The Observatory initial objective was to provide updated information on the evolution of the following issues in different parts of the world:
access to information in public domain, electronic commerce, privacy and confidentiality in cyberspace, violence in cyberspace.

Since then the UNESCO online Observatory underwent many structural changes and was further developed into an Internet-based gateway to online resources on ethical, legal, socio-cultural and policy issues of the Information Society.

The current UNESCO mandate commits the Observatory to pay due attention to the impact of globalization on knowledge societies through the collection of pertinent information and monitoring of main trends. As a part of UNESCO’s strategy to build knowledge societies and in compliance with UNESCO’s function as “clearing house”, the Observatory aims at monitoring the development of knowledge societies by:
identifying, collecting and organizing pertinent, high-quality and multilingual information on the evolution of ethical, legal, socio-cultural and policy issues of the Information Society at the national, regional and international levels, with particular attention to education, science, culture and communication; timely presenting new trends and contexts; covering broad international developments and events; sharing information about the challenges of the Information Society and advances in ICT; providing a joint platform for UNESCO’s clearing houses related to the Information Society issues (including ICT in Education Portal, Free Software Portal, Multilingualism in Cyberspace website, UNESCO WSIS Action Directory, IFAP Projects data base, IFAP Best Practices data base); creating a network of users and content providers and interacting with them through community tools; serving as a best practice for other organizations working in the area of the Information Society.