UN official urges action to close global digital divide

DUBAI, Oct. 15 (Xinhua) -- Digital cooperation and governance are crucial to narrowing the global digital divide, said UN Special Envoy on Technology Amandeep Singh Gill during GITEX Global, one of the world's largest technology, AI, and startup exhibitions.

According to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), an estimated 5.5 billion people were online in 2024, an increase of 227 million compared with revised figures for 2023. The ITU's Facts and Figures 2024 report showed that while global internet connectivity continues to grow, significant disparities persist, especially in low-income regions.

"We need multilateral institutions, especially the UN -- the most inclusive of them -- to approach these technologies through the lens of cooperation and solidarity," said Gill, in an interview with Xinhua on the sidelines of GITEX Global, held on Oct. 13-17 at the Dubai World Trade Centre.

Despite progress, some 2.6 billion people remained offline in 2024, accounting for 32 percent of the global population. Gill said even where people are connected, many lack meaningful access, limited by low-speed connections or inadequate devices. "On top of this, we face a data divide and an AI divide," he added.

In high-income countries, 93 percent of the population is estimated to be using the Internet, compared with only 27 percent in low-income countries. "All of Africa has less than one percent of the world's data center capacity," Gill noted. "Until recently, the continent had fewer than 1,000 GPUs or chipsets capable of training AI models."

"This divide is real and is negatively affecting how the opportunities offered by these technologies are distributed," he warned. ■