Challenges in digital space

In Asia, no economic or business sector is as vibrant or commands more attention of policymakers as the digital sphere. This trend is well documented in a landmark study by United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)'s first annual Digital Economy Report. The timely study was released earlier this month as countries across Asia grapple with a complex digital future. Digital technologies help cut costs, enable delivery of services without leakages, reduce opportunities for graft, promote ease of doing business, leverage an increasingly non-tactile world, grow economies, have the potential to create millions of new jobs and, it appears, even help fight fake news. On the flip side, there are concerns of the cost of the emerging digital economy in terms of loss of traditional employment sectors, eroding the right to privacy, abetting authoritarian statecontrol of citizens' lives, causing a spike in cybercrimes and, according to some, promoting a deracinated, atomised existence for human beings.