The following are the outputs of the real-time captioning taken during an IGF virtual call. 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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>> Hello, everyone. It's the top of the hour. Why don't we give it another minute or two for everybody to finish joining.
>> This is Titti.
>> Hi, welcome. We are giving it another minute for everybody to join.
>> Just these few minutes to give a shout out to you about the meeting I participated in yesterday, the high level meeting of European Commission, because
>> Titti, would you like to put this under AOB so that all of us hear it?
>> Okay, yes.
>> Time under AOB.
>> Okay, thanks.
>> Thank you for the update. Why don't we get started. It's two minutes past the hour, which is kind of the usual time. I actually think that one of the, one quick admin. note, Luis, it seems as though you are allowing scrolling of the captioning in the lower right hand window, that we can actually control ourselves. Right? That is why there is two?
>> This is Veni, I'm on the phone.
>> We will read out anything that's, Luis is saying that's correct. So for those of you that are on Webex, you see the captioning on the bottom of the central screen there. But if you want to control it yourself and scroll up on the right hand corner under participants in chat (background noise) thank you, Luis. I know you keep trying to find ways to make this even more accessible. So appreciate all the effort.
The first item of business is to approve the agenda. The agenda was posted the end of last week. If there are any suggestions, and we have one request for an AOB item.
(static).
Not seeing or hearing any ...
(scratching noise).
I'll call the agenda approved.
The next question is, are there any objections to the call being recorded.
(pause).
Seeing none, and hearing none, we will let the recording stand. And the only other item I have under agenda 1 is to mention that in fact, the meeting summary from the last meeting was posted a few days ago. So you can find that on the Web site as well as all the previous meeting summaries as well. Thank you to Eleonora for supporting all that in the midst of a very busy period. Let's move to item 2, which is miscellaneous updates by the Secretariat, chair and note to everybody that we actually do have an item 3 which is update Host Country preparations and we have a representative from the French Government here, Dalila so we will take any specific questions to Paris and Host Country preparations in that agenda item.
First see if there are any general updates from the Secretariat, any of the Secretariat members that are on the call.
>> Hi, Lynn. This is Luis, the Secretariat. Two or three updates. One is that the schedule system will be available from next week, the new system together with the new hand up system that will be used, and also online participation access and registration, all of this will be available beginning next week. Second thing is that we have at the moment a little bit more than 20, 23, 24 remote hubs registered, end this Sunday or next Monday, if you can broadcast to your networks, that would be good. There is more than 1500 registration, 1600 by now.
>> Thank you, Luis and thank you for everything you are doing to improve on all the useful tools. Eleonora, anything you would like to add?
>> Hi, Lynn, hi, everyone. Just two quick updates from me, tied to what Luis just said. Since the schedule is really in his hands now, and is going to be transferred on to this great new platform he designed, I will say that on a ongoing basis, we have been tweaking the schedule a little bit based on some requests that, no major changes and some participants on this call will know that we do make these minor changes here and there, leading into the meeting. But otherwise, the schedule is of course finalized and will be accessible through the Secretariat platform that Luis designed soon.
Other than that, there is a possibility to reserve bilateral meeting rooms now. We have this posted on our home page. Anyone who is interested in reserving space for a bilateral meeting is asked to E mail the Secretariat, specifically me, directly, and what I do then is provide a link to a self reservation calendar which we have used the last couple of years and that has worked quite well. So that is now available for anyone looking for that bilateral meeting space.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Eleonora. Anja, is there anything you would like to provide in terms of general update?
>> Thank you, Lynn. Maybe just for the record, to reference the official press release on the announcing this meeting (whirring noise) 2018 MAG composition that is available on IGF Web site.
(echo).
MAG members to help us in spreading out the words that all participants are required to register online. There will be on site registration but it's going to be very complex. We advise everybody to save their own time and register online. Also, very brief update that the IGF village is finalized so everything is available on the Web site, even the logistics related to the village are described on the Web site, and if you could just take a look and of course let the Secretariat know if you have any other questions. That would be all for me. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Anja. If I could ask a couple of mentions for the updates that it would be good for some word to be spread further in the community, if I could ask remote hubs and another one, participate online, you should also register ahead of time, if someone in the Secretariat could draft the particulars of what we should be communicating, and the appropriate links, and send out a series of individual E mails to the MAG, I think we can forward that on to ...
(echoing and whirring noise).
Getting all the right topics and having the right information.
(echoing).
There is a lot of echoing in the background, Luis. I'm not sure if you could fix that. Sounds like it is fixed. Eleonora confirmed the Secretariat will do that. We want to get the message out but clear on any information, would be really helpful. Let me see if there are any comments or questions from the MAG to the General Secretariat update, and just by way of background, what I propose is we go to the Host Country preparations, and then I can follow that up with any additional (background noise) updates from my meeting in Paris a few weeks ago, but this will ensure that I don't take anything away from any announcements that the Host Country would like to make. But at this point in time, are there any specific questions from the MAG to the general updates that were just provided by the Secretariat? Waiting just a moment to see if anybody requests the floor. Not seeing any requests then, we will go to also there are a number of
>> It's Raquel.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: You have the floor, Raquel.
>> Thank you, Lynn. I'm sorry to jump in. I was confused if we are using the speaking queue or
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: We are. (chuckles).
>> Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry to jump in.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: No, please go ahead.
>> RAQUEL: Okay, it was just a quick question, and I understand the Secretariat also manages the bilateral requests, if we are going to have those this year and how we are going to proceed.
>> Eleonora.
>> Sure, hi, Raquel, is your question how can one make a bilateral meeting room request?
>> Yes.
>> ELEONORA MAZZUCCHI: Okay. So on the IGF home page, there is a little notification on bilateral meeting rooms. And we ask anyone interested in reserving the space to E mail me, and then I provide a link to a self reservation calendar. We don't post this self reservation calendar outright, so people out on the open Internet can't just block space. We want to have some kind of filter. But if you E mail me, I can give you that link and the spaces can be reserved. Okay. Raquel says thanks.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Great, thank you. There are a number of call in users as well, if people can identify themselves, maybe by just sending a note to Eleonora just for the meeting summary, that would be helpful if people want to come in quickly and identify themselves, that is good as well. If you are on a cell, on a phone only, could you just quickly identify yourself? We will track that, somebody coming in, yes. (pause) Veni, I think you were call in user 3. Any others who could other call in users? Timae, you may be one, I'm not sure. The mics are open here. If people could let us know off line, that would be helpful for the meeting summary.
Let me move to item 3 then.
(scratching noise).
Invite, not sure if you are, if David is on the phone to present the Host Country update. Dalila, is that yourself? Dalila appears to be speaking but I can't hear her. Luis, can you help
>> LUIS BOBO: Yes, I unmuted her, Lynn. But apparently she is not speaking or hearing, she was able to hear before, because we could hear also their sound from their side.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Okay.
>> LUIS BOBO: Apparently they are not
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Dalila, can you try speaking again?
>> LUIS BOBO: Let's try with call in users, okay.
>> Do you hear me?
>> Can you hear me?
>> This is David. Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, we can hear you, David, excellent.
>> Okay. So hello, everybody.
(echoing).
Also on the phone, we are two governments, two representatives to answer your question. Quick update on the preparation. Everybody has in mind the fact that it is going to be a Paris digital week, because there will be the Paris Forum which part of it will be dedicated to digital affairs, and digital discussions. On Monday 12 in the morning, there will be the summit at the City Hall of Paris, and of course, we have the IGF starting on Monday morning, with a high level multistakeholder session that we are currently preparing in the afternoon of the 12th. So as usual, it will be open by the representative of the Host Country, which will be the French Minister of foreign affairs. Then we will have keynote or introduction as you like, by the Secretary General of the UN. We will have two high level panels multistakeholder with people from Civil Society, Internet Governance organizations, some industry, and a few Government representatives. Then at the end of these two panels, we will have the can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: We can hear you well, thank you, David.
>> David: Good. And so we will have a keynote by the President of the republic that will basically be, close the session, so that is it for the multistakeholder high level, multistakeholder session.
Right now we have three receptions, which should be booked, one on Monday evening organized by ICANN organization, on Tuesday there should be another reception by one other entity which will be I guess unveiling its project very soon, and for Wednesday, there should be a German night in the perspective of course of the 2019 IGF in Berlin.
Having said that, so, we are still fine tuning a few things in the organization along with UNESCO, and UNDESA. I was yesterday at the high level Internet Governance group in Brussels, and I must say that several country representatives have expressed the fact that they wanted, of course, their ministers to be part of it, but so far there is no real slot for the ministers, for Minister for digital affairs or foreign affairs. That is the point that we should look into together, because if we want Government and states to commit themselves to the IGF, of course they need to feel that they are welcome and they can have the space and time to express their vision. This is a question that we need to put to you, the MAG. We have talked about that a bit.
I guess there should be still some available time on Tuesday very early in the morning. I would propose that at least one hour, two hours would be dedicated to the ministers who would come from around the globe to present their vision. And so that we can actually propose them something in order to encourage them to be part of the IGF. That's it for now.
I'm happy to answer all your questions, and with Dalila.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, David. We do have somebody in the queue, just one quick comment. You are probably aware of this already but UNESCO has a Open Forum, and they volunteered to support some of the VIPs that wouldn't be supported in some of the other panels. So that is certainly one vehicle.
>> One option.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: If we can get a idea of how many other people you think we need to try and support, we can certainly kick around some ideas on how best to do that. But we can work that off line between yourself and Dalila.
>> Okay.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Wisdom, you have the floor.
>> Thank you, chair.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: We can hear you, yes.
>> Good afternoon from Ghana. Just a quick one to the Host Country, with regard to issues, yesterday and I think last two days, I received a E mail from two individuals who are trying to apply for visa, I mean they were successful in filling the application form and all that. They are trying to book an appointment for [inaudible] I think the dates for this appointment is in December, December 12. I don't know if the Host Country can do something about this, if maybe a sort of, could issue to all persons who want to take part in this IGF, so they can give them [inaudible] this is my concern for now.
We might be having a lot of Africans not taking part in this IGF, that is my concern to the Host Country.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Wisdom. There is a note you are only on the phone there is a note from Sumon saying the same visa issue is happening with individuals in Bangladesh as well, the date is in November.
>> DAVID: On this what I can say of course, registrations will be add to the file, and support for the candidacy for visa, but of course there are rules and regulations, and that is something I don't have a grasp on it. Being invited, being registered to the IGF will not prevent any file from being of course cross examined by the French consulates around the world, and they will still have their part in the decision to deliver the visa. And that is something I really can't help with.
We might be, try to help on certain cases, so we will figure out, we will give you a E mail address so that you can convey special requests to the organizing team, which is basically comprised of Dalila and myself. We will see with the appropriate authorities what can be done, but there is no guarantee, of course, of a visa, even if you are registered to the IGF.
>> Yes, Madam chair, if I can comment.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, please, Wisdom.
>> We are not talking about guaranteeing persons wanting to participate in this visa, what we are trying to say is a big push forward, that is where the concern is, if someone is trying to apply and take part in BCS program and getting [inaudible] if something can be done about this, it's a big issue, so that we can get people, more people applying, why they think they want to take part in this year's IGF.
>> I'm really sorry, it's very far away, and I have a hard time understanding everything. But what you could do is, if you could write us an E mail, so that we see what is exactly at stake, and so that we could see what we can actually do, that would be extremely helpful, because right now on the phone, it's, I really have a hard time understanding everything. Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: We can hear you fine.
Eleonora, I'm wondering if there is anything that the Secretariat has done in the past or anything that they understand about this issue that could help? I don't mean to put you on the spot. I know this was traditionally Chengetai who really managed it. But
>> ELEONORA MAZZUCCHI: Hi, Lynn, no, it's okay, you are not putting us on the spot. Certainly we can talk about past practices, and I may cede the floor to Anja because she was more closely involved with that. But I will say that, for instance, last year, we did assist some applicants on a case by case basis and maybe Anja can speak more to that.
>> Thank you, Anja speaking. I think very clear here there will be support from the Host Country in terms of the formalities related to visa application for participants respecting the independent process of processing the applications by respective embassies. To completely respond to Wisdom's question, the responses align with the response we are giving to all participants that are contacting us, if you could maybe contact Wisdom with a concrete case, the Secretariat and we will forward the request to the Host Country to see whether the appointment for the interview can be moved any earlier, so that the embassy has time to process the visa application. I think that much probably could be done. In any case there is system that has been established with the Host Country this year as in previous years.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Anja, can I ask you to reach out to Wisdom and Sumon who are the two in the chat room that had a question, maybe understand their questions, their issues, I think you understand them well, just covered them, and but then document that and just ensure that between the French Government support, David and Dalila, the Secretariat, and the MAG members that we are clear on the process and the options available to them, if they are running into difficulty?
>> Yes, the Secretariat will reach out to Sumon and Wisdom and if any other MAG members have any problems, if you could please write concretely to the Secretariat, we will on case by case basis review the cases and see whether anything can be done.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I know you will but obviously keep the Host Country engaged as well, so that we are all learning from these processes as well.
>> Yes, yes, of course. The Secretariat just communicates to the Host Country these kinds of requests.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you.
>> Okay.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: There have been a number of questions in the chat room. David, you are on the phone. Let me try and cover them here. There is a couple questions referring to the list of participants of the upcoming IGF that members would like to share with their Government. There is a question on can we get the latest list of participants that are coming, that may be somewhere between the Secretariat and your office, there is also a question which is how do we ensure that the ministers were invited from our countries, is there a list of those that were invited?
>> To speed up the process, I can only encourage these members of the MAG who are willing to have their Government representatives invited to send to us the names, title, official addresses and E mail addresses, that would absolutely speed up the process.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I'm assuming you want that to go to the general E mail address, the one that
>> Right.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Okay, we can make sure that that is shared as well or put here in the chat room perhaps.
>> Okay. (background noise).
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: There were a couple other questions as well. Let me keep going back, it scrolls by so quickly. There was support for, there was a comment thanking you for your efforts in bringing ministers to the event and to agree that it's worth making room in the agenda on Tuesday morning to have a session to hear from ministers, and that got support from a few other people.
>> Great.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: There was also a question on how is the agenda described by you for the main session interacting with the MAG main sessions. So just to be clear, that session that Ambassador Martinon just described is actually a plenary session. There are no other sessions scheduled against that. And the other eight thematic main sessions are scheduled throughout the program, so they don't interact or interfere with the plenary session that Ambassador Martinon just described.
Let me see if there are any other comments. That is all I'm seeing. There is also nobody else in the speaking queue. Let me give a last call to see if there are any other comments or questions for Ambassador Martino or Dalila. Do a slow count to six, to allow people to find the appropriate buttons. Okay. Not seeing any. If I could ask the Ambassador and Dalila to stay on for a few more moments, because I'd like to give a high level update on the various meetings that I actually had when I was in Paris. There have been memos sent to the MAG list on a couple of the items, but I met with the Secretary General, managing directors of the Paris Peace Forum of the gov tech summit of the digital France council which is equivalent to cgi.br, I know that structure is familiar to the people on the call here. I met with the national NRI in France, and other members of the organizing committee. There is a multistakeholder organizing committee that the French Government has put together for IGF. I met with a number of them.
And I also met with two strategic advisors in the Office of the Presidential republic with Ambassador Martino and Dalila.
With the Paris peace Forum gov tech summit, council etcetera meetings, the primary purpose there of course was to build a relationship between those efforts and the IGF, ensure they understood what the IGF was and we were looking for areas of integration or cross promotion, both the Paris Peace Forum and gov tech summit, this is their first year of what they expect to be a annual. They were equally interested in cross promotion efforts, and some of the things that are being discussed are around social media channels.
We also discussed and most of the time the discussions were two way, what we could do to promote the other events. So we are looking at some of those things. It's maybe something on Web sites, and that sort of thing.
There was the thought that we might prepare a leaflet or a small postcard sort of thing, small brochure on the IGF that we can distribute at those other events as well. As a result of that conversation, there was also a suggestion that there might actually be a leaflet that could be prepared by the French Government which would cover all three events, again as part of the Paris digital week.
One question is whether or not David and Dalila, have any further discussions so we know what we need to support from this end, and it's both a general discussion on what else we might do to both bring in additional participation, support for the IGF and in the work of the IGF, not just the annual meeting, and of course also as a result of that, we are certainly hopeful that downstream we would actually find some additional donors and supporters for the trust fund as well.
But have you had any further
>> On the leaflet, it is introduction. We have a [inaudible] presents the whole Paris digital week, the three events. It's introduction right now.
It will comprise a map on which we located the three main places again for the Paris digital Forum, the IGF and gov tech summit.
As Lynn has let you know, all members of the MAG are invited to the gov tech summit and to the Paris Peace Forum. Unfortunately, not on the 11th of November, because it's, it will be the opening of the Paris Peace Forum and there will be like 60 heads of states and governments, so unfortunately, there is no room left for anyone else, not only because of the security, the protocol, etcetera, the official delegation, but on the 12th and 13th, all MAG members are invited to participate in the Paris Peace Forum.
This is basically, this is the main idea of that digital week, to try and make the most of these events that are basically organized at the same time, on the same days, so that participants of the Paris Peace Forum can actually attend the gov tech summit and the IGF and reverse it, this is the idea, to bring new ideas, new energies, new people, and to notably have usual participants of the IGF be able to hear new ideas, new voices, new people on other topics, by the way, at the gov tech summit, and at the Paris Peace Forum.
So, having said that, yes, we are thinking about the future. We are trying to see how we can keep the momentum that was started by our Swiss friends and colleagues last year in Geneva, so that the IGF won't be in the same situation as last year and this year, with no Host Country ready to do the job, no country willing to host the event and do the job. Of course, we won't have the problem with Germany because Germany knows how to plan on the long term, and that is why we love our German friends. But what will happen in 2020, we don't know. So we need to really keep on brainstorming on the way the IGF can actually deliver and can be we need to find a sustainable path. We are thinking about that with our friends from Switzerland. Of course, our German friends are interested in this reflection too.
We will exchange with the MAG, we need to talk to the office of the Secretary General too, so this is in the middle of that reflection, and we are happy to get any input, any ideas from MAG members on what could be done to achieve a more sustainable situation for the IGF.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, David. One or two quick comments, in your earlier comment about the Paris Peace Forum the 12 and 13, you said all members of the MAG were invited. I think you meant all members of the IGF, at least when I touched, when I met with the Paris Peace Forum gov tech summit, made it clear that there could be 2500, 3,000 people on site registered for the IGF. Certainly for the gov tech summit they were okay with a full open to the IGF participants. We said even if 10 percent come, so we are still planning everyone with the gov tech summit for them.
>> You are absolutely right. Yeah. I spoke too quickly. There will be a problem of capacity in the Paris Peace Forum. The Paris Peace Forum location can only accommodate around 800 persons. So only MAG members could be invited, unless IGF have asked for a invitation earlier in the process, that is the best our friends and colleagues at the PPF, at the Paris Peace Forum can actually do.
But you are right. As for the gov tech summit, there is plenty of room, and so any, anyone from the IGF community willing to attend and participate in the gov tech summit is more than welcome. Thank you for the clarification, Lynn.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. There was another question in the room, from Julian, you need to register for each one of the events individually, there is no joint registration.
The other comment is just a good time to bring this up with respect to the 2020 IGF. We have had for some years now interest expressed by a country to host it, they have approval of the Government. They are ready to submit the formal application. It's in a different region in the United Nations. It is on the European continent. In fact, not all that many miles from Berlin. There are some questions on their part as to whether or not they should submit the candidacy because, and this is a question to the MAG of course, or maybe just a comment, as to whether or not it would be acceptable to the community at large, because even though it is in fact in a different UN region and not one where we have had many IGFs before, it is in fact on the same continent. So I think that is something we will need to try and find a way to get a thoughtful read on. It wasn't so much of an issue before, when we thought that 2018 would be in Asia. But now in fact on the same continent, clearly the object given the IGF's focus on diversity and inclusion, so participation makes that a key question.
I guess there is not really a question there. We need to think about how we go forward. They are looking for advice, and what sort of advice we might give them on that. But we have 2020, we thought we had 2020, kind of easily sewn up some time ago and now it's just a question of representation, in one geographic area.
Any, I'll check quickly in the queue, are there any other questions for Dalila or Ambassador Martino? The only other thing I will mention is I also met with folks from UNESCO, toured the facility. UNESCO had been planning to have a Forum on artificial intelligence on the Sunday. They have moved that, because Sunday is quite subscribed between Armistice Day and Paris Peace Forum. They now moved it to the Thursday. They are meant to be sending their draft program, and they are interested in participation, and some possible speaking slots for individuals that are either engaged in any of the artificial intelligence work within the IGF community broadly, or through the Best Practice Forum as well.
So if I could just ask MAG members to note that, I don't have anything I can pass on at this point in time, but that would obviously extend to the day after the IGF for travel plans. A number of other and to be honest I was pinch hitting on a lot of these discussions last week for Chengetai so there are a lot of other smaller things we are trying to coordinate in the background, it was a very successful meeting. It was a full three days. If people have any specific questions, I'm happy to take them now or take them online. This would be a last call for any further questions for Ambassador Martino or Dalila. Doing a slow count to 6, checking the queues.
>> Apologies, Lynn. I am only on the phone. I don't have access to the queue. It's okay, it's Sylvia here, it's okay if I ask a question?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, please.
>> I tried to comment on the chat about the importance of getting the confirmation from the registrations and the same that applies also for the artificial intelligence event that you mentioned, for people from our region that is just, extensively to be able to arrive to Paris for the event we really need for the people not only for us in our staff, but also for the award winners, for example, that we are inviting to attend, both the peace Forum and the IGF, that the registration confirmations arrive as soon as possible. In our case, the people that are attending have confirmed so that is not a issue. But if we don't have registrations confirmed and they have not, they are not able to participate, we can't justify budget to have them in Paris or us in Paris for two or three days before or after, just waiting for that to come. There are not that many connecting flights and things like that, to be able to sort out the logistics.
So the difference in price will be really considerable, and we are making already huge commitment to bring people from Asia Pacific to IGF in Paris. So the registrations is really important to know what is a commitment for participation for people traveling from overseas, because it's not just getting on the train and getting there in a couple of hours for us. It's really, it takes a lot of time and preparation to be able to get people from the region there, and have their calendars ready and organized. Your assistance to have those registrations confirmed will be really appreciated. In the case of the peace Forum we filled all the forms, and as well as that information came out and we are still waiting. We only got a E mail saying that the form was received, but nothing else. So we might need to change fares and accommodation to arrive a day or two later. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Sylvia. To be clear, your comments were specifically towards the Paris Peace Forum and the gov tech summit, because the Secretariat is processing the IGF registrations very promptly.
>> Yes. Yes. The IGF registrations were done when they open.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Right, okay.
>> For us we need six weeks to organize travel. This is all really, really
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Any advice to Sylvia with respect to, I guess getting an early reading or a earlier confirmation of the registration? Sounds like (overlapping speakers).
>> Pass the message along to our colleagues and friends at the PPF and the gov tech summit. My bet is if there was no confirmation for the first day of the Paris Peace Forum, don't count on it, because it will be overcrowded. On the other hand, the gov tech summit happens on the Monday morning and I think it should be fine for you. So if you have applied for invitation, my bet would be that you can consider, you can consider it done for the gov tech summit at least.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, David.
>> I will pass to our colleagues.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I guess if there was something which somebody thought was kind of really worthy of special consideration, if you are bringing in a number of award winners from Asia Pacific, for instance, then I think making that known, I mean there may be some other linkage that they are trying to build in the Paris Peace Forum that would make that important. Okay.
Thank you. I really appreciate, as I said, so many times, everything you are all doing to pull this together, in record time. If there is anything we can do to help, let us know. We will take your request for opportunity to find additional speaking slots for the ministers to participate. One thing that would help would be if we had some idea of the numbers, and ideally, I suppose, we would actually look at possibly structuring another sort of panel or a high level session that actually has some discussion, debate, engagement, as opposed to just a series of individual speeches. We try to get away from that last year, and it was pretty well supported by the community. It would be difficult to go back on that. But I also recognize that this is a bit of a different situation, with respect to possibly getting more high level speakers than we have had in recent years, and I do think it's important that we do pull them in and hopefully get continued participation.
>> Absolutely. We will revert to you as soon as we can, and in the meantime, thank you for this meeting, and I guess that's time for Dalila and myself to go back to our desk and work.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you.
>> Bye bye.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Okay. I think that was useful but it took up a fair amount of time. So if we could move to the item 4, reviewing the thematic session preparations. I think what is really important, and a lot of documents have come out in the last couple days, and that's obviously excellent news. When we go through, if we could just cover specifically the status of facilitators, it's less important who they are and more important if you are still searching for a facilitators, that we are made aware of that, so that we can do whatever we can to support that. The status of your draft proposals, title and the proposed focus are policy questions, and then requests if any of the other MAG members.
In a discussion with Eleonora this morning as well, she pointed out that there is a template that has been used in the past and is requested in support of the main sessions, which obviously facilitates the other MAG members' review. It helps ensure all the information is actually collected properly. But most importantly, it actually allows the Secretariat to populate the agenda, the program agenda, with consistent information. So if people could use that template as they go forward, that would be helpful. I know the Secretariat would like to get some titles and descriptions out for those main sessions as quickly as possible.
We are now about roughly I guess four or five weeks away from the event. So we should be getting that information up there. Let me see if there are any, quickly, any kind of general comments or questions from anyone, the Secretariat, on this process overall, and then we can move to the individual updates.
So not hearing anything from the Secretariat, Ben volunteered to go first with the main session update. Ben, you have the floor.
>> Apologize if there is problem with a sound (indecipherable) I'll try and keep this brief. We do have three facilitators. We are going to talk at a meeting tomorrow to advance the work on the Cybersecurity trust and privacy main session. I unfortunately won't be in Paris because I'll be at the IGF plenipot so probably for another facilitator to help particularly on the day, but we are certainly good for now, to move forward.
The proposed title is Cybersecurity and privacy practices, that can build trust and ensure growth and prosperity for all. I did send a written update to the MAG yesterday. People can look for more details there obviously. We put out a number of policy questions, but rather than going through all of them I would say we put them in three buckets. One asking about best practices, one about striking the right balance and between Cybersecurity and privacy, there are [inaudible] what trade off is needed. Certainly about international cooperation and collaboration, to what extent these issues should be dealt with at the international level.
We put around a discussion document in a Google doc and very much welcome ideas, particularly on the policy questions and suggestions for speakers, because we hope over the next week to come up with a list of potential speakers and start reaching out. So yes, that is my update. And to recognize the template is being sent out this morning, and thanks for that, and we will move that discussion documents towards that template.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Ben. Reminded me as well, in all of my meetings in Paris, there was a lot of support for looking at cross speaking opportunities, and gov tech summit and Paris Peace Forum and everybody is quite careful and thoughtful about privacy considerations and not looking to oversolicit individuals, but they did mention both of them that if there were individuals that we saw that were participating in their conference on their steering committees or on their boards and there is a lot of information on all of the Web sites, that we should feel free to invite them or engage them. If you want them in their daily capacity, feel free to reach out individually. If you are actually looking for a participant that might speak on behalf of or in light of Paris Peace Forum or gov tech, then you should go through the managing directors or the Secretary General. If anybody needs help with that, feel free to drop me a note. But the good news is, many of them will already be in Paris, and the other good news is a lot of them are people that haven't traditionally participated in IGF. So again that would bring a little freshness to our discussions as well.
So, with that, unless there are any comments for Ben on that update, I'll give it a minute to see if anybody wants to come in. Timae is in the queue but I suspect to give a update on the next thematic session. Let me see if there are questions for Ben. Not seeing any. I hope everybody is reading the documents that have been submitted and sending any suggestions or any questions on line as well. I know it's a lot of information to digest here. Timae, let's move to you.
>> Can you hear me?
>> Yes, we can.
>> You assume right. I'm looking for the floor to provide a brief update on the main session on development innovation and economic issues. But as you know MAG members and the Dynamic Coalitions are organizing together. The session is updated by our colleague Jutta who is part of the D.C. coordination steering group, Markus Kummer, the same group and myself.
We have been working closely with the Dynamic Coalitions for a session that would focus on exploring policy considerations and approaches needed to leverage the Internet and ICT to facilitate the Sustainable Development Goals. We aim to showcase the work and value of discussions and intersessional work as it relates to SDGs. Obviously the work of the Dynamic Coalitions but also the CENB and any others interested, any PPFs or partners sharing their work in this vein.
And to convene a global multistakeholder discussion about the main elements required to enable ICT innovation and investment and mitigate challenges on consequences, we aim to bring questions and perspectives shared at the local and regional level, to generate ideas and insight at the global IGF discussion. We aim to strengthen a shared understanding of commitment of stakeholders on developmental challenges to promoting holistic policy approaches and multistakeholder cooperation. We have worked with a Google document that was shared with the Dynamic Coalition, and with the list that is organizing the main session to develop our policy questions. These are how can Internet and ICT be used to positively drive the SDGs, to facilitate inclusiveness, equality and development. In this vein we consider which of the items are part of Internet Governance processes already and which ones are missing. We are looking at what are some of the challenges identified, particularly in the context of rapid digital transformation for developing economies, labor considerations, groups, etcetera, and what are the possible routes for overcoming the challenges. We aim to discuss what is policy environment for supporting inclusiveness across societies and where can we identify areas of mutual collaboration within the policy space.
This is what we aim for the session, where we are in the planning and the considerations of the next steps, as I said, we are working closely with Dynamic Coalitions, and on their last coordination group call, D.C.s have each agreed to produce a one pager on their work as it relates to the Sustainable Development Goals. These papers will serve as background material for the session, which will be shared ahead of the session, and also with the participants of the session to prepare. The D.C.s agreed that the submission of this paper will be taken as indication of their intent to intervene in the main session. There were general guidelines shared with the D.C.s on these papers and including their content. D.C. agree they would submit to the Secretariat a abstract by last Friday, the 5th of October. And 11 D.C.s have already done so. We have 11 out of the 17 Dynamic Coalitions interested in participating in the session. They will submit their final one pager by Friday next week, the 19th of October.
The session will be constructive to allow for brief presentation and key messages by the Dynamic Coalition, and invited expert panelists will reflect on the messages shared by the D.C.s and debate on the policy questions I mentioned earlier. We also hope to capitalize on the high level presence of the IGF and invite senior experts from Government and all other stakeholder groups for this expert dialogue on this session. I'm very happy to hear that there is such an interest for high level participation. We hope to find some of those willing to participate in the session more substantively as well.
What is left for us to do is to select the title, finalize the description of the session, the structure and to identify our final roster of panelists. We have a call set up for Thursday, so tomorrow, the 11th of October at 4:00 p.m. UTC, so which will be I think 6:00 central European time. I invite you all to join the mailing list for the organization of the session, if you are interested in it. There we will share agenda soon so I invite you all to join us tomorrow to discuss further. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Timae. Let me see if there are any comments or questions for Timae or the other organizers. Wisdom again, I see you in the queue. I'm assuming that is a update since your hand went up some time ago for the next thematic update. Seeing no further requests for the floor, Wisdom, you have been in the queue for some time.
>> Yes, I want to give updates on digital inclusion and accessibility.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Please go ahead.
>> Thank you. I've been working on our proposal, myself and co facilitators, Zeina, Paul and Paul, we have been working on our proposal, I did share on the MAG list. I don't know if others have seen it, requests from MAG members, what we are seeking to do is look at what really the issues are in developing countries and looking to see best practices, what we can learn from that, also looking at human rights issues. For example, there are issues regarding [inaudible] looking at that. We will also be looking at how these help achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. The structure of the whole session is going to be a panel, panel discussion and group that into sessions, and the first part is going to be, the first session is going to take ten minutes. We have the first segment of the discussion which is going to be the digital inclusion, we will have our first segment on that. The second segment will be digital accessibility. I think we also are considering the audience contribution. I think it is also important to get feedback from them as well. So we will have 15 minutes with that regard as well as a remote audience. We will have the conclusion part, and then the wrap up.
The policy questions, we have come up with a number of policy questions for our session, both digital inclusion and digital accessibility. We have quite a number of them. We are still working on questions, both for inclusion and accessibility. Once that is done, we have the last segment of that is going to be a conclusion and recommendation. We are looking at multistakeholder, international cooperation to see what can be done, in helping bridging those gaps. Part of the session we are going to have the Host Country chair this session. I think I will be writing to the Secretariat to see they can get us someone from the Host Country. As usual, we did contact [inaudible] he showed interest in the session but he has yet to confirm his participation as well as [inaudible] to be determined. For the panelist, we are looking at two segments, we will have for each of the segment the digital inclusion part and accessibility part. We have a number of interests, have shown interest in taking part in this session. So I would conclude on the list, we are hoping by next week, by next week we should conclude with panelists, the list of panelists, and should be finalizing the whole session proposal for final comments by Monday. Once that is done, we can forward to the Secretariat for [inaudible] basically, that is all we have done about the proposal, it's online, Google doc. I've sent a link. We are hoping to get some comments from MAG members. (indecipherable) thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Wisdom.
I don't see Paul online, unless he is on the phone.
Are there any comments or questions for Wisdom?
Maybe I can just take a moment or two here, and there is an effort ongoing which has been by the Secretariat and a couple of members of the working group on strategic work program focused on outputs, specifically on the various processes that are used to capture all of the outputs that come through an IGF. One of the things we piloted last year that got a reception of course was something called Geneva messages. We have also said that those should probably just be moved to IGF messages.
But we are trying to build that process, learning from last year, build the process, so I would simply ask MAG members to keep in mind.
(whirring noise).
Rapporteurs will be expected to help capture the main messages from those thematic sessions.
(voice in the background).
Wisdom, could somebody mute Wisdom's line? The Secretariat. Thank you.
So, we will be getting a draft process out to all the MAG, but it's particularly important for the organizers of these thematic sessions because you are expected rapporteurs, the rapporteurs should support those IGF messages, and then of course we actually want to pull all those together, the messages coming out of all the individual workshop sessions, and we are looking to revamp the chair's report which comes out at the end and make that more of a executive summary level, probably organized by the eight themes we have here.
There is a small team effort going to trying to pull those pieces together and we will get more information out to the MAG as quickly as possible. But I want you to keep that in mind as you look for your rapporteurs and structure your sessions. Two other things that are really important of course is that you make sure that there is appropriate time for engagement with the participants online and those in the room. And be careful about respecting the time, particularly if you are in the first part of that three hour slot, because you will need to finish on time, so that we can vacate the room and get the next panelists up and in place.
I think it's really incumbent on everybody to think carefully through the structure of the number of panelists and the process.
With that, let's move to June Parris, you have the floor.
>> Hi, good morning, everyone. June Parris, I'm going to talk about the IGF main session, human rights, gender and youth. The length of our session is going to be 90 minutes. The title of our session is the importance of human rights, direct link to gender, youth and equality. We are looking at a debate with the audience [inaudible] room set up with extra chairs for the speakers so members of the audience can join in the empty chair (background noise).
Brief description, protection and promotion of human rights, achieving gender equality and securing youth policies for the present and next generation. That is the core of the international Arena. The agenda we are looking at speakers, presentations, interventions, workshop interventions, audience interventions and moderators. I won't go into the policy questions. The organizers, Renata, she has written the policy document and the co facilitator Miguel is representing Government and Jutta is Civil Society. We are looking at speakers. We have had some ideas about speakers. We are looking to give them five minutes to speak, so that the audience can have a lot of time to participate. We hope to have representatives from each IGF stakeholder group, but that is to be announced. That hasn't been finalized. We will have remote participation, and connections with other sessions. What we have done so far last week, we had a meeting on Skype which was quite eventful, and successful.
We are hoping to have other members of MAG join in, on our group, because we need a bit more support. We have had, it's still open, the doodle poll is still open to members who want to join. We have had a E mail confirming ARP Coalition, they want to take part. So at the moment, we are going to be working on a letter to invite speakers, we will send a letter to the speakers inviting them to speak and suggestions to meet again, document has to be finalized but we have a problem with we are clashing with another session, so Eleonora has promised to have a look at that to see if she can change that for us. And that's my speech. I'm done.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, June. Let me see if there is a quick response from Eleonora or if you are still looking at it.
>> Hi, Lynn. We are still looking at this. Sorry, June, I'll get back to you by E mail.
>> Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Any other questions for June? Seeing none, then Sylvia. You have the floor.
>> Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, we can hear you.
>> Thank you, Lynn. Thanks for the time to give the short update about the technical and operational issues main session. We have put together a very brief document based on the template. The only thing that we did was kind of shift things to have one information byline that says like all the subtitles together instead of grouping information, I guess, you know, everything that is on the template is there. This is delivered separate. Same to June, we also have a clashing with another session. But I will follow up with Eleonora to see what can be done about that.
The session is planned for 80 minutes as Secretariat requested to have time to vacate the room and all of that. The topic will be content.
(static).
Blocking, we still don't have a engaging title for it. Simone and myself are the main session organizers or facilitators, both from the technical community. I put my name up as moderator, but that is kind of like temporary, waiting for confirmation for remote moderator. Simone and I will be sharing the Rapporteur role, to make sure that same as we had to co organize the session, that the report is done according to the structure that we agree on.
In terms of speakers, they are all to be confirmed. On that note, I will have, I have a question about the list of registered participants with the IGF that normally is available on the Web site, and I haven't been able to find it. So it will be really good if we can have access to that.
So, just to check that people that are already attending for other workshops can be the ones kind of prioritized, to make sure that we actually have them in place.
So, we have Lisa Cooper from the IGF technical community, then [inaudible] Article 19 from Civil Society. Danko and Simone are looking at representatives, in terms of Government representatives we think that the governments where content blocking is widely used will be an interesting Government to have, maybe some that have other approaches will be good. So help from the Secretariat to identify Government representatives attending and regulators attending will be really good.
In terms of Intergovernmental Organisations, most of the documents around these that are calling for international collaboration and understanding are coming from the Council of Europe. We still have to approach them to see if they can confirm a speaker. Basically then the focus of the session is going to be around the blocking and filtering should not damage or affect in any way or break the Internet as such, that should allow, be aligned with the architecture of the Internet, and the idea is to try to focus on the technical end, the implications of applying those filtering roles.
On the document that we put together, we included a table from a paper that ISOC prepared some time ago about the existing filtering and blocking techniques, and how they are assessed, to reserve to what it is actually practice on that space (background noise) and what are the recommendations from sorry, there is someone on the line? Okay. So to there is another line, can be muted?
(echo).
There is a lot of noise. Sorry. Thank you.
So based on those documents, there are recommendations around what approaches support or are in agreement let's say with the architecture and the spirit and values of the Internet and those are listed straight after. In terms of the agenda, we have divided the time in five blocks. One small block to set the scene, that will be Danko [inaudible] from the technical perspective will focus the conversation. Then we have 15 minutes for Lisa from the IGF and then Council of Europe, intergovernmental organization, to present like the big picture, effects understood by organizations working on collaboration.
Then a short block of questions and answers around that topic, then a third block of 15 minutes on why doing it and why not, and that will be Government and Civil Society speakers, to dive into the pros and cons of actually doing it, again focusing on technical and operational issues. Then another block with a concrete experience or example, will be given by a content provider or a ISP provider, we are looking to confirm as a speaker, about what are the risks, costs and technical implications when this is enforced, right, to see what is the impact for the network or the content provider when that happens. Then another block of five minutes for questions and answers on that specific block of the session.
Then 15 minutes open microphone session, about what can we do about it, trying to combine the three, the previous ones which are the standards and like the big picture, the practical implications.
In terms of the policy questions, we drafted three, that are basically trying to link various policy development happening around content filtering and blocking, how the policy building happens, and what model is used is what we are more interested in. So the question is about multistakeholder, consensus building approach and how that influence or not the policy around that. Then to try to have agreements on what are the means available to deal with legal activity to reinforce the importance of doing whatever you do, and aligned with the architecture of the Internet. And then what are the, the last question which I think is probably the most practical one that might be linked to the outputs question later, is what steps should be taken to minimize the effects for service providers and users and consumers.
In terms of the remote participation and remote moderator and online interaction, they are all kind of pretty straightforward. And on that, I think it would be really good to have information about what is available on the Sal 1 at UNESCO like what is the setup of that room, to see what methodology for engagement and interaction in the room will actually work, because depending on the setup and actual physical structure of the chairs and all of that, then we can figure out if the methodology is going to work or not.
And then the remote participation part, what we hope to do is to capture questions and comments from the remote hubs and from social media that are curated and organized at least before the event, so people have issues connecting because of the time differences, their voices can still, all their questions can still be part of the conversation. From the workshops already approved, there is only one that I could find that have a link directly with this session. That is touching on technical issues. There are other issues around, other workshops, sorry, around content filtering and blocking that are more from the human rights perspective. I think what we really are trying to do is to keep focused on one dimension of the content and filtering approach. We have not worked on the desired outputs or results and next steps, and the SDG 9 and that will be all for us for now.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Sylvia. A couple of points to emphasize. The Secretariat is commenting in the chat room, all the thematic main sessions are targeting 80 minutes. There was reference earlier to 90 minutes but it needs to be 80 minutes. We need to respect that, so we can again vacate the room and get the next panel set up. We want to ensure that the room configurations are made available, I think they are on the Web site, but we will make sure that they are known and available, Sylvia.
>> Thank you, Lynn. I'm sure it has been shared somewhere. I just have not been able to find it.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That is fine.
>> Thank you very much for that. [inaudible] also on the line and Danko as well, I don't know if they want to comment on anything. From my end we are still working on it. We will get there hopefully (chuckles).
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I think it was a fairly thorough review, Sumon and Danko, anything you would like to come in quickly on? Sumon is fine, Danko says no, he is in another meeting listening remotely. My only other comment would be to make sure we are all leaving enough time for real audience engagement, participant engagement. We didn't want to fill this up with just panelists speaking to the room.
We have three more left. Is there somebody who wants to volunteer, the ones that I have noted were the evolution of IG, emerging technologies and media content.
>> Hi, this is Anja. Evolution was the first one, maybe I can start and briefly give a update.
So, the updates compared to the last update we gave to the MAG is that now we know that the session is definitely scheduled to be on the second day of the meeting from 11:40 to 1:00. The session is 80 minutes long. The title still stands as evolution of Internet Governance focus on the multistakeholder approach. But it could be that it will change in the coming days. For the format of the main session the approach was run across all the areas involved in this process which is more than a hundred. It was agreed that so called town hall approach will be taken, where the session will be divided into two major segments, the first segment will call for to address the policy questions that I will reference later. Then the second segment is 25 minutes long as well, and it will include comments upon the second two questions. After that, we will open the floor for 15 minutes to interact with everybody present on line and on site.
It will be of course challenging given the time constraints, and we will ask the moderator to make sure that these interventions are no more than 90 seconds long. After that segment of course we will have the moderator concluding the session, and standing up by multiple rapporteurs and sending concrete messages as was done last year in Geneva. As to participants, the plan is that the session will be open with a very brief presentation by the Secretariat on who are the (indecipherable) what are the current records. That will be I think up to five minutes long maximum. As for the contents of the session, as I said last time the session will definitely focus on four policy questions, and what I will read now are the final version of these questions.
The first policy question that will be addressed is the examples from the NRI on the application of the multistakeholder model to the Internet Governance matters. Contributed to development of Internet Governance at the NRI national, subregional and regional levels, and whether the specific engagement with Government or impact on policies or practices are cured from the NRI Internet Governance Forum initiatives. The second is what are the challenges faced with while engineering or developing and implementing the multistakeholder model for discussing the Internet Governance matters. The third one will be how can the implementation of the multistakeholder model be improved on the national and regional levels. Finally the session plans to conclude the content with the fourth question which is focused on the multistakeholder model on a global level, what is a current status and what are the recommendations for improvements.
The session of course as for the session guidelines that the NRIs produce that are fully in line with the IGF principles is that it will be, it will aim to have a interactive discussion between all present NRIs, so far we have more than 30 confirmed NRIs that will speak on site. They will delegate through their processes one or two potential speakers that will intervene probably for up to one or two minutes, to do these policy questions.
When it comes about the moderators, this is still under, to be decided by the NRI colleagues and of course by the interested MAG members that are joining this preparatory process. The same goes for the remote moderator and for the rapporteurs. As soon as this is finalized, we will communicate this information to the MAG. Thank you, I think that will be all. If you have any questions, I'm here.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Anja. Are there any questions for Anja? Not seeing any then. We have Natasha volunteered to give us a update. Natasha, you have the floor. She is going to speak on the emerging technologies. Natasha, let's make sure.
>> Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: You are a little faint. You are quite faint.
>> Can you hear me better now?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That is a bit better, yes. Make sure
>> I'll give a short update on the preparation of the emerging technologies main session. Establish communication with the colleagues from Best Practices Forum on IoT, big data and artificial intelligence, so Titti and her colleagues. This main session will be informal panel discussion, and the structure of the panel is yet to be defined. We are preparing this part.
Facilitator of our main session is Christoph and co facilitator, Raquel and myself. So far we have main sessions ideas, that still need to be filter and adopted to become real policy questions. I can say which eight of those are, so this main session ideas like ethical considerations.
(typing).
Bias, including AI facial recognition, when bias is made by [inaudible] great proposal [inaudible] explanation of results, possibility, multistakeholder approach needed for AR, improving accessibility AI content removal and ownership of data and data governance.
We plan to ask speakers that are already participating in this year's IGF panel so with similar thematic, also panelists of our main session panel. We have not yet discussed participants specifically. We still have a lot of things to do. But there is definitely some progress. We are aware that we need to hurry up with the preparations in order to meet the deadlines.
So we will do our best to do so.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Natasha. If there is anything specific you need help with, please put a note out to the MAG list and I'm sure you will get volunteers. This is such an important set of topics. So if you are looking for refinement on policy questions or suggestions for speakers, anything, put a specific request out and I'm sure you will get lots of support. (background noise).
>> Will, thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Raquel, I don't see Sala on the call, if you can give a update on media content, that would be great.
>> Thanks, Lynn. I need to do [inaudible] thanks for jumping in with the topic, I'm going to help you out [inaudible] struggling a lot. But on the media and content also, actually she did a great job with a summary with the template, outlining the plans. The media content main session, a couple facilitators are myself and Mamadou. We put out the document yesterday or this morning for some, so this is still an early draft. It's possibly going to change. The title, we had a suggestion from June early today, the disparity between headlines and interpretation in the dialogue subjective or objective. The session is going to take place on Tuesday, on the 3rd of November, at 10:00 a.m.
We have actually about 80 minutes of discussions there, 90 minutes almost. And we have built on previous sessions as much as we could, as well as the Sala, are you there? I could hear someone.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I think it's just a open mic. We will close it in the background, Raquel, if you could continue.
>> Of course, thank you very much.
(voice in the background).
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Secretariat, can you close that open mic? Thank you.
>> So, it's been drawing also on the main topics that are raised with the consultations, so hate speech, fake news and local content under the big umbrella of media and content. So in the document, I'm just noting there are some interesting breakdown of the number of speakers, gender balanced (indecipherable) so a important figure to bring up on the main session and try to rebalance where we are missing in the workshop proposals that are tied to, that are feeding this discussion.
In terms of and going forward more concretely on the asks, we have also been working with the information, with the policy questions, so as I said, it's drawing from the topics and discussions that are raised in previous IGFs as well as the new one. It's bringing the media freedom. How we can make the policy enabling environment for media freedom, what are the implications, also as a second big bucket, is fake news or we should politically say the misinformation dissemination. So how we are going to tackle that, and more also on the roles and responsibilities from the stakeholders in this.
So, in terms of the structure we have put out, there are some options, of course, getting an introduction, get at least five experts from different stakeholder groups to be in the main session, and then allow as much as possible the discussions on the ground. We are also seeking for the NIRs and the D.C.s that are connected and other groups that are connected to be representative, to be represented there.
So having about leaving at least 30 minutes of discussions with the audience, and there is a tentative list of speakers, Lynn has been reached out yet, if you want to take a look and you have any suggestions, we are more than welcome receiving them.
Please join the list, if you didn't saw the document I'm glad to share with you later on, and getting suggestions in terms of speakers and policy questions that you want to tackle. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Raquel. Any questions or comments for Raquel? So again I would encourage everybody to read the submissions. I will work with the Secretariat and a small drafting team to get more clarity on some of the output and some of the message capturing processes. Again, we learned from last year, so I think there's some suggestions for a better process, but you should make sure that you are taking that into account in your planning at this point as well, with respect to finding rapporteurs, one of the more critical posts, actually in these activities.
If we could move right now, if we can, we will come back to the NRI updates, intersessional updates and MAG working group updates, if not, I ask individuals to submit them on line. A few of them have been submitted on line already. But I'd like to turn to Titti now to get a update on the HR IG meeting which was held in Brussels yesterday. That goes directly to Internet Governance and to a critical set of stakeholders.
>> Yes, this is Titti.
(traffic noise).
Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: We can, yes.
>> Thanks for giving me the floor.
I want to give a update about the discussion we had yesterday during the high level, on Internet Governance, by European Commission. As you know, usually meeting has two session, one which involves the community and the second part of the meeting involves only member states.
So there was a lot of discussion yesterday about the global IGF. I was impressed about the fact that complaint have been arised about the fact being IGF doesn't give the good output to governments and also business, so maybe that is the reason why maybe there is no too much involvement about from Government from business.
(sound of horn in the background).
There was a discussion arised also a lot of suggestion, because some people think that maybe the mandate of IGF should be a little bit changed, in order to give more guideline, more recommendation, that could be used from governments. And also, there were some suggestion to strengthen IGF (overlapping speakers) because IGF is a special project, it doesn't have a lot of people that could be allocating the project. Also it's difficult to involve Government because maybe there is not so much pressure I mean on Government, because as you know, sometime you need to know it's not, I mean you need to maybe, more communication about IGF, and also about IGF processes, governments sometimes are not so much involved as they should be in the IGF processes. I think in some way Martino before explained a little bit about the discussion, because when, because he was attending the meeting yesterday, so when he mentioned about IGF that should be a little more sustainable, so I think he was referring to the discussion we had yesterday, because I was in the meeting.
So, I think it's important to have suggestion to discuss, to think how maybe IGF could be changed in order to have more involvement from Government, from business. I think a way should be working on communication about Internet Governance for processes. Okay, that's all, thanks.
(voice in the background).
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Titti. Will there be specific suggestions or minutes or requests or anything like that, that would come to IGF?
>> Okay, usually there is a meeting, there is the minutes of the meeting. But actually, it takes about one month to have the minutes, because it's not so fast process. But I think that communication also involvement of NRI because in order to have governments involved in the processes, I think it's helpful to have a map of key actors, institutional and key actors that are involved in Internet Governance processes. I think NRI one member could help IGF Secretariat to build this map and to reach people that have an impact on Internet Governance processes at the national level.
So I think having this map maybe could help to involve more of the governments, but the same work should be done for involve also business, so in order to have a more balanced, IGF stakeholder community. I don't know if I trust in the good way the concept but I think that we should work on that, because the main worry is that maybe after the 2020, when we not have too much country how you say available to IGF because there is lot of discussion, lot of debate but the output of IGF is not useful to the multistakeholder community. So it's important to understand how chart could be useful to the multistakeholder community, so that is what we have discussed, try to improve processes in order to reach this goal, to reach this objective, and so in this way maybe IGF could be more strength, could be more, could have more impact worldwide.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: One more question, then I'll open the floor. This discussion took place within the Government only section of the meeting? Or in the
>> Actually, in both session, in the multistakeholder community and also in the member states session, in both sessions there were a time slot that was reserved to the IGF preparations as a whole, so the discussion, but there were a lot of people that were attending this HLRG meeting so some, maybe you can also collect more information from other members that were attending the meeting yesterday. So I don't know. Maybe we can just have a call, try to discuss, maybe in the next meeting the multi strategic working group meeting we can discuss more about these topics, because I think it's more related to this working group. But I think it's important, I mean try to have, to listen, because as Martino told before I don't know if you remember, but discussion between, from German, from French, also [inaudible] said something.
(voices in the background).
Because there was a request to have a more sustainable IGF, so maybe we should share, discuss how to reach this objective.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes. I think the reason I was asking the question is, I think everybody is very willing to listen, but that means somebody needs to actually talk to us. (chuckles) or send us a report or send us the questions or suggestions or concerns or whatever. If you could do anything, and I certainly will reach out to individuals as well, but if you can do anything to get kind of a report or request from that meeting, that would be helpful. Then we can take it
>> Okay.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: It's appropriate that it go to the full MAG. If people are worried about subsequent years, we have a solid host with funding for 2020 and for '21 and '22, Japan and New Zealand have both expressed interest, solid interest. They were querying us. I don't think there is a problem with finding appropriate places going forward. Also been told Thailand would be interested in a later year, they just couldn't do it this year.
So that is what is triggering one of the concerns, I think we can respond to that, but I think the meta point is if we can really understand what the questions were, the concerns, any suggestions, etcetera, then we can get an appropriate dialogue going. Are there any questions from anybody, any other MAG members on the call, or if there were other MAG members that were in the meeting, any other comments? Not seeing any, why don't I reach out to a couple people that I know were there, and see if we can really get some fuller communication. Titti, you have the floor. You are not muted I mean you are muted. Titti, was there something else you wanted to say?
>> Maybe you can just, Donna from the European Commission was the President of the HRIG working group so maybe he can give you more information about it. (overlapping speakers) you know
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I do. Yes. I can reach out to him. Thank you very much for bringing the report, very helpful. I'm sure we will hear more about it over the coming months. We have another 8 minutes. I said we need to finish promptly at the top of the hour because a number of MAG members are getting on another working group call immediately. In fact, I need to open that call up.
Is there any let me go first coming back to the agenda, Anja, is there a update from the NRI that you would like to give?
>> Hi, Lynn, yes, thank you for giving me the floor.
There is a general update, during the course of the meetings happening, for example today we have a meeting at IGF that is under way but since I know that we are out of time basically, then I would maybe send a comprehensive updates to the MAG list, if you would agree.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I think that would be excellent. Thank you. Are there any things quickly we should touch on with respect to BPFs, D.C.s or CENB? Ben, you have the floor, then Raquel.
>> Ben: I actually put my hand up, because you mentioned Japan and New Zealand, as being interested in hosting in the future. And you earlier mentioned a eastern European country, not too far from Berlin, looking at next year. And I think it's fantastic that you have this interest from different countries, and I would also be concerned about four years in a row in the same continent. And if there is any opportunity to shift those three countries around, so one of the Asia Pacific countries could go in 2020, eastern European country could hold back a year, that would be great. That is why I put my hand up before.
You did ask for updates from the intersessionals, which was probably why you turned to me, and I did send a brief update on the BPF on Cybersecurity, which just noted that we are having a call next Tuesday, where we are going to consider the submissions that we received and what that means for the draft 2018 BPF output. We are still planning to have that draft, 2018 BPF report out for, as a draft version by the end of next week so that people can see it.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. The eastern European country, the offer is good only for 2020, governments and budgets and etcetera will change after that. So it wouldn't be possible to swap. Both Japan and New Zealand, those conversations are a couple of years old, still fairly current, but they couldn't do it any earlier than that, either.
If we decide not to go to eastern European country in 2020, we will be looking for a different venue. We are still trying to see if Thailand is interested as well. I saw Raquel with her hand up and then Sumon.
>> Thank you very much, Lynn. Really quick intervention, BPF updates [inaudible]
(audio is very faint).
Have the first draft out for phase 4, and also a document out for the BPF gender next week, but we are still receiving contributions and inputs. So it's a ask for the MAG members who can help spread the word with the questionnaire that is out for both. So we can get as many as possible. Thank you very much (background noise).
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Raquel. Sumon, you have the floor.
>> Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, we can hear you.
>> Thank you. I'd like to give a brief update on BPF on IoT, big data and AI. We held our 8th meeting on 4 October. We tried to structure the session and our session for the number, 90 minute session. We tried to roughly structure a session on the four different parts, initially starting with some interaction on BPF, covering IoT, big data and AI and correlation. Then the second part being [inaudible] perspective, sharing experience and best practices. Then proposed practice and principle in the future. The last part we try to cover the next steps and how we can move forward from here in the next years. As for Titti and me coordinating, we get support [inaudible] in the fourth session, Alex, Lucia and Martin will be volunteer to moderate the sessions and we are looking for speakers. And a few names are in place. So sorting out quickly the other panelists, the speakers in the session to fit in different places and we try to cover all the three items, it's a big topic, IoT, big data and AI. We are trying to cover in such a way how they are interrelated, and what perspectives we should be following, based on the experiences in the space and best practices.
We also found that we need to find a Rapporteur and moderator [inaudible] if you want to volunteer, we are happy to have your support. There is a draft document, it's already in a good shape, I think. It's on the Web site. You can share, input your comments there. Our next meeting will be on 18 October. I hope in the next MAG meeting we can give more precise and concrete output of the meeting. Thank you very much.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, and thank you, everybody for, fitting in the quick updates. There are two working groups today, one on fund raising held this morning on the multi year strategic work program which is held in a few minutes. I can send updates out on those two meetings. I know Rasha is trying to set up a meeting for the workshop prep and eval that offer was open to all the MAG. I hope people will take advantage of it. It is important that we update that as quickly as possible. Mamadou has been good at sending updates out on communication and outreach, also Julian on the working group on improvements. We will make sure that we continue to communicate those. Briefly, I want to work with the Secretariat on a transition plan, which would determine how we transition and what recommendations might come out of these various working groups that we would make available to the incoming MAG. Again the assumption is that the incoming MAG is announced and known in a month's time.
I think we should think about how we can manage that to everybody's best advantage. I apologize for ending so quickly but I need to get off myself to open up another call. If there are any questions or comments or open items, please send a note to the MAG list or to myself or the Secretariat. Appreciate all the great good work and thanks again to everyone in the Secretariat for everything they are doing to keep all this moving forward. Thank you. The MAG should be announced before the IGF or during the IGF, Sylvia. Thank you.