Description: The Internet’s key proposition - global connectivity - is increasingly at risk as more countries abandon protections for the free flow of information and security online in trade policies about cross border data flows. Countries worldwide have legitimate concerns about what happens when data leaves their ‘borders’. But recent trade policy debates threaten the ability of the Internet to exist, and pose serious threats to privacy, security, and human rights. The threats include: -Leading economies are deprioritizing crucial Internet protections for cross border data flows in trade discussions. -The World Trade Organization set a 2026 end date to a long-standing moratorium on tariffs of electronic transmissions, threatening the ability of Internet traffic to flow freely. -Countries are promoting provisions that would undermine encryption in plurilateral trade initiatives, threatening privacy and security. If we don’t stop trade policy debates from carving up the Internet with digital borders online, we will lose the enormous social, political, and economic benefits that the Internet can offer, and hinder progress on Sustainable Development Goals that depend on the Internet. We cannot allow the Internet - and its billions of users worldwide - to be victims of misguided trade talks. We cannot allow the Internet to be used as a pawn of trade negotiations. Not at the WTO, nor the Joint Statement Initiative on Ecommerce, nor in bilateral trade agreements. It is vital that the global Internet community find ways to protect the Internet data flows that are under threat, and establish a global norm that people the world over can communicate freely with people in other countries. This workshop will involve a briefing about emerging trade threats to the Internet, a discussion about current and potential impacts around the world, and an interactive brainstorm discussion on how to prevent trade initiatives from fragmenting the Internet.
Open Zoom
