Underscoring the urgent global demand for actionable support, the
DPI Safeguards Accelerator received
279 applications across 108 countries. Crucially, 214 of those submissions represent systems already active on the ground, demonstrating that governments and partners are not starting from scratch—they are actively seeking practical frameworks, technical tools, and peer cohorts to retrofit, reinforce, and embed safeguards directly into live, operational digital public infrastructure.
To turn this unprecedented demand into sustained impact, the Initiative is channeling resources through targeted catalytic funding and partnership models. Through the
DPI Safeguards Accelerator Investment Opportunity, investors, philanthropic leaders, and development finance institutions can directly resource the institutions, technical assistance, and cross-border learning mechanisms that participating teams need to translate safeguards commitments into lasting institutional capability and trusted digital systems at scale.
Safeguards in Frontier Themes
A parallel session on national harmonization and cross-border interoperability examined how countries can connect foundational systems—such as digital identity, data exchange, and payments—across borders without sacrificing national sovereignty or centralizing sensitive data.
Rwanda’s experience, presented by Minister Paula Ingabire, highlighted how investments in trusted foundational identity, purpose-built institutions, and single-window service delivery through Irembo established the essential domestic baseline for regional cross-border initiatives, including seamless peer-to-peer mobile payments across East African borders. These domestic rails demonstrate that interoperability can only succeed when strong institutional oversight and citizen trust are architected at home before connecting across jurisdictions.
Mariana Brito, Program Director of Gov.br, spotlighted the Brazil–Uruguay bilateral integration, which enables citizens to authenticate across borders to access more than 300 government services without merging national registries or compromising data sovereignty. She emphasized that applying federated data architectures to regional challenges—such as environmental monitoring in the Amazon Basin through Brazil's Rural Environmental Registry (CAR) and the expansion of the ID-LAC initiative across 12 countries—relies fundamentally on safeguards: strict purpose limitation, data minimization, open standards to prevent vendor lock-in, and granular access controls for sensitive territorial and personal data.
Panelists emphasized that cross-border integration depends on institutional trust, mutual recognition, and treaties rather than technology alone. Today, open-source digital public goods and verifiable credentials enable seamless cross-border economic coordination while preserving full domestic data sovereignty. Crucially, participants underscored that regional frameworks like the AfCFTA Digital Trade Protocol require deep spectrum coordination, fair connectivity pricing, and regulatory alignment so that cross-border expansion does not widen existing digital divides or leave critical infrastructure exposed to uneven security standards.
Running in tandem, a dedicated DPI × AI workshop, convened by CDPI, DIAL, UNICEF, and UNDP’s AI Trust and Safety team, examined how to govern these technologies as they deploy across health, social protection, agriculture, financial inclusion, and emergency response. Across both breakout tracks, a central consensus emerged: whether systems are connecting across borders or powering automated decisions, advanced digital transformation is only as viable as the underlying trust in its infrastructure. As artificial intelligence becomes embedded into public administration, trusted DPI foundations, meaningful human oversight, inclusive access, and actionable routes for citizen redress become indispensable—with practical insights from the session directly informing the next iteration of the Universal DPI Safeguards Framework.
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