Category: Newsletter

\When U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping meet this week, AI security is likely to be a topic of focus, with officials from the respective nations “spooked by the increasing cyber capabilities of AI models,” says director of the Wadhwani AI Center at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Aalok Mehta. However, experts see a genuine slowdown agreement as unlikely given their rivalry, Kai Nicol-Schwarz reports for CNBC.

More than 600 youth gathered in New York City for the Youth and AI Summit on International Youth Day this month, presenting a Youth-led Declaration on AI Policy and Governancemeant to help shape the UN’s Global Digital Compact. Assistant Secretary-General for Youth Affairs Felipe Paullier stressed that “meaningful youth participation is not about being consulted in a tokenistic way at the end of a process. It’s about involving them at the beginning.”

The second Tech Diplomacy Global Forum concluded July 2 at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, convening Ministers, Ambassadors, senior officials, technology leaders, and scholars from across the globe under the theme “Tech Diplomacy as Statecraft: Building Trust in a Fragmented Era.”

Martin Rauchbauer, Austria’s first Tech Ambassador to Silicon Valley and Co-Director/Founder of the Tech Diplomacy Network, will speak at the Tech Diplomacy Global Forum at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris on July 2nd.

Geneva will host the UN’s first Global Dialogue on AI Governance in July, with organizers now seeking government and stakeholder representatives to facilitate discussions on topics including AI’s societal impacts, capacity-building, trustworthy systems, and human rights.

The Iran conflict is becoming a real-world test of AI-driven warfare, with the U.S. military using AI systems to select targets and speed up strike decisions, compressing decision-making timelines from days to minutes. At the same time, both sides are deploying AI in information warfare, turning the conflict into both a physical and digital battlefield. Analysts say this marks an early shift toward faster, more automated wars, but raises major concerns about reduced human oversight and accountability, Rafi Schwartz reports for The Week.
UNESCO and UNDP are rolling out a global training initiative to help governments build rights-based data governance systems as a foundation for AI. The program brings policymakers from across Africa and Asia to turn high-level principles into practical frameworks for managing data in areas like health, digital identity, and social services. 

The Tech Diplomacy Network was honored to co-present the third annual Tech Diplomacy Award alongside Keith Strier Streit, SVP, Global AI Markets at AMD, to Her Excellency, Deemah AlYahya, Founding-General Secretary of the Digital Cooperation Organization (DCO). Her relentless commitment to expanding access to the benefits of digital technology and AI for people around the world is exactly the spirit this award was created to celebrate. A special thank you to Her Excellency for joining us for a fireside chat diving into the origins and impact of the DCO.

Tech Diplomacy News: 3rd Annual Technology Diplomacy Award Announced

We are pleased to announce that Tech Diplomacy Network’s Co-Director and Founder Martin Rauchbauer, and CEO Christina Steinbrecher-Pfandt, have been recognized amongst the world’s 50 most influential leaders in tech diplomacy by the Tech Diplomacy Global Institute. This group of individuals advances policy, digital governance, and international cooperation, and encompasses ministers, ambassadors, civil society leaders, UN officials, and more across five continents.

The G7 Industry, Digital, and Technology Ministers agreed on a broad agenda to boost economic growth and security through AI, quantum technologies, and more resilient digital supply chains after meeting under Canada’s presidency this month. The G7 emphasized a human-centric approach to AI, with new tools to help small and medium-sized enterprises adopt the technology responsibly while building trust through voluntary frameworks and international cooperation.