"A year ago we began the collective endeavour of enhancing and protecting this for future generations. For the first time the London Conference on Cyberspace brought together Ministers, industry leaders, the internet technical community, civil society and youth from across the world to begin a dialogue on shared principles and to set out the agenda for how to build a secure, resilient and trusted global digital environment. This week, Hungary will host a conference to drive this agenda forward 'with trust and security for freedom and prosperity'. (...)
In the last year we have made good progress: OECD policy principles have established a benchmark to preserve the fundamental openness of the Internet; the UN has begun work on norms for behaviour in cyberspace including at the Human Rights Council; the Den Haag Conference Declaration established a cross-regional coalition of countries in a Freedom Online Coalition to protect and promote freedom of expression online; the Council of Europe has driven further implementation of the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime; and there has been increasing agreement between members of the OSCE and ASEAN Regional Forum on how to develop confidence building measures to reduce the risk of unintended conflict between states.
Budapest will build on this. We will explore in more depth the free and secure use of cyberspace; the importance of capacity building for internet security; and the drivers behind the continued development of cyberspace, particularly increased prosperity and enhanced benefits to societies. We will also push the debate on how these can be maintained and improved through mechanisms which promote innovation, freedom and co-operation, but manage the threats from crime, inequalities of access and a lack of trust.