Internet universality

Internet universality is a concept and framework adopted by UNESCO in 2015 to summarize their positions on the Internet. The concept recognizes that "the Internet is much more than infrastructure and applications, it is a network of economic and social interactions and relationships, which has the potential to enable human rights, empower individuals and communities, and facilitate sustainable development. The concept is based on four principles stressing the Internet should be human rights-based, open, accessible, and based on the multistakeholder participation. These have been abbreviated as the R-O-A-M principles. Understanding the Internet in this way helps to draw together different facets of Internet development, concerned with technology and public policy, rights and development." Through the concept of Internet universality, UNESCO highlights four separate but interdependent fields of Internet policy and practice that are considered key to assess a better Internet environment: access to information and knowledge, freedom of expression, privacy, and ethical norms and behavior online. A framework named ROAM was developed by UNESCO in order to investigate and evaluate the universality of the Internet in different countries. The framework is based on four normative principles agreed on by UNESCO member states: human rights, openness, accessibility and multi-stakeholder participation, summarized in the acronym R-O-A-M. The principles represent a solid ground for UNESCO in order to create a tool to comprehend Internet governance, the Internet Universality indicators. The term was agreed on by UNESCO's General Conference in 2015 as a means to integrate UNESCO's work, in the framework of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). It is part of UNESCO's project to fulfill the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. During the 37th session of the General Conference, UNESCO Member States affirmed the principle of applicability of human rights in cyberspace.