Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

IGF meet from tomorrow

HYDERABAD: Internet Governance Forum (IGF), with about 1,500 participants from 100 countries, will begin its brainstorming on several critical issues like reaching out to the next billion, promoting cyber security, and managing critical Internet resources, will begin here on Wednesday.

Addressing a press conference here on Monday, Under Secretary-General of United Nations, the chief nodal agency for the conduct of IGF, said that the Hyderabad edition was the third in series after Athens in 2006 and Rio De Janeiro in 2007.

“Internet for all” was the main theme, as providing access to all was the main objective. He said that the Internet was dominated by English, while people speaking many other languages would have to get access to it. India had 22 languages and Internet should reach out to all those.

Internet had to be a marvellous tool for the physically-challenged people as it would provide confidence for them. Key Internet resources like internet protocol (IP) addresses, domain names – which were four billion now – would have to be moved from IP version 4 to IP version 6 to accommodate much more, including route servers, technical standards, and telecom infrastructure.

The IGF might not come up with any declaration, but it would make efforts to ensure e-readiness of the world, particularly the developing world.

The forum would provide a platform for ‘dynamic coalitions’ – partnerships between different stakeholders.

Ravi Shankar, Joint Secretary of IT and Communication of Government of India, said that 10,000 institutions of higher learning in the country would be networked with 1 GB high-speed bandwidth as part of National Knowledge Network. The government was trying to roll out one lakh common service centres by 2009-end.

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