The Chair of ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee has issued a statement on the censorship of top level domain names. We are sad to report that the alleged GAC position is deeply flawed and outrageously wrong-headed. It is a recipe for global censorship, and although at this point it only applies to the DNS it can lead to the erosion of all internet freedom of expression unless it is stoutly resisted.   more »

As we enter an era of thousands of new top level domains, how will the industry evolve? The ICANN Working Group on vertical integration was one attempt to answer that question. In the course of its lively and extensive debates, the policy setting group confronted some fundamental issues about the organization of the domain name industry. Back in March the ICANN Board threatened to impose a draconian ban on any and all forms of vertical integration and cross ownership between registries and registrars if the group failed to reach consensus on a new policy. The working group (WG) will complete its work this week.

First, the bad news: the WG was not able to agree on a single, comprehensive new policy. It did, however, manage to reach consensus on one thing....   more »

Editor's note: The following letter was initially sent privately to the U.S. government's representatives in ICANN. It asks why they - like all other governmental representatives - are completely absent from an ICANN group discussing the way to handle "sensitive" or "objectionable" top level domain name proposals. So far, I've received no response. The lack of participation by GAC members raises doubts about their commitment to a nongovernmental, multi-stakeholder process in Internet governance. The silence of the US government representatives raises even more serious questions about its commitment to its own Constitutional guarantees of freedom expression, and Secretary of State Clinton's Internet freedom initiatives.

Dear Daniel Weizner, Suzanne Sene and Fiona Alexander:

As you may know the USG's concerns about morality and public order (MAPO) objections to new TLD strings have led to the creation of a discussion list within ICANN. We are trying to come up with an adjustment in the policy; a fairly broad spectrum of ICANN participants are engaged in discussion of this problem. However, we have noticed that no GAC members have joined the list.

The MAPO issue is particularly sensitive and important given the way it converges issues related to freedom of expression, ICANN's legitimacy and the role of the Governmental Advisory Committee in ICANN.

Given GAC's role in this controversy, I see no way that the rest of us can have a productive discussion without the participation of GAC members. Therefore, I am hoping that the US Government will set a good example and join the rest of the community in good-faith discussions of the problems GAC is concerned about and help in the movement toward a solution, and that it will encourage other GAC members to join these discussions.

I am making this request both as a stakeholder within ICANN (Executive Committee member of the Noncommercial Stakeholders Group) and as a U.S. citizen who wishes to see that the U.S. Constitution and U.S. values regarding Internet freedom are protected in this process.

Best wishes Milton Mueller, Professor, Syracuse University School of Information Studies

The U.S. Internet Governance Forum is convening in Washington DC July 21 (Wednesday) to discuss the challenges of Internet governance. It will cover key areas such as privacy, openness, security, critical internet resources and child online safety. Launched in 2009, the IGF USA’s purpose is to engage US-based civil society, government, technologists, research scientists, industry and academia, to cultivate partnerships, build coalitions and facilitate dialogues that demonstrate best practices and facilitate participation of all stakeholders at a national and global level.

The one-day event will focus on the changing Internet and the way forward for the international Internet Governance Forum, an initiative facilitated by the United Nations. Key speakers will include Markus Kummer of the UN Secretariat for IGF, Larry Strickling, administrator of the National Telecommunications and Information Agency, Andrew McLaughlin, White House Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Internet Policy, Ambassador Phil Verveer, U.S. State Department and key leaders from the technical, business and civil society sectors. Workshops and special sessions cover topics such as cyber security, critical internet resources, cloud computing, global governance of the Internet; the role of users in defining a future for Internet governance, e-crime and malicious conduct in the domain name system, and a best practice forum on child safety challenges in the always-on world that youth and children experience today. For more information, see: http://www.igf-usa.us

Yawn.

Just as WSIS represented a discovery by the UN that we were in an information society about 30 years after it happened and 10 years after its basic institutional parameters had been set, now the UN has discovered that broadband is important, a decade after everyone else. So it assembles a blue-ribbon commission with no capital and no authority, based on the assumption that collecting the pictures of as many status-quo luminaries from industry and government as possible onto a web site will actually accomplish something. Your tax dollars at work...

S.3480, The Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act of 2010, introduced by Sens Lieberman, Collins and Carper quietly passed committee last week on a voice vote and is now scheduled for debate on the US Senate floor. The controversial, nearly 200-page bill which amends the Homeland Security Act of 2002 has been criticized by civil liberties and industry groups alike, who say it grants the President the ability to order operators of “covered critical infrastructure” to disconnect parts of the Internet. Our reading of the bill agrees with these general criticisms. We are also concerned with specific effects on the Internet’s DNS and possible extraterritorial effects of the legislation.   more »