IGF - 2010 Edition

Internet Governance Forum - 5th meeting

14-17 September 2010, Vilnius (Lithuania)

“Internet should be a space of freedom, justice and democracy”, said Maud de Boer-Buquicchio, Council of Europe Deputy Secretary General, at the opening of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) held in Vilnius (Lithuania) from 14 to 17 September.

During the IGF, the Council of Europe engaged in an open dialogue with representatives of governments, business and civil society on how to safeguard freedom on the Internet - as well as security, openness and privacy - while also protecting users from its risks.

Contributing to the overall theme 'Developing the future together' of this United Nations event - the Council of Europe presented its most recent work to protect human rights online and to provide an adequate legal framework for the Internet.

This work includes a convention for protecting children from sexual abuse – which entered into force in July 2010 - and two new conventions to be adopted soon, one for fighting violence against women, and the other for combating counterfeit medicines, including those sold online.

The Council of Europe also presented at the IGF a draft recommendation on data protection and profiling, an update of ongoing work to implement the Cybercrime Convention worldwide, and the development of an international legal framework for the protection of critical Internet resources and cross-border flow of Internet traffic. (more ...)

• Cross-border Internet traffic – Workshop
  Council of Europe expert group presents proposal for setting a standard protecting critical Internet resources

• Cybercrime – Workshop
  Council of Europe workshop discusses need for a mechanism to assess progress against cybercrime

• Role of Internet intermediaries - Workshop
  Participants call for greater transparency and legal certainty

• Communication in the digital era – Workshop
  Participants debate how to measure communication and media

• Good practices in Internet governance – Workshop
  Code of good practice in Internet governance to be further tested by several organisations

• Gender equality – Workshop
  Council of Europe convention to combat the use of the Internet for violence against women

• Parenting in digital networks - Workshop
  Parents need to be empowered to promote critical thinking of children

• Internet openness and privacy open forum
  Maud de Boer-Buquicchio: ''States must cooperate to protect openness and privacy online''

• OSCE and Council of Europe Open forum
  ''Hate speech must be addressed without endangering freedom of expression''

• EuroDIG regional discussion forum
  EuroDIG to connect European national IGFs

The Council of Europe provides the secretariat of the European Dialogue on Internet Governance (EuroDIG) in cooperation with European Union institutions and other organisations.

EuroDIG is a platform for discussing and shaping a European perspective to Internet governance. In its last edition, participating stakeholders concluded that the protection of human rights, ensuring universal access to the Internet as a public service and promoting media literacy should be key priorities for Internet governance in Europe.

• 2010 EuroDIG
• 2009 EuroDIG
• 2008 EuroDIG