Some 200 representatives from the private sector, governments, parliaments, civil society including youth, media and international organisations gathered to debate current European concerns and challenges to Internet governance at EBU headquarters in Geneva. The 2nd European Dialogue on Internet Governance (EuroDIG 2009) was organised by the European Broadcasting and the Swiss Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM), with the support of the Council of Europe.

The opening of EuroDIG 2009    

Key issues being discussed include access to the Internet, online privacy, cybercrime, critical Internet resources, social networks and net neutrality. Other topics will be the quality, reliability and responsibility of user-generated content and new media, the role of public service media, copyright issues as well as media literacy. Delegates will also speculate about what the Internet will be like in 2020.

Eurodig 2009 also takes place at a crucial time, since one of the main agreements that links the only body that currently 'governs' the Internet- ICANN*- to the US government, expires in September 2009. Who should govern cyberspace after that? Should a new model be adopted for overseeing the Internet when the agreement runs out? The multi-stakeholder debates also serve to prepare the European contributions to the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) which will take place on 15-18 November 2009 in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.

On Monday morning, the debate began with opening statements by Jean-Paul Philippot, President of the European Broadcasting Union, Veronique Gigon, Deputy Director of the Swiss Federal Office of Communications, Philippe Boillat, Director General of Human Rights and Legal Affairs of the Council of Europe, and Asa Torstensson, Swedish Minister for Communications, together with other speakers. This was followed by a roundtable discussion entitled: “European parliamentary perspectives regarding Internet governance”.

From left to right: Veronique Gigon, Deputy Director, Swiss Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM); 
Philippe Boillat, Director General of Human Rights and Legal Affairs, Council of Europe (CoE);   
Markus Kummer, Executive Coordinator, Internet Governance Forum (IGF), United Nations, Geneva   

The rest of the afternoon was devoted to six workshops: 

• End-users access to, and choice in services.  
• Personal and professional privacy 
• The Internet - critical to our lives:  are we sure it's reliable? 
• Cybercrime and cyber security: Public-Private-Partnerships 
• Effective media literacy for the end-user
• The Internet of 2020: Future services  future services   

Tuesday will include four plenary sessions : 

• Access to content online: regulation, business models, quality and freedom of expression
• Online social media – governance issues from a user perspective
• The post-JPA phase: towards a future Internet governance model
• Arrangements for a European IGF and Future EuroDIG events   

The debate will end this afternoon with conclusions and next steps and will include the following speakers:  Frédéric Riehl, Vice-Director, Swiss Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM); Jean Réveillon, Director General EBU - European Broadcasting Union; Jan Malinowski, Head, Media and Information Society Division, Directorate General of Human Rights and Legal Affairs, Council of Europe; William Dee, Directorate General for Information Society and Media Internet, Network and Information Security Unit", European Commission and Maria Häll, Deputy Director, Division for Information Technology Policy, Ministry of Enterprise, Energy and Communications Government Office of Sweden. 

More on EuroDIG

The 2009 EuroDIG programme can be found at www.eurodig.org 

Reports on EuroDIG from participants: www.diplointernetgovernance.org/

About EuroDIG

The EuroDIG Organisation Network, created in 2008, is an open and growing group of European stakeholders such as the Council of Europe, “The Club of Rome – European Support Centre”, Comunica-ch, DiploFoundation - the European At-Large Organisation (EURALO), the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), Euro-NF, the European Parliament, the German Association of Internet Economy, the Finnish, French, Icelandic and Swiss governments, INHOPE, the International Chamber of Commerce, INSAFE, ISOC-ECC , Medienstadt Leipzig e.V., NOMINET, Swiss Federal Office of Communication (OFCOM), SWITCH, United Service Union (ver.di) and the European Youth Forum.