28 July 2025 – Wellington/Singapore – As part of New Zealand’s Netsafety Week 2025, the AI Asia Pacific Institute (AIAPI), in collaboration with Netsafe, hosted a timely webinar exploring the evolving intersection of AI and online safety in the Asia-Pacific region.
The session was moderated by Kelly Forbes, Executive Director of AIAPI, and featured insights from Alex Toh (AIAPI Board Advisor and Project Lead), Michael des Tombe (Netsafe), and Peter Brimble (AIAPI Board of Directors). Together, the panel examined how generative AI is reshaping the digital safety landscape.
In just a few years, these tools have moved from research labs into everyday use, Forbes noted in her opening remarks. “While they offer incredible potential for creativity and productivity, they also create new vectors for harm—from deepfakes and misinformation to cyberbullying and abuse.”
Building on last year’s joint AIAPI–Netsafe discussion paper, AI and Online Safety: Emerging Risks and Opportunities, the webinar addressed how generative AI is amplifying existing harms, especially for vulnerable populations such as children, women, and minority communities. The session also tackled recent developments—including the emergence of agentic AI—and called for more coordinated, inclusive, and forward-looking responses.
