17 What date is May?

May 17 is International Information Society Day.

From World Telecommunication Day to Information Society Day

On May 17 every year, the global telecommunications industry will celebrate its own * * * festival-World Telecommunication Day. Since 2006, this day has gained special significance. Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations, and Ustumi Yoshio, Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union jointly sent a notice to the whole world, inviting all member countries to celebrate the first World Information Society Day.

From Telecommunication Day to Information Society Day, it not only indicates that the ever-changing telecommunication technology has developed into more advanced and richer information communication technology, but also indicates that human society is striding into a new era of information society.

"ITU has been playing a driving role in connecting the world from the days when telegraphy became popular to the communication in the space age until it entered the network age." -Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations.

1844, telegraph was officially used for public communication. Some European countries have successively established the "German-Austrian Telegraph Union" and the "Western European Telegraph Union". 1865 In March, the above two organizations merged into the International Telegraph Union. On May 17 of the same year, more than 20 countries including France, Germany, Russia, Italy and Austria signed the International Telegraph Convention in Paris, France, announcing the formal establishment of the International Telegraph Union. With the wide application of telephone and radio, the International Telegraph Union changed its name to the International Telecommunication Union on 1932. The purposes of the International Telecommunication Union are: to expand and promote international cooperation in telecommunication technology; Promote the popularization of telecommunications; Coordinate the telecommunications policies of various countries.

To commemorate the founding of the International Telecommunication Union, the International Telecommunication Union designated May 17 as May 1969 World Telecommunication Day, and requested all member countries to hold commemorative activities on this day every year from June 1969. 1973, the international telecommunication union passed a resolution again. In order to make the commemorative activities more systematic, there is a theme for World Telecommunication Day every year.

Since this century, the construction of human information society has been put on the official agenda of the international community. In 2003 and 2005, the first summit with the theme of information society in human history was held in Geneva and Tunisia in two stages. It is also proposed to designate May 17 every year as World Information Society Day, which was approved by the United Nations General Assembly. The summit also reached an understanding that a truly people-oriented and knowledge-based global information society should be open, inclusive and secure.

For this reason, in 2007, the United Nations and ITU not only called on the whole world to celebrate the first World Information Society Day, but also marked it as the 38th World Telecommunication Day, with the theme of "making the global network more secure", encouraging the global telecommunications industry to build an open network infrastructure with telecom-level security, so as to lay the foundation for realizing the information society.