Replying to ICANN's draft 2009 Operating Plan and Budget, the Security and Stability Advisory Committee submitted comments last week vying for its piece of the estimated $60 million ICANN revenue pie. But the interesting story is not the dollar amounts requested by SSAC, rather their request for a specific line item for "Management of certificates for the addressing system (RPKI)." This request to put ICANN in the middle of controlling routing security raises many governance issues.   more »

This is the most intensely political ICANN meeting I have ever been in, with the possible exception of Berlin 1999. Part of the cause is the GNSO structural reform, which has the various constituencies snarling at each other about vote distributions. Multilingual domain names, which combines market pressures with geopolitics, adds to the mix. But one of the main causes is the escalating power of ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC).

GAC is gradually inserting itself ever more persistently into the so-called bottom-up, nongovernmental policy making process of ICANN. As this happens, the politics of ICANN become ever more high-level and difficult for ordinary Internet users to access. As this happens, some of its more ambitious members of the GAC are chafing at its "Advisory" status. It is evident that many governments have trouble understanding the idea that their role is only to provide advice and guidance to ICANN on matters within their jurisdiction, and that they are (supposed to be) one of many "stakeholder groups." Which goverment has the most trouble here? The answer may surprise you. It is not China or Russia, or some other authoritarian state. Nor is it Brazil or South Africa, or any other state that led the charge against ICANN during WSIS. No, it is the USA.

But fortunately, there are some people within ICANN willing to assert its autonomy and stand up to state pressure. The following dialogue between ICANN's Board Chair Peter Dengate Thrush reveals an unexpectedly stiff spine. In the following exchange, the US GAC representative, Commerce Department's Suzanne Sene, is badgering ICANN's Board about GAC's advice that it do "studies" on Whois - privacy. We repeat the exchange here with only a few excisions. It makes for delightful reading. The Board chair politely but firmly explains to the US government how ICANN -- an organization it set up -- is supposed to work.   more »