On December 18–19, 2025, the annual Digital International Relations 2025 conference was held, organised by the Foreign Ministry, MGIMO University, and the Ivannikov Institute for System Programming of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
As part of the conference, the Youth Council of the Coordination Center for TLD .RU/.РФ, jointly with the School of International Cybersecurity of the Institute of Contemporary International Studies of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Diplomatic Academy, organized a roundtable discussion on Internet Governance: Voice of the Young Generation. The discussion focused on contemporary internet governance models, international legal and political aspects of the digital agenda, cybersecurity, personal data protection, and the role of digital literacy.
Taking an active part in the discussion were members of the Coordination Center’s Youth Council. The event was moderated by Andrey Aleinikov, Chairman of the Coordination Center Youth Council, and Arevik Martirosyan, Doctor of Law, Head of the School of International Cybersecurity at the Diplomatic Academy. In their opening remarks, the moderators emphasized that the involvement of young professionals in discussions on the digital agenda is becoming an essential element in shaping future international rules and norms.
“The internet today is more than a technological environment; it is a space of competing values, interests, and approaches to security. That is why it is so important for young professionals to engage in these discussions now,” Andrey Aleinikov noted.
Alexander Ignatov, Doctor of Political Science, spoke about aligning the BRICS countries’ positions on international cybersecurity. He highlighted the role of the United Nations as a key negotiation platform and stressed the importance of developing coordinated approaches among UN member states to issues of state responsibility and conflict prevention in the cyberspace.
Karina Strebkova, Lecturer at the Department of General Psychology at St. Petersburg State University, proposed examining internet governance through the lens of evolving security concepts. She demonstrated how the discussion is gradually shifting from content moderation and technical restrictions toward a broader notion of cognitive security, which takes into account the impact of the digital environment on users’ thinking, behavior, and decision-making.
Alyona Gerashchenko, Doctor of Law and Lecturer at HSE University, focused on practical aspects of the digital agenda. She addressed the challenges companies faced in complying with personal data protection legislation on websites and emphasized that formal compliance, without established internal processes and a mature data culture, did not ensure genuine protection of users’ rights.
Summing up the discussion, Arevik Martirosyan emphasized: “Today’s digital agenda is increasingly shaped at the intersection of international law, security, and technological development, and multilateral formats remain key platforms for developing coordinated approaches.”
