Global Digital Compact Endorsement

[Youth IGF in Canada]

Dear Canada Youth Internet Governance Community,

Today it came to our attention that we were listed as an organization endorsing the Global Digital Compact (GDC). We were surprised by this news as we did not endorse the GDC, and instead had signed up with our general email to receive updates, news, and engagement opportunities regarding the GDC in the future, a month or so ago.

Youth IGF Canada makes decisions by consensus from an open group of diverse, multistakeholder youth. If we were to endorse the GDC, we would ensure some form of open comment for a minimum 14-days input window, ahead of such a decision.

We have been thankful to follow conversations about GDC endorsement and implementation, such as from the Internet Society and ICANN, along with other stakeholders. We therefore are urging more organizations prior to endorsing the GDC, to deliberate this topic with their memberships and impacted stakeholder communities, to ensure a bottom-up decision regarding endorsement has been made, especially prior to WSIS+20 this year.

We apologize for any confusion our listing as an endorsing organization has made and we have contacted the responsible UN office general inquiries inbox for the GDC to remove us as an endorser.

We thank you for being part of our ever-growing community. If you have questions about the GDC and WSIS+20 Review, we will be holding community engagement sessions in the first half of this year to help address these. Keep an eye out on our newsletter and other communications channels for updates on these (virtual) future events.

All the best,

Dana Cramer

President & CEO of Youth IGF Canada