address any issues within the GDC and they're already exist in channels and any alternative process will significantly undermine this multistakeholder collaboration and participation. Also, with regard to IGF being such a vehicle it should not become an avenue to sideline non‑governmental stakeholders. When governments are discussing the implementation or WSIS system somewhere else and others are discussing, no. They should be brought together. And in this regard, the IGF as an avenue, should be strengthened as open inclusive platform. At the same time. The WSIS and the GDC implementation should become more transparent, open and inclusive so this is a mutual process, thank you.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you and Jason I know the global network initiative has been quite involved in the WSIS + 20 discussions and the global digital compact. What do you think?
>> JASON PIELEMEIER: Just to kind of synthesis what Veni and Tatiana are saying. There's good text in the GDC that it would be helpful to see reiterated and underscored in the WSIS.
However, the WSIS process has been around for twenty years. It's had a very broad and I think fairly politically sophisticated approach to global cooperation around the internet and internet governance. The GDC is very new. It's a process driven by relatively new office in New York. And that was facilitated and negotiated really in New York which, you know, within the U.N. system is a very different operating environment than Geneva and some of the other centers of conversation, multilaterally so there's a real concern if the WSIS process essentially becomes transformed into GDC implementation rather than the WSIS being seen as a way to incorporate the objectives of the GDC into an existing process that is built with multistakeholder purchase and participation. So I hope that we can see those sort of textual references in the WSIS but without changing the locus of the process that WSIS has embodied and hopefully will continue to carry forward.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you and Flavia I know that Meta‑and other businesses have been involved since WSIS inception as well as the other global impact do you agree?
>> FLAVIA ALVES: To your point obviously I agree with Veni and Jason. I think if I can step a bit with regard to the WSIS in general.
I think it's important for us to look at the process and the WSIS review right now. And so first I need to see and make sure this process is predictable, transparent and is inclusive so to the extent that there are consultations, that there are papers that we need to have enough time to reiterate and connect between civil society and industry and others to submit comments and those comments should be taken into account and I think that's the process that we think should be established. We see a lot of good intention and they're trying as much so we should continue to reinforce that. In the comments in regard to the WSIS per se I think there's a critical opportunity for us to again reinforce the multistakeholder governance framework that we have seen for internet governance in general and we should take advantage of that again and do so for instance the definition of internet governance for some might not be an issue right now we've just heard something about like maybe the G77 are not necessarily concerned with the internet governance they are more concerned with AI and access, et cetera, but I really think that we do not need to lose this opportunity to reinforce internet governor glance to, again reinforce the principle of a multistakeholder approach to internet governance that we should be seeing on the definition that is right now on the elements paper, it is not. When it comes to internet governance too it is important to renew the IGF mandate and now I wonder, is it in order to renew or make permanent? Should we make it permanent? How is the, at the WSIS discussions ten years ago and we are discussing this. Obviously I'm getting old but it went too fast. Ten years is too much too fast and here we are again. We are having more and more participation from delegations such as China and others that were not necessarily in approval of the this but now they're hosting. We all have an agreement here with countries that IGF, it's important. So I think we should take this opportunity to make it a permanent... and then obviously on the WSIS and the negotiation process given the geopolitical process where we are that U.N. negotiation now is issues such as human rights, AI, content information integrity, internet liability, copyrights and et cetera, are going to be brought up. And I think we should go back to what the resolution has been adopted before in going to those, looking into those space but also taking into account what has been discussed at GDC and that's how I go to Veni's point I don't think we should open the discussion again of AI, human rights. Jason is much more of an expert but we want to support this. We want to open the discussion with stakeholders. Adopting that text, it's going to be interesting. And then finally I think there are things that are good that everyone is working towards and we should continue but not forget is important, connectivity. There's an importance on connectivity, access. It's too important that we try to bridge the technical divide. So that I must say for instance on artificial intelligence open source artificial intelligence has been a way of getting much more people using the tool than any other so we would be supportive of something around that. I think the negotiation on certain topics that we agree on. Allocation research and then afterwards topics that we have issues that are hard to agree on let's leverage the GDC that already has been adopted. I already know this issue to make sure that we actually have these put together somehow as we lead to the December negotiations.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Great points and connectivity is so important so thank you for raising that with respect to making the IGF permanent that is a topic that we heard in a number of different meetings and you know it's been here for twenty years and has had great results and great success. Does that mean it's permanent already? Do we make that push for it was one of the conversations that Flavia and I were interested in recently. From a government perspective AnnMarie what do you think?
>> AnnMarie: I think many things. One is this discussion between WSIS and GDC alignment and negotiating texts and the outcomes. We advocate for transparent inclusive negotiations of the WSIS. We very much support permanently institutionalizing the IGF because more global conversations about process I don't think is going to lead to better outcomes so it's also about institutionalizing what works and that goes to my second point about all of this. As we negotiate and spend years it feels like years since the first panel was set up in Geneva that led to the office of the tech. Now with WSIS. Going back to my initial conversations that the geopolitical backdrop is completely changing. The erosion of trust and altered global environment as we know it. If individual people citizens are to trust these processes in an open, free, secure internet to participate in the technological revolution we need to focus on how to deliver that actually not just negotiate text. This is not to diminish the work that many of us spend time on which is negotiating commas and sentences and words but if we do not want to lose so many countries who still have yet to fully participate in the digital revolution and harvest that for prosperity, for community, for dignity we need to think a lot more about what can we do in actually implementing this.
I was just on maternity leave and I come back and curious ‑‑
>> CHERYL MILLER: Congratulations.
>> ANNMARIE: Thank you so much. What have we done. This takes a long time but if you look at the commitments in the GDC, on delivering on this, on leveraging digital we have so much work ahead of this. We say this in a time when we know civil society is losing funding, we know this is a time when funding goes into digital connectivity is gone, where platforms are stepping back a little bit on platform accountability. So, I think that this IGF should be not just about the negotiated text and how we do processes in New York and Geneva but how to use the process whether they're with us or against us and see that the multistakeholder model is delivering on the promises that we made.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you and on your point on the dots and the commas and the hard work Jorge I know you've been hard at work and on the multistakeholder advisory group with me and you put so much into the IGF and other things.
>> JORGE CANCIO: It's difficult to sum up. Maybe some of you know that there's been a paper being circulated by the Swiss so by my government. And if you are interested and you don't know it please approach us because we are happy to share and we try to, we've been building that over many conversations, not only, we work in the western countries or in the global north but with many partners from the global south to really see how we can build U.N. system on digital governance that delivers for all and that means to really look into the what and the how and how we get there and on the what, I agree very much that it will be very difficult to go beyond what we agreed last year in the global digital compact?
The, there's a lot of substance there. Maybe if the process of WSIS+20 is stronger, more inclusive maybe we can move the needle in one or two issues. But it will be a hard thing.
But more important that what is on paper is how we put it to work. And they're especially thinking about this UN80 which is budget cut process within the U.N. system we cannot afford any duplications in having parallel processes and some of them established ex novo. We have to update and use the WSIS framework and the WSIS framework is really the U.N. agencies putting the WSIS action lines into work together with stakeholders.
All over the world. And that is what we have to update putting the new agreements of the GDC into that work. That's why we are advocating for a joint implementation roadmap of the GDC integrated into WSIS and we are advocating also to update the existing WSIS architecture which is a different U.N. bodies and U.N. structures to instill them with a multistakeholder approach to include stakeholder participation in the different steps of the work of the United Nations in this field and of course of improving and strengthening the IGF, making it permanent, with the stable funding, and mixed funding, voluntary contributions but also U.N. contributions and that will be a hard fight but we are not talking about tens of millions, we're talking about a couple of million so it's doable. And we are also talking about other specific measures that we explain in our paper. So I think that of course the elements paper is lacking in many things. And as we have discussed here, it is also due to the fact that the co‑facilitators decided to exclude everything that was minimally controversial.
So it's very important for all stakeholders, for all of you, for all of us to really participate in this consultation until the 15th of July. Put forward specific proposals, wording proposals if possible we will of course do on our paper and let's use all channels of participation to the furthest extent possible.
The co‑facilitators are showing some willingness to go along the lines of the Sao Paulo multistakeholder guidelines for instance they have decided to establish this informal multistakeholder sounding board to help them in the negotiation process and it's important that this is not just an elite group formed by a couple of members of the IGF leadership panel. And the IGF mac. It's important that those members are really connected to the rest of the global community and act as speaks person as a speaks person group of the multistakeholder community in order to be in the negotiation process and of course we as governments, we have different possibilities to include stakeholders, like embedding them in our delegations. And we for sure are going to try and do that again as we have done in the past.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you so much and we're moving toward the end but I want to check with our online participants is there anyone that wants to ask a question or make a comment? No? Anyone in the room that would like to comment on anything that's been said? Come on up to the mic. If you can just let us know your name and who you're with, that would be great.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you so much. Candidate at USC. I feel another elephant in the room is perhaps the inequality within the network currently that you know, we have massive companies if you put Google and YouTube together they have the same amount as the next 48 websites put together. We have a massive inequality in the distribution of value of being together. The ten richest people I think eight of them have made money off the internet we're talking about connectivity. We want to connect everyone but what are we connecting them to? We have very little technical distribution, you know, that main companies keep their headquarters in the U.S. They don't create jobs elsewhere and we have the weaponization of these infrastructures so you know the ICC e‑mails got cut by Microsoft so how are we going to remain together if being together implies weaponization, implies inequality, implies lack of distribution of values so I think one of the elephant s in the room is what is happening with the taxes, what's happening with disarmament?
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you. Collaboration comes to mind when you mention that.
Does anyone in the panel want to respond or make a comment?
>> JORGE CANCIO: I wish I had the response to that but I think it's important if we are talking about multistakeholder approach and you're looking to the Sao Paulo guidelines which were adopted last year, the first guideline addresses that point, the point of asymmetries of power. Asymmetries of influence so it's really a very tough question.
But I think we can evolve also the multistakeholder approach to at least try to address some of those issues.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you. AnnMarie?
>> AnnMarie: It's absolutely an elephant in the room. I think there are three sort of main things that we're doing from my sort of own perspective. One is the DMA, so the European legislation trying to make better access for more players. How do we support innovation. I think the power grab and you're rightly so much of internet traffic is within few platforms. How do we support an innovation for European companies, companies from all over the world that can deliver internet platforms to compete and allow for diversity? Because with that also comes the diversity what are we discussing online? How are we engaging online and I think the third one and that goes back to how we think about the multistakeholder cooperation which is also around platform accountability because it's going to be some time before that we see a fundamentally different picture of how it looks today. But I do think this is a hopeful comment. This is not the end of the digital revolution. Just because this is how it evolved for the past 10‑15 years that you have few companies that have been incredibly successful to the point that we have few others competing with them. How can we change that? The evolution and the incredible innovators out there, the open source community that ebbs and flows over the past thirty years and have gained an incredible traction again. The use of AI, very much in the hands of people around the world. Maria is here with rabbler. There are so many new platforms that are trying to see the light. And we are engaging online and diversifying the services that we are using. This is not the height from here on, it's just downwards, we're really at an inflection point I think for a rethinking the internet we want. And how does it live up to the hopeful expectations back in 1992 of actually providing this wide array of opportunities and emancipation for individuals and citizens in all sorts of acceptance form.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you so much and as we close out maybe we can close out this way I would like to give everyone really quickly we'll go down what specific action, we've had a lot of discussion about what we need to do but what specific actions could we prioritize if we are to ensure meaningful, inclusive and effective multistakeholder cooperation? Tatiana?
>> Tatiana: Yes I can start. To sum up what we discussed here. We should continue demanding that the process is transparent and inclusive. That stakeholders' input is taken into account.
And we should participate as Jorge said and in terms of priorities. I have three. Protect the global interoperability and interconnectivity. Ensure this is at the core. Secondly, strengthen the multistakeholder cooperation by reaffirming commitment to the multistakeholder model in the WSIS+20 review and also by evolving the IGF and renewing its mandate.
And thirdly and this goes to what was said about connectivity. The original WSIS goal was connectivity. We still have one‑third of the world not connected. The WSIS has to deliver. We have to strengthen the implementation to address the current and emergent digital divides.
>> CHERYL MILLER: We're running short on time so I will give Flavia the last word.
>> FLAVIA ALVES: It is important that on the multistakeholder to make sure it works that every single stakeholder play their role.
And so for instance when we say about making sure the internet is accessible, free and open for everyone, how do we do that as us, I speak for industry now. We invest in connectivity. We have just announced a super cable that is one of the biggest that is going to go around to have users, to give users access to the latest technologies we have but our users are also not necessarily receiving information. They are actually small business selling, trading and creating on the platform. We are also increasing economic value in these countries. But when it comes to the user platform, this is important for everything, it's important for us to also invest on education and awareness that years ago we discussed the importance of helping education, including accessibility, no, awareness programs to make sure folks are using the internet that they should. There are people that have access that not necessarily know how to use the internet but when it comes to the WSIS I have said my points before making sure the process is right and included and the multistakeholder process is defined.
>> CHERYL MILLER: Thank you so much and thank you to our audience. Thank you for the questions and anyone, raise your hand if you're an IGF newcomer? If this is your first. That's awesome so I hope that we keep continuing to see you guys in these meetings. I hope that you know you get involved. And I hope to see, I hope to be sitting there and listening to you guys up here at one of your next panels maybe at the next IGF. So, thank you so much. And let's give it up for our panel.
>> AUDIENCE: (Applause).