Trust, Technology & New World Tectonics

An interesting question concerning the trustworthiness of technology, or perhaps more accurately those who control it, was raised out of my last missive, ‘Is Trust The Strategic Asset Democracy is Neglecting?’ that got me thinking.

To start with let me lay that thinking out so you get the context, I am postulating that the defining currency of globalisation is no longer trade or capital, it is trust. For years, the dominant story was that technology would make the world smaller by enabling trust at distance. A developer in Edinburgh could work with a team in Seattle, a doctor in Mumbai could train with specialists in Oxford and communities could form around shared interests rather than shared flags (flags being a volatile thought avenue reflecting on recent sensitivities on the issue here in the UK). Here’s the thing, people trusted that the network itself was neutral territory, a place where geography faded and collaboration flourished.

Platforms created common experiences and a shared cultural layer. Translation tools promise to dissolve linguistic friction and are doing a pretty good job of it so far. Open-source movements became borderless nations built on contribution and reputation rather than passport and provenance. The underlying psychological shift was profound, we began to trust strangers on the basis of skills, signals and digital identity not proximity. (For more on the Digital ID debate see my pieces – ‘Is There Quiet Coercion Behind the EU’s Business Wallet ID Initiative?‘ and ‘Fragile by Design – How Social Paralysis Weakens Digital Trust’). If trade built trust between countries, the internet built trust between individuals. Even that was not instant, it has taken decades for secure protocols (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS)) to become the norm and trusted form of divining good from the questionable, if not outright bad. Looking back at the Internet and unverified website addresses, the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) world, is like looking into a trust-less era.

Yet this same network is now fragmenting under the weight of national distrust. As we enter the next globalisation or should I say de-globalisation evolution, leaving behind the failed hyper-globalised motion for a new one that will see the US and China powerplay it out as nations choose a corner or struggle to sit on the fence. The pandemic and latterly the Ukraine conflict highlighting trust challenges in access to certain goods like personal protective equipment (PPE) and energy (Russian oil and gas) supplies that flow through global supply chains. With the latest act in this play being the US restrictions on computer chip technology to China.

Digital infrastructure has become strategic infrastructure. Nations no longer assume that trust can be outsourced to global platforms or foreign supply chains. Clouds are becoming regulated the way ports once were; chips are controlled the way steel once was. Governments argue that to protect their citizens, they must reclaim trust at the sovereign level, through data residency, national security reviews, export controls and digital standards tailored to domestic values. Regulatory regional integrity backing off compliance postures is a start, but those in the know recognise the game that can be played means it cannot instil real trust.  The splinternet is not merely technical; it is a trust architecture designed around sovereignty. Technology shrinks the map, but sovereignty redraws it and trust fuels it.

Ironically, the tools that were meant to democratise trust also erode it. Unaccountable algorithmic echo chambers create micro-cultures with incompatible truths. Open networks enable disinformation as easily as collaboration. Strategic dependency on compute, models or critical infrastructure feels less like interdependence and more like leverage by hidden actors for commercial or personal gain. Nations are rediscovering that while individuals may trust networks, states trust only what they can control.

Even at the state level, multilateral organisations like the World Trade organisation (WTO) are showing flaws in delivering independent trustworthy outcomes. Just reflect on the move by the US in 2019 to block WTO appointments to its Appellate Body, which acts as a kind of Supreme Court for settling trade disputes.

Both stories are true, because trust is layered.

At the human level, technology collapses distance and builds trust between strangers. At the geopolitical level, it triggers a defensive instinct to break systems apart in pursuit of trustworthy autonomy and resilience. Culture becomes global while infrastructure becomes national and sovereign.

In a world that is both unified and divided, the real question for me is … can we build technologies and their ecosystems that we can demonstrate are worthy of our trust without demanding we surrender it?

In the absence of a neutral trust protocol for AI and cloud (in simple terms think of a HTTPS for this era), do we fill the vacuum with the uneven landscape of common regulatory governance?  The world agreed once on how to trust the web; can we do it again for the new AI age and its technologies or does the vacuum leave us with many certificates and no authority?