IGF-Japan 2nd Plenary Meeting / APrIGF 2012 Tokyo — In-Depth Report: Minutes Digest & 3-Line Summary

The 3-Line Summary

1. On 18–20 July 2012, Japan's JAIPA hosted the 3rd Asia Pacific Regional IGF (APrIGF 2012 Tokyo) at Aoyama Gakuin University, drawing 278 participants from 28 economies; IGF-Japan's 2nd Plenary ran as one of its sessions on 19 July.
2. The plenary asked what risks must be managed 'in an age when cloud is taken for granted', while APrIGF tackled disaster recovery, new gTLDs, free expression in Asia and IPv6 — with outcomes reported to the 7th IGF in Baku that November.
3. This was the first time Japan hosted a regional IGF: the national meeting merged into an international one, the high-water mark of Japan's internet governance engagement.

Welcome — this is the Japan IGF Support Organization. This in-depth report on IGF-Japan 2nd Plenary Meeting / APrIGF 2012 Tokyo draws on official outputs, session records and on-site reporting. In a hurry? The three lines above and the diagrams carry the gist.

Conference at a Glance (from official records)

(See the source list at the end of this article.)

Discussion Digest — from the Session Records

Key exchanges extracted from session records and transcripts.

1. APrIGF Tokyo — Japan's three days as regional host

Sessions: All 22 sessions, 18–20 July 2012, Aoyama Gakuin University

"The IGF is possibly the best example of a global multi-stakeholder forum, and we should keep it alive and ongoing, respecting its original foundations"
— Paul Wilson (APNIC Director General) [1][4]

• JAIPA hosted the 3rd APrIGF with 278 participants from 28 economies (202 domestic, 76 overseas) and a cumulative 19,762 Ustream views across three venues [1][4]
• The opening lined up AGU's president Semba, JAIPA president Takenori Watanabe, APrIGF chair Ang Peng Hwa, the UN IGF Secretariat's Chengetai Masango and MIC bureau chief Shun Sakurai, with Keio's Jun Murai delivering the keynote [1][4]
• That year the NRO doubled its annual contribution to the IGF process to USD 75,000, with APNIC framing it as a statement of support for the multistakeholder forum [1][4]

2. IGF-Japan's 2nd Plenary — interrogating risk in the cloud era

Sessions: Session C3 'IGF Japan' (19 July, 14:30–16:00, Room 3)

• Held as an APrIGF session on the theme 'What risks must we prepare for in an age when cloud is taken for granted?', examining the interconnected nature of cloud from both provider and user perspectives [2][1]
• Tsuyoshi Kinoshita moderated a panel of Sakura Internet CEO Kunihiro Tanaka, Nifty's Takaya Ueno, NEC BIGLOBE's Endo and Infosec's Takeshi Higuchi [2][1]
• Where the 1st Plenary in Kyoto had been a standalone two-day event, this year's plenary was compressed into a 90-minute session inside an international conference [2][1]

3. Disaster recovery and the internet — municipal voices and the Ishinomaki tour

Sessions: Plenary 1 and Session A1 (18 July); study tour (21–22 July)

• Sixteen months after the 2011 earthquake, officials from Tagajo, Soma and Sendai reported first-hand on municipal information policy in the disaster zone [1]
• A post-conference study tour took ten overseas participants from seven economies, plus fifteen Japanese, to Ishinomaki and Onagawa in Miyagi Prefecture [1]
• A distinctly Japanese agenda item — disasters and the internet — was elevated into a shared Asia-Pacific concern [1]

4. New gTLDs and free expression — Asia's issues converge

Sessions: 'The New gTLD Shock', 'Free Expression in Asia', Youth IGF and other sessions

• Timed with ICANN's opening of new gTLD applications, 'The New gTLD Shock' brought together JPRS's Endo, ICANN board member Sebastien Bachollet and the GNSO's Rafik Dammak [1][5]
• A Freedom House-moderated session on internet free expression in Asia heard from civil society in Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia [1][5]
• On 19 July, students from Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore ran the Youth IGF (YIGF 2012 Tokyo), continuing the regional IGF tradition of youth participation [1][5]

Three-Minute Short Talk — Your Questions Answered

Q. Was this a Japanese meeting or an international one?

A. Both. Japan's JAIPA hosted the 3rd Asia Pacific Regional IGF in Tokyo, and IGF-Japan's 2nd Plenary ran as one session inside it — a rare year when national and regional activity merged.

Q. What was most discussed?

A. Cloud risk at the plenary; disaster recovery, new gTLDs, free expression in Asia and IPv6 across APrIGF. Afterwards, overseas participants toured the tsunami-hit towns of Ishinomaki and Onagawa.

Q. What happened next?

A. The outcomes fed into the 7th IGF in Baku that November as the Asia-Pacific contribution. Japan would not host an IGF gathering of this scale again until IGF 2023 in Kyoto.

What Is Japan IGF? (for first-time readers)

Japan IGF is a National or Regional IGF Initiative (NRI), aligning local internet governance discussion with global IGF principles.

Why It Matters to You

What was discussed here becomes the baseline for national digital policy, platform rules and AI regulation worldwide within a few years. The principles confirmed at the 2012 meeting are the foundation of the "next rules" for the phones, social platforms and AI services you use every day.

Sources & References

1. APrIGF 2012 Tokyo 開催報告書（PDF） — 日本インターネットプロバイダー協会（JAIPA） (accessed 2026-07-11)
2. IGF-Japan 第2回全体会議 — 日本インターネットプロバイダー協会（JAIPA） (accessed 2026-07-11)
3. 2012 AprIGF Tokyo — 日本インターネットプロバイダー協会（JAIPA） (accessed 2026-07-11)
4. APNIC supports the regional IGF in Tokyo — APNIC (accessed 2026-07-11)
5. Events — APrIGF.Asia（歴代開催一覧） — Asia Pacific Regional IGF (accessed 2026-07-11)
6. 日本におけるインターネットガバナンス関連活動の経験と課題 — 日本ネットワークインフォメーションセンター（JPNIC） (accessed 2026-07-11)

Quotes are translated or condensed from the records listed above. Bracketed numbers [n] refer to the source list.

Related links

• IGF official (NRI list): https://www.intgovforum.org/en/content/national-and-regional-igf-initiatives
• Japan IGF: https://japanigf.jp/
• Yuki Nakazawa's blog: https://nkzw.jp/category/igf/

Revision History

Rev. 1 — published 26 September 2012, 14:00 (Article published)

Rev. 2 — updated 16 July 2026, 20:09 (Fully revised into the in-depth edition: added the 3-line summary, minutes digest, short talk, source list and diagrams (all quotes verified against the listed sources))

— 中澤祐樹