Ethical, Legal and Societal Challenges of Cyberspace in Latin America and the Caribbean

Rio de Janeiro, 26 and 27 October 2000

The Information Society Programme (SocInfo), co-ordinated by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MCT), is invested with the purpose of articulating, co-ordinating and fostering the development and use of new communication, information and informatics (NICT) products and services, their contents and applications, in order to achieve universal access, hence, including all Brazilians within the Information Society.
Living in the Information Society, a new era where information flows at speeds and quantities that were unimaginable a few years ago, has forged a crucial dilemma: the ethical use of information in electronic environments.
Many countries and several international organisations are currently studying ways to approach this issue in the best possible way. UNESCO - the main international organisation of co-operation in the communication, information and informatics spheres - has a main objective, according to its mandate, to contribute to foster knowledge and comprehension among nations, as well as the free flow of ideas through word and images.
UNESCO has already organised two international meetings, in 1997 and 1998, convening world-wide specialists to discuss the ethical, legal and societal challenges of digital information in view of building up a consensus on the principles applicable in cyberspace.
Our challenge, in addition to promoting reflection on these and other related issues that may subsequently arise, is to guarantee the freedom in the use of electronic communication media and ensure the actual development of individuals and society.
The Ministry of Science and Technology, mindful of the relevance of this matter, has thereupon decided to grant UNESCO the support of the Information Society Programme to jointly organise this event, aimed at producing a document that gathers the position of the Latin American and Caribbean countries regarding the legal and ethical issues pertaining to the production of information.
This document will afford a contribution for UNESCO's InfoEthics 2000 Congress on the ethical, legal and societal challenges of cyberspace will be held in Paris, between November 13 and 15, 2000.

Objectives
The InfoEthics 2000 meeting to be held in Brazil, is aimed at accomplishing the following objectives:
· Defining, from the Latin America and Caribbean perspective, the main ethical issues involved in the production, dissemination, preservation, access and use of digital and multimedia information in world-wide digital networks.
· Identifying the main principles in relation to these issues that shall be presented as the Latin American and Caribbean position at the Paris Congress.
· Formulating an international co-operation strategy on these matters.

Guests:
The Governments of Latin America and the Caribbean