Internet Democracy Project

Comments were invited on the recently released Draft Outcome Document for the WSIS+10 Review process from UN member states, observer states and all relevant stakeholders till the 17^th of November 2015. The Internet Democracy Project submitted comments on all the sections of the document. We also contributed once again to a joint civil society submission that resulted from the Civil Society Strategy Meeting that we co-organised at IGF 2015.   More

Comments were invited on the Zero-Draft for the WSIS+10 Review from UN member-states, observer states and all relevant stakeholders until 15^th October 2015. The Internet Democracy Project submitted comments in the form of specific text proposals on all the different sections of the zero-draft. We also joined in on a submission by a diverse number of global civil society groups that participated in the Civil Society Coordination Event preceding the Second Informal Stakeholders Consultation and the Second Preparatory Meeting of the WSIS+10 Review in New York.   More

Until Friday 18 September, comments were invited on the UN Non-Paper for the WSIS+10 Review from UN member-states, observer states and all relevant stakeholders. The Internet Democracy Project submitted comments in the form of specific text proposals on all the different sections of the non-paper, namely Digital Divide, ICT for Development, Human Rights, Internet Governance, Cyberspace and Follow-Up and Review. We also joined forces with other civil society organisations and representatives to submit comments on behalf of Asia-Pacific and BRICS.   More

From 3 to 5 September, a group of 38 people from 15 different countries participated in the Asian Regional Consultation on the WSIS+10 Review, co-oganised by the Internet Democracy Project. While the meeting originally aimed to gather views on a non-paper drafted by the UN appointed co-facilitators of the WSIS+10 Review process, a delay in the public release of this non-paper made this not possible. Nevertheless, the group collectively drafted and released a statement with key messages, based on the rich discussions it had around the topics of development, human rights and Internet governance. We have reproduced the statement below, as well as on the event website.   More

A Committee of the Department of Telecommunications released a report on net neutrality in May 2015. It included recommendations on the technical, regulatory and public policy concerns. The following report is Internet Democracy Project’s comments on the views expressed in the committee’s report.    More

The United Nations General Assembly invited member states, observer states and all relevant stakeholders to provide inputs on the desired elements and content of a ​“non-paper” that will be released at the end of August 2015 and eventually developed into the final outcome document to be adopted in December 2015. This report by Dr Anja Kovacs was the Internet Democracy Project’s official submission to their review of the implementation of WSIS outcomes on development, human rights, funding questions and ICT’s.   More

Between 4 and 8 May, the UN Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD) discussed, in Geneva, the overall review of the outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). The WSIS outcome documents are considered a cornerstone of international norms and discourse on internet policy and governance. As civil society organisations committed to the goal of a ​‘people-centred, inclusive and development-oriented Information Society, the Internet Democracy Project, the Association for Progressive Communications and the International Federation of Library Associations released the following statement at the meeting to highlight this central WSIS goal (the statement can also be found on the CSTD website.   More

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) invited comments on their consultation paper No. 2/2015 on regulatory framework for Over-The-Top (OTT) services. The Internet Democracy Project submitted comments to TRAI, outlining the importance of an unadulterated understanding of network neutrality as a necessary precondition for an open and free Internet.    More

The Internet Democracy Project joined forces with partner civil society organisations from around the world, to comment on the UN Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD) Secretariat’s draft report on the ​‘Ten-year Review of Progress Made in the Implementation of the Outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society’. The report is expected to be an important input into the overall review of the World Summit on the Information Society outcomes that will be conducted by the UN General Assembly next year. A shorter version of the statement was read out by Matthew Shears from the Center for Democracy and Technology during the recently concluded CSTD 2014 – 2015 Intersessional Panel in Geneva, which discussed the draft report. The full text of our statement, which has been shared with the CSTD Secretariat, can be found below.   More

A Consultation Paper on Media Law was floated by the Law Commission of India in May 2014 to elicit views from all stakeholders, to be submitted to the Commission by mid-August 2014. The Consultation Paper covered a wide range of areas: from opinion polls to methods of media regulation, from media and individual privacy to cross media ownership. The Internet Democracy Project made the submission below to the Law Commission in response to this call, focusing on one of the central areas of the Consultation Paper to touch on freedom of expression on the Internet in India: social media and section 66A of the Information Technology Act, 2000. The questions we answer below are the questions that have been raised by the Law Commission in the Consultation Paper.    More