IMFD participates in the Glion Summit of Centers, a global meeting on digital trust for research centers
September, 2024. Creating environments, protocols, and tools that make digital interactions trustworthy: this is one of the biggest challenges currently facing the world of computing and information technology. Digital trust is the main focus of the Glion Summit of Centers, held in Switzerland, which brought together leaders from 20 research centers around the world with the aim of comparing their experiences in the field, aligning their missions, and increasing their impact, as well as establishing international collaboration networks.
Aidan Hogan, director of the Department of Computer Science at the University of Chile (DCC U. Chile) and alternate director of Millennium Institute Foundational Research on Data IMFD), and Claudio Gutiérrez, DCC U. Chile academic and IMFD researcher, were invited to the meeting as the only representatives from Latin America.
"Digital trust issues are becoming increasingly relevant for those of us who work in this area. As IMFD, we have worked on different projects that have allowed us to gain experience and question the challenges that arise when we see that behind all our models and data, there are People whom our systems must respond and be useful," says Aidan Hogan.
This is the second meeting coordinated by EPFL's Center for Digital Trust (CD4T), which, in addition to its main focus, had two additional objectives: to address and understand the needs of the challenges faced by the centers, and to use the world of journalism as a concrete case study to serve as the basis for the centers' research programs.
"Addressing the idea of digital trust from an academic and research perspective allows us to establish guidelines for the creation of tools aligned with the objectives of our societies, avoiding leaving this important space, which is becoming increasingly populated, in the hands of private companies," says Claudio Gutiérrez. "Among those of us who participate, there is broad consensus on the need to promote these dialogues, create an international community on the subject, and thus pave the way for a significant collective impact," he emphasizes.
The Glion Summit hopes to fill a gap in the needs of research centers: Although there are many conferences where these topics can be addressed, this summit is the only place dedicated to internal and operational exchange. Those who participate in the Glion network must meet a series of selection requirements: they must be based at a university or technical department, have external partners, and include in their mission the development of policy and outreach activities on crucial issues of digital trust. The meeting also seeks to reflect the excellence and flourishing activities taking place in various parts of the world.
Thirteen centers participated in the first meeting (2023), and four new ones joined this year: Arizona State University's Center for Cybersecurity and Trusted Foundations (USA), the CyLab-Africa at Carnegie Mellon University Africa (Rwanda), the ACTION Institute at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the Millennium Institute Foundational Research on Data, Chile.
Participating centers
Carnegie Mellon University (USA) – CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
Carnegie Mellon University Africa (Rwanda) – CyLab-Africa
Harvard University (USA) – Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society
Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (India) – Trust Lab
Korea Advanced Institute of Science & Technology (South Korea) – Cyber Security Research Center
KTH Royal Institute of Technology (Sweden) – Center for Cyber Defense and Information Security
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA) – Internet Policy Research Initiative
Nanyang Technological University (Singapore) –Digital Trust Center
Oxford University (UK) – Responsible Technology Institute
Purdue University (USA) – Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security
Queen’s University (UK) – Belfast Center for Secure Information Technologies
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne EPFL (Switzerland) – Center for Digital Trust
Technical University of Munich (Germany)– Munich School of Politics and Public Policy
Tel Aviv University (Israel) – Blavatnik Interdisciplinary Cyber Research Center
UC Berkeley (USA) – Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity
University of California, Santa Barbara (USA) – ACTION Institute
University of Chile – Catholic University of Chile (Chile) – Millennium Institute Foundational Research on Data
University College London (UK) – Cybersecurity Center
Uppsala University (Sweden) – Research Institutes of Sweden (RISE) Cybersecurity Unit