Tech Diplomacy as a Form of Statecraft?

To foster knowledge-sharing, discussion, and collaboration in understanding the digital economy, TFGI Brownbag offers a platform for exploring research, gathering feedback, and engaging diverse perspectives.

Published 26 Nov 2025
2 mins read

Topic

Cybersecurity and Cyber Resilience

Country/Region

Malaysia

In this Brownbag session, Samantha Khoo, Cybersecurity and Technology Policy Researcher at the Institute of Strategic & International Studies (ISIS) Malaysia, will present her paper on tech diplomacy as a form of statecraft.

The paper examines how Malaysia can build a coherent national approach to tech diplomacy: the strategic engagement with technology companies, standards-setting bodies, and multilateral platforms that shape the digital order. Adapting the Cyber-Diplomacy and Cybersecurity Awareness Framework (CDAF), the paper proposes an expanded CDAF-D+ model that maps seven key domains that range from internet and data governance to AI and cybersecurity. It then aligns them with Malaysia’s existing institutions. The research argues that tech diplomacy is essential for safeguarding digital sovereignty, attracting investment, and ensuring Malaysia helps shape, rather than simply inherit, the rules of the evolving digital ecosystem.

Details

Date: 12 December 2025
Time: 10:00 AM – 11:00 AM (GMT+7) / 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM (GMT +8)
Registration link here

Note: Please register before 11 December 2025.

About the speaker

Samantha Koo

Samantha Khoo is a cybersecurity and technology policy researcher at the Institute of Strategic & International Studies (ISIS) Malaysia. Her work focuses on social media regulation, cyber policy, and artificial intelligence governance, with an emphasis on their intersections with human rights and ethics. At ISIS, she has published on AI governance, online child safety, and Malaysia’s emerging approach to tech diplomacy. She holds an MA in Development Studies from the Graduate Institute Geneva and a BA in International Relations and Modern Languages (French and Spanish) from the University of Essex. She is also part of the Global Majority team at the Centre for AI and Digital Policy, where she analyses national AI strategies, reviews policy announcements, and contributes to international statements and feedback on evolving AI governance frameworks.

About TFGI Brownbags:

To foster knowledge-sharing, discussion, and collaboration in understanding the digital economy, the TFGI Brownbag Session offers a platform for exploring research, gathering feedback, and engaging diverse perspectives.

Interested to partner with us on this? Write to us at @[email protected].

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Cite this article

(2025, November 26). Tech Diplomacy as a Form of Statecraft?. Tech For Good Institute. Retrieved from https://techforgoodinstitute.org/events/past-events/tech-diplomacy-as-a-form-of-statecraft/

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Mouna Aouri

Programme Fellow

Mouna Aouri is an Institute Fellow at the Tech For Good Institute. As a social entrepreneur, impact investor, and engineer, her experience spans over two decades in the MENA region, South East Asia, and Japan. She is founder of Woomentum, a Singapore-based platform dedicated to supporting women entrepreneurs in APAC through skill development and access to growth capital through strategic collaborations with corporate entities, investors and government partners.

Dr Ming Tan

Senior Fellow & Founding Executive Director

Dr Ming Tan is Senior Fellow at the Tech for Good Institute; where she served as founding Executive Director of the non-profit focused on research and policy at the intersection of technology, society and the economy in Southeast Asia. She is concurrently a Senior Fellow at and the Centre for Governance and Sustainability at the National University of Singapore and Advisor to the Founder of the COMO Group, a Singaporean portfolio of lifestyle companies operating in 15 countries worldwide. Ming was previously Managing Director of IPOS International, part of the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore. Prior to joining the public sector, she was Head of Stewardship of the COMO Group.

Ming also serves on the boards of several private companies, Singapore’s National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre, Singapore Network Information Centre (SGNIC), and on the Digital and Technology Advisory Panel for Esplanade–Theatres on the Bay, Singapore’s national performing arts centre. Her current portfolio spans philanthropy, social impact, sustainability and innovation.