Enhanced membership

as a membership organisation the CTO is committed to delivering enhancing and delivering value to all its members. As such, it is the CTO’s ultimate goal, to be achieved through specific initiatives:

Development Assistance Programme

The DAP is an initiative that aims to raise funds for development activities through members, ICT partners and other financial and development institutions and donors to support members in their various objectives for ICTs. The CTO works with funding partners to secure support for the development of members’ capacity. Several CTO members have been assisted through the DAP such as assistance in the development of national cybersecurity strategies, cybercrime and cyber standards.

Member Services

The CTO responds to members’ needs in areas where the CTO has the capacity to assist, especially in technical support, capacity development and international coordination. Designed to ensure members derive the highest possible value from their membership of the CTO, assistance is provided through consultation between the CTO and member organisations.

Affiliate and Academia membership

Collaboration, knowledge and experience sharing are at the heart of the CTO’s work. Governments of Commonwealth Overseas Territories or Crown Dependencies who previously joined the CTO as ICT Sector Members will now be admitted as Affiliate Member Countries. Like current Full Member Countries, Commonwealth Overseas Territories or Crown Dependencies can join the CTO through a government department or a regulatory agency and have observer status at the CTO Council.

In recognition of the non-profit making and the funding challenge most academic institutions face, and considering also the special role of education in building information societies, universities and other tertiary academic institutions will no longer be admitted as ICT Sector Members, but rather as Academia Members. Benefits include annual membership contributions significantly below those paid by ICT Sector Members (see Units of Membership Contributions below).

A single unit of membership contribution

In order to consolidate previously separate membership financial contribution rates into a single, simpler and fairer system, the CTO introduced the annual unit of membership contribution (UMC), currently set at £25,000/year. Therefore, members annual contributions now range from £2,500 to £25,000. For more details, see How to join.