Human Rights in the Internet Engineering Task Force: Using Large Language Models and Network Analysis to Explore Norm Entrepreneurship

Integrating human rights into Internet infrastructure shapes how people exercise their rights online. Prior literature has provided qualitative evidence on how rights are (or are not) considered in technical organizations. However, few examine these processes at a large scale. We analyze a novel dataset of emails sent by Internet Engineering Task Force and Internet Research Task Force participants recorded in the IETF Mail Archive containing the term “human rights” sent between 1992 and early 2025 (n = 3,377). Emails are annotated by a large language model to indicate their position on integrating human rights. Emails are then analyzed using time series, regression, and network analysis. We find evidence of a new cohort of norm entrepreneurs emerging around 2013. Based on our analysis, it appears that these entrepreneurs had limited success in diffusing norms to the broader IETF community. Understanding informal Internet-mediated interactions can help explain policy-making outcomes in Internet governance.