Articles, blogs, and meetings about the internet of the future are filled with happy, positive words like "global", "uniform", and "open". The future internet is described in ways that seem as if taken from a late 1960's Utopian sci-fi novel: the internet is seen as overcoming petty rivalries between countries, dissolving social rank, equalizing wealth, and bringing universal justice. If that future is to be believed, the only obstacle standing between us and an Arcadian world of peace and harmony is that the internet does not yet reach everyone... more
The i2Coalition has unveiled a new report and website, DNS at Risk, spotlighting the growing misuse of Internet infrastructure by governments to control online content. Released on June 3rd, the initiative documents how states are increasingly deploying DNS resolvers and IP filtering—originally neutral systems—as tools of censorship and enforcement. more
On Wednesday 22 February the United States and The Netherlands signed a "declaration of intent" on the cooperation on fighting cybercrime. This event was reported by the press as a treaty. At least that is what all Dutch postings I read wrote, with exception of the official website of the Dutch government. So what was actually signed? Reading the news reports some thoughts struck me. more
Abdul Rahim's Internet governance experience spans over 20 years and most recently she served on the Board of Directors for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). more
Trevor Little reporting in the World Trademark Review writes: "The Chinese government has announced that registries and registrars will have to meet a number of conditions and obtain the approval of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) before being allowed to engage in commercial and operational activities in China." more
Sen. Amy Klobuchar has introduced a new bill, the "Cloud Computing Act of 2012" (S.3569), that purports to "improve the enforcement of criminal and civil law with respect to cloud computing." Given its introduction so close to the election, it's doubtful this bill will go anywhere. Still, it provides an excellent case study of how even well-meaning legislators can botch Internet regulation. more
Washington may be the first state to approve a net neutrality law that applies to all wired and wireless Internet providers in the state. more
Law enforcement demands to domain name registrars were a recurring theme of the 42d ICANN public meeting, concluded last week in Dakar. The Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) took every opportunity at its public meetings with GNSO and Board, and in its Communique to express dismay, disappointment, and demands for urgent action to "reduce the risk of criminal abuse of the domain name system." more
As we blogged about recently, Neustar is committed to ensuring that the domain name system is secure and stable and has been operating top-level domains (TLDs) for over a decade. Tuesday, Neustar submitted comments to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in response to ICANN's proposal to delay the launch of hundreds of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs). ICANN's decision to delay the launch is based on a study it commissioned that measured the potential frequency of domain-name collision. more
Google is deploying fiber at its own expense in Kansas City, Kansas and Kansas City, Missouri to demonstrate the value of one gigabit (a gigabit is a billion bits -- a lot) per second residential Internet connections and perhaps to show at&t and Verizon and the cable companies how the search giant might fight back if its growth is restricted by their restrictions or limitations. ... Whoops. Google just learned the same lesson that President Obama learned in Stimulus 1 more
Globally, people are connecting more and more "things" to the Internet. Devices that were traditionally offline or dumb like refrigerators, cars, watches, home cameras, air condition, door locks, agriculture monitoring devices, etcetera, are now being connected to the Internet. This is referred to as the "Internet of Things" (IoT). Using sensors, IoT devices collect data of some sort, which is then most likely shared over a network connection to a service provider, where some analysis is performed on the data. more
A group of twenty-four civil society organizations and individuals today submitted a joint statement regarding a proposal from an ICANN Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) sub-group on the use of "geographic names" in top-level domains. The joint civil society statement cautioned against the adoption of the GAC proposal that would give governments veto power on domains that use "geographic names." more
When I began writing about the dot-org sale, it was out of concern for the loss of what I felt strongly was long understood to be a unique place in the Internet's landscape. Like a national park, dot-org deserved special protection. It turns out lots of people and organizations agreed. On April 30th, 2020, The ICANN Board upheld these values. They unanimously withheld consent for a change of control of the Public Interest Registry to a private equity firm. more
I read with interest the recent blog written by Theresa Swinehart a Sr. Advisor to the President on Strategy. She wrote: "The most critical element of this [ICANN Transition] process is trust and alignment. To ensure success on this accountability track, we must as a community work closely together to make sure that the final process is meaningful. There is plenty of work to be done in an ambitious period of time." more
Cybersecurity regulation is coming. Whether regulations intended to enhance critical infrastructure protection will be based on existing statutory authority, new legislation, an Executive Order or a combination of legal authorities, however, is still unknown. Other aspects of the coming federal oversight of critical infrastructure cybersecurity that remain undetermined include the extent to which governance system will include voluntary characteristics and the time frame for initiation of new cybersecurity regulation. more