The Parliament and the Internet Conference - Houses of Parliament, October 15th 2009

Agenda

2009

09.00	Registration and coffee in the Attlee Suite, Portcullis House
09.20	Introduction by John Robertson MP, Joint Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Communications Group
09.30	Speech by Ed Richards, CEO, Ofcom followed by Q&A
10.00	Morning workshops - A, B, C (details below)
11.00	Break
11.10	Speech by Martha Lane Fox, the Government's Digital Inclusion Champion, followed by Q&A
11:50	Speech by The Rt. Hon Stephen Timms MP, Communications Minister
12.20	Lunch in the Attlee Suite
12:55	Feedback reports from morning workshops
13:25	Speech by Derek Wyatt MP, Joint Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Communications Group, on the Group’s Inquiry into Internet Traffic
13:40	Speech by Lesley Cowley, Chief Executive of Nominet, "Internet Governance: Protecting Wider Stakeholder Interests".
14:10	Coffee break
14:30	Afternoon workshops - D, E, F (details below)
15:30	Feedback reports from afternoon workshops
16:00	Transfer to Strangers Dining Room in the House of Commons
16:15	Drinks reception to include a speech on Internet Governance by Nick Thorne, former UK Ambassador to the United Nations Institutions in Geneva
18.00	Close

Workshop A

Britain's Road to Digital Recovery, organised by PITCOM (Parliamentary IT Committee)

Chairman: Andrew Miller MP

Speakers: Patrik Karrberg & Dr Jonathan Liebenau, LSE-Enterprise

Tony Clayton, Divisional Director, Economic Analysis, Office for National Statistics and Chair of OECD's working group on Indicators for the Information Society

Workshop B

Digital Inclusion: acting locally, acting nationally, acting globally, organised by Nominet

The challenges of digital inclusion is not just a national one: local initiatives are making a real difference to people's lives. And globally, reaching the next billion is a challenging target. This session will look at current thinking for the national agenda, draw on examples from local initiatives that have made a difference and we will look at messages to take to the next UN Internet Governance Forum in November

Chairman: Martha Lane Fox, the Government's Digital Inclusion Champion

Speakers: Rt Hon Alun Michael MP, Philip Dunne MP (tbc)

Workshop C

The 2Mbs Universal Service Commitment, organised by the Internet Services Providers' Association (ISPA UK)

One of the salient recommendations of the Digital Britain report was the creation of a 2Mbs Universal Service Commitment by 2012 to ensure that all can enjoy the benefits of being online.
This session will look at whether the target is ambitious enough, what impact it will have on the digital divide, how best to rollout universal broadband and what the long term goal for broadband infrastructure should be.
Chairman: Derek Wyatt MP, Joint-Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Communications Group
Speakers: Andrew Heaney, Director of Regulation and Strategy, TalkTalk Group
Andy Carter, Broadband Policy Lead, Department for Innovation, Business and Skills

Workshop D

Youth and the Internet Governance Forum, organised by the Information Society Alliance (EURIM) and Childnet

This interactive session will bring together young people, parliamentarians, industry and other interested stakeholders in an 'open discussion' session, broadly based around the four discussion themes of the IGF (openness, access, security and diversity).

The session will give young people who have participated in the Youth IGF project a chance to share what the Internet means to them and what their online experience is with those who are, or who play, an integral part of their online experience.
All delegates will be warmly welcomed to this session. Please send any particular questions that you would like to be considered for discussion in the session to both lucinda@childnet.com and ellen@childnet.com by Thursday 9th October. These questions will help to shape the session.

Chairman: Childnet representative (name TBC)
Speakers:
Parliamentarians: Rt Hon Alun Michael MP and Margaret Moran MP or Judy Mallaber MP
2-4 youth participants
Industry participants TBC

Workshop E
"The Final Third: Does it matter? If so, why?”, organised by the Broadband Stakeholder Group
Antony Walker, CEO of the Broadband Stakeholder Group will chair a panel discussion on this issue with contributions from the following speakers:
Andy King, Director, Industry and Public Sector, North Europe, Alcatel-Lucent
Andrew Heaney, Director of Strategy and Regulation, TalkTalk Group
Nigel Ashcroft, Director of NGA for Cornwall, Cornwall Council
Jon James, Executive Director of Broadband, Virgin Media

Workshop F

VoIP security, organised by the Internet Telephony Services Providers' Association (ITSPA)

A discussion about the security implications that VoIP roll out has for both consumers and the law enforcement agencies.

Chairman: Lord Erroll, Secretary of the All-Party Parliamentary Communications Group

Speakers: Richard Jarvis, Senior Manager, Detica

Andy Beet, APCO DCG Future Groups lead

Dan Winfield, Managing Director, Voxhub

The development of the Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) market, both in the business and residential sectors has gradually started to have some traction in the UK telecommunications market. Internet telephony providers are now offering services with more user friendly applications that have significantly higher levels of voice quality and reliability than before. With the role out of next generation networks, this trend is likely to continue as companies migrate their systems to IP.

For many years, the critics of Internet Telephony have long argued that it opens up the possibilities for numerous risks that are inherent with Internet based services. These problems can vary from Denial of Service attackers to Voice spamming (or SPIT); premium rate fraud to viruses. VoIP security stories are frequent in the tech press and the critics have long voiced their scepticism of developing VoIP networks as a replacement to the PSTN.

Equally the use of VoIP has a number of security concerns for the law enforcement agencies, in terms of serious organised crime and international terrorism. Tracing the location of VoIP calls is an issue which the industry and Government has been working on to find a viable solution.

Despite these potential problems however, businesses have been undeterred from investing in new networks, whilst in many instances; residential customers use VoIP without even knowing.

So are there genuine problems in terms of security or has this emerging technology reached a point where proper precautions can ensure people's voice communications are safe?

This seminar will look at:

1) The security risks surrounding VoIP for residential and consumers and their potential impact.

2) The response by VoIP providers in minimising the risks.

3) The security concerns for the law enforcement agencies.

4) The solutions being discussed

5) The future under next generation networks