IGF 2025 Japan Pre-Meeting & Readout Session — In-Depth Report: Minutes Digest & 3-Line Summary

The 3-Line Summary

1. Japan's national IGF activity in 2025 comprised two meetings — the IGF 2025 national pre-meeting on 26 May and the IGF 2025 readout on 8 October — both hybrid at the JPNIC conference room in Uchikanda, Tokyo, and on Zoom.
2. The pre-meeting debated regulating AI-generated CSAM, illegal online casinos, and the IGF's role toward WSIS+20; the readout brought home the outcomes of IGF 2025 in Oslo (Lillestrøm) that June.
3. In the year the WSIS+20 review put the IGF's own future on the line, these two meetings show Japan's domestic community plugged directly into the global debate.

Welcome — this is the Japan IGF Support Organization. This in-depth report on IGF 2025 Japan Pre-Meeting & Readout Session 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. Generative AI and CSAM — The Blocking Debate Reignites

Sessions: Pre-meeting Session 1: CSAM Blocking and Regulating AI-Generated CSAM (26 May)

• Moderated by Toshiaki Tateishi (JAIPA / Internet Content Safety Association), the panel brought together six members including attorneys and NPO representatives [2][1]
• The established practice of CSAM blocking now collides with a new problem — CSAM created by generative AI — reopening the question of how to regulate [2][1]
• Carried over from Japan IGF 2024, the theme has become a standing item of Japan's national IGF [2][1]

2. Illegal Online Casinos — How Far Should Access Suppression Go?

Sessions: Pre-meeting Session 2: The Illegal Online-Casino Problem (26 May)

• Moderated by Toshiaki Tateishi, three panellists — a member of a government legal panel, an attorney and a JPNIC figure — took up the issue [1][2]
• Suppressing access to illegal online casinos, which became a major social issue in Japan in 2025, was weighed against secrecy of communications and the ban on censorship [1][2]
• After piracy and CSAM, this emerged as Japan's 'third blocking debate,' touching the principles of its internet [1][2]

3. WSIS+20 and the IGF's Role — An International Panel on Its Survival

Sessions: Pre-meeting Session 3: The IGF's Role toward WSIS+20 and the GDC (26 May)

• Moderated by Motohiro Kato (CFIEC / team chair), two international panellists from ICC BASIS and an Indian civil-society group joined JPNIC staff; overseas presentations were in English with machine-translated subtitles [2]
• The panel asked what role the IGF should play in the UN's WSIS+20 review and Global Digital Compact implementation, framing these as central issues for IGF 2025 in Oslo that June [2]
• Following the previous year's precedent of overseas speakers at a national meeting, the direct link between domestic debate and global processes is becoming routine [2]

4. IGF 2025 Readout — Bringing Oslo (Lillestrøm) Home

Sessions: IGF 2025 Readout Session (8 October, 14:00–17:00, JPNIC conference room + Zoom)

• Participants in IGF 2025 (Norway, 23–27 June, the 20th edition) — Motohiro Kato (MK Next), Akinori Maemura (JPNIC), Hirofumi Hotta (JPRS), Yukio Teramura (MIC) and Yuri Takamatsu (JPRS), among others — shared reports and impressions [3]
• A closing panel moderated by Akinori Maemura discussed the IGF's future and WSIS+20, on the eve of the UN General Assembly review that would decide the IGF's mandate renewal [3]
• In a year without a national meeting under the Japan IGF name, this readout sustained the domestic community's continuity [3]

Three-Minute Short Talk — Your Questions Answered

Q. Was there no 'Japan IGF' conference in 2025?

A. No national meeting under the Japan IGF name has been confirmed. The year's events were the May pre-meeting and the October readout, both hybrid at the JPNIC conference room and on Zoom.

Q. What were the biggest issues?

A. Two: domestically, how far 'blocking' should go against illegal online casinos and AI-generated CSAM; internationally, whether the WSIS+20 review would keep the IGF itself alive.

Q. Why should I care?

A. Casino-site countermeasures cut straight into secrecy of communications and internet freedom, and the fate of the IGF determines where debates on AI rules and digital policy will happen.

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 2025 meeting are the foundation of the "next rules" for the phones, social platforms and AI services you use every day.

Sources & References

1. IGF 2025国内事前会合開催のご案内 — Japan IGF（日本IGF公式サイト） (accessed 2026-07-11)
2. IGF 2025国内事前会合（プログラム詳細） — Japan IGF（日本IGF公式サイト） (accessed 2026-07-11)
3. IGF 2025報告会開催のご案内 — Japan IGF（日本IGF公式サイト） (accessed 2026-07-11)
4. IGF国内事前会合シリーズ一覧 — Japan IGF（日本IGF公式サイト） (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 May 2025, 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