Session
Description:
How do we make sure reliable information survives in an AI-driven world? AI systems pose unprecedented existential threats to the information ecosystem. They disrupt traditional business models, amplify and create disinformation, and affect public trust in the news. As AI advances faster than most frameworks can track, two urgent problems sit at its core. The first is a media business question: platforms and AI tools increasingly act as gatekeepers to news, impacting their visibility and diverting revenue away from them. With AI, journalistic content is being trained on and retrieved in AI generated summaries in most cases without consent and compensation. Are existing copyright frameworks fit for the AI age? Is a competition-law approach more appropriate than copyright? Should AI companies simply be taxed? And crucially, how do we design compensation that serves pluralism, rather than channeling resources only to a few big legacy players? The second is epistemic and democratic: AI-augmented disinformation is gaining traction online, eroding trust in news media and citizens' ability to tell fact from fiction with the highest stakes in elections and wartime. This session will build on the policy strategies and best practices identified over a year-long workstream of the Partnership for Information and Democracy (an intergovernmental agreement between 57 states worldwide) co-chaired by the governments of Ukraine, Luxembourg, and Spain.The workstream's final policy recommendations on both issues are ready, and the aim of this session is to stress-test them with an even wider public, gathering critique on their efficacy and representativeness across diverse regulatory contexts globally. Focusing especially on the Global South perspective, the workshop will recognize and speak to structural inequalities in technology, infrastructure, and language. The outcome of the workshop’s discussions will feed directly into the final policy report to be published in 2027.
How do we make sure reliable information survives in an AI-driven world? AI systems pose unprecedented existential threats to the information ecosystem. They disrupt traditional business models, amplify and create disinformation, and affect public trust in the news. As AI advances faster than most frameworks can track, two urgent problems sit at its core. The first is a media business question: platforms and AI tools increasingly act as gatekeepers to news, impacting their visibility and diverting revenue away from them. With AI, journalistic content is being trained on and retrieved in AI generated summaries in most cases without consent and compensation. Are existing copyright frameworks fit for the AI age? Is a competition-law approach more appropriate than copyright? Should AI companies simply be taxed? And crucially, how do we design compensation that serves pluralism, rather than channeling resources only to a few big legacy players? The second is epistemic and democratic: AI-augmented disinformation is gaining traction online, eroding trust in news media and citizens' ability to tell fact from fiction with the highest stakes in elections and wartime. This session will build on the policy strategies and best practices identified over a year-long workstream of the Partnership for Information and Democracy (an intergovernmental agreement between 57 states worldwide) co-chaired by the governments of Ukraine, Luxembourg, and Spain.The workstream's final policy recommendations on both issues are ready, and the aim of this session is to stress-test them with an even wider public, gathering critique on their efficacy and representativeness across diverse regulatory contexts globally. Focusing especially on the Global South perspective, the workshop will recognize and speak to structural inequalities in technology, infrastructure, and language. The outcome of the workshop’s discussions will feed directly into the final policy report to be published in 2027.
Policy Question(s)
How do we ensure AI serves, rather than undermines access to reliable information?
What policy and legal approaches to ensure media viability and visibility in the age of AI?
How do we ensure representation and pluralism are embedded in AI governance frameworks with a diversity of topics, actors and viewpoints?
What legal measures and safeguards can we implement to counter AI-facilitated information manipulation?
Expected Outcomes
The discussions from this workshop will feed directly into the next draft of our final policy report to be published in February 2027. Participants will share how AI market and power dynamics are affecting public interest media in their own regions, helping us test our findings against a range of real-world contexts. They will also get an overview of where AI regulation against deepfakes and manipulation currently stands globally, and where the gaps remain. Speakers will include NGOs, academic experts, and government officials, to offer a mix of perspectives. We are particularly keen to hear from Global South stakeholders, whose experiences are often missing from these debates. The insights and feedback raised during the session will directly inform the next iteration of our recommendations.
Format
Classroom
Duration (minutes): 60
Format description: The classroom format is best suited for our activity as we hope to elicit maximum commentary from a large, diverse audience. Since we hope to have detailed discussions with maximum participation, we will require 60 minutes of time. This will include a 15-minute presentation by three speakers involved in the workstream, representing different regions (Europe, LATAM, South-East Asia) and backgrounds (government, civil society, and academia), covering the key challenges and, more specifically, the policy strategies identified to address them; a 40-minute Q&A with the audience, guided by the moderator through prompt questions and an online poll with multiple-choice and yes/no questions for online participants; and a 5-minute wrap-up summarizing the key points of discussion and next steps. Since we prioritise geographical and organizational diversity in our policy feedback, even if they are not necessarily copyright experts, walk-in participants are encouraged to contribute via questions and comments.
Duration (minutes): 60
Format description: The classroom format is best suited for our activity as we hope to elicit maximum commentary from a large, diverse audience. Since we hope to have detailed discussions with maximum participation, we will require 60 minutes of time. This will include a 15-minute presentation by three speakers involved in the workstream, representing different regions (Europe, LATAM, South-East Asia) and backgrounds (government, civil society, and academia), covering the key challenges and, more specifically, the policy strategies identified to address them; a 40-minute Q&A with the audience, guided by the moderator through prompt questions and an online poll with multiple-choice and yes/no questions for online participants; and a 5-minute wrap-up summarizing the key points of discussion and next steps. Since we prioritise geographical and organizational diversity in our policy feedback, even if they are not necessarily copyright experts, walk-in participants are encouraged to contribute via questions and comments.
Hybrid Format: Since we prioritise a classroom set-up with a moderator, we will open the floor to question-and-answer sessions to participants online, who can then engage in a live discussion with onsite participants.
We recognise that onsite participants are uniquely advantaged, but we will share slides and any relevant materials at the beginning of the workshop.
We plan to share questions in the chat online and share online polls which participants can contribute to. Complementary tools include Mentimeter and Wooclap for online polls.
Organizer 1: Grenier Camille, Forum on Information and Democracy
Organizer 2: Emma Gruden, Forum on Information and Democracy
Organizer 3: Katharina Zuegel, Forum on Information and Democracy
Organizer 2: Emma Gruden, Forum on Information and Democracy
Organizer 3: Katharina Zuegel, Forum on Information and Democracy
Speaker 1: Lizete Nóbrega, Civil Society, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Speaker 2: Merrin Muhammed Ashraf, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 3: Luc Dockendorf, Government, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Speaker 2: Merrin Muhammed Ashraf, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 3: Luc Dockendorf, Government, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Moderator
Grenier Camille, Civil Society, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Online Moderator
Katharina Zuegel, Civil Society, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Rapporteur
Emma Gruden, Civil Society, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
What will participants gain from attending this session?
