December – The 15th Nexa Conference took place on the 15th of December 2023, at the Conference room “Luigi Ciminiera”. The main focus of this year’s symposium has been that of showcasing diverse initiatives and solutions able to envision and work towards a different digital future. Addressing the growing criticisms in regard to the current conception and utilization of digital technologies in our daily lives, ranging from social media inducing sadness and imposing incorrect behavior models to concerns about websites, apps, and "smart" objects collecting surveillance data, the main goal was that of highlighting the fact that an alternative, more ethical digital landscape is already conceivable.


July – The Nexa Center announced the new members of the Nexa community for the 2023-2024 academic year. The new members are: two Trustees, Stéphane Grumbach (Inria - Institute for Research in Digital Science and Technology) and Enrico Donaggio (Institute for Advanced Study of Aix-Marseille University); two Fellows, Ludovica Paseri (University of Turin) and Cristina Voto (University of Turin).


June – The annual Nexa Board of Trustees took place July 10 and 11 in Turin with the participation of the center's trustees and fellows in attendance and remotely. It was an important opportunity to analyze and discuss together the activities carried out by the center over the past year.

May – Presentation of the book "Law, Regulation and Governance in the Information Society: Informational Rights and Informational Wrongs" written by Roger Brownsword (King’s College London and Bournemouth University) and Maurizio Borghi, co-director of the Nexa Center.


March – Nexa Center participated in the 2023 edition of the Biennale Democrazia (Turin, 22-26 March 2023), focused on the theme "At the edge of freedom". The intent of the event was to return to the fundamental issues affecting our democratic systems, starting with freedom, which, along with equality, is the very foundation of democracy.

December – The 14th Nexa Conference took place on 2 December 2022, at the Conference room “Luigi Ciminiera”, in collaboration with MUFANT – Museo del Fantastico e della Fantascienza di Torino. This year the conference focused on “the future of digital societies”, calling for the contribution of science fiction from around the world. Science fiction has often tried to delineate potential societal futures based on technological trends, offering a critical look into the present of the complex relationship between technological innovations and humanity. Involving writers from Africa to America, from China to Italy, an attempt was made to imagine how, today and in the near future, art, identity, spirituality, affectivity, life, death and, in a single word, Humanity, can be shaped by the increasingly decisive role of digital technologies.

November – The Nexa Center participated in the 2022 edition of the Biennale Tecnologia (Turin, 10-13 November 2022), focused on the theme "Principles - Building for Generations". Ample space was dedicated to digital technologies and their relationship with society, offering a series of meetings with the participation of the co-directors and some trustees and fellows of the Nexa Center for Internet & Society of the Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN).

A new PhD student at the Nexa Center for Internet and Society has been announced: Marco Rondina, with a research project entitled 'Responsible AI: from principles to industrial practices'.
The PhD is in collaboration with ClearboxAI and is supervised by Juan Carlos De Martin and Antonio Vetrò.

September – From 1 September 2022 the Nexa Center has a new co-director: Maurizio Borghi. Prof. Borghi, full professor at the Department of Law of the University of Turin and former Trustee of the Nexa Center, joined the current co-directors, Prof. Juan Carlos De Martin (Politecnico di Torino, DAUIN) and Prof. Marco Ricolfi (University of Turin, Department of Law).

November – The 13th Nexa Conference took place on November 30, 2021, on the occasion of the 15th anniversary of the Nexa Center's formal establishment. This year the conference focused on “digital and the State”, highlighting issues such as education, the cloud and State-developed apps. In particular, the keynote and the three sessions of the day focused on relevant topics such as citizenship in the digital State, software and the State, public territorial clouds and digital infrastructure for schools and universities. The last session of the day was organized with the Centre Internet et Société (Paris) in the context of the activities of the Global Network of Internet & Society Centers.

November – The Nexa Center for Internet & Society at Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN) announces the new members of the Nexa community for the 2021-2022 academic year. The new members are: two Faculty Fellows, Giovanni Leghissa, associate professor at the Department of Philosophy and Educational Sciences at the University of Turin, and Don Luca Peyron, presbyter of the Diocese of Turin, graduated in Law and licensed in Pastoral Theology; two Fellows, Giuseppe Futia, Senior Data Scientist at GraphAware Srl and alumnus of the Nexa Center, and Francesco Ruggiero, teacher, writer and alumnus of the Nexa Center.

October – The Nexa Center participated in the 2021 edition of the Biennale Democrazia (Turin, 6-10 October 2021), focused on the theme "One planet, many worlds". Ample space was dedicated to the theme "Internet and Democracy", proposing a series of meetings with the participation of the co-directors and some trustees and fellows of the Nexa Center for Internet & Society at Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN).

June – The Nexa Center for Internet & Society at Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN) is partner of the Erasmus+ project CLIKC, which intends to experiment with an innovative way to effectively train unemployed people.

March – The Nexa Center for Internet & Society at Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN) is the coordinator of the Erasmus+ project StrategyHack – Hacking Institutional Strategy for Rapidly Deployed Digital Education, that aims to build skills for mid-level institutional leaders to accelerate the digital transformation of their areas of competence.

March – The short course “Tempi difficili - Maps to find our way out of the first pandemic of the 21st Century” (March – June 2021) was designed and promoted by the Politecnico di Torino. 11 lessons, about 45 to 60 minutes long, with experts who tried to reflect upon the pandemic from various points of view.

December – The 12th Nexa Conference (December 10-11, 2020) took place. We discussed the contribution of communication technologies to the formation of public opinion, highlighting issues such as the relationship between the so-called “traditional media” and the “new media”, the circulation of information on social platforms and the problems that can arise from practices such as “hate speech”, “politically correct” and the spread of so-called “fake news”.

November – The Nexa Center was an active partner in the organization of the Biennale Tecnologia (November 12-15, 2020), a permanent appointment proposed by the Politecnico di Torino. The initiative has proved to be a great opportunity for universities, citizens, companies, the public administration and the third sector to meet, get informed and reflect on the great challenges of an increasingly technological society.

December – The 11th Nexa Conference (December 6, 2019) took place. This year the Conference focused on the impact of digital technologies on the future of work, highlighting issues such as the relationship between workers’ rights and technological innovation, or the need to support technological training for workers of the future.

May – The Nexa Center for Internet & Society at Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN) announces three new prestigious members of its Board of Trustees. The new Nexa Trustee are Francesca Bria, expert in digital strategies; Sandra Cortesi, fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University; Ugo Pagallo, full professor of Philosophy of Law at the Department of Law, University of Turin.

March – The Nexa Center co-director Juan Carlos De Martin activated the course “Tecnologie Digitali e Società" (Digital Technologies and Society) in the context of the Master’s degree programmes in Computer Engineering and Electronic Engineering at Politecnico di Torino. The course aims at providing the students with a critical reflection on the mutual influence between society and information technologies and on the forces shaping the latter, with an interdisciplinary approach.

December – The 10th Nexa Conference (December 18, 2018) took place. We discussed the role of urban digital commons in shaping the future governance of our cities, in the context of two ongoing projects: the Digital Open Urban Twin at the Future Urban Legacy Lab, and the H2020 project DECODE.

June - This year a new Fellow, Lara Merla, Ph.D. candidate in Law and Institutions at the University of Turin, as well as a new Faculty Associate, Simone Arcagni, Associate professor at University of Palermo (Cinema and Media), will join the Nexa community. They all have already collaborated with the Nexa Center on several topics including computer vision, big data, privacy and protection of user data.


March – This first version of the AI White Paper was realesed by AgID (Agency for Digital Italy) and it was available for public consultation until March 12th 2018. The aim of this document is to analyse the impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) on our society and, specifically, how these technologies can be used by Public Administration (PA) to improve services for citizens and businesses. Nexa Center has collaborated to the writing of the White Paper.

December – The 9th annual Nexa Conference for Internet & Society (December 18, 2017) focused on the ethical and governance problems arised from the coming of the Artificial Intelligence. Several sector experts who come from the scientific and humanistic academic fields have been involved, but also businessmen, Public Administration and media professionals.

September – The Nexa Center for Internet & Society at Politecnico di Torino (DAUIN) is the coordinator of the Erasmus+ project EDU-HACK – Hacking Education through eLearning and Open Education, an education project that intends to directly address the recommendation of the European Commission on Opening Up Education to "support teachers' professional development through open online courses" (2013) by increasing the digital skills of the higher education teachers in creating innovative learning and teaching approaches and tools.

June - This year will join the Nexa Community one new Faculty Fellow, Antonio Casilli, associate professor at the Paris Institute of Technology and research fellow at the School for Advanced Studies in Social Sciences (EHESS) will join the Nexa Community, as well as three new Fellows: Lorenzo Canova, who studied Management Engineering at Politecnico di Torino, Fabio Nascimbeni, Assistant Professor at the Universidad Internacional de La Rioja and Guido Noto La Diega, tenured lecturer in law at the Northumbria University.

May – On 16 May, the Nexa Center, in collaboration with the University of Torino, organized in Brussels the round table “IOT & Circular Economy: this side of paradise” with representatives of the European Commission, industry, academia and international organizations. The program is available here.

February –Juan Carlos De Martin, co-director of the Nexa Center, completed his work on University in the digitale age which he had started in 2011 during a stay at Harvard University. The book, titled: "Università futura. Tra democrazia e bit" (Future University. Between democracy and bit), was published by Codice edizioni in February 2017 (under a Creative Commons License). The work examines the role of Universities in the light of five global challenges for the 21st century - environmental, technological, economic, geopolitical and democratic - and articulates an idea of University which is at the same time old and new.

December – The eighth annual Nexa Conference for Internet & Society (December 2, 2016) focuses on "Internet of Things: Hell ora Paradise?", comparing benefits and risks in digital technology, envisaging good or bad scenarios.

September –The 27th of September the IT and Society Lab promoted by Cini, under the supervision of Professor Juan Carlos De Martin, was presented at the House of Deputies in the presence of President Laura Boldrini. The Lab is an opportunity to enhance the understanding – wide, interdisciplinary and fundamental – of digital technology, an understanding which is strictly linked to the international debate, but which is also focused on specific problems and opportunities of the Italian context.

July – This year will join the Nexa Community one new Faculty Fellow, Enrico Donaggio, Professor of Philosophy of History at the Università degli Studi Torino, and two new Fellows: Davide Allavena, a master student of Physics at the Università di Pavia, e Antonio Langiu, a student of Computer Engineering at the Politecnico di Torino, collaborating with the Nexa Center on several topics including net neutrality, open data, privacy and reuse of user data in the context of the apps.

March – The Nexa Center Fellows Federico Morando and Alessio Melandri found Synapta, spin off of the Nexa Center that creates advanced services based on Linked Data technologies for companies and public administrations.

The Nexa Center Research Fellow Giuseppe Futia wins the "Best Tool For Multi-lingual Journalists" prize in occasion of the #newsHACK 2016 competition organized by the BBC Connected Studio and the BBC News Labs. During the hackathon Giuseppe has exploited tools that use the same technology of the TellMeFirst software.

December – The seventh annual Nexa Conference for Internet & Society (December 4, 2015) focuses on "Fedeltà e servitù digitali", featuring two keynotes by Gianmarco Veruggio and Bruce Sterling.

November – The Nexa Center is partner of Lumen, the project of the Berkman Center at the Harvard University on the network transparency.

June – The first edition of the third level course "Topics in Internet & Society Interdisciplinary Studies", organized by the Nexa Center and encompassing several Nexa Trustees as lecturers, is held at Politecnico di Torino.

Three new Fellows join the Nexa community for 2015/2016: Marco Torchiano (as Faculty Fellow), Arturo Filastò, and Alessio Melandri.

May – In collaboration with the Italian Chamber of Deputies and the Italian Senate, the Nexa Center completes and publishes the first version of a study on the use of Open Data within the Italian Parliament ("Gli open data in ambito parlamentare", in Italian).

The Nexa Center organizes the conference entitled "The legal challenges of service robotics: safety, privacy law, rights and responsibilities" at the University of Turin, linked to a research project on the law of service robots, in cooperation with Telecom Italia.

January – The Nexa Center organizes and hosts NNTools2015, a multidisciplinary workshop on network-measurement methodologies and tools applied to net neutrality.

October – On October 2, 2014 the Global Network of Interdisciplinary Internet & Society Research Centers hosts an academic symposium on “The Evolution of the Internet Governance Ecosystem” as part of an ongoing Network of Centers (NoC) events series on the future of Internet governance. In accordance with the foundational principles, the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society (HIIG) hands over the administrative leadership of the Network to the Nexa Center for Internet & Society.

July – A public consultation on the Italian translation of the 4.0 version of the Creative Commons licenses is opened. In the previous months, the Nexa Center contributed to the drafting of the 4.0 licenses - officially released November 25th, 2013 - and translated in Italian the Legal Code, in cooperation with the CC Headquarters Legal Staff.

June – The Nexa Center organizes three international seminars at the Politecnico di Torino, involving the Nexa Trustees Luciano Floridi (University of Oxford), Brett Frischmann (Yeshiva University), and Jean Claude Guédon (Université de Montréal).

May – The paper entitled "Breaking public administrations’ data silos: the case of Open-DAI, and a comparison between open data platforms" (Raimondo Iemma, Michele Osella, Federico Morando) earns the "Best Paper Award" of the International Conference for E-Democracy and Open Government 2014 (CeDEM14), Danube University Krems.

March – Simone Basso, Neubot project leader, successfully defends his doctoral thesis, becoming the first official PhD produced by the Nexa Center.

The Nexa Center presents the report "#socialUniversity", the first quantitative research on the use of social media by Italian universities, with a focus on Facebook and Twitter.

November – The fifth annual Nexa Conference for Internet & Society (November 30, 2013) focuses on "Internet & Democracy". The conference also features CCIT2013, a session reporting on the state of Creative Commons in Italy.

The Nexa Center announces that Professor Luciano Floridi (Oxford University) and Professor Maria Chiara Pievatolo (University of Pisa) have joined the Nexa Board of Trustees.

June – The Nexa Center announces that Prof. Brett Frischmann (Yeshiva University), Prof. Lucie Guibault (University of Amsterdam) and Bruce Sterling (author and journalist) have joined the Nexa Board of Trustees. The Nexa Center announces also the new Fellows for 2013 / 2014 who contribute to the activities of the Center, and two Faculty Associates: Giorgio Ventre (University of Napoli Federico II), Andrea Cairola (journalist).

April – The 1st International conference on Internet Science - Internet, Interdisciplinarity & Innovation organized in Brussels (April 10-11, 2013) under the aegis of the European Commission, by the EINS project, the FP7 European Network of Excellence in Internet Science.

March – On March 8, the Public Domain Day takes place in Turin, organized by the Library System of the Politecnico di Torino with the collaboration of the Nexa Center.

The Global Network Initiative welcomes new participant the Nexa Center for Internet & Society at Politecnico di Torino. “We’re pleased to welcome GNI’s first participant from Italy", says GNI Executive Director Susan Morgan. “The Nexa Center is a critical source of interdisciplinary research, informed by expertise in technology, law, and economics, on Internet policy from a European perspective.”

Published the source code of TellMeFirst, a tool for classifying and enriching textual documents via Linked Open Data.

December – Celebrations for the 10 Years of the Creative Commons licenses (and eight for the Italian version). Federico Morando becomes the new public lead of Creative Commons Italia.

The Nexa Center becomes part of the global Network of Internet & Society Centers (NoC), a collaborative initiative among academic institutions with a focus on interdisciplinary research on the development, social impact, policy implications, and legal issues concerning the Internet.

October – The Internet Governance Forum Italia 2012 takes place in Turin under the scientific coordination of the Nexa Center and the organizational coordination of Regione Piemonte.

September – The Nexa Center contributes to the agreement signed between the Italian Ministry of Heritage and Culture (MiBAC) and Wikimedia Italia concerning the "Wiki Loves Monuments" international photo competition that aims to make available on Wikipedia images related to the cultural heritage of a country.

May – The Nexa Center presents "Come funziona Internet", the Italian translation of "How the Internet Works," a guide to the Network published in English by European Digital Rights (EDRi), a non-profit association based in Brussels.

The series of “Nexa Lunch Seminars”, which take place the fourth Wednesday of each month starting from May 2012, is inaugurated.

April - The Nexa Center announces the new Fellows for 2012 who contribute to the activities of the Center: Mauro Alovisio, Raimondo Iemma, Monica Alessia Senor, Giuseppe Vaciago. Moreover, the Nexa center announces three new members of the Board of Trustees: Urs Gasser (Harvard University), Jean-Claude Guédon (Université de Montréal), David Post (Temple University).

Partnership agreement with the Internet & Society Lab at Keio University (Tokyo, Japan). The agreement provides for the development of joint research projects, seminars, conferences, courses as well as the exchange of researchers between the Nexa Center and the Internet & Society Lab.

March – On March 21 at the Politecnico di Torino the first lesson of the "Rivoluzione Digitale" course is held.

February – The kick-off meeting of the Open-DAI project takes place in Turin. Open-DAI (Opening Data Architectures and Infrastructures of European Public Administrations) is a project funded under the ICT Policy Support Programme as part of the Competitiveness and Innovation framework Programme (CIP) Call 2011.

On February 28, the Public Domain Day is held in Torino, organized by the Library System of the Politecnico di Torino with the collaboration of the Nexa Center.

January – The Neubot project is hosted at Measurement Lab, an open, distributed server platform on which researchers can deploy open source Internet measurement tools.

December – The third annual Nexa Conference for Internet & Society focuses on "Open Data over an Open Network". The conference also features CCIT2011, a session reporting on the state of Creative Commons in Italy.

November - Proposal for a regional law on the reuse of public data with the contribution of the Nexa Center for Internet & Society and CSIG – Centro Studi di Informatica Giuridica (Ivrea). The memo is available on the EVPSI website.

January – On January 22 the Public Domain Day takes place in Turin, organized by the Nexa Center, PolyMath project (Istituto Superiore Mario Boella) and the Accademia delle Scienze. The initiative is supported by the Politecnico di Torino and Communia.

The Nexa Center announces the new Fellows for 2011 who contribute to the activities of the Center: Alessandro Mantelero and Claudio Artusio. Moreover, the Nexa center announces a new members of the Board of Trustees: Giulio De Petra (Informatica Trentina).

December – The independent report Open Data, Open Society - a research project about openness of public data in EU local administration by Marco Fioretti states that “Currently the most interesting Open Data initiative carried on by an Italian Public Administration, that is the single project with the largest scope and one coherent vision and road-map, is the portal for open data launched in 2010 by Region Piedmont, building on already existing common regional guidelines about PSI reuse. Piedmont is the only Italian region in 2010 that is explicitly moving to adopt an open license for all their currently available data (CC0 license), enabling unrestricted re-use and dissemination by anyone, even for commercial purposes.”

The Nexa Center also supports the Italian instance of CKAN - Comprehensive Knowledge Archive Network: the first community portal attempting a collection of Italian open public datasets.

November –The second annual Nexa Conference for Internet & Society focused on freedom of expression and information online in Italy. The conference also featured CCIT2010.

The first public release of the Network Neutrality Bot (Neubot) is available online.

October – Free Culture Research Conference in Berlin, organized in collaboration with Communia, the European Network on the digital public domain.

June – Third annual Communia conference in Turin: "University and Cyberspace - Reshaping Knowledge Institutions for the Networked Age", co-organized by the Nexa Center and Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.

March – The Nexa Center, affiliated to the Politecnico di Torino, leads the European thematic network called LAPSI project (Legal Aspects of PSI). Unlike EPSI, LAPSI's goal is to find, study and overcome the current legal obstacles to PSI reuse.

November – The first annual Nexa Conference for Internet & Society presented the main research fields addressed by the Nexa Center along with experts, policy makers, professionals, enthusiasts and citizens. The conference also featured CCIT2009, a session reporting on the state of Creative Commons in Italy.

October – Free Culture Research Workshop 2009, international seminar aimed at the multidisciplinary study and promotion of emerging trends of the Internet organized by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society with the support of the Nexa Center.

June – The Nexa Center hires its first communication manager, Anna Piccitto.

A more formal and structured relationship between the Nexa Center and its Fellows is defined.

January – Public inauguration of the Nexa Center, featuring a keynote of prof. Stefano Rodotà.

December – The Center hires its first managing director, Federico Morando, and administrative and project manager, Federica Cedriano.

September – The series of “Nexa Wednesdays”, which take place the second Wednesday of each month, is inaugurated.

Andrea Bairati, Regional Ministry for University, Research and Innovation and Francesco Profumo, Rector of the Politecnico di Torino, sign a collaboration agreement.

July –Agreement with Regione Piemonte on a project on “Public Sector Information and digital archives: development of regional strategies for making information, contents and scientific results available online”. Budget: €500.000 over three years.

September – The Nexa Center becomes the coordinator of Communia, the European Thematic Network on the Digital Public Domain. Communia is one of the pillars on which the Nexa Center built its international network and reputation.

November – The Nexa Center for Internet & Society is officially founded on November 30, 2006

"Accordo di Programma Quadro Politecnico di Torino-Regione Piemonte" entitled "Internet & Society". This framework agreement provides the seed money to establish the Nexa Center.

April – Launch of the Italian Creative Commons license suite, version 2.5.

November – First annual meeting of Creative Commons Italia, featuring a keynote of Philippe Aigrain, and the first Italian Creative Commons Party.

January – The second phase of the Creative Commons Italia project begins: Juan Carlos De Martin becomes the "public lead" of Creative Commons Italia and Marco Ricolfi becomes the "legal lead".

December – Public launch of the Italian version of the Creative Commons license suite.

November – Lawrence Lessig announces in Turin the official beginning of the work to translate and adapt the Creative Commons licenses to the Italian legal system.

July – Juan Carlos De Martin and Marco Ricolfi (future founders and co-directors of the Nexa Center) meet to kick-start the working group of Creative Commons Italia. Several founding fellows of the Nexa Center will be involved in the CC Italia project, including Lorenzo Benussi, Nicola Bottero, Marco Ciurcina, Alessandro Cogo, and Massimo Travostino.