The United Nations has launched for the first time the “Global Principles for Information Integrity” with the aim of promoting good practices in the field of public information and combating hate speech, misinformation and disinformation.
The document, drafted – inter alia – in cooperation with UNESCO and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, addresses specific recommendations to States, technology companies, AI actors, advertising companies and other private sector entities, specialised news media, researchers and civil society, and ultimately to the UN itself.
There are five UN Global Principles: societal trust and resilience; healthy incentives; public empowerment; independent, free and pluralistic media; transparency and research.
The recommendations included in the document are, for example, to protect users’ security and privacy and to protect minors, in particular, as early as the design of computer applications and Internet pages; to establish and implement robust procedures on permissible advertising content; to clearly label content generated with Artificial Intelligence; and to define effective policies for the ethical use of AI.
Further recommendations are addressed to fact-checking networks and bodies, such as declaring their sources of funding, or to political actors in elections.
The United Nations, which will redouble its efforts to strengthen information integrity globally, calls on all players in the field to support the Global Principles and actively publicise them.
