Geneva hosted on 18-22 September the 31st meeting of ITU Council WG WSIS, which reported the current situation of:
- ITU activities in 2017 in the WSIS process and link with the sustainable development goals;
- presentation of results of the 2017 ITU Council;
- relevant United Nations decisions and resolutions impacting the ITU’s work, especially those deriving from the 20th session of the Commissions for Science and Technology for Development and the meeting of the United Nations Economic and Social Council on assessment of progress implementing the WSIS action lines and the 2017 High Level Policy Forum;
- progress in facilitating WSIS action lines C2, C5 and C6, including actions set out in the ITU’s operational plans;
- the 2017 WSIS Forum and cataloguing of key actions and other organisational details for the forum to be held in 2018;
- the WSIS Stocktaking Process and the WSIS Project Prizes for the 2017/2018 two-year period;
- the importance and responsibility of having the ITU lead the United Nations Group on the Information Society in 2017 and 2018;
- organisation of World Telecommunications and Information Society Day (2018);
- the Partnership on Measuring ICTs for Development;
- the WSIS Fund in Trust for the creation of strategic partnerships for projects addressing the WSIS action lines.
The meeting also focused on the presentation and debate of responses to the public consultation on public policies for the internet; the theme was ‘public policy considerations for OTT’.
The contributions received in the scope of the public consultation refer to:
1. defending that regulatory intervention should be created with regard to over-the-top (OTT) services;
2. defending that regulatory intervention is not needed because it will harm digital innovation and prevent or discourage the creation of a capable and facilitative ecosystem for innovation and for investment.
Several specific topics of policy for OTT were indicated, such as competition, tighter tax revenue, dangerous content (hate speech, cyberbullying and fake news), privacy and personal data, consumer protection and net neutrality.
Also notable was a contribution that proposes creating a taxonomy for OTT which in the area of telecom services would result in concrete measurement of economic benefits and consumer surplus deriving from the use of those services.
