The third World Internet Conference has begun in China’s eastern town of Wuzhen. The three-day conference will have over 16-hundred participants, who will discuss the future of the digital economy. A total of 16 sessions on 20 topics will be held, covering the Internet economy, innovation and international cooperation.

• This year’s conference will feature the leaders of some of the world’s top tech firms, including Alibaba, Tencent and Baidu. Foreign firms such as LinkedIn, Microsoft and Nokia will also take part.
• Foreign government officials and telecom regulators have been invited. They will brainstorm on ways to better govern cyberspace.
• Chinese President Xi Jinping called for greater cooperation among nations in developing and governing the internet, while reiterating the need to respect so-called “cyber sovereignty”.
• At an internet conference in Wuzhen, in the eastern province of Zhejiang, Xi and propaganda chief Liu Yunshan signaled a willingness to step up China’s role in global internet governance, seeking to rectify “imbalances” in the way standards across cyberspace are set.

Do you know?

• China, officially the People’s Republic of China (PRC), is a unitary sovereign state in East Asia. With a population of over 1.381 billion, it is the world’s most populous state.
• China is also the world’s largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods.
• China is a recognized nuclear weapons state and has the world’s largest standing army and second-largest defense budget.
• China is also a member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the WTO, APEC, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the BCIM and the G-20.