Contact: William Dube
[email protected]
202-626-5744
WASHINGTON (July 28, 2014) -Earlier this year, the Department of Commerce announced that it would give up its historic oversight of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which oversees one of the key backbones of the Internet: the Domain Name System. As the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) told Congress in testimony earlier this year, under a new governance framework, ICANN will not be accountable to anyone and will only be motivated by the interests of those individuals who control the organization.
This makes it incumbent on the U.S. government, the ICANN leadership, and global Internet stakeholders to insist that a comprehensive set of principles for the responsible management of Internet resources be firmly embedded within ICANN before the transition is allowed to be completed. To that end ITIF and a group of multi-level stakeholders have worked together to draft Key Principles for Coordination of Internet Unique Identifiers.
The Principles state that any oversight framework for ICANN should include: a clear separation of the policy making, dispute resolution, and implementation functions; protection from government capture or control; complete transparency in ICANN's processes; broad consensus for policy decisions; and significant budget and revenue limitations. Above all else, the global community of ICANN stakeholders should remain the ultimate overseer of the Domain Name System.
"We face a seminal moment that will define the future of the Internet for generations to come," says Daniel Castro, Senior IT Policy Analyst at ITIF. "We believe these guidelines should be the foundation of any transition plan and urge others to join us in working to incorporate these ideas into ICANN's charter and bylaws."
Read the Principles.
ontact:William Dube[email protected]202-626-5744WASHINGTON (July 28, 2014) -Earlier this year, the Department of Commerce announced that it would give up its historic oversight of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which oversees one of the key backbones of the Internet: the Domain Name System. As the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) told Congress in testimony earlier this year, under a new governance framework, ICANN will not be accountable to anyone and will only be motivated by the interests of those individuals who control the organization.This makes it incumbent on the U.S. government, the ICANN leadership, and global Internet stakeholders to insist that a comprehensive set of principles for the responsible management of Internet resources be firmly embedded within ICANN before the transition is allowed to be completed. To that end ITIF and a group of multi-level stakeholders have worked together to draft Key Principles for Coordination of Internet Unique Identifiers.The Principles state that any oversight framework for ICANN should include: a clear separation of the policy making, dispute resolution, and implementation functions; protection from government capture or control; complete transparency in ICANN's processes; broad consensus for policy decisions; and significant budget and revenue limitations. Above all else, the global community of ICANN stakeholders should remain the ultimate overseer of the Domain Name System."We face a seminal moment that will define the future of the Internet for generations to come," says Daniel Castro, Senior IT Policy Analyst at ITIF. "We believe these guidelines should be the foundation of any transition plan and urge others to join us in working to incorporate these ideas into ICANN's charter and bylaws." Read the Principles
