Ismaila Whittier case for reforming the ITU

Full Article with citations: https://medium.com/@ishmi.whittier/reforming-the-itu-5d4797cf8f63

Ismaila Whittier case for INTERNATIONAL TELECOMMUNICATION UNION

Founded: May 17th, 1865

Parent Organization: United Nations Economic and Social Council

Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland

Membership: 193 Countries, and around 900 businesses, academic institutions, and international and regional organizations

U.S. Budget Contribution: 30% of the ITU’s regular budget

Purpose: A specialized UN agency, responsible for all matters related to information and communication technologies (ICT). The ITU coordinates the shared global use of the radio spectrum, promotes international cooperation in assigning satellite orbits, improves communication infrastructure in the developing world and establishes worldwide standards that foster the interconnection of communication systems.

For more information on how the ITU works see Appendix.

Why the ITU Matters

The ITU is a critical organization for the UN system and the future of global governance. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, ITU regulations “determine what type of access to information you have when you open an internet browser or how much you pay for Netflix." Private sector actors, especially from America's strategic competitors, have increased their participation in the ITU. For example, a Chinese company, Huawei, introduced 2,000 new standard proposals to ITU study groups on topics including 5G, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence. In the ITU, Chinese corporations focus on proposing standards around a variety of emerging technologies like facial recognition, video monitoring, and vehicle surveillance, all of which will have monumental consequences for privacy and personal freedoms worldwide. China is currently taking these steps to influence how the next generation of technologies will work, from telecommunications to artificial intelligence. Technological advancement is critical to global governance as countries that set the governing standards will increase their global influence.

Many developing countries are particularly vulnerable to adopting China’s political and technological norms in their early stages of development. According to the Financial Times , standards ratified by the ITU are commonly adopted by developing nations in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, regions where China has made significant inroads in developing infrastructure and providing surveillance technology.

Wingfield, who works for Global Partners Digital, a British NGO that works to align international tech and human rights standards. Chinese technology norms are not necessarily harmful; however, they do not place the same value on privacy and free speech as liberal democracies do. Furthermore, Chinese norms are more draconian regarding government surveillance. For example, Chinese multinational technology company Huawei is proposing a radical redesign of the internet, which Huawei calles “New IP,” designed to build “intrinsic security” into the Internet. According to Just

Security, a publication at the Reiss Center on Law and Security at New York University School of Law, this means that individuals would need register to use the internet, and authorities can shut off an individual user’s internet access at any time.182 These proposed norms that are tolerant of widespread, top-down, government surveillance could lead to negative impacts on free speech and privacy.

The difference between the ITU's current objectivity and its objectivity during the Cold War is that the Soviet Union did not utilize its vast resources to reshape technology standards. China's actions in the ITU are straining the organization’s core mission, which is to be a non-politicized agent of global technological advancement and regulation. Since the ITU received little attention until the advent of the internet, many previous reforms have fallen in line with Category 1.

ANALYSIS OF PREVIOUS REFORM EFFORTS

Most of the ITU's history has been concerned with Category 1 reforms, which seek to expand an organization's mandate, authority, or scope. The ITU started as the International Telegraph Union and was founded to regulate its namesake. Over time, the organization expanded its scope and responsibilities to regulate the telephone and radio. There was an increasingly consistent use of the telegraph, telephone, and radio; simultaneously, uniform coordination was needed to standardize their use. In 1925, member states decided there was a need to coordinate technological studies and create regulations on all fields of telecommunications and make this the responsibility of one organization.

As a result, the International Long-distance Telephone Consultative Committee (CCIF) was incorporated into the ITU, and the International Telegraph Consultative Committee (CCIT) was created at the 1925 International Telegraph Conference in Paris. In 1927, the International Radio Consultative Committee (CCIR) was established at the Radiotelegraph Conference in Washington, D.C. The CCIF, the CCIT, and the CCIR worked together to coordinate technical studies and draw up international standards across these fields of telecommunications under the umbrella of the ITU.

In 1947, the ITU joined the newly created United Nations. This merger proved to be a significant Category 2 reform, which are reforms that deal with an organization's management, governance, or programmatic processes. On November 15th, 1947, there was an agreement between the ITU and the United Nations to make the ITU the specialized UN agency for telecommunications.

After joining the UN, the ITU began setting technology standards for an increasingly popular new technology: television. More than 150 technical standards were published as television developed. ITU standards today cover a vast array of broadcasting, including today's multimedia and data transmissions. In 1956, the CCIF and CCIT merged to form the International Telephone and Telegraph Consultative Committee (CCITT), a major Category 2 reform. More consolidation meant more centralized control over technological studies and recommendations.

The ITU has historically kept a lower profile than other multilaterals. This anonymity began to change with the advent of the space age. As the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union raged on, the satellite highlighted the need to regulate space communication and satellite traffic.

The Space Race motivated the United States to develop the internet, which led to new global standards by the ITU. It set technical standards necessary for the internet to expand worldwide, from the first modems to today's broadband. The ITU brokered and approved global standards for computer networking and general internet access technologies.

The ITU faced its real first test of objectivity and regulatory authority in internet governance. The internet's burgeoning coincided with the emergence of powerful corporations, which quickly joined the ITU as members. Some states, like China, also became much more involved with the ITU.

With ballooning membership, the ITU faced significant management issues. According to a United Nations management and administration report on the ITU, increased membership led to major structural reforms. It also resulted in significant Category 2 reforms. Restructuring in 1992 worked exceptionally well to delegate the ITU's work into its three significant areas of responsibility: standardization, radiocommunication technology regulations, and equity in global technology development and adoption. The 1992 reforms and the subsequent tweaks at future conferences are a model for future reform efforts.

RECOMMENDATIONS

In reforming the ITU, the U.S. should:

Collaborate more intensely with non-state actors to help establish standards that protect human rights and free speech. Quarterly dialogues and conferences could occur, inviting policy analysts in the State Department and representatives from the United States ITU Association (U.S. ITUA) to coordinate on tech regulation. The association is an American tech industry forum for discussing issues and developing views and proposals on ITU policy matters. The association is dedicated to developing consensus on private sector views on the ITU and coordinating with the U.S. government. These policy conferences could help the U.S. government coordinate public-private cooperation and formulate a strategy to counter authoritarian states.

Pros: There is a disconnect between Western governments and Western tech companies that does not exist between the Chinese government and its technology companies. These dialogues could create much-needed cooperation between governments and corporations, which could help liberal democracies counter authoritarian states in the ITU.

Cons: There's no guarantee that western companies will see completely eye to eye on privacy and free speech issues, but these conferences could help create more consensus. Also, some western companies may view access to the Chinese market as more critical than coordination with liberal democracies. These conferences could help lay these differences out in a productive dialogue and create a new consensus.

Why the U.S. should pursue: Currently, western companies are not incentivized to play leading roles in slow-moving organizations like the ITU and waste resources playing defense against abstracts, like Huawei’s plans to reinvent the internet. However, creating a new dialogue that could lay out some incentives may be the key to kick-start this leadership on behalf of western corporations. One cannot make progress on a policy priority if there is no productive dialogue in the first place.

Establish a new study group dedicated to free speech, and privacy protection in the ITU's Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T). The U.S. should implement this proposal with like-minded nations, such as the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, and countries in the European Union. This consortium of liberal democracies should create a study group dedicated to creating and maintaining an international standard of privacy and free speech across the global technology sector. Thus, an "Internet Privacy and Freedom" Working Group should be established.

Pros: As a State Department official stated during an interview, tech standardization work is most effective when done in regional blocks, so forming a consortium of nations with similar values may be more effective in this endeavor as well.

Cons: Countries like China that view robust privacy rights as a threat to state control or sovereignty may see actions like forming a consortium of "liberal democracies" to protect privacy rights as a threat. These authoritarian countries will bolster their public relations campaign to decry efforts to reform international standard-setting as "fear-mongering" or "racism." Also, despite agreeing on freedom of speech’s importance, some

U.S. allies interpret this freedom differently. The discrepancy on views on freedom speech could be remedied through robust dialogue between the liberal democracies.

Why the U.S. should pursue: China may try to push back on structural proposals like this and use divisive arguments to undermine this proposal, has previously stated:

The countries that abstained from voting on this UN resolution are countries that are impartial and are potential allies. Winning these countries over, and working with allies, is the way to push back against China, and other authoritarian states, and their efforts to undermine this important policy proposal while also forming a more universal consensus on internet freedom.

Push for the creation of a Human Rights Office in the ITU. This way, basic guidelines of norms and rules protecting human rights, privacy, and civil liberties will be in place. It will be necessary to uphold these rules before any additional significant technical changes are made to technological standardization. This would be different from other UN human rights organs because it will involve the application of some core UN Human Rights standards to technology standardsetting for both state and non-state actors. In this sense, it might draw on the example set by the UN Global Compact which supports companies to align their strategies and operation with 10 principles on core human rights drawn from existing human rights documents.194

Pros: The last major structural reform to create new entities within the ITU was in 1992, and that worked remarkably well; the case could be made to make similar efforts here. Also, it provides another venue for non-state actors to shape technology standards; these non-state actors could help with funding here.

Cons: There's a possibility this office does not get the financial support it needs or gets undermined by states that do not want it to succeed. This undermining could occur at the Plenipot Conferences, and non-state actors could fill the gap in funding here if necessary.

Why the U.S. should pursue: Some authoritarian states may not support the creation of an ITU Human Rights office, since it would undermine their plans for more top-down control of the Internet and other draconian

193 Montgomery and Lebryk, ‘China’s Dystopian “New IP” Plan Shows Need for Renewed US Commitment to Internet Governance’.

194 ‘The Ten Principles of the UN Global Compact’, Offical Website of the United Nations Global Compact, United Nations Global Compact, n.d., https://www.unglobalcompact.org/what-is-gc/mission/principles.

proposals, but liberal democracies and allied non-state actors have enough combined resources (political and economic) to push for this reform at the ITU if they coordinate robustly enough and force the issue.