On April 7, Innopolis, Tatarstan, will host the RIGF 2017 8th Russian forum on internet governance. This year, the conference focuses on involving young people in internet governance, and it was decided to hold “day 0” prior to the official opening of the forum. On this day, RIGF speakers met with students at Kazan universities and colleges.
The day began with a meeting with students of the Kazan College of Information Technology: Deputy Director of the IoT Association Gleb Pyzhov spoke about the history and development of the Internet of Things and what changes the IoT will bring to various industries in the near future, and then answered students’ questions.
Kazan Federal University’s Higher School of Information Technology and the Kazan Aviation Institute hosted lectures by PIR Center expert Oleg Demidov. Over 100 students came to the lecture about global cybersecurity. Demidov spoke about the international and Russian systems of IT market regulation, the vulnerabilities of the Internet of Things, which is the youngest IT area, and about the new security standards and the establishment of a new culture of user cybersecurity.
The Kazan Federal University’s Legal Department hosted a roundtable, Human Rights on the Internet: Anonymity, Privacy and Censorship. Law students from all around Russia came to take part in the event. The roundtable was attended by Dmitry Afanasyev, head and coordinator of the expert council under the State Duma Committee for Information Policy, Information Technology and Communications; Marina Rozhkova, Professor at the Intellectual Rights Department at the Kutafin Moscow State University of Law; Vasily Lukashevich of the European Court of Human Rights; and European Council representative Yelena Lopatina.
Discussed were such issues as human rights and freedoms on the internet, the need for censorship or control over social networks, and the freedom of speech on the net. Experts said that a huge responsibility for providing human rights and freedoms on the net lies with private businesses engaged in creating and distributing content, rather than with the government. These businesses must create and support a platform for self-regulation and develop clear working standards. As Lukashevich said, many bloggers act as the media but are not bound either by a professional ethics code or the media regulations. In this case, self-regulation is a must. Lukashevich’s opinion was supported by Dmitry Afanasyev, who said that the right to anonymity -- a basic human right – might turn evil and plant the seeds of hate speech, that is, all forms of propaganda of violence, racial discrimination, and others. “Hate speech is toxic and must be eliminated from the net!” Afanasyev said.
The main events of RIGF 2017 will take place on April 7 and will again focus on young internet users. The introductory lecture on internet governance will be delivered by Leonid Todorov from APTLD.
