| APrIGF 2022 Session Proposal Submission Form | |||||||||||
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| Part 1 - Lead Organizer | |||||||||||
| Contact Person | |||||||||||
| Mr. Charles Mok | |||||||||||
| Organization / Affiliation (Please state "Individual" if appropriate) * | |||||||||||
| GDPi, Stanford University | |||||||||||
| Designation | |||||||||||
| Visiting Scholar | |||||||||||
| Gender | |||||||||||
| Male | |||||||||||
| Economy of Residence | |||||||||||
| Hong Kong | |||||||||||
| Primary Stakeholder Group | |||||||||||
| Academia | |||||||||||
| List Your Organizing Partners (if any) | |||||||||||
| DotAsia Organization. Edmon Chung. edmon@registry.asia | |||||||||||
| Part 2 - Session Proposal | |||||||||||
| Session Title | |||||||||||
| Inaugural Asia Pacific Digital Policy Impact Panel: The Unfortunate Combination of Disinformation and Censorship in Asia Pacific | |||||||||||
| Session Format | |||||||||||
| Panel Discussion | |||||||||||
| Where do you plan to organize your session? | |||||||||||
| Onsite at the venue (with online moderator for questions and comments from remote participants) | |||||||||||
| Specific Issues for Discussion | |||||||||||
| The future of the Internet is facing a critical crossroads moment with technologists, developers, corporations and users of the Internet facing a collision of technological, regulatory and geopolitical factors. At Stanford's Global Digital Policy Incubator program, the moderator has initiated a project to analyse the development and trends of digital policies in Asia Pacific, and this panel will be the inaugural open discussion on the timely subject of disinformation and censorship. All over the world, disinformation has become the biggest threats to trust on the Internet, contributing not only to frauds and crimes, but also emerging as a major threat to public health, social unrest, inequality, discrimination and election integrity. While social media platforms are often blamed for its lack of actions, content moderation however often is pitted against free speech. Governments around the world have started to legislate against disinformation and misinformation, yet these laws are often either ineffective or become tools of censorship and coercion. Often while governments and corporations and their lobbyists fight over these regulations, civil societies and users are left out of the process. Asia Pacific economies in particular faces the challenge of having a wide variety of political systems and different levels of Internet freedoms, caught between the influence of the world's leading digital policy regimes of China, the U.S. and Europe. As more and more economies are introducing regulations and legislations to counter disinformation, such as India, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and others, civil societies in the region are becoming increasingly concerned about the implications of these measures on information freedom and censorship. What are the lessons that can be learned and shared? Are there any best practices from the civil, technical and business communities to balance combatting disinformation with safeguarding Internet freedoms? |
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| Describe the Relevance of Your Session to APrIGF | |||||||||||
| This panel addresses all APrIGF thematic tracks of trust, inclusion, and sustainability. Disinformation is one of the biggest threat undermining trust on the Internet, often making it less inclusive and indeed divisive, and threatening the sustainability of the whole network ecosystem. Yet the solutions offered by content moderation by corporations and their "artificial intelligence" as well as governmental attempts to regulate "fake news" all have left much to be desired, and often backfired in creating more problems that harm freedom of expression and information flows. Civil as well as technical societies cannot be left out of the process, in the true and full sense of multistakeholderism. The Asia Pacific Digital Policy Project will aim at monitoring trends and development, bringing together stakeholders, and coming up with analysis and recommendations, with an emphasis on human rights and democratic values, on a regional basis and in a sustained manner over time. We intend to achieve continuity through participation at APrIGF and other Asia Pacific-based, or global and regional Internet governance and digital policy related forums. We believe this panel and its outcome, and hopefully others to follow, will contribute to APrIGF's goals to promote Internet governance. | |||||||||||
| Methodology / Agenda (Please add rows by clicking "+" on the right) | |||||||||||
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| Moderators & Speakers Info (Please complete where possible) | |||||||||||
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| Please explain the rationale for choosing each of the above contributors to the session. | |||||||||||
| The above currently proposed speakers/panelists are chosen in order to have a good diversity and mix from different regions in Asia and also from different stakeholder communities, i.e. civil society, academics and private sector. In particular, WWW Foundation and Asia Foundation has been conducting a research program on misinformation in Fiji and other Pacific islands and they can report on the findings. Likewise, Prof Park is an expert in legal and regulatory policy matters and can make comments for the region. Ms Browning from Google also has background in government in Australia in addition to her current private sector role. | |||||||||||
| Please declare if you have any potential conflict of interest with the Program Committee 2022. | |||||||||||
| Yes | |||||||||||
| If yes, please detail the person and his/her level of engagement on your session proposal. (e.g. 1 or more of the PC members are co-hosting/moderating/speaking at the session) | |||||||||||
| I am a member of the APrIGF MSG. | |||||||||||
| Are you or other session contributors planning to apply for the APrIGF Fellowship Program 2022? | |||||||||||
| No | |||||||||||
| Number of Attendees (Please fill in numbers) | |||||||||||
| Consent | |||||||||||
 I agree that my data can be submitted to forms.for.asia and processed by APrIGF organizers for the program selection of APrIGF 2022. |
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