Tough call: avoiding internet governance from becoming FIFA-like

Monika Ermert, Heise, Intellectual Property Watch, VDI-Nachrichten, Germany

PUBLISHED ON: 06 Mar 2015

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) a year ago announced that US government would finally end its contractual oversight over the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). At its heart, IANA is a set of core databases of unique identifiers necessary to locate and address machines on the internet and understand what protocols are being used.

Since the US administration’s announcement, it has not been easy to track working groups and sub-working groups working hard to develop the draft proposal on how domain name policies should be overseen in the future. The next big deadline is April 6. This when the Cross Constituency Working Groups (CWG and CWG) will be convened to a showdown of perspectives on the matter. The last face-to-face meeting scheduled at the end of March in Istanbul shall allow for final coordination on the transfers of IANA oversight and accountability of ICANN.

Disputes about the US government's special oversight role over the domain name system - through its stewardship role of the central root zone for domain zones from .eu or .cn to .com and newcomers like

.wales or .bmw - have been on the international agenda for over a decade. By taking this off the table, the US role could not be “exploited by other governments, authoritarian governments to our detriment“, NTIA boss Larry Strickling said during a hearing of the Senate Commerce Committee last week. Handing over IANA oversight to the community would be the best promotion for a private-sector led multi-stakeholder model, Strickling said to the concerned senators.

How to hold ICANN to account

One of the concerns of the US senators, namely that ICANN could become a FIFA like organisation “flush with cash and accountable to no one“, is not far-fetched, especially when one looks .app, which was just auctioned off for 25 million dollars. Once fully privatised, what could stop a self-interested ICANN to bank on the essential IANA functions? While the two other IANA customers, the IP

address registries and the protocol standardisation body Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) are inclined to include an option for taking their respective databases (for IP addresses and protocol numbers) and find another manager elsewhere. The domain name community has not yet agreed if they will propose that.

One accountability measure discussed by the Cross Community Working Group (CCWG) this week was the removal of the ICANN Board of Directors by the community. Yet what shall be the bylaw-based trigger for the “nuclear option“? How to define for example if the Board acts “in the public interest“, or not? How does the “big stick“-version relate to a removal of individual directors by the board (already possible with a 2/3 vote by the board itself)?

Should constituencies be able to pull the trigger on directors they themselves selected for a seat on the board? And what about the directors selected by the Nominating Committee? Are smaller nuclear options possible? If the CCWG and the CWG want to be able to present a draft, “a simple spill-option” might suffice for the moment, said NetChoice coalition member Steve Del Bianco.

Complexity as a vehicle to delay transition

CCWG Co-Chair Thomas Rickert from the German Internet Association eco also cautioned the subgroup on legal issues. He pleaded against making the task of an external law firm too complicated. The still “too wordy“ document could mean lawyers take a lot of time before coming back with the still-to-be-commissioned study.

During the Domain Pulse conference, the annual meeting of the German language TLD registries in Berlin last week, Rickert warned that trying to push for fundamental changes could complicate the transition. “Turning ICANN upside down now“ could result in the failure of the transition.

“If we want to succeed we have to deal with the most urgent issues now,“ he said. On top of that list is to make sure “that this is an accountable organisation that cannot be hijacked by one interest group“, governments included, as the CCWG this week discussed. Governments too, could try to change the way their “advice“ will be weighed in the multi-stakeholder model, by for example lowering the threshold for this advice.

Price to pay

From the point of the view of some governments the question of jurisdiction also should be addressed during the transition. Government Advisory Committee (GAC) chair Thomas Schneider reported during the Berlin conference that “there are governments like Brazil who have said jurisdiction is an issue for them“. It was also a topic in Europe, Schneider added. But for most European countries a smooth transition comes first.

ICANN CEO Fadi Chehadi during the Senate Hearing said, ICANN would remain in the US. Giving up the idea of a Geneva based ICANN might be the price to pay, Del Bianco added this week, “the quid pro quo“ for the big handover to happen.

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