The UN Internet Governance Forum will be held June 22-27 in Olso, Norway. The Program Committee for the conference, known as the Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG), released its selection of workshops for the 2025 IGF. The number of workshops was more limited than ever this year, with over 400 applications vying for about 40 slots.
We used AI to analyze what was accepted and what was rejected. The results are interesting.
In: UN process
The most notable finding is that the MAG heavily favored proposals dealing with United Nations process. It accepted a disproportionate number of proposals related to the future of IGF, the future of the World Summit on the Information Society process, and the Global Digital Compact. Seventy percent (70%) of the accepted sessions involved pitches about these things. Only 39% of the rejected proposals dealt with UN process issues — signaling what the MAG saw as strategic priorities. Many of those proposals were put forward by people on the MAG or affiliated with I* institutions.
Out: Digital Conflict
The data also shows that the MAG deliberately avoided sessions discussing the geopolitical controversies that are making dramatic changes in Internet governance. The dataset of 360 rejected workshop proposals contains 52 sessions that dealt explicitly with three areas of digital conflict:
- US‑China geopolitical competition in the digital sector
- State‑directed content censorship
- Trans‑Atlantic (US‑EU) regulatory or trade frictions.
None of the 52 proposals in these three categories were accepted for IGF 2025. This is of concern to us because those conflicts are in fact the main drivers of Internet governance today. Tables for each area follow.
1. US‑China conflict (tech‑decoupling, security & governance)
| Proposal ID & title | Evident angle | Illustrative excerpt |
| WS #111 “Geopolitical Barriers to AI Development” | Frames the “AI race” as a US‑China rivalry that distorts global R&D cooperation. | “…the US–China tech war shapes perceptions of AI progress and blocks cooperative governance pathways.” |
| WS #359 “Role of the Global South in AI Warfare” | Examines export‑control regimes and compute embargoes driven by Washington‑Beijing tensions. | “…export‑licensing for GPUs, chip sanctions and their spill‑overs on non‑aligned states.” |
| WS #405 “DeepSeek and the Straw‑Man Fallacy” | Uses a Chinese LLM roll‑out to critique Western narratives of Chinese AI capability. | “…deepseek incident offers a fresh perspective on China’s AI after years of US–China tech conflict…” |
| WS #392 “LEO Satellites, Global Connectivity and Sustainability” | Analyses spectrum and orbital‑slot battles among Starlink, OneWeb, GuoWang, etc. | “…U.S.–China rivalry in LEO mega constellations threatens ITU coordination norms.” |
| WS #88 “WSIS+20 & the IANA Transition: Are we done yet?” | Argues that IANA transition ended calls for ‘sovereign’ Internet governance | “…allow both external critics of ICANN’s governance model and internal participants and supporters of its process to come to a common understanding of what the transition achieved” |
Count: 6 proposals contain both “China” and explicit references to the United States, tech war, export controls or decoupling. Accepted list: only two workshops even mention China, and both treat it as one stakeholder among many (AI‑security panel; LLM content‑moderation), not as an explicit geopolitical clash.
2 State censorship & circumvention
| Proposal ID & title | Focus | Notes |
| WS #147 “Censorship in the Shadow: Transparency of Authority Requests” | Shadow‑banning & secret blocking orders | Case studies from Russia, Turkey, India |
| WS #274 “Anti‑Censorship, Encryption & the Free Internet” | Technical circumvention tool‑chain | Builds on Tor Pluggable Transports & MASQUE |
| WS #328 “Breaking Through Censorship with Built‑in Resilience” | New steganographic tunnelling for activists | Targets Iran & Myanmar shutdown tactics |
| WS #350 “How to Censor the Internet Better: Lessons from Asia‑Pacific” | Empirical audit of Great Firewall–style models | Contrast of China, Vietnam, Cambodia |
| WS #267 “Global Network Blocking and Human Rights” | Extraterritorial DNS/IP blocking mandates | Flags Belarus & EU’s CSAM regulation risks |
Count: 26 rejected proposals include the terms “censor”, “blocking” or “shutdowns” and analyze state content controls.
Accepted list: zero workshops with censorship or circumvention as the main theme (only tangential mentions inside broader trust or platform‑duty sessions).
3 US‑EU regulatory / trade frictions
| Proposal ID & title | Trans‑Atlantic tension surfaced | Key reference |
| WS #326 “Brussels Effect: Platform Regulation at the EU Doorsteps” | How DSA/DMA “export” rules to US platforms; risk of retaliation | “EU’s extraterritorial reach over US Big Tech.” |
| WS #296 “Costs of Internet Fragmentation” | Network‑fee mandates, data‑localisation & their cost for US–EU data flows | Economic modelling of ‘splinternet’ costs |
| WS #150 “Trustworthy & Interoperable Digital Identity Infrastructure” | Clash between EU eIDAS‑2 wallet & US federated‑ID approach | Calls eIDAS a “potential trade barrier” |
| WS #111 “Geopolitical Barriers to AI Development” | Analyses separate U S, E U and Chinese chip‑export policies | Identifies “trans‑Atlantic divergence on open AI R&D” |
| WS #334 “AI Regulation in Latin America: A Rights‑Based Strategy” | Notes that LATAM drafts must “choose between EU’s AI Act and looser U S templates” | Discusses forum‑shopping by US firms |
Count: ≈ 20 proposals mention “US‑EU”, “transatlantic”, EU DMA/DSA vs. US tech models, or trade/adequacy disputes.
Accepted list: the only session touching trans‑Atlantic relations (‘Network Fees & Net Neutrality’) frames it in global terms, not as a bilateral tension.
Overall evidence
| Fault‑line |
Proposals submitted |
Accepted workshops |
Gap |
| U S‑China tech & geopolitics |
6 |
0 |
Entirely filtered out |
| State censorship, anti‑ censorship |
26 |
0 |
Entirely filtered out |
| US‑EU trade or regulatory friction |
20 |
0 |
Entirely filtered out |
The tendency of Governments, ICANN, and the Internet Society to avoid direct engagement with policy controversies is well-known. In this case, however, avoidance behavior seems to have reached a new level. We’re not saying there should be no discussion of GDC or WSIS+20, but the MAG’s preoccupation with these obscure, not very powerful UN processes and near-total exclusion of evolving geopolitical digital governance controversies has not served the community well. How can the IGF maintain its status as the site for global governance discussions if it is unable to discuss the real conflicts and problems affecting the future of the Internet?
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