|
Ermert added,
"For years there has been a back and forth on the
issue of complete privatisation and internationalisation
of the DNS core resource management. The topic nearly led
to a failure of the United Nations World Summit on the
Information Society (WSIS) because of demands by
governments from the Arab world, Asia and Europe to end
the privileged oversight role held by the United
States.
|
The US government,
which established ICANN, still has to give its
blessing to every change in the root zone
file which not only includes the introduction of new
top level domains (TLDs), such as .com, but
also possible changes of the so-called country code
TLDs, from .us to .fr for France,
.cn for China or .ir for Iran."
Ermert went on to
write, "In Paris, ICANN Board Chairman Peter
Dengate Thrush explained ICANN’s intention to
streamline this relationship (with the U.S.
government) by taking over distribution of the root
zone file to the root zone server operators. NTIA
reacted immediately by denying any intention
to take VeriSign out of the game. |
Peter
Dengate Thrush
ICANN Board Chairman |
This is repeated in the new
statement sent to ICANN: “The department believes
strongly,” the NTIA letter reads, “that it is
important to clarify that we are not in discussions
with either party to change the respective roles of the
department, ICANN or VeriSign regarding the management of
the authoritative root zone file, nor do we have any plans
to undertake such discussions.”
So even if ICANN, which has
also presented plans to set up a second legal entity in
another region, becomes a completely privatised body
governed by its so-called multi-stakeholder structure, the
heart of the DNS would stay where it is."
(Posted
July
31,
2008) |
