IGF 2021 Lightning Talk #69 Measuring Internet Resilience and Shutdowns: An overview of Internet Society's Pulse platform

At the Internet Society, we believe that the Internet is for everyone. Our work centers on increasing the Internet’s reach, reliability and resilience, as well as ensuring that the Internet remains open, globally connected, secure, and trustworthy. But how do we assess whether our efforts – and the efforts of other Internet Industry organizations that facilitate the smooth functioning of the Internet – are working? 

There are many people, projects and organizations that are collecting data on various facets of the Internet, but there’s currently no single site that provides a curated set of information. So, to help everyone gain deeper, data-driven insight into the health, evolution and availability of the Internet, we are building Internet Society Pulse.

This session will offer an overview of the Pulse platform and the Internet Society's efforts to document and reflect on the harms of Internet Shutdowns, which include diminished trust in local Internet ecosystems and damage to the economy. The session will also outline how the team is measuring Internet resilience in Africa as well as how it is measuring the adoption of technologies that enable the Internet to keep growing, evolving and meeting the changing expectations of users.

Relevant issue areas:  Economic and social inclusion and human rights - and specifically policy questions related to "Inclusion, rights and stakeholder roles and responsibilities" Trust, security, stability - and specifically policy questions related to "Cybersecurity practices and mechanisms"

Related resources: Internet Society Pulse https://pulse.internetsociety.org/

We will work with the set up provided by the IGF. Our moderator will ensure equal participation from online and onsite participants during the Q&A session.  We will adapt our session to use whatever tools/platforms the IGF provides to increase participation and interaction.