Big Tech as an Actor of Global Security and Geopolitical Conflicts
Big Tech as an Actor of Global Security and Geopolitical Conflicts
Salle des conseils du Centre Panthéon, Université Paris-Panthéon-Assas
CONFERENCE PROGRAM
May 2nd
10:00-10:45 - The Privatization of Covert Operations: Insights from the Research of the Citizen Lab
a keynote lecture by Ronald Deibert, Professor of Political Science, founder and Director of the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy, University of Toronto
10:45-11:15 - Coffee break @ salle des Professeurs/Salle Goullencourt
11:15-13:15 - Panel 1 - Infrastructuring the Digital World: Privatization, Power and Digital Sovereignty (Chaired by Françoise Daucé, CERCEC EHESS)
Big Tech on the World Stage: Corporate or Foreign Affairs?
Zoe Jay Hawkins (Australian National University)
Cloud Wars on the Sea Floor? Explaining Submarine Cable Investments by Big Tech Companies
Olivier Chatain (HEC Paris)
QUIC, or the battle that never was: a case of re-infrastructuring control over Internet traffic
Clément Perarnaud (Vrije Universiteit) and Francesca Musiani (Centre internet et société, CNRS)
Trust, interrupted: the infrastructural power of Chrome at the CA/B Forum
Anneroos Planqué-van Hardeveld (University of Amsterdam)
Techno-Nationalism or Techno-Internationalism? The Development Pathway and Surviving Strategy of Huawei in Europe after the 5G Technology Turbulence
Zhan Zhang (University of Nottingham Ningbo China)
13:15-14:15 - Lunch break
14:15-15:00 - Big Tech and Civil Society - Friends or Foes?
a keynote lecture by Natalia Krapiva, Esq., Senior Tech Legal Counsel, AccessNow
15:00-15:30 - Coffee break @ salle des Professeurs/Salle Goullencourt
15:30-17:30 - Panel 2 - Dealing with “Dangerous” Speech, between Surveillance and Censorship (Chaired by IRSEM)
Big tech platforms, digital transnational repression, and the globalized security risks of human rights defenders
Siena Anstis and Marcus Michaelsen (Citizen Lab, Munk School, University of Toronto)
Big Tech and Russian wartime censorship: Comparing state platform conflict dynamics of Russia’s platform bans
Mariëlle Wijermars (Maastricht University)
Security from a distance. The role of Big Techs in the fight against violent extremism in Iraq
Anne Bellon (UTC Compiègne)
The GIFCT hash-sharing database as Global Security Infrastructure
Gavin Sullivan (University of Edinburgh)
Big Tech, Algorithmic Content Moderation and the War of Terror
Valentine Crosset (Université de Genève) and Benoît Dupont (Université de Montréal)
Social Media Manipulation and Misinformation in Israel and Palestine
Nadah Feteih (Berkman Klein Center, Harvard University)
17:30-19:30 - Cocktail @ salle des Professeurs/Salle Goullencourt
May 3rd
9:30-10:15 - The New Axis of Evil? Big Tech as Diplomatic Actors
a keynote lecture by Dr. Ilan Manor, lecturer at the Department of Communications at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, and member of Oxford University’s Digital Diplomacy Research Group
10:15-10:45 - Coffee break @ Hall de la salle des Professeurs/Salle Goullencourt
10:45-12:45 - Panel 3 - The Global Geopolitics of Big Tech (Chaired by Zhao Alexandre Huang, Paris Nanterre University)
Content delivery platforms’ data storage practices’ unintended spillovers on emerging countries’ Internet resilience: the case of Pakistan
Nowmay Opalinski (GEODE, Paris 8)
Jerusalem contested: Israel, Palestine and U.S Big Tech in the Holy City
Margherita Monti (Università di Bologna) and Davide Blotta (Università di Urbino "Carlo Bo")
Normative dislocation: how Brazilian militarism was left (un)moderated throughout the Brazilian elections of 2022
Emilie V de Keulenaar (University of Groningen) and Marcelo Alves Dos Santos Junior (Pontíficia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro)
Big Tech as Spyware Regulator
Natalie Davidson (Tel Aviv University)
12:45-13:45 - Lunch break
13:45-14:30 - Mediating Operational Images : Visibilizing the ‘Invisual’ in the Ukrainian War
a keynote lecture by Anna Leander, Professor of International Relations and Political Science, Geneva Graduate Institute
14:30-15:00 - Coffee break @ Hall de la salle des Professeurs/Salle Goullencourt
15:00-17:30 - Panel 4 - Big Tech as an Actor of Contemporary Warfare (Chaired by Julien Nocetti, Advisor, digital and cyber affairs, Centre for analysis, planning and strategy (CAPS), French MFA)
Analysing the growing “infrastructural” role of platform corporations within warfare
Jasper van der Kist (University of Antwerp)
Platform Wars: Big Tech, the Power of Metaphors and the Future of Warfare
Marijn Hoijtink (University of Antwerp)
Big Tech Goes to War: Humanitarian Action in the Age of AI
Sarah W Spencer (DoveTail & University of Cambridge)
Platforms in war: A comparative analysis of the digital platforms in transnational conflicts
Matti Pohjonen and Mervi K Pantti (University of Helsinki)
Big Tech goes to war: Renegotiating the role of technology companies in global cybersecurity politics
Tobias Liebetrau (University of Copenhagen) and Jeppe Jocobsen (Royal Danish Defence College)
Call for Proposals
From the war in Ukraine to geopolitical rivalries between China and the USA, and terrorism-related threats, the digital giants colloquially known as “Big Tech” corporations are increasingly involved in issues of national and international security.
Most often, their involvement stems from their services and platforms serving as new theaters of conflict in cyberspace (Singer & Brooking, 2018), as with Russian or Chinese information operations on social media during elections (Jeangène Vilmer et al., 2018; Charon & Jeangène Vilmer, 2021; Marangé & Quessard 2021); or when Donald Trump, then President of the United States, took to Twitter to threaten North Korea with nuclear war (Schwartz, 2022). In such cases, the role of Big Tech companies in conflict is an infrastructural, near invisible one, as the services they provide and govern are used as intermediaries for conflict (Musiani et al. 2016). In other cases, these firms are themselves the objects of conflict, as with the multiple bans on Huawei's 5G (Statista, 2020) and on the social network TikTok owned by Chinese conglomerate ByteDance (Chan, 2023); or Russia's designation of Meta as a "terrorist" organization in the context of the Ukraine war (Euronews, 2022). In International Relations scholarship, it is commonly assumed that private corporations act as “ambassadors” of their country of origin and that their technical innovations are prolongations of national power on the world stage (Carr, 2016; Strange, 1996; Keohane & Nye, 1998). It therefore comes as no surprise that conflict situations involving Big Tech are becoming more common with the internationalization of Chinese internet giants, signaling the emergence of non-American Big Tech. Meanwhile, tech giants’ political power is increasingly recognized by the traditional actors of international affairs, with multiple states naming “tech ambassadors”. Finally, Big Tech companies are increasingly becoming actors of global security in their own right, by “co-producing” security alongside public authorities (Bellanova & de Goede, 2022) and even in some cases launching their own initiatives, such as Microsoft’s Digital Geneva Convention, or YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Microsoft’s launch of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) in 2017.
While it is not unprecedented for private companies to be involved in security issues, policymaking and enforcement (Abrahamsen & Leander, 2016), and especially so in cyberspace (Dunn Cavelty, 2016), the variety and importance of current ties between digital giants, security and conflict seems to indicate a general trend towards the privatization of security through these (quasi-) global players. Due to their scale and economic clout, Big Tech companies profit from a particular form of “entrepreneurial private authority” (Srivastava, 2021) or “platform power” (Culpepper & Thelen, 2020). In practice, this notably means a privileged access to public authorities and international fora, and the ability to impose standards ("best practices", definitions, processes), as well as to form coalitions to defend their interests. As its central position in the digital industry and economy is being translated into a centrality in security-related policy areas, Big Tech can leverage its integration within security governance networks and geopolitical rivalries to fend off threats of antitrust action (Woll, 2019), thereby consolidating its market power and becoming further integrated into high politics, raising multiple concerns in terms of legitimacy, accountability, and sovereignty (Monsees et al., 2023).
Such developments invite us to look beyond the instrumental study of Big Tech platforms, services and technologies, and to turn our attention to the agency of these actors in global security and geopolitical conflicts. With this in mind, the aim of this conference is to initiate a holistic discussion on the diversity of the security roles played by these companies, how they “learn to see the world through a security lens” (de Goede, 2018:26) and their relationship to traditional security networks. A number of disciplinary perspectives and fields of study are relevant to this theme, and the goal is to bring together their respective contributions. This conference will be of relevance for, and expects contributions from, a range of disciplines including but not limited to international relations, political science, media studies, security studies, science and technology studies and political economy.
1.Big Tech in transnational conflicts and social movements
2.Big Tech and everyday “trust and safety”
3.Big Tech and digital sovereignty
4.Big Tech and its relations to traditional security actors
Organizing Committee
Marguerite Borelli (Carism, Université Paris-Panthéon-Assas)
Ksenia Ermoshina (Centre Internet et Société, CNRS)
Francesca Musiani (Centre Internet et Société, CNRS)
Gulnara Zakharova (Carism, Université Paris-Panthéon-Assas)
