Growing Up Digital:
An AI World Tour
AI isn't arriving everywhere the same way. This hour tours how it's growing up in the countries our neighbours come from, then comes home to a surprising portrait of Australia.
Figures quoted were current at their linked sources in July 2026; sentiment moves fast, so check the dates.
Nobody arrives as a blank slate
Digital worlds travel with people
When someone moves here, they bring years of experience of their home country's digital life: its platforms, its rules, its assumptions about privacy and AI. Attitudes to technology aren't just personal preferences; they're products of the systems people grew up inside.
Meeting people where they are
The Territory's classrooms, clinics and workplaces are full of colleagues, students and clients from across Asia and beyond. Knowing what digital world someone grew up in turns generic advice into guidance that actually lands; understanding, not assumption.
Is a country ready for AI, and does it want it? Different questions.
What governments and systems can do
Measured by structured assessments: laws, institutions, skills, infrastructure, data. This is what UNESCO's Readiness Assessment Methodology evaluates, country by country. It says nothing about how people feel.
What people trust and fear
Measured by surveys of ordinary people: excitement, nervousness, trust in government to regulate. This is what Pew and the Stanford AI Index track. It says nothing about whether the wiring is in place.
UNESCO's RAM: a country-scale check-up
Readiness Assessment Methodology
A structured review a government completes with UNESCO under the global Recommendation on the Ethics of AI: legislation, institutions, skills, infrastructure and data ecosystems, ending in concrete recommendations. Dozens of countries have now published one; every report is free to read on UNESCO's Global AI Ethics and Governance Observatory.
A mirror, not a medal
A RAM report is a self-examination, not a ranking; there's no leaderboard and no score to win. Read it for what a country says about its own gaps. (Separately, Oxford Insights publishes an annual Government AI Readiness Index that does rank countries; and the OECD has so far reviewed only a handful, so beware mislabelled citations.)
India · Bangladesh · Indonesia
Scale like nowhere else
Home of the world's largest digital identity system (Aadhaar) and a UNESCO readiness assessment published February 2026. Sentiment is intense both ways: 89% trust their own government to regulate AI, the highest of 25 countries Pew surveyed, yet nervousness rose 14 points in a single year, the sharpest rise recorded.
The data gap, personified
Completed its UNESCO readiness assessment in November 2025 (published in draft form), yet barely features in the big global sentiment surveys. A reminder that "global" data has holes, and they're usually the same countries every time.
The early mover
An early adopter of UNESCO's assessment (2024), a national AI strategy since 2020, and its first comprehensive data protection law only in 2022. Daily digital life runs on WhatsApp and Grab; and its public is among the world's most upbeat, with 76% trusting their government to regulate AI.
Readiness reports: UNESCO RAM via unesco.org/ethics-ai/en/ram. Sentiment: Pew Research Center, October 2025; Stanford AI Index 2026, chapter 9 (Ipsos AI Monitor data).
Vietnam · Philippines · Thailand
Assessed, but under-surveyed
Published its UNESCO readiness assessment in October 2025, one of the newest in the region; like Bangladesh, it's largely missing from the major global sentiment surveys, so its people's views go under-reported in "worldwide" headlines.
Ethics up front
Its UNESCO assessment (November 2025) was launched under the banner of "anchoring ethics in AI governance"; a deliberate framing choice, putting values ahead of infrastructure. Filipino communities are among the Territory's largest, which makes this stop personal for many Darwin workplaces.
Enthusiasm out front
UNESCO assessment published June 2025, and one of the world's most optimistic publics: in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore, more than 80% of people expect AI to profoundly change their lives within three to five years.
Readiness reports: UNESCO RAM via unesco.org/ethics-ai/en/ram. Sentiment: Stanford AI Index 2026, chapter 9 (Ipsos AI Monitor data).
"Just Google it" doesn't translate
Privacy itself is a cultural concept
"My data, my choice"
The Australian and broadly Western framing: privacy as an individual right, built on consent. You own your data and decide who gets access; the assumption behind our Privacy Act.
"Data serves the community"
Research on privacy attitudes in China, for example, often finds privacy framed through collective benefit and social harmony rather than individual control. Not wrong; differently reasoned.
"The system handles it"
In government-managed digital ecosystems, people may carry quite different assumptions about who can access their data and why; and find Australian caution genuinely puzzling.
The world is torn, not divided
The most AI-enthusiastic people aren't in the richest countries
Stanford AI Index 2026 chapter 9 (Ipsos AI Monitor); Pew Research Center, October 2025.
Asked who they trust to regulate AI, the world says: the EU, then the US, then China
Australia: anxious in the surveys, sophisticated in practice
One of the wary countries
Around half of Australians say they're more concerned than excited about AI, placing us with the US, Italy, Brazil and Greece near the top of Pew's concern table. Optimism has climbed 10 points since 2022 on Ipsos's measure, but from a low base.
One of the heaviest users
Anthropic's data tells a different story: Australians use Claude at more than four times the rate our population size would predict; seventh in the world per person. Wariness in surveys, enthusiasm at the keyboard.
How would Anthropic know?
Automated analysis at scale
The Anthropic Economic Index studies aggregated, anonymised Claude.ai conversation data (this report: a February 2026 sample) to map what AI is actually used for. Its headline metric, the AI Usage Index (AUI), is simple: a place's share of usage divided by its share of population. 1.0 means "exactly proportional".
Your chats are data
Notice what this report could measure: topics, task types, complexity, even the reading level of prompts, by state. That's a window into the kind of metadata AI providers can derive from usage at scale. A good prompt for any tool you use: what does my provider's privacy policy say about how conversations are analysed?
Heavy use, unevenly spread
Share of Australia's Claude.ai conversations by state and territory; AUI 1.0 = proportional to population. Anthropic, February 2026 data.
7th per person worldwide
Australia contributes 1.6% of global Claude.ai traffic (11th overall) with an AUI of 4.1. Usage splits almost evenly: 46% work, 47% personal, 7% coursework.
It follows knowledge work
Only NSW and Victoria punch above their population weight. Anthropic notes the spread tracks the size of professional-service sectors, not income; adoption follows the kind of work a place does.
Less code, more life admin
Each bar: the request type's share of Australian conversations minus its global share, in percentage points (Australian vs global shares in parentheses). Rebuilt from Anthropic Economic Index, "How Australia uses Claude", February 2026 data.
Australians are using AI like editors, not vending machines
Australia's report card: the AI Agency Tool
103 capabilities, three lenses
The AI Agency Tool (Tech Policy Design Institute, final version June 2026) is a structured, repeatable method to assess a nation's AI position across 103 capabilities in six layers, scoring each for maturity, sovereignty (control, access, choice, leverage) and agency; ending in prioritised recommended actions, not just a grade.
Real strengths, named gaps
Strengths: critical minerals, domain-specific datasets (medical, geospatial, environmental) and computer-vision expertise. Gaps flagged: public-sector compute, data lifecycle management, inclusive AI models and regulatory oversight capability; with a note that national planning doesn't yet fully play to Australia's strongest cards.
What to bring home
Keep exploring: the primary sources
The assessments
UNESCO Readiness Assessment Methodology: every country report, free · AI Agency Tool (Tech Policy Design Institute): Australia's 103-capability check-up
The surveys and the behaviour
Pew: How people around the world view AI (Oct 2025) · Stanford AI Index 2026, Public Opinion chapter · Anthropic: How Australia uses Claude (Mar 2026)
Where this deck's claims come from
Prepared July 2026 for the NT World Ink AI Special Topic Workshops. Survey findings describe populations, never individuals; treat every figure as a snapshot with a date.