India, along with 11 other countries, is selected to formulate internet governance principles and roadmap for the future evolution of its ecosystem.
A meeting of all stakeholders will take place in Sao Paulo in Brazil on April 23 and 24, and will be live webcast, enabling remote participation.
The draft agreement submitted to the high-level multi-stakeholders committee (HLMC) reveals that focus would be on formulating principles for internet surveillance and international cyber weapons treaty.
“It is necessary to pursue international agreements on topics such as jurisdiction and law enforcement assistance to promote cyber security and prevent cybercrime. Discussions about those frameworks should be held in a multi-stakeholder manner. International agreements should include measures of restraining cyber weapons development and deployment,” the draft document, inviting comments from stakeholders, said.
Besides India, South Africa, South Korea, Argentina, Brazil, France, Ghana, Germany, Indonesia, Tunisia, Turkey and the US are ministerial representatives of the HLMC.
In the wake of mass surveillance by the US intelligence agencies, countries such as Brazil and Germany had opposed arbitrary snooping. The document said such surveillance undermined the trust in the internet and governance ecosystem.
The new regime also proposes to remove the US hegemony over the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) by September 2015. ICANN, based in Los Angeles, is responsible for issuing domain names and internet protocol addresses.
The draft agreement suggests globalisation of ICANN, to bring accountability mechanism that satisfies stakeholders’ requirements.
“The relevant, balanced and active representation from all regions and stakeholders in the ICANN structure is a key issue in the process of a successful globalisation,” the draft agreement read.