8th Annual Meeting of the Internet Governance Forum Spain (IGF Spain 2018, 10th anniversary) — In-Depth Report: Minutes Digest & 3-Line Summary

The 3-Line Summary

On 29-30 October 2018, the 8th IGF Spain annual meeting marked the forum's 10th anniversary at the SEAD auditorium in Madrid, gathering government, business, academia and civil society.
Debates covered fake news, AI ethics, cybercrime and digital democracy; a special session was also held at ICANN63 in Barcelona, the first ICANN general meeting hosted by Spain.
The state secretary's line — the Internet is a mirror of the world, and the world is not a perfect place — captured the case for governance built on trust, equality and knowledge.

Welcome — this is the Japan IGF Support Organization. This in-depth report on 8th Annual Meeting of the Internet Governance Forum Spain (IGF Spain 2018, 10th anniversary) 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)

Item	Detail
Official name	8th Annual Meeting of the Internet Governance Forum Spain (IGF Spain 2018, 10th anniversary)
Edition	8th Annual Meeting
Dates	29–30 October 2018
Venue	Auditorium of the State Secretariat for Digital Advancement (SEAD), Madrid
Theme	Regional governance themes
Participants	Over 100 participants
Sessions	7 (Seven roundtables (the archive page counts eight); a special 10th-anniversary session was also held during ICANN63 in Barcelona (20-25 October))
Host	Coordinated by Jorge Pérez; supported by UPM, Telefónica, Vodafone, Google, Orange and the ministry; opened by State Secretary for Digital Advancement Francisco Polo
Note	10th anniversary of the forum's founding in 2008

(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. Ten Years of IGF Spain — 'The Internet Is a Mirror of the World'

Sessions: Opening session (29 October, State Secretary Francisco Polo)

"While there are people, organisations and groups pursuing the dream of a better world thanks to the Internet, the network also contains fraud, lies and crime. The Internet is a mirror of the world — and the world, as we know, is not a perfect place"
— Francisco Polo (State Secretary for Digital Advancement) [1][2][3]

The meeting took stock of ten years since 2008, with an anniversary session held during ICANN63 in Barcelona — the first ICANN general meeting hosted by Spain [1][2][3]
Speakers noted Spain's advanced fibre and smartphone base while urging modernised legislation, digitalisation support for SMEs and coordinated digital taxation [1][2][3]

2. Fake News and Digital Democracy — The Decide Madrid Experiment

Sessions: Roundtable 'Digital democracy' and related sessions

Guaranteeing trustworthy information against fake news and protecting fundamental rights ran through the whole meeting [1][2]
Madrid's participation platform Decide Madrid was showcased as a working example of digital citizen participation [1][2]
Panellists urged transparency, user control over data and narrowing digital divides including the gender gap [1][2]

3. AI Ethics — Comprehensible, Ethical, Rights-Aligned AI

Sessions: Roundtable 'Are we ready for artificial intelligence?'

Panellists agreed AI must be comprehensible, ethical and aligned with human rights and the UN SDGs [1][2]
Separate roundtables declared 'blockchain is already here' and examined what technological change means for human capital [1][2]

4. Cybercrime and Teenagers — Between Myth and Reality

Sessions: Roundtables 'Cybercrime: between myth and reality' and 'Teenagers and the Internet'

Speakers sorted hype from reality in cybercrime, with the government urged to stay alert to proliferating threats [1][2]
A session asked teenagers how they live the Internet today and want it tomorrow — a forerunner of the forum's youth-participation track [1][2]

Three-Minute Short Talk — Your Questions Answered

Q. What did the meeting decide?

A. Nothing binding — but on its 10th anniversary the forum affirmed a net governed by trust, equality and knowledge, and set out the next decade's challenges from fake news to AI ethics.

Q. What made the anniversary special?

A. Spain hosted an ICANN general meeting for the first time (ICANN63 in Barcelona), which included a special IGF Spain session — national forum and global institution visibly joined up.

Q. Why does it matter?

A. Decide Madrid became a global reference for municipal digital democracy, and the AI-ethics principles debated here fed the wave of national AI strategies that followed.

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

Spain 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 2018 meeting are the foundation of the "next rules" for the phones, social platforms and AI services you use every day.