UN CSTD 29th session, Chengetai Masango: #IGF2026 venue is Nairobi, Kenya - 2nd time IGF in Nairobi.

2026 MAG will be announced "soon" (note: a number of past proposed dates for announcement have been & gone - still no news... weirdly, UNSG seems more concerned with averting potential WWIII)

29th UN CSTD Session, D Bogdan-Martin, ITU SG: the Independent Scientific Panel on AI (an outcome of the Global Digital Compact) will hold its 1st physical meeting on Wednesday this week in Madrid.

29th UN CSTD, D Bogdan-Martin, ITU SG: Al's reshaping economies, public services, how we learn & work & it's doing so faster than any tech ever b4 it, inc. the Internet. The question: will that transformation b an engine of growth 4 all everywhere or will its benefits b reserved 4 the best resourced

The UN CSTD's 29th Session begins in Geneva today. CSTD members will review the annual progress report on WSIS implementation, among many other topics. Opening plenary (now) is webcast:

webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1z...

More information on the meeting:

unctad.org/meeting/comm...

Traveling Abroad? Your Phone May Be The First Checkpoint: The Expanding Reach of Electronic Device Searches | Insights | Mayer Brown Introduction Electronic devices such as mobile phones, tablets, and laptops routinely store years of sensitive company and personal information,

"Expanded [digital device] inspection powers and/or enforcement postures do not just affect individual travelers; they also expose the organizations that employ them, and the compliance challenges they present increasingly span multiple jurisdictions."

Iran war: We spoke to the man making Lego-style AI videos that experts say are powerful propaganda "Slopaganda" is too weak a term to capture how powerful this "highly sophisticated" content is, one expert says.

"AI's enabled Iran & others 2 communicate directly w Western audiences more effectively than ever b4 [...] using tools largely trained on Western data, making them ideal 4 creating culturally appropriate content. This is what authoritarian countries wanting 2 target the West have lacked in the past"

And a niche question to those of you who've been around the ICANN world for a while, is it just me, or does Gordon-Levitt give off faintly Fadi Chehade vibes?

Brian Cox: ‘We don’t know how powerful AI is going to become – it’s both exciting and potentially a problem’ The physicist, BBC presenter and author on snowflakes, art v science and the time Paul McCartney quizzed him about one of Saturn’s moons

Just image the UN had appointed someone the calibre of Brian Cox as Global Advocate for Human-centric Digital Governance instead of Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who most people under 40 have never heard of (& even I need to keep googling his name).

Trump unveils giant gold-accented victory arch design for Washington DC The new monument, if approved, would be taller than the US Capitol building and the Lincoln Memorial.

With MAGA fragmenting & Trump's anger escalating, I assume at some point scales tip & Trump is ousted/forced to resign. Depending on how long it takes, what happens to all this architecture of his? Radical remodeling? Hacked down by the people, a la Berlin Wall? New museum of American fascism?

The latest IGF strengthening process is an Expert Group Meeting, 14-15 April, with many of the exact same bubble of folks who've been discussing how to improve IGF for many years now.

Reminds me of that cliche about insanity being doing the same thing again & again but expecting a different result!

2/ This information was sent via email to those who had previously signed up to the UN Global Mechanism on cybersecurity's mailing list for stakeholders & isn't yet on the official G-Mech website.

Make sure you sign up to the mailing list to stay up to date with the latest developments:

1/ The Chair of the new UN Global Mechanism on cybersecurity is holding her 1st informal dialogue (via Microsoft Teams) with interested stakeholders, 24 April, 12:30 to 14:00 UTC.

To participate, register by 22 April, 16:00 UTC via:

Britons warned about Russian hackers targeting internet routers for espionage Expert stresses importance of staying alert for unusual activity, as hackers could ‘take you to fake sites’

A reminder: last week at the UN Global Mechanism on Cybersecurity, Russia emphasized its key role in kickstarting a number of processes to tackle issues related to security of ICTs at the UN, dating back to 1998 (inc. the new cybercrime convention & the cyber OEWG that preceded G-Mech)

You should try following meetings from the Asia Pacific... even global processes like IGF & ICANN tend to schedule for EU/Africa/US time window because "not many people from the AP region ever participate". Gee, I wonder why that might be!

From what I hear, Plenipot is on ITU Council agenda this month. Geneva is often the fallback for ITU events, but hotels, etc, tend to be booked out months in advance. If it does move to Geneva, it's likely to be right before end of year, when everyone is usually on holiday. (Remember IGF 2017?)

Porn, dog poo and social media snaps: the ‘taskers’ scraping the internet for Meta-owned AI firm Scale AI gig workers describe desperation of using people’s personal profiles and copyrighted work to train AI

Employed to feed the AI machine in the short-term - complete with negative mental health impacts & having to check your ethics at the door - so the US billionaires can get richer by laying even more people off in the long term:

There is no more appropriate day to have posted this than the day we almost started WWIII.

I spent my morning doom scrolling as we came way too close to WWIII.

Now I'm wondering, in my very niche line of work, if the 2026 IGF MAG announcement will be pushed back yet again because, you know, the UNSG currently has slightly bigger priorities than the weird world of Internet governance.

Iran’s internet blackout is longest national shutdown since Arab spring Iranian authorities cut access to internet on 28 February leaving many with limited information about war

Doug Madory, director of internet analysis at Kentik: "The fact that the Iranian government continues to block internet access suggests that the structures of the regime have not changed very much"

Tech companies are cutting jobs and betting on AI. The payoff is far from guaranteed AI experts say we’re living in an experiment that may fundamentally change the model of work

"While the drumbeat of companies that say AI will help them do more with less is getting louder, it’s unclear whether AI is actually driving cuts. Some companies may be “AI-washing” layoffs, using the techn as a convenient excuse for a slowing labor market, lagging consumer demand or rising costs"

Memes, AI slop and financial advice: Iran is beating Trump at his own propaganda game Fake news and misinformation about the war is spreading like wildfire alone as Washington and Tehran compete for attention and control of the narrative. Jessie Williams looks at how Iran is using the ...

"More than 92 million people in Iran have been cut off from the internet for over 30 days under a severe nationwide blackout, but one man with access is using a dizzying combination of memes, trading tips and sarcasm to play Donald Trump at his own propaganda game."

Connection at a cost: The high-risk world of Iran’s underground VPN market Users are risking it all to get online as operators gain the ability to monitor activity during the nationwide internet shutdown, writes Alireza Manafi

An interesting read. Iranian citizens risk being being targeted by Iranian authorities for using VPNs as well as being defrauded by dodgy VPN operators taking advantage of people simply wishing/needing to have access to the Internet & information during a time of war.

Photo of a packaged chocolate easter egg with a chocolate dinosaur baby hatching out of it.

Wonder how many geek kids found this on their Easter egg hunt.

Also, love how far Easter has drifted from Christian appropriation of pagan fertility festival to commercial appropriation of movies that failed to update their depiction of dinosaurs, even when science proved they had feathers.

Doctor sends US embassy invoice over petrol price spike | CENTRIST Summarised by Centrist

When I first read this, I giggled at plucky NZer making a statement about -ve impact of Trump's Iran folly on the rest of us.

But now I'm wondering if it's possible for some brave souls in the many countries facing fuel & food shortages to sue US govt &/or Trump businesses, in US, for compensation

Sydney councils fear new datacentres could cause blackouts, block housing and affect locals’ health Datacentres ‘directly competing’ with possible residential builds near public transport, one council tells NSW inquiry, amid growing concerns

The Australian government is keen to build an AI-enabled economy, & has set 5 key parameters to ensure datacentres don't gobble up resources at the expense of citizens, but from this article, it seems Aussie communities don't think that's good enough.

Age Assurance and Privacy What Australian Businesses Can Do Now - Bird & Bird

"The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner has drawn a clear line: age assurance obligations do not override privacy law. [...] The 'we had to comply' argument has limits. Compliance with age assurance obligations do not excuse privacy non-compliance."

“More Carrot than Stick:” Kyrgyzstan embraces self-regulation for AI development Hope is lax regulation leads to more foreign investment.

"[As well as local AI developers,] we are also inviting global platforms active in Central Asia, such as Google, Meta, and others. It’s important to have a diverse range of market players on board if we want efficient self-regulation."

This is really cool:

"Unlike the compute-heavy AI models developed by Silicon Valley, the smaller models being built in India, Indonesia, & elsewhere can run on low-end devices & low-bandwidth networks [...] The models are not only cost-efficient, they also have a lower impact on the environment."

I wrote a novel using AI. Writers must accept artificial intelligence – but we are as valuable as ever | Stephen Marche Mastery of banal style is losing its usefulness – but language is more powerful than ever. It’s up to the writer to do what machines can’t

"A recent survey found that 86% of college students use AI regularly, which means that 14% are lying to survey-takers."

Ouch.

11/ UN Global Mechanism on Cybersecurity: A new web page for statements by Member States during the organizational session is now available. Right now, only Australia has submitted a written version of their statement, but more are sure to come:

meetings.unoda.org/meeting/7682...