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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>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Can you hear me? Yeah. All right. Good afternoon -- good evening, everyone. Welcome to the session on sustainability and data protection on ESG enhancement. And ESG stands for environmental, social and government.
My name is -- governance, yes. Governance.
My name is Melania Anthony. I am from Tanzania. I'm the Founder of Stem Hard Network, but also the youth IGF in Tanzania, but as a Generation Connect Youth Envoy.
In our session today, we are going to see different insights on the integration between cybersecurity and ESG principles, but also we are going to explore innovative technologies and their roles in addressing data protection.
But we will also see and understand the risks, but also challenges that are related to data privacy and ESG context. But and then we will also be able to engage with different stakeholders here, including the speakers who are coming from different stakeholder groups.
So, but without proceeding, I would like to first welcome my fellow online moderator, Thais. Please welcome to proceeding, and welcome the speakers.
>> THAIS AGUIAR: Hi, everyone.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Yes. We can hear you. You need to unmute your mic.
>> THAIS AGUIAR: I'm Thais, a lawyer in digital rights. It's a pleasure to be here with you today and also with my dear friends, fellows in the panel. Hope we have a great discussion today. We are talking about the ESG in privacy and data protection. And hope you enjoy to spend it with us.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you very much. Allow me to please introduce my speakers, also Jasmine, please introduce yourself, and then when we are done with onsite speakers, we will move to online.
>> JASMINE KO: Everyone, this is Jasmine Ko. I based in Hong Kong. So, I'm a convener of healthcare YYGF, and also I am affiliated with Ice Hong Kong and DotAsia, so I am now also Ziska, which is certified ESG analyst, so it's a cert that get recognized on doing the ESG governance analysis work.
So, also I am a researcher and project beat on the eco Internet index, and that's how I found the relevance between sustainability and also the IGF. Thank you.
>> ALINA USTINOVA: Hi, everyone. My name is Alina Ustinova. I am based in Moscow. I am the head of Youth Russian IGF and also represent Centre for Global IT Cooperation with the researchers, and different topics cover IT and especially emerging technologies. So, I specialize in emerging technologies regulation and the emergency technologist topic brought to anything connected with new technologies.
And I also try to bring these topics to the youth and to let their opinions be heard among legislative and also different experts, and we also try to cover ESG as well. It's not so popular in Russian, but still opinions about that and try to bring them up to the youth. Thank you.
>> MARCO: Hello, everyone. I'm Marco coming from Macedonia, Coordinator of the (?) and youth governance here. I would say this topic is -- this year I got on this topic because it's previously mentioned also in (?) is topic is not talked about. The private sector and international corporations that are here are starting to implement this or request this. So that's why I'm also getting interested in trying to get involved in this topic, because it's, how can I say, in the future must and also to implement it as better as possible. So, yeah.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you very much.
Denise.
>> DENISE LEAL: Hello, everyone. I hope you are hearing me well. It's a pleasure to be here with you today. We are talking about this important topic, ESG. And you might question yourselves what does it mean, why are we here talking about this, and you will soon discover it.
I am part of the Youth Coalition on Internet Governance. I am Brazilian, and I was part of the Brazilian youth programme. I am happy to be here. I am also part of the youth LACIGF organization team, as well with being diving into so many discussions and it's really important and really nice that we do have sustainability as a topic in this IGF.
I am looking forward to our discussions, and I am also happy that we have (?) in our room. Welcome, everyone. It's so important that we have an inclusive and also a sustainability session.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you very much, my dear panelists. We are also joined with our rapporteur. His name is Osei. So he's here. He's going to take notes on whatever that we are going to be discussing.
So, this session we are going to talk -- to explore two main critical fields. So, the first we are going to see how cybersecurity can also enhance transparency, but also safeguard personal data. And how we are -- this ESG can also -- I mean, cybersecurity can enhance sustainable practices. And we have three policy questions that are going to be guiding the discussion today. And I will mention them. But then when I go to a specific speaker, I will ask specific questions to each one of them.
So, the first policy questions that we are going to be considering, it says, how do we -- why do we need to discuss the ESG in Internet Governance Forum? What are sustainability and cybersecurity challenges in ESG systems. And how can technology verify and check information accuracy in reports.
Moving directly to my first speaker and I will start with you, Alina, and my question to you is, why are we discussing ESG in governance? Why is it important for us to discuss ESG in Internet Governance?
>> ALINA USTINOVA: I will try to be brief because I would like to share more details, like later. But I think that it's -- if you look at the name of the topics, we barely discuss ESG, it's usually connected with some kind of ecological thing like the infrastructure that is showing some of the ecological specifics, especially, for example, in Russia we have digital north thing, which is where we try to put our centre for data, because it is cold and we can protect it there.
But still, we should understand that it could be really damaging for the ecological system there and we should also consider everything that goes because sometimes we do not consider this. Sometimes we think that the phone we use, sometimes we throw it away and never look back what happens to it and where it ends up on some kind of a storage.
As you know, there's a big, big technological Dumpster in one African countries and still it's not -- unfortunately, it's -- there are a lot of broken and forgotten things that we do not consider. And five years from now, we probably can be in a very dangerous risk situation. This is why we should talk about ESG in the first place.
And of course the second, the cybersecurity, but we will talk about this a bit later. Thank you.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you so much, Alina. Jasmine, you mentioned that you are ESG certified, right? So, how do you see the current ESG framework address the issue of sustainability and cybersecurity challenges?
>> JASMINE KO: Right. Thank you very much. Actually, for what different people have different understanding, knowledge level of ESG, but just to be very brief, within the ESG framework and the social centre, the second ladder when it comes to social equity and also the cybersecurity level, how safe -- how people feel safe and how inclusive is Internet setter and also the service they have been using is actually part of the many, many, many (?) within the ESG framework. But the ESG framework itself has this limitation as well because as you know, we do have different ESG framework being used such as GLI, Global Reporting Initiative, second one, SASB, the sustainability building standard support. Also the TCFD, the task force on climate-related financial disclosure. So, et cetera, et cetera. Just so many standards that people are using.
I am just mentioning those which are more common to be used. And actually, if you don't mind, I want to jump a little bit back on what Alina mentioned about the damage of, you know, on the ecology from the Internet centre itself because it involve data centre, it involve the operation of it, the energy consumption, the amount being very soaring. Because we need cooling, we need heating. The system itself, infrastructure to manage the data centre and this is actually part of the research that I have been doing that eco Internet index, we have been mentioning the carbon footprint of the data centre across 14 Asia Pacific jurisdictions. So, we are looking into continuing the research and also to expand it to more Pacific Islands and to further Asia because mostly now we are around the seas in Southeast Asia but not yet to the west Asia. So we are we looking forward to expand our research scope on that one.
Last thing to add on. So, why we talk about ESG. It sounds like a very commercial term, right, in IGF, but the importance that if you have noticed the reason why people start to do ESG is because we care about environment. And we need to acknowledge that there is also a common framework when we are into this Internet centre and whoever here, we are using a laptop, we are using the screen here, we using the light thing here, you know. Wow, actually a lot of thing, even just event itself it's consuming a lot of energy.
It is just unavoidable topic and impacts that it have on the environment and it is under the big umbrella of sustainability. And I just want to wrap a little bit, the effort of sustainability have actually been done, been doing by the ICANN, IETF, ITU and of course my organization as well DotAsia so I want to recognize there have been works that being done on sustainability and related to the IGF community.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you very much Jasmine, that was really insightful.
So, when speaking about the ESG issue, another important aspect is data. Like, data protection and all that. So, now to you, Marco. In what ways can technology verify and enhance accuracy on sustainability reporting, while protecting personal data?
>> MARCO: Hello. Thank you for the question. And, yeah, I would say it's a good question. I would give here some -- can you hear me? Okay.
Few examples how can we use the technology and for better accuracy and also very fine stuff. The first one that is also under (?) and development, it's what we can do in social is the Blockchain for transparency and also seeing this technology can provide a good records of the SDG data, supply chain, compliance or emission reporting. Another thing that also IoT centres especially for those kind of data, sometimes we use AOT in the data centres, in the rooms that we are using or in the model -- not models but the hardware stuff we are doing because of the consumption of energy. It is used to monitor and see precise data and current AI for patent detection because we can see over a long period of time if something change or drastically changing to check it out if it's -- I mean it's accurate data or something else.
About the protection of the personal data, I would say is the previous examples maybe use encryption because this data is very crucial, especially some of the data might be, how can I say, in the process of because some of this data might be publicly available anonymized so it can be protected in some way from the data and privacy.
And, yes, tools different privacy federal learning Angeles, for sustainability data without exposing public data. Cannot be publicly shared with all of the details.
I would revert to the question -- I mean, the first one, but what she also mentioned today, yeah, I was reading research analysis on how in the past because it -- I mean, five, 10 years ago it was, like, promoted to use cloud or something, you want to save, don't buy CD. You can have cloud service where you can watch whatever you want and the cost from production for everything for that CD com will cause the environment.
But now that's I think the smaller issue. If you buy CD, for example, I get the CD and DVD. You are maybe saving more the Earth than using the cloud services because someone on the SIM services always is watching. You don't need to watch to scroll.
I don't know. There was like every click or every (?) on the Internet cost energy. Maybe not you, because maybe I will use it with a phone, which uses less consumption than the laptop, but the service in the background uses more consumption than what we are currently doing and have in the past doing.
I think it's a crucial thing and getting more and more bigger especially how the data centres are managed. I mean built. I don't say that we need to stop building this but to find some way. Even if there is not data centre, of course, there are a lot of servers. But the data centres are the one that call for energy. Times a little bit changing and now not everything that we do in the cloud is (?) I am not doing the laptop, I don't know, TV or DVD for streaming so I am saving energy. Maybe you yes, but, data centre is (?) much more energy and environment. I would say.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: From the same discussion, I want to ask to talk more about the data consumption of this -- I mean the consumption of this data centres. And Denise now, coming to you. How can we address the environmental challenges associated with the energy consumption of data centres and communication networks? So, we have seen Jasmine and Marco have spoken about the data consumption of these data centres. So, what would be your thought on that?
>> DENISE LEAL: Hey, everyone. So, when it comes to ESG topic, we have to understand that ESG is a standard for sustainability, but not only environmental sustainability, but also governance and social sustainability.
We talk -- when we talk in technology, what is ESG and why we discuss it. We need to discuss the standards of sustainability, social, environmental and governance sustainability, because technology has a huge impact and now of these categories and have changed how we live in society, how we work and with what we work and also has huge impact in environmental, in environment and then we come to this question that is related to consumption, energy consumption and data centres.
So, we have lots of topics related to data that are important here. The reports and other aspects. But specifically talking about energy consumption, we need to consider it, as Marco said very well, maybe it was more sustainable to use CSD or DVDs than to use the way we start data now and informations, because we really use not only energy, but a lot of space, in physical space. Many people don't really understand that when they are keeping their photos online, they are actually using another space that is located in another part of the world. And sometimes, in a very important aspect is where are we using these -- where are being these data centres located, and what are they -- in environmental impacts and in which communities are these impacts.
Because sometimes we think that the way we are impacting the world with the exploration of the environment and the exploration for technology use, it's, well, it's not seen in other places, but it's really well seen especially in marginalized countries, where we get the -- where we mind to get the important things we need to build our technology and where we storage places that build the technology and this Internet that we have now.
So, it's important to consider in ESG that the impacts of Internet are not so obvious and they need to be considering these standards. So, what I think when it comes to Internet Governance and what I have seen reports is it's easy to say beautiful things in the reports, in the sustainability reports. But we need to pay attention, because when it comes to Internet, it's not so obvious that we have another kind of impact and specifically we need more standards related to Internet use and Internet aspects because we don't have enough standards that could take care of these kind of impacts.
So, what I wanted to call the attention and call for action that I would like to leave in this talk about energy consumption of data centres and communication networks is that we need to pay attention how we build technology, how we build and how we spend our -- and use energy, and we need to have more specific standards on Internet issues and aspects related to ESG because ESGs are due to, how can I say, secure, verify, and check if enterprises are working well and in a sustainable way. But it's very easy to work well when you don't verify Internet issues and other aspects of cybersecurity and how you actually make the reports and what you are really caring about when you make these reports.
Thanks. I think I talked a lot. I hope it was clear. And let's move on.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much for that.
Jasmine, what ethical consideration should organizations prioritize when aligning cybersecurity progress with ESG goals?
>> JASMINE KO: Thank you. It's not an easy question to answer because, you know, a little bit similar with what Denise have been mentioning, when it comes to reporting, it always have to look good. And the people, the consultant that you pay for doing the ESG report, they get your money. So, you know, you can imagine, like, what could be their incentive, you know, how much -- sometimes there is a tricky dynamic in between on data accuracy and transparency.
And the considerations, when it comes to linking up cybersecurity and ESG is I think it's about the organization itself, the leader have to have a clear alignment with the stakeholders, including their employees, including the community they serve, their customer, the supply chain, the upstream, the downstream. They have to be more using multistakeholder approach like the IGF doing, something like that. Come to expectation alignment.
Second thing, when it comes to buy-in, it's important to think about what could be the pain point from each stakeholder when they have to report on the level of cybersecurities, you know, standards and to check the box of different index when we talk about cybersecurity level.
Fourth thing is about -- I think I'm losing track. But I think fourth thing is about the incentive. So, after the pain point, it's about the incentive. How can you motivate and encourage people to do extra work to measure the data, measure the performance, track it and trace it? A lot of work behind the scenes, actually. A lot of cause, a lot of time, effort.
So, it's about -- it's a long and could be a painful, but we (?) in a long term for sustainability of the organization. Sustainability in terms not just in terms of, you know, information sustainable but also the business sustainability, because nowadays the business centre itself, now it's a (?) to write on ESG. But we have to remember there's also risk and concern about green rushing. It's another topic. I'm not going to talk more about it. But it's good that we acknowledge there are risks and concerns. This is how we move forward constructively.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Jasmine.
Now I want to open the floor to the participants. If you have a contribution from whatever that has been discussed up that this point, before I move -- I get deeper to other questions. Can you help me pass the mic back there?
>> PARTICIPANT: Firstly, my name is Peter Zynga Jackson Jr. I'm from Liberia, a developing country. And during the opening session we are told that IGF, no one should be left out. And so when the first (?) started deliberations, she spoke about ESG, and you say you will tell us what ESG is. And she started to talk about ESG, but she didn't tell us what ESG was.
Okay, I am from the regulator. How do I use the concept of ESG, excuse me, ESG, such that it benefits the society in which I serve?
So, this is where my little frustration or confusion is. Sorry to let you know.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: First, before I leave it to my panelists to elaborate more, so first I think I mentioned earlier that ESG stands for environment, sustainability and governance. So, the discussion that we are having today is about that, too, in relation to -- what?
>> DENISE LEAL: If I can insert.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Environment, social and governance. So, we are talking about ESG in relation to cybersecurity today. So, you guys want to speak more? Denise?
>> THAIS AGUIAR: Denise wants to talk.
>> DENISE LEAL: Thank you, Thais. To answering his question, I think it's an important question. ESG is not always an easy and common topic among many countries and many places. I remember when I used to work doing the reports, it wasn't is it you see how it impact people's lives, but it does impact because when it makes enterprises think about how they are being sustainable, not only in an environmental way, but also in a social way and the governance way. Come it comes to governance it's the internal structure of the enterprise. So, if they have governance (?), if they have security, but not physical security, the security in a way their processes are secure and safe. In many ways they don't have corruption and things like that.
But when it comes to social, it's when we see the impact in people's lives because we have a lot of standards that are related to the impact in the society. So, if we work with NGOs, if we have allocated money to the society, if we give back what we are receiving in our work, in our -- what we are setting and the stuff like that, when it comes to environmental, it's the easier way because we usually associate, we used to see the word sustainability as an environmental word. But it's not only an environmental word. What is to be sustainable? This is the discussion, this is the idea, to be sustainable is not only to be sustainable in environmental, but also in society, in our governance model.
So, the discussion here in this session, we are focusing more in cybersecurity, in data centres, in this stuff, because it's Internet Governance related. But we can see a lot of impact in other places, too. And when it comes to Internet, we can see -- we could elaborate a lot. But I wanted to answer for you to your question is, we don't have a lot of regulations in many countries. Many countries don't talk about ESG. But we do have this internal policies in the enterprises that used to help them to get funds because they have ESG standards, they are accomplishing with it, they are sustainability.
So, what I think we can do as civil society and as government is if we have more understanding of ESG, we can assure, we can accomplish with the standards, we thank the enterprises because they want to accomplish it, because they will get money and funds from accomplishing it.
So, how we can develop more standards that will be useful for us, and they will get benefits from accomplishing them and we as civil society and government will get also benefits from them to accomplish it.
I don't know. I think it's clear now. I hope it's clear now.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Exactly. Okay. Perfect. I take one more from onsite, and then we will move to online. I will take one more from onsite and then we will move to online. Yes.
>> PARTICIPANT: Okay. Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen. Hope I'm audible my name is Chris Odu from Nigeria, Easy Web Technology. And my question is for one of the panelists, which is Marco. I'm glad to be having, I'm part of this conversation, and one thing you talked about which caught my interest is Blockchain technology. You did mention you want to use -- talk about Blockchain technology for transparency of the data, which is a very good thing.
But, however, I do have some concerns, because for you to be able to use the Blockchain technology, we need blockchain nodes on the network. And these nodes actually consume a whole lot of energy. So, that's a bit contradictory. So I would like you to help me with that so I'm not -- I don't find myself in a lot of confusion. Thank you very much.
>> MARCO: There we go. Thank you for the question. What I mentioned is it's also in the testing phase and those kind of things but the idea was to use on the lower age like on the Internet of Things to use the blockchain for secure and accurate transmission of the data. To use in that kind of (?). So I totally agree with that. And I will sometimes got in the conflicts when discussing about blockchain and now electronic money and those kind of things. But not always all the blockchain technology doesn't mean that it use that much power and data. I mean, we have seen the bitcoin and those kind of stuff which is, yeah, consumption a lot. But not every aspect and how it's implemented depends on that.
But it's (?) so I never try it. This is from what get into in the research. So, but on that point.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Please let me move to online and then we will get back to the last on site. So Thais, please.
>> THAIS AGUIAR: Thank you. And those were important considerations for us. Also we see here that as Denise has said, we need to discuss sustainability in a broader meaning for us, the stakeholders, to understand and implement ESG in the way the society needs and wants for sustainable development in a broad sense.
So, bringing some additional points on data protection and ESG. We see that data protection is a cornerstone of ESG principles, especially as organizations increasingly rely on digital systems to manage sustainability and governance efforts.
So, when you see (?) governance or breaches not only it undermines trust, but also compromise the integrity of ESG reporting. So, this raises critical questions about accountability in data stewardship.
So, our organization treating data protection as a fundamental ESG pillar or is an afterthought in their sustainable strategies.
So, I want to leave this provocative question to Alina so that Alina can share with us how can we assure that ESG commitments to data protection go beyond compliance to actively foster transparency, trust and long term stakeholder engagement? So, thank you.
>> ALINA USTINOVA: Thank you for the question. It's a very important issue. I will speak from my personal experience. I come from the most attacked country in the world and some of the cyberattacks. I guess my personal data has been five times stolen and sold to someone. I receive lots of calls that I don't take because it's from numbers I don't know. Just because there is a lot of breaches to the system and it's not because my data is not protected well but probably because it's so much attacked so that we can understand that probably, but the companies don't need to consider only ESG. I guess we should move from ESG to ESGC, where C stands for cybersecurity, and to implement this standard because it's not only about cybersecurity companies that protect our data. It's about the cybersecurity issue in each company that protects our data as well.
We should consider that each company should be responsible for the data it stores, not only in data centres, but also we use computers, we use Internet, social media, everything. And everything that we use has its own creator and the company that is responsible for everything we have.
Because if, for example, your phone is stolen, it's not just the phone. You can buy a new phone. You can restore its data. But if your data is stolen, it's like your personality is stolen. Someone can use it to pretend to be you, to use your bank account, to steal your money. What we did in Russia, we implemented a law, companies not just pay penalty in data is stolen. It has criminal liability for the data it stores.
So, I guess one of the answers to this question is, to have implemented a law which considers the company a criminal, liable for everything they do with your data. Because otherwise, they will not compliant. Unfortunately, the big penalties, it's not an issue for them. They can pay. They have lots of money, especially the big tech companies. But probably if they have something like you will be sent to jail to some years or your company could not work, for example, on this market if you do not compliant to the law, I guess is something they can listen and sometimes we and sometimes we do risky and constructive things to make them listen and comply. Thank you.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you. Thais, I wanted to confirm to you, is there any contribution from online speakers? I mean from online attendees? If you can help me check the chat.
>> THAIS AGUIAR: Not on the chat. But I think that Osei wants to ask something.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: If we don't have online, then we can move onsite. Osei.
>> OSEI MANU KAGYAH: I hope I'm audible enough. This topic is quite interesting in the sense that how can we hold big companies accountable or, say, big tech accountable. It's such a very delicate matter. It seems we are plundering our environment. My question to my able panelists here is in a few citizens, two lines is, what is the way forward. Will bring finally to the conclusion, we are the top of the hour, right? I want to hear from my panelists, what do we need to do moving on, like both things that we need to do? Thank you.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Any of the panelists ready to respond?
>> ALINA USTINOVA: As I said, I guess we need to change ESG to ESGC and try to move it to every possible panel we can. Because otherwise, they will just stuck to ESG and think it's more about ecological thing. And not social things. Sometimes social and governance, they don't bring it up. They usually stands only on E, on the environmental. And other suggestions for then? If you said ESGC, that means that they will consider also data protection as well. That's my point.
>> JASMINE KO: Okay. Thank you. So, perhaps from the very grassroot individual level, it's to -- like for the audience here, to -- we think what we have been talking about and try to digest and reflect on how -- you know, how does it make sense or not make sense. You can always criticize many things that you have been listening because it's about your own judgment and it's also about your personal experience.
And now it's like your homework to think about how do you convert the information that you absorb, transform it into something that you can do as an output.
So the very, very general term is to keep paying attention, you know, like follow the trend, you know, there are some work that have been done by different organizations I had mentioned in the beginning, so you can always search it up online. And for my part is to continue doing my eco Internet research. And as I say, we are expanding our research scope and also to refine our research methodology. So, always finding a way to improve, you know, and also bring ESG into IGF and also bring IGF and cybersecurity into the ESG centre.
So the major agenda in our mind is to integrating and fostering (?) centre of ESG and IGF. That's my moving on. Thank you.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: All right. Do you want to --
>> MARCO: Yeah. I would give a few words. It's very good question because, yeah, it's -- we are panel, we are discussing but what is the next step. We cannot change it from here but how we see. I would say maybe because the data centres, they will be growing, I mean, the next years not just the big tech companies but we now see the countries are building, other smaller companies, everybody is how can I say going to debt because of the services and data requests.
I would say maybe the first thing is going with renewable energy to try to use that and maybe build data centres where there are a lot of sun or maybe that you can later use it for electricity on those kind of stuff.
But what is important here, not with just renewable but also with other, I would say that the government and the policymakers should get bigger here because, yeah, we agree that we are going to do this and it's better. But and the companies are sharing a lot of, I don't know, saying 2030 we want to be 100% renewable those kind of things. But how many people know if they are exactly doing this or in the details or I think there must be some kind play of the government and policymakers to make this regulation okay to 2025 all data centres -- 2025 is so close. 2030 all the data centres must be renewable or must have this more of this kind of strict regulation because there are still five years to their six, actually, but to have to implement because without regulation or what we are doing sometimes I think with the plastic in the ecosystem where we need to stop plastic doing but nobody is reverting to the person.
Of course, also we should be, how can I say, mindful how we are using the technology and everything because sometimes we are so used to it, we are using, I don't know, you play YouTube on your computer whole day and you are not even listening. Why is that or something like that?
But my point is that we need to have some kind of regulation here so to make sure more strict and to get more serious because like this year every companies like mentioned going with the trend but if I don't want, I won't go with trend and nobody will do anything to you. Yeah, might be costly, sometimes it can be cheaper not to go with the trend. But nobody's getting, how can I say, for that, that you are not following the regulations or if it's not in the policy. Yeah, that will be my answer.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you very much -- you want to say something.
>> DENISE LEAL: Thanks, Melania. Just a few words. What I want to give as my topic in this discussion is that I believe and I see that we need regulations that are made for and in the Global South. We use standards, sustainability standards that usually comes from Europe or USA. But we need to create also specific regulations that that related to the reality of Global South.
And why I am saying that? Because we have these groups, these communities, traditional communities, NGOs and people that have very different realities and they need to be considered in what it means to be sustainable in ESG or other discussions, so for that to happen, we need to better work and improve regulations, law and policies made by these people.
We have to stop using only regulations that come -- types of regulations and models of regulations that come from a part of the world and apply it everywhere and sometimes it doesn't really protect specific interests of people who are so marginalized.
So, I would recommend that we start reading and understanding also what these communities have to say about these discussions on sustainability and that could be used also in other topics, not only ESG. Thanks.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you so much, Denise.
I think that's really an important point. I think there's this approach that is called the human centric approach. So I think that should be something that we can consider in this kinds of a discussion, have people who are affected in this candy of field, all the stakeholders that are involved in these kind of issues, put them at the table or in the room all together, discuss, understand their needs, and then altogether come with a solution that we think may work and help us. Yeah.
So, I want to close the discussion. But before I do that, I wonder if any of my panelists, one or two, can help me suggest what actionable steps can stakeholders, let's say, be it the government, civil societies or the technical communities, use to enhance transparency and accountability in sustainability reporting.
>> THAIS AGUIAR: If I may add to Melania's question, to complement, I would like to ask you all also, in terms of actionable points, what role should global regulatory frameworks play to harmonize ESG data protection in cybersecurity standards across different regions to ensure consistent and enactable implementation?
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Again, any of the panelists who is ready to take any of the two questions? Mine was the steps that the stakeholders can take, like the stakeholders can take to enhance transparency and accountability.
>> DENISE LEAL: Well, you are not easy on us. Both questions are hard to answer. We need a little time to think about.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Yeah. We have a contribution here.
>> DENISE LEAL: Yeah. Go on and then I will speak. Yeah, please.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Okay.
>> OSEI MANU KAGYAH: The question of stakeholders and government is quite a tricky one because it's all about interests. It's all about interests. Big technology as an industry will always have the interest, government will also have their interest. But that's where we need to push for the advocacy. That's where all of us in this room, all of us interested in saving our environment, interested in pushing this cause, we need to push this topic to every corner of the world. And holding our leaders accountable, holding industry or stakeholders accountable. That's the only way we can make progress or move forward.
If we are to leave it that way or say if we are to freestyle, your guess is as good as mine. Thank you.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Nicholas, you had something to say?
>> NICHOLAS FIUMARELLI: Nicolas Fiumarelli. Blockchain to actually accurately measure in realtime if there is cheap parameters. That should be enough for (?) organization to the false ESG or quick fixes to fit on the ESG reporting. But then on the long-term, they are not like complying, right? So, if you have a way to measure and to have a realtime blockchain, having this information, you will actually disclosure if this organization is not complying with the ESG.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: All right. Okay. Now, since I don't have -- is there anyone who wanted to contribute before I move to a rapporteur to help us summarize what we have discussed?
>> DENISE LEAL: Yes. Just to add something to this question that Thais has asked us about harmonizing the global regulatory frameworks and harmonizing ESG data protection in cybersecurity standard across different regions, I think that this ESG is pretty global, actually, and it's used across the globe. The same -- very much the same standards, but I think what we need is to have more specific standards depending on the realities of different regions.
So, I would not say that we need always to have -- we could and it's good to have global standards, but we also need to have specific standards that apply to different realities.
So, in terms of how we explore these countries and how we protect these countries and how we make this enterprises sustainable in each different reality, because it's very different when you are talking about a place that have traditional people who are impacted very differently and how a very differently relation with nature and society.
So, we need there also to consider these different realities to create different standards to be more effective in protecting and being sustainable. That's what I wanted to add. Thank you.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you so much, Denise, thank you so much to my panelists. And before we close, so I would like to invite our rapporteur to summarize for us what we have discussed.
>> OSEI MANU KAGYAH: Hello. It's been such a forward-looking conversation and we hope we have all enjoyed ourselves.
I wanted to make it quite interactive, actually. I will come to the summary. I am going to take a step here and go through -- go out there and hear words from our participants and also their interventions or suggestions and make a quick run up. I think we still have some few minutes. So just a few words from our participants, what they have to say about this. Please, Madam, would you like to say something? Would you loo I can to contribute to this topic? Would you like to contribute, have anything to say to this topic?
>> PARTICIPANT: Thank you. I like your idea that you discussed today, that regulation and input should be at different levels. Alina told about very top level of contributing cybersecurity to ESG problem at the level of international and intergovernmental, from intergovernmental perspective.
Another of our colleagues told about implementation into local regulation, synchronized in between the regions and between different countries.
Another one topic I have heard about implementation in term corporate level, in term individual responsibility of each company, not just to find the reasons and to find arguments, not to do so, but to find the resources, find the energy to implement the proper standards, despite the fact they are not set up into the regulation. Thank you.
>> OSEI MANU KAGYAH: Thank you very much. Next? Chris? Would you like to say something?
>> PARTICIPANT: Okay, I think I am audible. I won't say much but for me, when I speak, I would like to focus more on my primary constituency which is Africa. I think we should have more collaborations to see that Africa also comes into this kind of conversations and, like, the other participant also said, no one should be left behind. How can we include everybody so that these conversations do not just remain in some certain areas of the world, but also extend to other continents as well, least overlooked and other categories as well. So, that's my own contribution. I would like us to just do, and the key word is collaboration, more collaboration. Thank you.
>> OSEI MANU KAGYAH: Thank you very much. What an amazing end to a very fruitful discussion. I will then proceed to my reporting.
So, this topic is quite (?) in the sense that globally ESG concerns has been gaining prominence with its rapid-growth growing cybersecurity industry, both industries and emerging on our winter session. But seldom in these discussions are these specifics brought to bear.
But today our able panelists were able to provide nuance to this very, very interesting discussion.
We got -- straight away got to know why the need for ESG Internet Governance at all. We got a fair idea how it is cyclical and technology is enormous from data centres and its interconnectedness.
We also got to understand the need to save the environment and data consumption, already been said, data consumption from these data centres. ESG, because technology has a huge impact on all aspects of technology, and also we had a fair idea of how blockchain could be explored, it's still up to debate, but it has opened that -- we have opened up Pandora's box where we can explore that, too, and the use of encryption for data protection, transparency reporting ESG and also and, most importantly, awareness and effective communication we need around ESG topics.
We also had a fair idea of how the conversation should be moved from ESG to ESGC. And not more about ecological, but also the data protection, more research, we dovetail into that conversation on more research, more advocacy and fostering collaborations, renewable energy could be also explored.
So, it has been such an insightful conversation and we hope to continue this conversation through further future discussions and other sessions which seeks to explore. I think tomorrow there's a session on effective e-waste solution for sustainable digital future where Jasmine is the speaker. And just pass by and we can further move this conversation further. Thank you very much.
Over to you, my online moderator.
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Thank you so much, our dearest rapporteur. That was well noted.
So, I would like to thank everyone for attending this session, and much appreciation to my panelists and my online moderator. Thank you so much. This was very interesting. Have a nice evening.
>> THAIS AGUIAR: Thank you, all. Denise, can we take a picture together?
>> ONSITE MODERATOR: Yes. Please.
>> THAIS AGUIAR: For the online?
All right.
Thank you all.