ICANN Corp seems to have finally taken the tension between Whois and privacy rights seriously, thanks to the impending General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe. In preparing for the advent of GDPR, ICANN has solicited legal advice from Hamilton Advokatbyrå, a Swedish law firm, regarding possible conflicts between its...
For the big legacy top level domains like .COM, the registry holds a minimal amount of mainly technical information. But for some time ICANN has been trying to amend its policy to require registries to hold the contact information about the registrant as well. This compromises registrant privacy and is...
In this month's VoM, we highlight Dave Clark's recent presentation, concerning the role of the IETF in Internet protocols and human rights, made to the plenary at IETF 98 in Chicago. Clark reflects on the recent efforts proposing guidelines for human rights considerations in IETF standards work. He recalls earlier...
As this blog post shows, ICANN's management is now thinking about how to comply with the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). They'd better be. Everyone knows ICANN’s Whois policies, which require registries and registrars to provide indiscriminate public access to personal data about domain name registrants, violate European privacy laws. In...
The recent appeals court decision in the Microsoft – Ireland case was a milestone in Internet governance. If it is not challenged, or if it is appealed and holds up in the U.S. Supreme Court, it will mark an important turning point in the attempt to subject the Internet to...
As we move toward the IANA transition, many observers are concerned about the relationship between an autonomous ICANN and Internet freedom. One proposal even went so far as to propose to replace NTIA oversight with an “Internet Freedom Panel” that could veto any ICANN decisions that threaten Internet freedom. That...
ICANN's Expert Working Group (EWG) on Whois and privacy, which published its final report today, has unfortunately continued a long tradition of failing to find consensus between privacy advocates and business interests. The business interests see coerced publication of domain name registration data as an invaluable aid to brand protection...
Editors note: This blog post is based on a talk given at the New America Foundation December 5, 2013. Thanks to Tim Maurer and Kevin Bankston for hosting the talk The evolution of Internet governance has been characterized by a tension between the Internet’s organically evolved governance institutions and nation-states....
In her UN General Assembly speech denouncing NSA surveillance, Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff said: Information and communications technologies cannot be the new battlefield between States. Time is ripe to create the conditions to prevent cyberspace from being used as a weapon of war, through espionage, sabotage, and attacks against systems...
Public interest groups involved in ICANN will gather on Friday 12 October 2012 at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel in Toronto, Canada. The event, "ICANN & Internet Governance: Security & Freedom in a Connected World," is sponsored by the Noncommercial Users Constituency (NCUC), the voice of civil society in ICANN....
“In characteristically rigorous fashion, Mueller’s outstanding book punctures the alarmist myth of Internet fragmentation and helps us to understand what is really at stake as nations and other groups vie for power over the Internet.”
