The Global Internet Governance Community is headed to France!!!

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It was announced recently that the Government of France would host the thirteenth Annual Meeting of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Paris, France, from 12 to 14 November 2018.

The meeting will be held at the headquarters of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), in parallel with the Paris Peace Forum on 11-13 November.  In his announcement, French President Emmanuel Macron emphasized the importance of welcoming the IGF in Paris in order to “share common ideas” and progress discussions on International Internet policy issues.

Sharing ideas and broad and thoughtful collaboration has never been more important given the pace of change and the clear and increasing need to make progress.

The 2018 IGF will focus on a range of international internet policy issues, including cybersecurity, data privacy, emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence and Internet of Things, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Human Rights. The themes for the meeting were derived through an open global call for issues ensuring greater inclusion.

The IGF is unique as the open multistakeholder platform dedicated to advancing global Internet policy discussions. Past IGF meetings have attracted between 2,000 and 3,000 participants, representing all regions and stakeholder groups, including Governments, the private sector, civil society and the technical community. The 2017 IGF in Geneva, Switzerland, gathered over 2,200 participants from 142 countries, with thousands more stakeholders participating online.

The IGF meeting will feature one or more high-level policy segments, a select number of workshops, thematic ‘main sessions’, ‘open forum’ sessions organized by Governments and intergovernmental organizations, as well as an IGF Village exhibition area.  Recent years have also seen the inclusion of dedicated youth and newcomer sessions and shorter ‘lightning’ sessions, held in informal spaces and with a focus on late-breaking topics.

It will present the outputs from the IGF community’s intersessional activities throughout the year.  This includes best practices on Cybersecurity, Gender and Access, Local Content, and Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT) and Big Data, as well as the major policy initiative Policy Options on Connecting the Next Billions. In addition, 17 Dynamic Coalitions and 105 national, regional and Youth IGFs will contribute to the programme through their expertise and experiences.

Finally, we are fortunate to be able to collaborate with the French Government on IGF 2018 and to explore synergies with the inaugural Paris Peace Forum which will spotlight the role of governance in a number of policy fields.

The preparation of the annual IGF and all its related intersessional activities is guided by the 55-member Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) appointed by the United Nations Secretary-General to advise him on these matters.

The MAG looks forward to seeing you in Paris – physically or virtually, and invites your participation in the upcoming MAG meeting.

Lynn St.Amour

IGF-MAG Chair