Session
Organizer 1: Hartmut Richard Glaser, Brazilian Internet Steering Committee - CGI.br
Organizer 2: MARCIO MIGON, MCTI
Organizer 3: Bruna Toso de Alcântara, NIC.br/CGI.br
Organizer 4: Vinicius W. O. Santos, NIC.br / CGI.br
Organizer 5: Everton T Rodrigues, NIC.br
Organizer 6: Rodrigo Silva, The Brazilian Internet Steering Committee (CGI.br)
Speaker 1: Susana Tapia, Intergovernmental Organization, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Speaker 2: Jamila Venturini, Civil Society, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Speaker 3: José Gontijo, Government, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
MARCIO MIGON, Government, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Vinicius W. O. Santos, Technical Community, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Bruna Toso de Alcântara, Technical Community, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Round Table - U-shape - 90 Min
Governance and cooperation for an evolving Internet: How does Internet governance need to change in order to meet the changing nature and role of the Internet? What tools, mechanisms, and capacity building instruments are needed for stakeholders to effectively cooperate, and engage in Internet governance?
Advancing global digital cooperation: What opportunities are provided by the current focus on digital cooperation resulting from the UN Secretary-General's Roadmap for digital cooperation? What role should the IGF play (and how) in advancing global digital cooperation?
Additional Policy Questions Information: Should a regional AI governance mechanism be created within LAC region? If so, how should it be designed?
The Governance of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is an emerging theme of the contemporaneous digital system of Internet Governance that needs to establish mechanisms so that the decisions made by machine learning systems do not perform operations in an unpredictable way or contrary to the good manners of society. In this sense, the adoption of AI Governance mechanisms is necessary for the intertwining of technology, sustainable development, and human rights goals.
It is not an easy task to propose AI Governance mechanisms. There are challenges that AI technology itself has imposed on society for years, for example:
• Cognitive algorithmic bias that reflects, occasionally or not, the implicit human values of its creator in AI systems;
• Privacy of personal data in any technological implementation of AI;
• Transparency as a preponderant factor in ethics to enhance the autonomy of human life in the face of automated decisions in AI systems.
Based on the above, the session recognizes that the Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region presents an enormous AI potential, including financial and social improvements. In this regard, many countries have established cooperation on the strategic level between the private sector and government to align efforts toward increasing connectivity, infrastructure development, national digitalization strategies, open data, and national AI agendas. However, there is still a gap in AI inclusiveness at both the national and regional levels. Countries in the region have different degrees of development and financial resources directed to this emerging technology.
Besides, governance mechanisms that emerge appear to be predominantly state-centered, excluding other stakeholders of the AI debate and governance process. In this sense, the present workshop aims to debate AI employment at the regional level. More specifically, it asks if a regional AI governance mechanism should be created in LAC in order to set a regional standard process and coordinate AI's better use in the region, and if needed, how this mechanism should be designed. In this regard, it is relevant to bring into this debate regional issues, especially those related to the lack of digital infrastructure, the need for better inter-connectivity systems, and the transformation of labor structures. In this sense, it is fundamental to push forward topics related to inclusion, how the community perceives misuses and abuses of AI, and how the LAC region's cyber landscape impacts possible joint solutions.
9. Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
10. Reduced Inequalities
11. Sustainable Cities and Communities
Targets: The session’s main focus will be on AI, an emerging technology that in the LAC region is not only directly related to Industry 4.0 (i.e., innovation and industry) but also to the need of digital infrastructure deployment. Besides, as the debate aims to center the discussion on developing an inclusive AI, it tackles the inequality gap the region faces, mainly as different states are currently in various stages of development regarding the technology. Finally, to create a secure and inclusive environment at the regional level, a sustainable mechanism or joint solutions shall be designed and implemented, configuring a sustainable ecosystem.
Description:
The Latin American and the Caribbean (LAC) region presents an excellent Artificial Intelligence (AI) development potential. The AI ecosystem is starting to emerge with start-ups and large companies. Many countries have established cooperation on the strategic level between the private sector and government to align efforts toward increasing connectivity, infrastructure development, national digitalization strategies, open data, and national AI agendas. Despite the significant progress on the application of AI, the development of proper legislation toward AI, mainly to avoid misuse and abuses of the technology, still varies significantly in the region. Besides, governance mechanisms still appear to be predominantly state-centered. In this sense, the present workshop aims to debate AI application to the regional level and ask if a regional governance mechanism should be created to coordinate AI's better use in the region and how it should be designed.
To answer the question posed, regional issues such as the lack of digital infrastructure, the need for better interconnectivity systems, and the transformation of labor structures shall be considered. In this regard, the workshop has a secondary objective to push forward issues related to AI inclusion, how the community perceives misuses and abuses of the technology, and how the LAC region's cyber landscape impacts possible joint solutions. To do that, speakers from different backgrounds and sectors are invited to expose their ideas on the topic and start to motion a bottom-up construction process of a regional AI agenda.
The session aims to achieve three main outcomes:
1. To raise awareness about the need for an inclusive AI regional discussion.
2. To gather information through the polls and the Q&A to frame the regional debate over the topic.
3. To trigger ideas of a regional AI governance mechanism and possible concrete steps toward it.
Moreover, the debate is expected to generate a baseline for further discussions, either within the next IGF or other international or regional forums.
The session will be divided into three main segments: introduction, debate, and interaction. The first segment will consist of the organizer’s institutional presentation (maximum duration of 7 minutes). The second segment will consist of the speakers’ views on the subject and the launch of three polls to the audience. In this part, each speaker presentation will have a total duration of 10 minutes, and the polls will be launched through the IGF platform or by an external tool (either Slido or Kahoot). The last segment will consist of the interaction between the audience and speakers. For this final part, questions from the Q&A will be gathered by the online moderator and given to the onsite moderator, who will select and distribute them among the speakers. Finally, the results from the polls will be jointly analyzed, directing both the audience and the panelists to their final considerations or conclusions.
It is essential to highlight that during the session, the onsite moderator will be responsible for organizing the interventions and interacting with the speakers to ensure that the goals of the session will be sought appropriately and also safeguarding the due balance to meet diversity expectations within the interventions, either by the speakers or the audience. The online moderator will be the one taking care of the flow within each of the online tools involved with the session, as well as read, select and guarantee that the onsite moderator will be aware of questions and comments received by the remote audience (Zoom Chat and Q&A, Hashtags in social networks like Twitter, among others). Moreover, as this workshop will have mainly online participants, a proper interaction between online and physical audiences will be ensured by the onsite moderator, the online moderator, and an onsite facilitator present at the venue in Katowice to help coordinate these interactions. The rapporteur will capture all the highlights and critical information of the session to list key takeaways for the short report and consolidate a further final report to be delivered to the IGF Secretariat. The organization team will also be alert to help participants in any technical issues and/or delays.
Usage of IGF Official Tool. Additional Tools proposed: The session will rely primarily on the IGF official tools, such as Zoom Q&A, Polling, and Chat, as well as the online queue for participants. The online moderator will also monitor Hashtags in social networks such as Twitter. Other tools that may be used are, but not limited to: Slido or similar tools to organize questions; Kahoot, Mentimeter or similar online quiz tools; Jamboard or other collaborative brainstorming tools.