Popular Enterprises LLC, the parent company of Netster.com, has filed a $100 million dollar lawsuit against VeriSign, Inc. The Complaint alleges antitrust violations, unfair competition and violations of the Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act based upon VeriSign's release of the Site Finder product. The suit requests injunctive relief to prevent VeriSign from operating Sitefinder, and to otherwise cease what Popular Enterprises believes to be its monopolistic practices. more
If you're a twit a Twitter user, you've likely used one or another of the URL shorteners out there. Even if you're not, you may have run across a shortened URL. The first one I encountered, several years ago, was tinyurl.com, but there plenty of them, including bit.ly, tr.im, qoiob.com, tinyarrow.ws, tweak, and many others. ... What would best practices for URL shortening services look like? Some suggestions, from others as well as from me. more
The UK government is proposing new regulations to strengthen cyber resilience in the private sector. Their intention is to expand cybersecurity rules for critical infrastructure (CI) operators to include managed service providers (MSPs), more stringent breach notification requirements, and legislation to establish the UK Cyber Security Council as the standards development organization for the cybersecurity profession. This is a welcomed development, but more details about implementation and enforcement are needed. more
A paper by Viktor Mayer-Schoenberger and Malte Ziewitz was recently published at John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University titled, "Jefferson Rebuffed: The United States and the Future of Internet Governance". The following excerpt provides an overview of the paper: "Over the last several years, many have called for an internationalization of Internet governance in general, and Internet naming and numbering in particular. The multi-year WSIS process that culminated in November 2005 was intended to create momentum in such direction. The United States has long resisted such internationalization, fearing in particular the growing influence of China and similar nations..." more
On January 14, 2021, the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) released its 2020 Review of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting and Piracy (the Notorious Markets List, or NML). This publication enumerates online and physical markets that have been reported to engage in trademark, counterfeiting, and copyright infringement at scale. For the first time, the NML documents show how internet platforms play a part in bringing illicit goods into the US. more
At its recent meeting in Seoul ICANN announced with great fanfare that it's getting ever closer to adding lots of new Top Level Domains (TLDs). Despite all the hype, new TLDs will make little difference... I agree with my old friend Lauren Weinstein that this is a tempest in a very expensive teapot, because all of the purported reasons that people want new TLDs have been proven false, and the one actual reason that a new TLD would be valuable has no public benefit. more
People are increasingly becoming aware of the emerging 'internet monopoly'. Companies such as Google, Facebook, Twitter and many the other (local) social network and media sites are becoming so large and powerful that they can dictate the use of their services in such a way that people lose control over their own information and their participation in these networks. ... These digital media developments certainly did happen, but they are not founded on the 'permission-based' principles that we advocated during all those years. more
This is, of course, about the recent NYT article that showcases the results of Prof Stefan Savage and his colleagues from UCSD/Berkeley. As my good friend and longtime volunteer at CAUCE, Ed Falk, points out, this is a great find, but hardly a FUSSP. The nice thing about the fight against bots and spammers is these little victories people on "our" side keep having in an endless series of skirmishes and battles... more
The recent announcement at the ICANN 50 London, by all stakeholder groups and constituencies comprising of ICANN's Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) to endorse a joint statement in support of the creation of an independent accountability mechanism "that provides meaningful review and adequate redress for those harmed by ICANN action or inaction in contravention of an agreed upon compact with the community" is a very welcome development to the Multistakeholder framework. more
July 15, 2010 (yesterday) marked the end of the beginning for DNSSEC, as the DNS root was cryptographically signed. For nearly two decades, security researchers, academics and Internet leaders have worked to develop and deploy Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC). DNSSEC was developed to improve the overall security of the DNS, a need which was dramatized by the discovery of the Kaminsky bug a few years ago. more
Ten years ago was the dawn of Voice over IP (VoIP). The pioneering Israeli company VocalTec had just released its VoIP software for PCs (it was named iPhone, BTW). Industry guru Jeff Pulver (whom I now partner with in FWD) had begun to hold his Voice on the Net (VON) shows. As the founder of VoIP startup ITXC, I was invited to give a keynote at VON in Boston. The evolution of VoIP, I opined with the requisite PowerPoint slides, will be like a three stage rocket. I was right about the first two stages and dead wrong about the third... more
The essay examines the breadth of new generic Top-Level Domain (gTLD) registrations needed for best enhancing a .Brand. And if you don't own .Brand, what should the scope of your new gTLD strategy be? With the introduction of hundreds of new gTLDs, a lot of businesses still don't have reliable information for figuring out which of the newcomers to register under. more
The IETF DKIM working group has been making considerable progress, and now has a close-to-final draft. DKIM will let domains sign their mail so if you get a message from [email protected], the furble.net mail system can sign it so you can be sure it really truly is from furble.net. But unless you already happen to be familiar with furble.net, this doesn't give you any help deciding whether you want the message. This is where the new Domain Assurance Council (DAC) comes in... more
ICANN held its first international meeting of 2012 last week in San Jose, Costa Rica, and kicked off the week on a high note with an inspired speech by Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla. While Chinchilla's point was made in reference to recent U.S. legislative initiatives and other proposals to increase Internet regulations at the international level, the tug-of-war over online rights and the governance framework to develop and assure them was a common thread throughout much of the ICANN meeting. more
Businesses may rely on domain names to conduct their day to day work, but that does not mean that they really understand what they are using or how important they are. Of course those of us in industry may feel tempted to either scoff at people's naivety or feel terribly frustrated with their ignorance, however neither action is particularly productive. Loic Damilaville, however, has tried to take a more practical and positive approach by publishing a white paper on domain name management. The document was published a few months ago in French and has since been made available in English. more
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