Encouraging responsible digital technology
Committed to sustainable development, the City of Geneva wants to ensure a responsible and ethical digital transition. It develops actions focussing on ethical issues, be it in terms of ecological impact, data protection or digital governance.
The public authorities must develop and share best practices with regard to sustainable and restrained use of digital technology.
By doing so, the City of Geneva wishes to prolong the service life of IT equipment, enhance recycling and re-use of obsolete equipment on the market in order to foster a virtuous circular economy. Responsibility in the field of digital technology does not, however, stop at the environmental dimension. It also involves taking the privacy and trust of the inhabitants into account in processing their personal data.
Furthermore, international Geneva plays an acknowledged in hosting numerous international organisations. It must now extend this role to the digital sphere in order to facilitate the debates and discussions on this matter, support the NGOs working in Geneva to develop critical and construction reflection around digital technology and its governance.
Examples of responsible, ecological and ethical digital technology
Geneva D-Tox day: clean your data!
"Cyber World Cleanup Day" takes place every year in March and aims to increase people’s awareness of the environmental footprint of digital technology and encourage reduced consumption of storage equipment and space while helping change data transfer habits.
As part of this movement, the City of Geneva offers its employees the chance to participate in Geneva D-Tox Day, clean your data! every year.
Because digital technology causes over 4% of global greenhouse gas emissions – a figure which could double by 2025 – participation in this day is the opportunity to clean unnecessary data stored on the internal servers of the City of Geneva, Cloud spaces, your messaging service and your own mobile phone.
Certification
To increase the residents’ trust in the cyber-administration, the City is committed to a certification approach, in particular so that data is processed in a responsible, secure and transparent manner.
4 videos about digital issues
If Geneva doubtless has a key role to play in the digital sector, it must be aware of this and communicate on the issues of the digitisation of society. A series of videos on the topics of ecology or culture in relation to the digitisation of society is available to the public:
- Episode 1: City Hall 2018 – 2019 on the topic of digital Geneva
- Episode 2: Fake news: a danger to democracy?
- Episode 3: Digital technology, an environmental paradox
In addition to these first episodes on the issues of digitisation, a fourth video addresses the topic of digital creation and innovation:
- Episode 4: Virtual reality, new creative possibilities
A year at City Hall (2018-2019) focussing on the issues of digitisation
During his year as Mayor, from 1 June 2018 to 31 May 2019, Sami Kanaan has the opportunity to make the public authorities and the general public more aware of the importance of managing the digital transition process in a reasonable manner and in line with the values of the City of Geneva, in particular within the framework of the following events:
- World Cities Day, organised by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe;
- the FIFDH, which welcome the inventor of the World Wide Web, Timothy John Berners-Lee, to its 2019 edition;
- the first digital day of the cities of the Canton of Geneva in partnership with the Union des Villes Genevoises (UVG), which resulted in all the member cities of the UVG signing the charter of digital values of the cities of the Canton of Geneva;
- Open Geneva 2019, focussing on sustainability and innovation.
#ACTMedia
Sami Kanaan also endeavoured to increase awareness among the public authorities and the general public of the difficulties facing the press. With #ACTMedia, the question of digital technology in relation to the development of media-related professions, was at the forefront of the discussions.
Increased public awareness of IT security issues
In addition to the essential measures to ensure the security of its IT systems, the City of Geneva has developed an important public awareness programme with regard to IT security issues intended for SMEs, senior citizens and young residents.
Article modifié le 11.07.2023 à 09:26