Secretary Antony J. Blinken at the Freedom Online Coalition Ministerial Event on AI for Humanity: Charting the Global Course for Human Rights-Based Governance

SECRETARY BLINKEN: Thank you very much. As the last speaker, I'm probably the only thing standing between you and a coffee break, so - and let me just say to everyone here, welcome to High-Level Week at the UN General Assembly. As a veteran of that week - I've done it many times before - I just have three words of advice to everyone in this room: Take the subway. (Laughter.) I want to at least be helpful today.

Look, as you look at - for all of us, and for my colleagues in particular, this event - this week is full of events, and if we were to do everything that we've been invited to do, there wouldn't be enough hours in the day. So in many ways, the schedules that we do have reflect what's genuinely important to us and to the governments we represent. And so I think our presence here today is a reflection of the value that we give to this issue and to the Freedom Online Coalition.

I just want to thank, first, Ambassador Tahzib. Thank you, to you, to the Netherlands, for chairing the Freedom Online Coalition this year, for hosting all of us here today. We're also grateful to Estonia, to my friend - a leader, of course, in digital governance for serving as the chair next year.

To the fellow members of this coalition and to partners from civil society, from the United Nations, from the private sector - thank you for joining us today.

From day one, President Biden has made defending democracy at home and around the world a core priority for his administration. In the fight for our democracies in the 21st century, the frontlines are increasingly online.

Around the world, authoritarian regimes are weaponizing technology to censor, surveil, to repress their citizens. Meanwhile, citizens and civil society groups use social media and online messaging to organize, to wield smartphones to document human rights abuses, to share them with the entire world.

The United States is committed to ensuring that digital technologies enhance the rights and the privacy of our people and expand broad-based opportunity.

We're determined to work with fellow democracies to realize that goal. That's why, at the first Summit for Democracy in 2021, we pledged to reinvigorate the Freedom Online Coalition, to double down on our shared efforts to safeguard and advance a free and open internet. And that's exactly what the coalition has done.

Over the past four years, we've grown from 32 members to 41. We welcome Cabo Verde, Slovenia, and Colombia just this year, as well as Taiwan as an observer.

Together, this coalition is enhancing internet freedom and combating censorship. For example, the United States, Germany, Estonia have supported the Open Technology Fund to help millions of people acquire virtual private networks, or VPNs, and other tools to circumvent firewalls, internet shutdowns - empowering activists, journalists from Russia to Iran to Cuba.

The coalition is also taking steps to curb digital surveillance. We've worked together to define guardrails for the use of surveillance technologies by governments. We've mobilized 17 nations who are committed to countering the misuse and abuse of commercial spyware. The United States has worked to lead by example, including imposing visa restrictions and sanctions against companies and individuals who exploit these technologies.

This coalition is also exchanging lessons on how to expose, how to disrupt, how to deter disinformation. Members are working to build a more resilient global information system and to hold accountable those seeking to undermine democratic elections.

Critically, we're shaping the frameworks and the rules for the responsible development and use of artificial intelligence - technology that, perhaps more than any other, will affect the future of freedoms, online and offline.

This year, the United States - with the support of members of this coalition - helped craft and put forward a landmark UN resolution to use safe, secure, trustworthy AI to promote sustainable development. Every member-state adopted that resolution, the first at the United Nations. Hopefully this sets a framework and sets a foundation going forward for AI.

A few weeks ago, we joined fellow democracies in signing the Council of Europe's AI Convention - the world's first multilateral treaty on AI and human rights.

Today, the Freedom Online Coalition is releasing a joint statement on responsible AI practices, spelling out how governments can procure and use artificial intelligence in a way that protects rights, safety, privacy for citizens. All of us should move swiftly to implement these principles, but also encourage partners beyond the coalition to do the same thing.

So I think we can take some pride in the progress that we've made. But I think each of us knows we cannot let up. This is such a fast-moving area, that standing still means getting behind. And authoritarian regimes are determined to co-opt and abuse technology to repress their people. We have to be equally determined in our mission to defend freedom online.

We look forward on the part of the United States to continuing this vital work together in the months and years to come. We know, as with virtually everything else we do, when we're doing it together, when we join forces - and not just among governments but with the private sector, with civil society, and NGOs - there's nothing we can't get done, if we share the determination to do it and do it together.

Thank you very much for everyone's work on this. Thank you. (Applause.)

Public link

Please use the above public link if you want to share this noodl on another website.