Values of Internet Technologies workshop series

VIT ‒ Values of Internet Technologies

A workshop series by ISOC-CH and p≡p foundation

Digital technologies are neither neutral, nor impact-free in our society. This series of six workshops represents a platform for discussions and hands-on training to privacy, anonymity and security online. Concrete tech approaches will be presented and analyzed against bigger socio-political implications and the broader picture for each topic, with insights into current and upcoming Free and Open Source Software (FOSS). Expert speakers and experienced trainers will propose scenarios and working solutions for policy as well as tech approaches to adopt privacy, respect anonymity and enhance security.

Among the issues under investigation are the digital societal values and the technological specifications that can respond to the needs of modern society. Among the cross-cutting issues to be addressed, the workshops will look at the structure of new developments, e.g. how well are they able to interoperate, do they support federated development, are they decentralized, can they be used easily? The workshops will also examine how to strengthen Human Rights using certain technological approaches. The solutions proposed will draw on a wide range of expertise and will not rely on any single central infrastructure that users must adopt. Each workshop covers a different subject which we find important for how to design, implement and deploy current and future digital developments.

The workshops are organized by Internet Society Switzerland (ISOC-CH) and p≡p foundation in the framework of the project entitled ‘Implementing Privacy via Mass Encryption’.

The workshops are open to policy-makers, technologists, researchers, programmers, activists, students and interested users. The agenda for the workshops will be prepared in close alignment with the demand-side, meaning that we need your presence and input! For us this workshop series is a precious opportunity to hear from you, answer your questions and get feedback from you, our audience, in terms of migration strategies for organizations, ease of use, ideas for specific features or other challenges that a resilient and future-proof free and open source tech development can meet.

Preliminary outline of all six workshops

1. Setting the scene for a digital future: What’s important and how can it be achieved?
   25th of Jan 2018
2. p≡p’s Internet-drafts and its implementations for digital communication technologies.
   27th April 2018
3. Human Rights and present / future ICT ‒ Why and how are they related?
   11th September 2018
4. How can digitalization mitigate current challenges of humanity?
   12. December 2018
5. Migration towards new and responsible IT ‒ Pathways for enterprises and public organizations.
   21. March 2019, Welle 7, Bern
6. “A network of networks” ‒ What are the most important requirements for spreading diverse and Human Rights-solid free and open source digital communication?
   19. June 2019, University of Zurich

Watch out for announcements on our website and on: https://pep.foundation/blog (@pEpFoundation). You can find us on Twitter at @ISOCSwitzerland.

Please find more information about the upcoming workshops on: https://www.isoc.ch/events

The p≡p Foundation advocates Privacy. p≡p stands for pretty Easy privacy (p≡p or pEp): We arethoroughly easing the use of end-to-end cryptographic tools for written digital communication channels (like email with OpenPGP-compliant encryption or messaging with OTR/XMPP). Ultimately, p≡p wants to change the default in written digital communications to encrypted, verifiedand anonymized. p≡p innovates on multiple fronts: It makes digital privacy easy – and empowers the user to have privacy on a Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) basis. We are a non-profit, tax-free foundation based in Switzerland and own p≡p project’s core code (the p≡p engine and the adapters / bindings for different programming languages). We develop independent code, support FOSS projects, finance and coordinate code audits and are engaged in political work. More information about the VIT series of workshops can be found here.

Contact: Dr. Nana Karlstetter, nana.karlstetter@pep.foundation (PGP: 1345 A283 3DA8 6944 0CD5 2CC0 6621 EC3D 2CE4 883E), https://pep.foundation/

Internet Society Switzerland (ISOC-CH), primarily a technologically oriented body, is dedicated to promoting, researching and developing the evolution of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in Switzerland. It is open to multi-stakeholder membership and is abiding by open, democratic and consensus based principles. It represents its members’ interest on public policy issues and provides technically-grounded advice on the impact of policy on the Internet generally. ISOC-CH also participates in the evolution and development of the Internet in a regional and an international collaboration context.

Contact: Dr. Roxana Radu, chair@new.isoc.ch, https://www.isoc.ch/

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