International Telecommunication Union

The International Telecommunication Unionⁱ, ITU describes itself as “the leading United Nations agency for information and communication technologies.” ITU membership is held by national governmentⁱs, but private sector organisations (and perhaps others; there is some ambiguity) can become “sector members” in one or more of the ITU’s three core sectors bureaus: radiocommunication, standardisation and development. It is based in Geneva, Switzerland, and its membership includes 192 member stateⁱs and more than 700 sector members.

Between 2003 and 2005, the ITU was the lead agency for the World Summit on the Information Societyⁱ. The WSIS Stocktaking Process is a follow-up to WSIS, initiated in 2004. Its purpose is to provide a register of activities carried out by governments, international organizations, the business sector, civil society and other entities, in order to highlight the progress made since that landmark event. ITU has been maintaining the WSIS Stocktaking database as a publicly accessible system providing information on ICTⁱ-related initiatives and projects with reference to the 11 WSIS Action Lines.