ITA
About the Nexa Center
The Internet considered in a wide sense – and therefore including topics such as AI, Big Data, Internet of Things, Industry 4.0, online privacy, and Computer Ethics – is a powerful technology. Founded in November 2006, the Nexa Center for Internet & Society at the Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN) is an independent research center, focusing on interdisciplinary analysis of the force of the Internet, and, more generally, the technologies for the transmission, processing and storage of information, and their impact on society.
Understanding the Internet and the digital technologies, their limitations as well as their potential, is an indispensable course of action to ensure economic, scientific, cultural and social development for the years to come. The Nexa Center for Internet & Society is born from the activities of an initially informal interdisciplinary group – with expertise in technology, law and economics – that was formed in Turin in 2003 and that has since evolved conceiving, designing and implementing a number of initiatives: Creative Commons Italia (2003-present), CyberLaw Torino (2004), Harvard Internet Law Program Torino (2005), SeLiLi, free legal advice on open licenses for creators and programmers (2006-2013), COMMUNIA, the European Commission-funded thematic network of 50 partners aimed at studying the digital public domain (2007-2011), and LAPSI, the European thematic network on legal aspects of public sector information (2010-2012). The Nexa Centre also played a key role in the launch, in May 2010, of one of Europe’s first public data portals, in 2018 in drafting Italy’s White Paper on Artificial Intelligence, with AGID – the Agency for Digital Italy, and in 2025 in the study of the implications of Generative AI for copyright, with EUIPO, the European Union Intellectual Property Office.
From October 2014 to October 2016, the Nexa Center coordinated the Global Network of Internet & Society Research Centers (NoC), which supports the cooperation among the main Internet & Society research centers worldwide. Other research networks the Nexa Centre is a member of can be found at page Research networks. Since 2016, the Nexa Centre has been involved in a number of projects funded by the European Union, including DECODE (H2020), EDU-HACK (Erasmus+), and STRATEGYHACK (Erasmus+, as coordinator). The updated list of projects, with their respective descriptions, is available at page Research Projects.
The Nexa Center interacts with the European Commission, national and local governments and regulators as well as with business and other institutions – careful at preserving its academic and intellectual independence and with a special attention to the policy implications of its activities. The Trustees of the Nexa Center – which include prof. Charles Nesson, co-founder and co-director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, as well as other renowned scholars and thinkers – meet in Turin at least once a year to review the activities of the previous twelve months and to give the Nexa community (directors, staff and fellows) the benefit of their judgement regarding both past activities and the priorities for the future.