Open Net strategizes in DC on protecting multistakeholderistic Internet from joint state control

Open Net joined the following expert meeting, and KS Park’s remarks are below:

Defending Democratic Norms in Global Tech Governance

1201 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Suite 1100, Washington, DC 20004

September 18-19, 2024

KS Park’s remark 1:

Multistakeholderism (and its civilizational import) can be best understood initially as a term to describe how the technical standards governing the Internet were created and implemented:  

“The current networked digital landscape could not have emerged without technical standards. Open Internet protocols and related standards, largely developed and maintained through open multistakeholder processes, have been key to the success of the free and open global Internet, enabling innovations at breath-taking speed and scale, global real-time communication, unprecedented possibilities for free expression and access to information and the development of new business models and economic growth.”  (OHCHR Report on technical standards and human rights, A/HRC/53/42, September 2023)

So, how was the multistakeholderism implemented?

The Internet evolved with the support of highly flexible and innovative governance arrangements. . .  Organizations that emerged from this unplanned process—for example, current bodies such as ICANN, IETF, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) or the Internet Architecture Board (IAB)—are open, collaborative organizations. They resemble a fluid and loosely linked networks of individuals and institutions under a common structural framework, rather than more hierarchical and bureaucratic organizations. . . . [T]here have been few formal Internet institutions that real-world governments could coerce, because [the aforesaid] institutions of Internet policy are voluntary, decentralized, and non-coercive themselves! There are few choke points others can grab hold of, and few mechanisms for delegating the coercive implementation of external policies.” (William Dutton, 2016 World Bank Report, p.40)

The term “multistakeholder” comes from participation of technical experts, civil society, academics, industry, and governments all coming together to make policy and support the infrastructure but the real discriminating nature of multistakeholderism is the non-hierarchical, non-mandatory, “rough consensus”-based, inclusive, open-membership-based decision making, which therefore cannot be subject to coercive, top-down pressure of the governments or the big businesses.   

“Multilateralism”, as applied to the current internet governance discourse, is an idea that the underlying internet’s architectural principles should not be left to these voluntary organizations such as IETF, IAB, W3C, ICANN, but under the control of many if not all governments.  

The reason for the push for multilateral control comes from the nature of the internet which resembles very much multistakeholderism.

The Internet is open, distributed, interconnected, and transnational. The multistakeholder approach to Internet governance has grown from the Internet’s own DNA and is what allows it to thrive. [The following key] Internet principles have made the Internet a global platform for innovation and economic growth: Participatory bottom-up processes; Prioritising the stability and integrity of systems, and Maintaining the open nature of the underlying technologies (The Internet Society, “Why the Multistakeholder Approach Works”)

One of the key architectural principles is the “end-to-end” principle which allows users anywhere in the world to communicate with each other provided they are interconnected through networks that conform to basic Internet protocols. This allows removes all constraints on the uses to which the information flowing through it are put, or how users interconnect and interact with other parts of the network. “In these ways, intelligence and control is decentralized and transferred to users, who can choose how to reconfigure access to people, information, services and other technologies (World Bank, supra). This creates a problem for some governments because it enables the Internet to be independent of geographical constraints and personal identification, the essential components of national sovereignty, legal jurisdiction, law enforcement, and control over political expression, cybersecurity, leaving only the internet service providers as the only technically available choke points.

So those governments are already using these choke points actively to enact internet shutdowns, website blockings, SIM card registration, social media registration (often based on SIM card registration), surveillance (often based on SIM card registration), etc., on top of direct restrictions on users and their platforms.  However, as these municipal actions are not coordinated, they are often ineffective, socially controversial, and politically unpopular. Those governments are seeking international coordination. Hence the multilateralism discourse. The UN Cybercrime Convention is one such example. 

Whether such coordination will intrude upon the sacred architectural principles and standards of the internet is unknown yet but such risk is real.  Separately from fighting for freedom of expression and privacy online, the global civil society should be ready to understand the human rights ramifications of the internet’s technical standards and protocols (see Internet Research Task Force’s 2017 “Research into Human Rights Protocol Considerations) and deliberate on whether these standards and protocols are the type of norms that can be robustly preserved under multilateral control. Multilateralism itself is not bad.  The UN human rights treaties are the products of multilateralism and some of which are often activated to defend free expression and privacy online.  It is multilateral control of the internet’s operating principles that we are concerned here and the ramifications may be more far-reaching than the most pernicious municipal actions such as internet shutdown. 

KS Park’s remark 2:

Lawrence Lessig said the Code is the Law.  I will add that the Device is the Law and the Technical Standard is the Law.

TCP/IP is the technical standard that has had such deterministic force on the internet’s civilizational significance.  It is TCP/IP that allow massivity of any-to-any communiation and anonymity, the features that powered the liberating, equalizing, and therefore democratizing potential of the internet.

The decentralizedness of the internet also influenced how its technical standard was implemented and updated as evidenced by the open governance structure of ICANN, IETF, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) or the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) Multistakeholderism of the internet governance arose out of the nature of the thing that is being governed, namely the internet itself.

So, one crucial feature of multistakeholderism is lack of centralized government oversight.  Then, multistakeholderism returned the favor to the internet because “real-world governments could not coerce ICAAN, IAB, IETF, W3C, because they are voluntary, decentralized, and non-coercive themselves! There are few choke points others can grab hold of, and few mechanisms for delegating the coercive implementation of external policies.”

That is what is at the stake.  Yes, censorship is bad and surveillance is bad but it is mostly done at the level of individual governments and we can at least put a normative restraint on that, if not a binding one.  We can push back on that using UN human rights treaties, which thankfully have recognized the internet’s central place in human rights.   

Now, we really mean by multilateralism in our context is joint government control, under which the internet might lose its decentralized nature, and anonymity, any-to-any massive communicativity, therefore its democratic significance.    

One harbinger of such risk is internet shutdown.  I said, there are few chokepoints on the internet, one of them is the network operators.  They are centralized in internal governance, meaning there are CEOs who can be threatened with criminal penalties. So governments are using them to shut down the internet.  Yes, internet shutdown itself does not touch the internet’s architecture but governments trained on internet shutdown may touch the architecture to make shutdown easier.  For example, the National Internet Gateway being considered in Cambodia and in other Asian countries.

Such tendency may be even more amplified multilaterally, namely through a treaty process. One area easily subject to cartelized race-to-bottom among governments is privacy because cross-surveillance of each other’s citizens and pooling of the data is very lucrative for governments as a whole.  That is what happening with the UN Cybercrime Convention.  It does not itself touch the internet architecture. That is fine, but it is eroding the warrant doctrine, facilitating post-surveillance data sharing among the governments, and we can envision another treaty or another iteration of the same treaty that actually tampers with the internet architecture to make surveillance and data sharing easier.    

It is horrifying because, on the privacy area, we don’t have a multilateral norm protecting privacy. We only have a multilateral norm derogating from it.  Yes, we have a ICCPR but it is only the single provision in it Article 17 and the normative density is not that robust – there are too few individual complaints to speak of to form a precedent.  This is what happens when governments get together. 

Asia sees other trends at the individual government level that, I think have potential of being absorbed into a multilateral process or even a treaty like : 

Registration of website operators – Malaysia, India, and Indonesia

Mandatory contracting between network operators and website operators – Indonesia, South Korea, Vietnam, India, and even the European fair share deal.

These two trends are threatening to the end-to-end doctrine which is at the heart of TCP/IP.  Exactly, what else can happen at the technical level under joint government control?  On this issue, the Internet Research Task Force produced a paper that how tweaking technical standards to better or worse protect human rights 2015. I did not read that yet myself because more urgent fight is not to compromise on the decentralized governance of the internet as it stands now, and so as not to compromise on the decentralized internet as it stands now.  Because, coming back to Lessig, the technical standard is the law.

Meeting Agenda:

We are at a critical juncture for the future of the internet and digital technologies. In a year that has included the WSIS+20 Forum, NETMundial+10, negotiations on a new UN cybercrime treaty and the Global Digital Compact, and a flurry of AI governance convenings in the UN system and beyond, the norms and procedures that underpin global digital governance are in flux. Shifting global political dynamics, especially the growing heft of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and transformative advances in artificial intelligence (AI) present novel challenges for prodemocratic actors in this space. Although advocates for digital rights, human rights, and media freedom have built up programs and networks for engagement on digital governance, resource asymmetries and the sheer proliferation of forums remain barriers to impactful advocacy. Moreover, the multistakeholder model of digital governance is itself increasingly being called into question.

To take stock of this shifting landscape and identify response strategies, the International Forum for Democratic Studies (IFDS) and the Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) are co- hosting a two-day expert workshop on September 18–19, 2024, at the National Endowment for Democracy’s office in Washington, DC. This private event, held under the Chatham House rule, will bring together researchers and practitioners across sectors including digital policy, media development, and human rights for a cross-sectoral assessment of the digital governance landscape.

On the eve of the UN Summit for the Future, we will assess the authoritarian threat to global digital governance bodies and growing challenges to multistakeholder participation, as well as ramifications for independent media and for democracy. We will also hold focused discussions on specific frameworks with potential to transform the normative landscape for digital governance, including the Global Digital Compact, the UN Cybercrime Convention, and a range of AI governance initiatives. Through a series of plenary and small-group discussions, we will seek to identify pathways toward a more informed, strategic, and collaborative defense of democratic principles in the high-stakes deliberations at global digital governance bodies.

To guide our discussion, we ask that participants keep in mind the following overarching questions:

• ➢  Looking across digital governance forums and frameworks, what are the key cross- cutting challenges to democratic norms? How do authoritarian influence efforts intersect with broader social and technological trends in creating these challenges?
• ➢  How can digital rights, media freedom, and democracy advocates most effectively defend democratic digital principles at this pivotal moment? Substantively, what should be priority objectives for the prodemocratic community in this complex landscape? Procedurally, what are the key entry points and opportunities for engagement?
• ➢  What opportunities exist to deepen collaboration, share knowledge, and otherwise amplify the impact of civil society engagement in global digital governance?

DAY 1
9:00 – 9:15 a.m. 9:15 – 9:30 a.m.

9:30 – 10:45 a.m.

Breakfast
Welcome / Introduction

Opening Plenary: Preserving Multistakeholderism, Countering Authoritarianism, and Advancing Democratic Norms

The battle over how digital technologies are governed will have crucial ramifications for freedom of speech, privacy, and the future of democracy itself. Across the digital governance ecosystem, the multistakeholder model that has long prioritized nongovernmental engagement in this space faces deepening challenges. So, too, does the open internet itself, as autocratic governments pioneer new legal and technical approaches to control information flows and democratic governments grow increasingly concerned with digital harms. From multilateral forums such as the UN system to multistakeholder standard-setting bodies, even as AI breakthroughs push democratic digital governance higher on the global agenda, longstanding democratic digital norms are under threat. How should we understand the top-order challenges in this domain, and what are the tasks facing the democratic community as it seeks to formulate a response?

K.S. Park (Open Net Korea); _____________________________

10:45 – 11:00 a.m. Break

11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Mixed Breakout Groups: Fresh Thinking About Multistakeholderism

Authoritarian regimes in Moscow, Beijing, and beyond have long promoted a state-centric multilateral model of global digital governance that excludes civil society and presents new opportunities to advance a closed vision of cyberspace. Yet concerns about inclusion, power imbalances, and the sheer capacity of tech-centric governance institutions to address complex normative questions also undermine confidence in the multistakeholder model within the democratic community. As we survey the upcoming turning points in global digital governance, what are the key opportunities to preserve multistakeholderism? Leveraging insights from national-level movement-building and engagement, what can be done to deepen participation, update global institutions for the AI era, and refine their roles in a wider multistakeholder ecosystem?

12:05 p.m. – 12:30 p.m. Readout from Breakouts

12:30 – 1:30 p.m. Lunch

1:30 – 2:45 p.m. Taking Stock of the Global Digital Compact

The discussions surrounding the Global Digital Compact (GDC) raise fundamental questions about the future of internet governance—whether it will continue to follow a multistakeholder model or shift towards a more centralized, multilateral approach led by the UN. The GDC will also influence policy agendas, government spending, and international assistance related to the development of digital technologies. How has the struggle between illiberal/authoritarian values and democratic values played out in the development of the GDC, and with what implications for the UN’s ability to protect human rights and free expression? What are the most important facets of the GDC for the preservation of independent media, freedom of expression, and other human rights? In the wake of the Summit of the Future, how can prodemocratic actors most effectively engage to capitalize on opportunities from the GDC and mitigate its risks?

2:45 – 3:00 p.m. Break
3:00 – 4:00 p.m. Breakout Sessions:

CIMA—UNESCO Guidelines for the Governance of Digital Platforms

Forum—Authoritarian Influence on Digital Frameworks and Tech Standards

4:00 – 4:15 p.m. Break

4:15 – 5:00 p.m. End of Day Plenary: Defining the Challenge

Reflecting on the preceding sessions, how can we best understand the key threats to democratic norms in global digital governance? When it comes to authoritarian actors, can we identify common themes across the different proposals they seek to advance? Taking a broader view, to what extent are repressive digital norms gaining purchase among the wider global community as it grapples with new digital threats?

5:00 – 6:30 p.m.

DAY 2
9:00 – 9:15 a.m. 9:15 – 10:30 a.m.

Reception

Breakfast

The UN Cybercrime Convention: Democratic Implications

In August, the UN’s Ad Hoc Committee on Cybercrime by unanimous vote put forward a final draft of a global convention on cybercrime that will be up for a vote at the General Assembly in the fall. The convention has raised serious concerns among human rights activists, who say it will pave the way for states to continue using cybercrime charges to stifle dissent. In addition, there are worries that vague provisions within the treaty will legitimize state surveillance abuses. How have authoritarian and illiberal actors influenced the treaty, and what does this tell us about the overall prospects for defending democratic norms within the UN system? What specific concerns does the treaty present for media freedom, privacy, and other democratic values? What avenues remain for collective action to influence the treaty or to defend against oppressive applications of the authority it confers at the regional and national level?

10:30 – 10:45 a.m. Break

10:45 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. AI Governance, Media, and Democracy

From heightened personal privacy threats to the unpaid use and misuse of journalistic content, AI technologies present new governance challenges whose management will be critical to the health of democratic societies. For civil society groups with limited resources, however, it can be difficult to identify key points and venues for engagement in an increasingly crowded normative landscape. The EU’s AI Act has recently come into force, creating a new landmark on the regulatory front, while the December 2023 report by the UN’s AI Advisory Body on “Governing AI for Humanity” joins existing guidelines from UNESCO and the OECD in seeking to identify durable principles for the fast-moving technology. Which AI governance frameworks deserve priority attention from the democracy community, and how can advocates across sectors better coordinate to check authoritarian risks and advance a democratic vision for AI?

12:00 – 1:00 p.m. Lunch

1:00 – 2:00 p.m. Breakout Sessions—Pathways to Action

Looking through the calendar of upcoming events across the global digital governance ecosystem, where are the key points for engagement in defense of democratic digital principles?

What concrete steps can prodemocratic civil society take to deepen coordination, engage new partners, and amplify its impact on these issues?

CIMA Joint Strategy

Forum AI Strategy

2:00 – 3:00 p.m. Closing Plenary

Reflecting on the past two days, what cross-cutting trends can we identify in terms of the current dynamics in digital governance institutions? How can prodemocratic actors raise their game to operate more strategically and effectively in this landscape?

Korean version text