EU Lawmakers Call for Further Talks to Strengthen Proposed US Data Transfer Pact

EU lawmakers are pushing for additional negotiations to strengthen a proposed data transfer agreement between the European Union (EU) and the United States. They argue that the current agreement still has shortcomings that must be addressed. The potential delay in reaching an accord is concerning for the thousands of companies that rely on the agreement. more

The Use of AI in the Domain Name Industry

Artificial intelligence has important uses in the domain name industry. With the use of AI, domain name registration, management, and valuation have been made more efficient and accurate. Here are some specific ways AI is affecting domain names... AI-powered domain name generators can suggest relevant and available domain names based on specific keywords, making the search process easier and faster. more

US Justice Department and FBI Dismantle Long-Running Russian State-Sponsored Cyber-Espionage Operation Targeting NATO

The United States Department of Justice has announced that it has neutralized a global network of computers compromised by malware called "Snake," which the U.S. government attributes to a unit within Center 16 of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB). more

Can Large Language Models Use the Contents of Your Website?

Large Language Models (LLM) like GPT -- 4 and its front-end ChatGPT work by ingesting gigantic amounts of text from the Internet to train the model and then responding to prompts with text generated from those models. Depending on who you ask, this is either one step (or maybe no steps) from Artificial General Intelligence, or as Ted Chiang wrote in the New Yorker, ChatGPT Is a Blurry JPEG of the Web. more

The Internet as a Public Utility

I recently attended a workshop on Lessons Learned from 40 Years of the Internet, and the topic of the Internet as a Public Utility in the context of national regulatory frameworks came up. For me, 40 years is just enough time to try and phrase an answer to the big policy question: Has the Internet been a success in the experiment of using market forces to act as an efficient distributor of a public good? Or has it raised more issues than it has addressed? more

Australian Government Issues New Guidelines to Address 5G Security Concerns in Smart Cities

The Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) has issued a new set of guidelines warning about the security risks posed by the use of 5G technology in so-called Smart Cities. The ASD's concerns align with those of the Five Eyes security alliance, which has warned that the interconnected nature of a fully connected city makes it vulnerable to cyberattacks. more

Verisign Issues Statement on ICANN’s Decision on .Web Auction

Verisign, a global provider of domain name registry services and internet infrastructure, released a statement today regarding the ICANN Board of Directors' decision on the .web auction. more

Celebrating 30 Years Since the World Wide Web Was Released to the Public

Thirty years ago, on April 30, 1993, a groundbreaking announcement was made by CERN that would irrevocably transform our world. Walter Hoogland and Helmut Weber, who held the positions of Director of Research and Director of Administration at CERN, respectively, released to the public a revolutionary tool initially proposed by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989. more

European Domain Market Faces Headwinds Amid Inflation and Regulatory Challenges

The European domain market is grappling with the combined pressures of inflation, energy prices, and EU regulations, which are impacting registry financials and operations. more

Matter - The New IoT Standard

Anybody that uses more than one brand of Internet of Things (IoT) device in the home understands that there is no standard way to connect to these devices. Each manufacturer chooses from a range of different protocols to communicate with and control its devices, such as BLE, LoRa, LTE-M, NB-IoT, SigFox, ZigBee, and others. more

Flying the Flag for the Technical Community: CENTR Provides Feedback to the United Nations’ Initiative on a Global Digital Compact

CENTR, the association which represents European country code top-level domain name registries (ccTLDs), such as .de for Germany or .no for Norway, has provided feedback to the United Nations' initiative on a Global Digital Compact (GDC). The GDC seeks to "outline shared principles for an open, free and secure digital future for all", and invites multistakeholder participation in the consultation phase. more

How You Can Be Hijacked Without Actually Being Hacked

Unsuspecting website visitors are often unaware when they have landed on a spoofed page or are re-directed to malware-hosting web servers designed to steal their sensitive data and information. This attack is known as subdomain hijacking, or subdomain takeover. A web user's private information is then traded on the dark web, and cybercriminals profit, further fueling the expansion of identity theft in the online world. more

FBI Director Warns of Vastly Outnumbered US Cyber Intelligence Staff in Face of Chinese Hackers

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is facing a massive cybersecurity challenge as the U.S. is vastly outnumbered by Chinese hackers, according to FBI Director Christopher Wray. In testimony before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Thursday, Wray urged Congress to provide the FBI with more funds to bolster its cyber intelligence staff. more

If You’re Thinking About Applying to Be the Next ICANN CEO…

ICANN is preparing to search for its next CEO. In the past and again now, each of us has been asked for advice about applying for the job. We have willingly offered our perceptions of what the job requires. The general thrust of our advice is to alert the potential applicant about the complexities and demands of the job so they can assess for themselves whether they might be a viable candidate. Our comments in these situations are, of course, purely our own opinions, and are not connected to the official posture of ICANN. more

The Trade War for Undersea Fiber

A recent article by Joe Brock for Reuters describes a new geopolitical battle over undersea fibers. There are about 400 undersea fiber routes that cross oceans and that connect the world with fiber. This is a huge business, and about 95% of all international broadband traffic passes through the undersea fibers. more