International Telecommunications Union (ITU) Working Group

UNCLAS GENEVA 000982 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ITU AORC KUNR AMGT SUBJECT: International Telecommunications Union (ITU) Working Group on Financial Regulations REF: Geneva 000825 ¶1. SUMMARY: USG maintained its positions at the Working Groups of ITU Council, which consisted of two meetings on terminology use at the ITU, two meetings on the World Summit on the Information Society (Geneva, 2003 and Tunis, 2005) (WSIS),and a meeting on financial issues. The working groups will submit reports on their activities to the ITU Council November 12-21, 2008. END SUMMARY. ¶2. The Working Groups of ITU Council consisted of a series of meetings to prepare for the meeting of the ITU Council in November ¶2008. There are five Working Groups of ITU Council comprising groups on: 1) Security Definitions & Terminology: Use in ICTs (Sept. 22-23); 2) Terminology: Use in the Constitution & Convention (Sept. 23-24); 3) WSIS: Implementation of outcomes (Sept. 25-26); 4) WSIS: Participation of stakeholders in ITU Activities (Sept. 29-30); and 5) Financial Regulations and other related Financial Management Issues (Oct. 1-2). This cable reports on meetings of the first four groups. The meeting of the fifth group was reported in reftel. WORKING GROUPS ON TERMINOLOGY ¶3. At the first meeting, on security definitions and terminology, the United States introduced its contribution stating that the United States supports the definition of Cybersecurity agreed by ITU-T Study Group 17 in ITU-T Recommendation X.1205, which is as follows: "Cybersecurity: Cybersecurity is the collection of tools, policies, security concepts, security safeguards, guidelines, risk management approaches, actions, training, best practices, assurance and technologies that can be used to protect the cyber environment and organization and user's assets. Organization and user's assets include connected computing devices, personnel, infrastructure, applications, services, telecommunications systems, and the totality of transmitted and/or stored information in the cyber environment. Cybersecurity strives to ensure the attainment and maintenance of the security properties of the organization and user's assets against relevant security risks in the cyber eQronment. The general security objectives comprise the following: availability; integrity, which may include authenticity and non-repudiation; and confidentiality." ¶4. There was no opposition to this position. The Russian Federation offered an additional proposal, which they broached at the previous meeting of the group in January. At the January meeting Russia indicated that it believed that, "in accordance with the para 36 of the WSIS Declaration of Principles and mandate of this Group (on Resolution 149) the subject of [the group's] discussion should include cybercrime, cyberterrorism and the use of ICT for purposes that are inconsistent with the objectives of maintaining international stability and security. They added that these fields should be reflected in any security-related definition discussed by the group. The Russian proposal for the September meeting included terms and definitions for information war, information weapons, international information crime, international information terrorism, and illegal use of information and telecommunications systems and information resources. The group concluded (with the exception of the Russian Federation) that those terms were outside the purpose of the Union as stipulated in Article ¶1. After discussion, Russia agreed that the definition of cybersecurity contained in X.1205 to a certain extent covers some items of its proposals. ¶5. At the end of the meeting, the Syrian chair proposed several ways of going forward with the work of the group. Two of his proposals involved including the word "security" or "cybersecurity" in the ITU Constitution and Convention (CS/CV). The other options involved either drafting an independent resolution on the definition of cybersecurity, or modifying an existing resolution. The United States stated "that the Constitution and Convention should be stable documents, and as such, we prefer other solutions, such as using Resolutions, over adding terms to the CS/CV. We believe that changing the CS/CV may cause difficulty for national administrations; however, we do support the use of accepted definitions, such as the definition of cybersecurity established by SG 17. These definitions are contextual and often "working" definitions, which make them flexible in the face of changing technologies. The United States believes that putting the SG 17 definition of cybersecurity in a Resolution is the appropriate response to Resolution 149." Canada supported this approach. The Syrian chair strongly opposed this approach because Syria hopes to revise either Article 1 of the Constitution, which indicates the mandate of the Union, or the definitions contained within the Annex to the Constitution or the Annex to the Convention. ¶6. The debate on terminology continued in the second meeting, on terminology in the CS/CV. In this meeting, the United States introduced a contribution stating that the U.S. continues to support no change to Article 1 of the CS/CV. USG believes the purposes of the Union and associated definitions, including the definition of telecommunications (CS 1012),are sufficiently broad to meet the needs of the Membership and a changing telecommunications environment. USG indicated that there are other ways to define terms in the ITU, such as in decisional elements. Japan and Iran supported the U.S. position. Russia and Syria opposed the U.S. position. Russia and Syria proposed modifications to the definition of telecommunications. Syria accused the United States of attempting to abrogate the rights of Member states to modify the Constitution and Convention. The U.S. indicated, and the Emirati Chairman agreed, that this view was incorrect, because the United States only offered its position while suggesting alternative means to define terms within the ITU. At this point no consideration is being given to adding any definitions to the CS/CV. A Draft interim report of the WG-Terminology was distributed and submitted for discussion. In the course of the debate, the final version of the report to be submitted to Council was agreed by all participants. WORKING GROUPS ON THE WORLD SUMMIT ON THE INFORMATION SOCIETY (WSIS) (Geneva, 2003 and Tunis, 2005) ¶7. At the third meeting, on WSIS Implementation, the ad hoc group on Internet matters was convened by the French chair. The French chair indicated that no contributions were received from Membership for the ad hoc group. Syria opined that the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) served no purpose, and is not helpful to developing nations, and that the ITU does not play a role at the IGF. The French chair stated that ITU plays a role at IGF, on the multi-stakeholder advisory committee, for example. Syria indicated appreciation for the work of the Chairman, while also suggesting an evaluation of the usefulness of the IGF, and of the ITU's role at the IGF. ¶8. During the regular session of the group, the Russian chair and Secretariat introduced multiple documents on WSIS implementation. Most of these documents lacked controversy. One document suggested changing the name of the WSIS Action Line meetings, or organizing the meetings differently by themes as opposed to Action Lines. Egypt, Gabon, Kenya, and Syria opposed changing aspects of the Action Line meetings. The U.S. (and the other Member states) agreed, because the Action Lines, and their related meetings, were carefully negotiated during the WSIS. ¶9. At the fourth meeting, on WSIS stocktaking, the group discussed the questionnaire on participation distributed to WSIS-accredited entities after the previous meeting in January. The group noted that the number of answers to the questionnaire sent to the Secretariat was very low, representing only 3.5 percent of Member States, less than one percent of ITU's Sector Members and Associates and less than 0.1 percent of WSIS-accredited stakeholders. The Group noted that additional contributions had been sent by Canada and the United States, and two more Sector Members, but these answers were never received by the Secretariat. ¶10. The group agreed that due to the small number of answers and lack of clarity and coherence of those answers, the relevance of the result of the consultation would be questionable; however, they decided to continue discussion on the answers given by Member States and to provide conclusions for each of the Questions. The Group also discussed the answers from Sector Members, Associates and WSIS-accredited stakeholders and had the opinion that, in most cases, the answers from Sector Members and Associates and to the lesser extent, the answers received from WSIS-accredited stakeholders, were normally consistent with the replies received from their Member States. ¶11. The Group felt that it was not yet time to discuss a draft structure of the final report to Council 2009. The Group asked the Chairman, in cooperation with the Secretariat, to present a proposal for a draft structure of the final report to be discussed at its coming meeting, to be ready one month before the meeting. The Group encouraged Member States to contribute to the next Meeting of this Group, taking into consideration the output of the Council on the Report. TICHENOR#