Interledger Foundation | Rapporteur for UN IGF Dynamic Coalition
UN IGF Dynamic Coalition on Digital Financial Inclusion
A deliberative space for financial access, health, and inclusion conversations
The Interledger Foundation is proud to support the activities of the United Nations Internet Governance Forum Dynamic Coalition on Digital Financial Inclusion, a multistakeholder working group bringing the needs and perspectives of historically excluded communities into the global Internet governance agenda.
About the Coalition
The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) is the United Nations’ principal space for global dialogue on how the Internet is governed. Within the IGF, Dynamic Coalitions are intersessional working groups that pursue specific policy questions. They are the IGF’s main engine of sustained analytical work, and their outputs are shared with policy and supervisory authorities worldwide.
The Dynamic Coalition on Digital Financial Inclusion (DC-DFI) was established in April 2024. It brings together independent experts from civil society, academia, industry, and the technical community to advance evidence-informed policy dialogue on the governance of digital payment infrastructure.
Four founding pillars
- Multistakeholder dialogue
The DC-DFI convenes government, civil society, technical, and private-sector voices within the IGF’s open, non-hierarchical framework. - Technical interoperability
The Dynamic Coalition is committed to payment infrastructure that is free, open source, and vendor-neutral. - Human rights at the centre
Financially excluded populations, including migrants, refugees and displaced people, and low-income communities, must not be an afterthought. Their needs shape the Dynamic Coalition’s entire agenda. - Evidence-informed positions
Policy recommendations emerge from deliberative research, expert consultation, and good faith engagement with contested questions.
The Role of the Interledger Foundation
Supporting the work. Not directing it.
The Interledger Foundation serves as rapporteur for the DC-DFI. We are the administrative home that enables the working group to operate. This means funding coordination activities, supporting travel for members to attend the annual IGF, and maintaining the infrastructure that keeps the Dynamic Coalition running.
We believe the Internet can be a genuine engine of economic opportunity for everyone. Open payment protocols like the Interledger Protocol are built on that conviction. The DC-DFI extends that belief into the Internet governance arena, ensuring that the design and regulation of digital payment infrastructure reflects the needs of those it is meant to serve.
The Interledger Foundation does not set the DC-DFI’s agenda, direct its outputs, or seek to use the Dynamic Coalition as an instrument of our institutional interests.
The Questions the Coalition is Working to Answer
Transaction fees alone cannot sustain inclusive financial infrastructure. The Coalition examines diversified business models, the economic self-interest argument for governments, and the aggregate commercial case for serving large low-income markets.
Access to a payment system is not the same as the ability to use it safely. The Coalition is exploring literacy as a regulatory obligation, a design imperative, and a metric of genuine inclusion, including the growing sophistication of fraud targeting low-literacy and elderly populations.
Drawing on public goods theory, the Coalition examines what it means for payment infrastructure to be non-rivalrous and non-excludable, and how that framing distinguishes genuinely inclusive infrastructure from commercial platforms. The role of open source software, DPI, and potential multilateral oversight mechanisms is also being debated.
The Coalition has converged on a principles-based position: digital assets should only be integrated into interoperable payment systems once they meet the same technical, consumer protection, and AML/CTFstandards applied to all other financial infrastructure.
The Coalition examines whether digital financial exclusion, particularly for migrants and undocumented populations, constitutes a violation of existing human rights norms.
Policy Blueprint for Interoperable Payment Protocols
The DC-DFI’s defining output for 2025 was a substantive policy document addressed directly to governments and regulators. Developed collaboratively over 18 months, it sets out principled recommendations for designing and governing digital payment infrastructure that is open, inclusive, and respectful of human rights.
Five recommendation areas
- Open and inclusive governance
Multistakeholder governance of payment infrastructure; transparent standard-setting; representation of underserved voices in protocol development. - Technical standardization
Modular, fit-for-purpose standards that work across devices and regulatory contexts; prevention of lock-in to closed ecosystems. - Regulatory design goals
Financial literacy obligations, multicurrency account access, protection against predatory digital lending, and AML/CFT equivalence. - Consumer-centred design
Simplified interfaces, offline capabilities, feedback loops with excluded communities, and defensive design to reduce fraud exposure. - Cross-border interoperability
Navigating jurisdiction-specific identity and compliance requirements without excluding vulnerable or unbanked populations.
Get Involved
The DC-DFI is open. So is the invitation.
The Dynamic Coalition welcomes new participants from across the Internet governance, development finance, financial services, and technology communities. You do not need to represent an organization; individual experts are the working group’s backbone.
Receive meeting notices, working documents, and announcements. Participation in the listserv is open to anyone with an interest in digital financial inclusion and Internet governance.
Annual Reports
The DC-DFI publishes an annual report documenting its activities, key discussions, and outputs in accordance with the United Nations’ requirements for intersessional Dynamic Coalitions.
A note on independence
The DC-DFI’s work products, including the Policy Blueprint for Interoperable Payment Protocols, are independently developed by the working group’s subject matter experts in their individual capacity. While the DC-DFI is recognized by the IGF Secretariat and functions within the IGF framework, adhering to its principles and code of conduct, the views and opinions expressed by the DC-DFI are independently reached and thus do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations.
Last updated: June 11, 2026