The Third Global Conference of the Internet and Jurisdiction Policy Network is scheduled to hold in Berlin, Germany, from June 3 to 5, 2019. It will bring together senior government officials, Internet companies, technical operators, civil society, academia and international organizations from around the world to foster policy coherence and advance the development of operational solutions and policy standards for some of the most pressing cross-border legal challenges of the digital 21st century.
Hosted by the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany with support from the Council of Europe, European Commission, ICANN, OECD, United Nations ECLAC, and UNESCO the Conference bring together senior-level key representatives of states, Internet companies, technical operators, civil society, academia and international organizations from around the world to foster policy coherence and advance the development of operational solutions and policy standards for some of the most pressing cross-border legal challenges of the digital 21st century.
Meanwhile, the Secretariat of the Internet and Jurisdiction Policy Network has also announced the release of Operational Approaches documents for each of its three policy Programmes: Data & Jurisdiction Operational Approaches, Content & Jurisdiction Programme Operational Approaches, and Domains & Jurisdiction Programme Operational Approaches. They contain concrete proposals for operational norms, operational criteria and operational mechanisms to address some of the most pressing cross-border legal challenges of the digital 21st century.
This release constitutes an important milestone in the work of stakeholders in the Internet & Jurisdiction Policy Network. The Operational Approaches documents have been developed over the course of 10 months by Members of the Programmes’ Contact Groups comprising of over 100 distinguished key stakeholders across five continents from governments, international organizations, internet companies, technical operators, civil society and academia.
The Operational Approaches documents will feed into the Third Global Conference of the Internet & Jurisdiction Policy Network . On their bases, stakeholders will discuss the Berlin Roadmap to structure the work in the Internet & Jurisdiction Policy Network for the next two years, in preparation for its 4th Global Conference in 2021.
The Work Plans of the Ottawa Roadmap identified important structuring questions to further guide interactions within the three Programmes of the Policy Network. The Operational Approaches that have been released are a joint contribution by some of the most engaged experts in this field to advance the ongoing debate on the complex cross-border issues of access to electronic evidence, online content moderation and restrictions, and requests for domain suspensions. They should however not be understood as the result of a formal negotiation validated by the Programmes’ Contact Group Members’ organizations.
The proposals for concrete Operational Norms, Criteria and Mechanism put forth in the Operational Approaches documents are intended to provide a common frame of reference for public and private decision-makers in order to help stakeholders take into account the full range of relevant parameters when developing and implementing responsible frameworks, rules and practices to address the issues addressed within the three I&J Programs.
The event will take place at the historical landmark site, Gasometer Berlin, which has been transformed into an innovative events location and will provide the appropriate setting for stakeholders to progress.
On November 14-16, 2016, over 200 stakeholders from more than 40 countries gathered at the 1st Global Conference of the Internet & Jurisdiction Policy Network in Paris, France, where they collectively identified Areas for Cooperation for the three Programs, based on Framing Papers summarizing four years of international deliberations in the Policy Network. These Areas for Cooperation served as mandate for three Programmes’ Contact Groups, whose members developed Policy Options outlining tangible pathways to jointly address pressing cross-border legal challenges in cyberspace.
These three Policy Options documents then formed the basis for discussions at the 2nd Global Conference of the Internet & Jurisdiction Policy Network, on February 26-28, 2018, in Ottawa, Canada. There, for the very first time, stakeholders defined concrete Common Objectives and detailed Work Plans to jointly develop policy standards and concrete solutions in each Programme of the Policy Network. Together, they form the Ottawa Roadmap. To implement the Ottawa Roadmap, members from around the world worked intensively in the Programmes of the Policy Network between July 2018 and April 2019 to develop the present Operational Approaches. They will feed into the 3rd Global Conference of the Internet & Jurisdiction Policy Network, taking place on June 3-5, 2019, in Berlin, Germany.
