What was the UN ICT Task Force?

• The ICT Task Force of the United Nations was set up by Secretary-General Kofi Annan in November 2001 to build broad-based partnerships, find the means to spread the benefits of the digital revolution in information and communication technologies and avert the prospect of a two-tiered World Information Society. The Task Force representedin its composition the public and private sectors, civil society and the scientific community, and leaders of the developing and transition economies as well as the most technologically advanced economies. The UN ICT Task Force and WSIS were two separate processes. WSIS could issue documents in the name of the global community (see para 1.1. of the Geneva Declaration: “We, the representatives of the peoples of the world….”. The ICT Task Force acted as a catalyst inside and outside the UN for ideas and partnerships for the Information Society, but lacked the democratic legitimacy of WSIS. The mandate of the ICT Task Force ended in December 2005. The Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) can be considered, to some extent, to be the successor to the ICT Task Force, but its composition is different. While the ICT Task Force was composed of a limited number of persons selected by the Secretary-General of the UN, the UN GAID is an informal and open platform for all stakeholders interested in the Information Society.