3.2 Trust and social cohesion
3.2 TRUST AND SOCIAL COHESION
The world is suffering from a “trust deficit disorder”, in the words of the UN Secretary-General addressing the UN General Assembly in 2018.140 Trust among nations and in multilateral processes has weakened as states focus more on strategic competition than common interests and behave more aggressively. Building trust, and underpinning it with clear and agreed standards, is central to the success of digital cooperation.
Digital technologies have enabled some new interactions that promote trust, notably by verifying people’s identities and allowing others to rate them.141 Although not reliable in all instances, such systems have enabled many entrepreneurs on e-commerce platforms to win the trust of consumers, and given many people on sharing platforms the confidence to invite strangers into their cars or homes.
In other ways, digital technologies are eroding trust. Lies can now spread more easily, including through algorithms which generate and promote misinformation, sowing discord and undermining confidence in political processes.142 The use of artificial intelligence to produce “deep fakes” – audio and visual content that convincingly mimics real humans – further complicates the task of telling truth from misinformation.143
Violations of privacy and security are undermining people’s trust in governments and companies. Trust between states is challenged by new ways to conduct espionage, manipulate public opinion and infiltrate critical infrastructure. While academia has traditionally nurtured international cooperation in artificial intelligence, governments are incentivised to secrecy by awareness that future breakthroughs could dramatically shift the balance of power.144
The trust deficit might in part be tackled by new technologies, such as training algorithms to identify and take down misinformation. But such solutions will pose their own issues: could we trust the accuracy and impartiality of the algorithms? Ultimately, trust needs to be built through clear standards and agreements based on mutual self-interest and values and with wide participation among all stakeholders, and mechanisms to impose costs for violations.
How can trust be promoted in the digital age?
The problem of trust came up repeatedly in written contributions to the Panel. Microsoft’s contribution stressed that an atmosphere of trust incentivises the invention of inclusive new technologies. As Latin American human rights group Derechos Digitales put it, “all participants in processes of digital cooperation must be able to share and work together freely, confident in the reliability and honesty of their counterparts”. But how can trust be promoted? We received a large number of ideas:
Articulating values and principles that govern technology development and use. Being transparent about decision-making that impacts other stakeholders, known vulnerabilities in software, and data breaches. Governments inviting participation from companies and civil society in discussions on regulation. Making real and visible efforts to obtain consent and protect data, including “security-bydesign” and “privacy-by-design” initiatives.149
Accepting oversight from a trusted third-party: for the media, this could be an organisation that fact-checks sources; for technology companies, this could be external audits of design, deployment and internal audit processes; for governments, this could be reviews by human rights forums.
Understanding the incentive structures that erode trust, and finding ways to change them: for example, requiring or pressuring social media firms to refuse to run adverts which contain disinformation, de-monetise content that contains disinformation, and clearly label sponsors of political adverts.150
Finally, digital cooperation itself can be a source of trust. In the Cold War, small pools of shared interest – non-proliferation or regional stability – allowed competitors to work together and paved the way for transparency and confidence-building measures that helped build a modicum of trust.151 Analogously, getting multiple stakeholders into a habit of cooperating on issues such as standard-setting and interoperability, addressing risks and social harm and collaborative application of digital technologies to achieve the SDGs, could allow trust to be built up gradually.
All citizens can play a role in building societal resilience against the misuse of digital technology. We all need to deepen our understanding of the political, social, cultural and economic impacts of digital technologies and what it means to use them responsibly. We encourage nations to consider how educational systems can train students to thoughtfully consider the sources and credibility of information.
There are many encouraging instances of digital cooperation being used to build individual capacities that will collectively make it harder for irresponsible use of digital technologies to erode societal trust.145 Examples drawn to the Panel’s attention by written submissions and interviews include:
- The 5Rights Foundation and British Telecom developed an initiative to help children understand how the apps and games they use make money, including techniques to keep their attention for longer.146
- The Cisco Networking Academy and United Nations Volunteers are training youth in Asia and Latin America to explore how digital technologies can enable them to become agents of social change in their communities.147
- The Digital Empowerment Foundation is working in India with WhatsApp and community leaders to stop the spread of misinformation on social media.148
Recent Comments on this Site
31st July 2021 at 6:00 pm
There have been some comments about the messages on the WS-16 mailing list rather than being logged as part of the messages procedure. The final result was a list of messages agreed by consensus.
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11th July 2021 at 5:39 pm
I suggest to rephrase more concrete: There must be a global collaborative effort in the form of dialogic regulation between governments, tech companies, and civil society to develop a solution grounded in human rights that will address disinformation and harmful content
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11th July 2021 at 5:36 pm
delete “being”
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11th July 2021 at 5:34 pm
I suggest tp rephrase a bit more concrete: Liberal approaches of governments towards online platforms at there start of the platform economy led to …
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11th July 2021 at 5:24 pm
Although I was the one who mentioned this during the session, I am not sure that we should push for frequency regulation – besides, it is very likely to be be outside our scope
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11th July 2021 at 1:12 pm
NEW WORDING PROPOSED:
One institution ALONE CANNOT solve the problem. Multistakeholder approach IS needed, TO BUILD AN HARMONIOUS SYSTEM WHERE HARD AND SOFT REGULATION MECHANISMS FIND A BALANCE WITHIN THEIR RESPECTIVE BOUNDARIES, MANDATES AND ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISMS. IN PARTICULAR Platforms have a big stake, and should be required to develop transparent self/co-regulation.
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11th July 2021 at 1:09 pm
propose to add at the end of the phrase: “Those defenses should be strengthened by media education: a field where public service broadcasters have a special role to play based on their remits.
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11th July 2021 at 1:01 pm
This legitimacy needs to arise from clear legislative frameworks in which hard regulation and soft regulations could find an equilibrium, each one with its own specific role and with clear boundaries and accountability mechanisms.
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11th July 2021 at 12:57 pm
[that will address disinformation and harmful content]
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10th July 2021 at 9:16 pm
As I mentioned during the session, I believe we should be careful with using the term ‘content moderation’ in the context of the Internet infrastructure level, as these services are typically very far removed from the actual content. I would like to suggest amending this paragraph to read: “Recent cases show that certain infrastructure providers unwillingly take action that could be argued to be content moderation by suspending services for the platforms in an ad-hoc manner without any transparent policy. But infrastructure services have limited possible options, which tend to be temporary solutions (clearing cache), overbroad reactions (limiting access) or options that open up websites to cyberattack (terminating services of particular users).”
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