At the 2017 Internet Governance Forum in Geneva, the Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace presented its recently published GCSC Call to Protect the Public Core of the Internet for feedback and comments from the Internet governance communities. This document calls upon both state and non-state actors to refrain from any activity that might interfere with the general availability and integrity of the Internet. The norm states:
“Without prejudice to their rights and obligations, state and non-state actors should not conduct or knowingly allow activity that intentionally and substantially damages the general availability or integrity of the public core of the Internet, and therefore the stability of cyberspace.”
The GCSC welcomes feedback on this norm, both in terms of wording as well as possible levers for implementation via info@cyberstability.org or cyber@hcss.nl.
GCSC Submission to IGF Cybersecurity Best Practice Forum
The Commission also contributed to the IGF Cybersecurity Best Practice Forum with a joint submission that outlines the notion of the public core of the Internet by means of an “inner core” and “outer core”.
GCSC Zero-Day event
The Commission hosted an interactive Zero-Day event on 17 December 2017 at IGF: ‘Building Bridges Across Troubled Waters’. The first session focused on the Call to Protect the Public Core of the Internet. After brief comments by GCSC Special Advisor Vint Cerf (Google), Commissioners Abdul-Hakeem Ajijola (CS2 Nigeria), Marietje Schaake (European Parliament), Bill Woodcock (Packet Clearing House) and Olaf Kolkman (Internet Society), IGF participants were encouraged to engage and offer feedback on the norm. The second session ‘Norms and the Future’, shifted the attention from the Public Core norm proposal to the future of norms in guiding responsible state and non-state behaviour in cyberspace. This panel included Marina Kaljurand (GCSC Chair), Anriette Esterhuysen (Association for Progressive Communications), Christopher Painter (former Cyber Coordinator, US State Dept.), and Katherine Getao (ICT Secretary, Kenya). A report of the event is available at the Geneva Internet Platform.
The Commission was very glad to have Vint Cerf (Google), Anriette Esterhuysen (APC), other members of the Commission and IGF participants refer to the relevance of the work of the Commission and its first norm on the protection of the Public Core of the Internet throughout the conference.
Video
Panel on “Local Interventions: Global Impacts: how can international multistakeholder cooperation address internet disruptions, encryption & data flows” with GCSC Special Advisor Vint Cerf and Commissioner Anriette Esterhuysen
Panel on “Empowering Global Cooperation on Cybersecurity” with GCSC Chair Marina Kaljurand
Panel on “A Digital Geneva Convention to protect cyberspace” with Commissioner Elina Noor
