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European Union Asks US To Free ICANN
An anonymous reader writes "Viviane Reding, Information Society Commissioner of the European Union, is calling for the United States to hand over control of ICANN (Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers). She said that the organization running ICANN needs be free of control by a single nation, and rather controlled by a private entity and governed by multiple nations. ICANN, headquartered in Marina Del Rey, California, was created in 1998 to oversee a number of Internet related tasks. Reding said, 'In the long run, it is not defendable that the government department of only one country has oversight of an internet function which is used by hundreds of millions of people in countries all over the world.'"
We can see how well the UN has worked out, so no thanks.
There is a war going on for your mind.
Reding claims that it is indefensible that one country control the internet as if it were prima facie true that this were the case.
However she prefaced that statement with the best defense:
"Reding believes "The US, so far, has done this in a reasonable manner", referring to the oversight that the US government has given ICANN."
So the US is providing oversight in a reasonable manner according to the people who wish to strip that oversight from the US. Then they claim that such "reasonable oversight" is indefensible.
I think Ms. Reding would be surprised how a great many things she doesn't believe in have reasonable and sometimes convincing defenses. I also think she'd be surprised to see how many of the things she holds so dear are actually undefended biases.
"ICANN was formed in 1998. It is a not-for-profit public-benefit corporation with participants from all over the world dedicated to keeping the Internet secure, stable and interoperable. It promotes competition and develops policy on the Internetâ(TM)s unique identifiers."
So it's already private and even countries that US companies cannot legally trade with still manage to get Internet access (North Korea). So there seems to be a solution without a problem.
I understand the unease that the rest of the world has with a single nation controlling ICANN. However, much as I often ask with engineering requests that seem spurious; what is the ROI to justify the change?
What is going wrong, which could reasonably be expected to go better, if we make the change? I'm not saying our stewardship of ICANN has necessarily been perfect, nor that we have a divine right just because we built the Internet. I do believe that the Internet is now a global resource, and that everyone has a very strong vested interest in it. And I am, generally speaking, a globalist -- I'd like to see us all spending more time on bettering all of us.
However, if there are not specific complaints, with a clear and significant path to improvement, it seems difficult to justify transferring control. Making the rest of the world feel good about Internet stewardship is not a good enough reason to risk the gridlock, posturing, saber rattling, and horse trading that could result from U.N. control.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
I have no problem with allowing ICANN to be controlled by a group of nations which all have a constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech.
[Insert pithy quote here]
I'm not an American, but I'm glad that ICANN is run by Americans. For the most part, the United States has a great deal of respect for different view points and allows for free thought. I can certainly imagine Europeans banning Internet websites for fear that they will anger Muslims, gays, atheists, Christians, animal rights activists, etc.. You can imagine European bureaucrats coming up with a handbook of acceptable thought and using that as a guide for website banning.
And which part of the plan to introduce any TLD for anyone who fronts the cash counts as 'ain't broke' in your interpretation of the phrase?
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
The web was invented in Switzerland by an Englishman. The Europeans have already invented their own 'interweb'; you are using it right now.
I've always wondered... How such an important function was run by a single country.
Simple: that's the country that created the Internet.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
We made it, it's our toy, and we'll do with it what we please.
Not really. ARPANet was your toy. The original core protocols were developed with ARPA funding, but the current generation of the Internet Protocol (version 4, with version 6 being slowly deployed) was created as an international effort. The physical bits of the Internet in the US and some outside were created by US corporations, some with funding from the US government, but most of the current infrastructure is not US-owned.
In reality, ICANN does not control very much. They control the root DNS servers (most of which are outside the USA, by the way). If the UN set up a competing ICANN and mandated that ISPs in their member regions use the new DNS root servers - which could potentially include all of the existing ones outside the USA, since they are not actually run by ICANN, they just carry ICANN's configuration) then there isn't much ICANN could do. US ISPs would have the choice of either switching to the new roots or having their customers potentially have links incorrectly handled in the future, if the two organisations didn't keep their configurations in sync.
Seriously, multi-nation governance over the Internet is a terrible idea. Excellent decisions are never made by committee (let alone one with multi-national components), and when you cloud the waters even further with political motivation it makes for an excellent tasting recipe for disaster.
I can make a telephone call to almost any country in the world from here. The UN doesn't seem to have done a bad job ensuring that this works correctly, in spite of the committee that controls the international telephone system having multi-national components.
Unless you can make a better argument than "we use it too so we get some say as well", I see no reason for this to happen.
I seem to recall reading that a variant of this phrase was the rallying call for the American Revolution.
Don't like it? Invent your own interweb.
I assume you know that the web was invented by an Englishman in Switzerland.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Very simple: It doesn't have much authority, unless it acts in the interest of the international network operator community. If ICANN were to do something unpopular, particularly something which openly favors US interests over those of other countries, providers in other countries would quickly band together and form an opposing organization. We'd see the network administration split for a while, but the network doesn't really need ICANN day-in day-out, so there would not be immediate problems.
That was way back in 1958, surely things could have moved on by now considering North America only contains 5% of the World's population.
Let's consider an analogy. I come into your country, build an entire series of roads at my own expense with technology and equipment I developed and let you drive on these roads for free - as a gift. The only catch is that I control the traffic laws, parking and traffic lights and road signs. Because the road signs in your free system, gifted to you by others, are in English, you ask for control of the systems traffic, construction, signs and laws. I think we've just redefined "Chutzpah."
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
Here is the cool part.
The US can't abuse ICANN. Well, it CAN, but when it does, it will lose all control over it as the EU/China/Russia/Australia... every other nation works to set up it's own segregated service. The other nations could force the US to release control if the US gave them a reason to. So as long as the US remains a relatively benign aspect of ICANN, it can remain in control.
And that's a good thing, it means that through the Mutually Assured Destruction that would occur in the event of an abuse of ICANN, it generally remains true to what it is supposed to do without becoming more than what it was intended to do.
I kind of view the US' control over ICANN as the Royalty in the UK. Sure, they technically have a lot of power, but the instant they tried to use that power it would evaporate away in an instant.
Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
I don't understand the need to split the control of a private company (even if it's controlled by a government). So, we should ask the US to force Microsoft to split the control of the company between the countries using Windows OS and servers ? Same thing for Oracle, Apple, etc. ? Come on. It's not because a country is dependent to a technology created by a private company or another country that it should have the ability to control some parts of the decisions over this technology. Create your own "internet" if you really want to control something and stay in your bubble, stupid !
They certainly came up with the idea, but all the technology behind it today was created internationally. Hell, the key is in the name - INTERnet. The internet wouldn't BE the internet if it wasn't for international coverage, so why should one country run the whole thing?
That's like saying that because a German inventor came up with SMS that Germany should be in charge of all international text messaging stuff.
Or perhaps France (or Belgium, depending on who you ask) should be in charge of the distribution of all french fries, internationally.
No it isn't divine right but the right of doing it first. The US did build the Internet and most of the tech that it runs on. "Thanks CERN for that http thing BTW".
So now the EU wants the US give up control. Okay what are you going to give us in return? Respect? I doubt that. Less scorn? Sure....
I have to say that I see no good reason for the US to give up control of ICANN any more than I see a good reason for France to give up control of the FAI.
I doubt that it will improve any service on the internet, increase cost, and potently aid censor ship. There are a lot of countries in the UN that do not value free speech at all.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
A lot of brave French men and women died fighting for their homelands while the Yanks made excuses and sat around eating ice cream in Times Square or whatever they were up to and didn't get involved til 1941. Show a bit of respect.
Ok jokes aside and in Europe we're truly grateful for the Americans finally getting involved in 1941 and for less open but valuable support beforehand, but I think you do the French a disservice, take a look at how many were fighting in different theatres of war and in home resistance. I think over here in Europe we're much more aware about how many nations fought together and suffered terribly. Check how many nationalities fought on the Allies side in the Battle of Britain, something like a sixth of the RAF pilots were from countries other than Britain.
I am not sure where American naivety comes from regarding WW2 (though for sure it's not limited to your country)- perhaps because the war was mostly something that happened far away and didn't happen on your home soil except with rare exceptions? I guess the folk-memory of the war is life going on as normal and waving off the brave boys to distant lands. Maybe this is something to do with how that war is perceived differently in the USA from Europe?
The difference is that you *can* challenge religion in the U.S. and the worst you do is get picketed, badmouthed, and boycotted by fundamentalists. There are atheist conventions very frequently in the U.S. and that's the worst that happens. Picketing and yelling is also the worst that happens whenever neo-Nazis come and have their marches through town, at least until somebody starts a fist fight or riot. The police actually protect the neo-Nazis. If the neo-Nazis went to Europe and tried to march, the police would arrest them instead. That is the difference in free speech that Americans have and Europeans don't.
Just "gittin-r-done," day after day.
I am not sure where American naivety comes from regarding WW2
Hollywood. Take a look at any US-made WWII film, and you see the French being rescued, the British being helpful to the main American force, and the Russians conspicuously absent (especially on anything made during the cold war).
Then take a look at what history is taught in school in the USA. All (most?) nations are guilty of focussing too heavily on their own history when it comes to education, and for the USA the two world wars were not nearly as major events as they were for most of Europe, and in WWII a lot more focus is given to the Pacific theatre. I'm guessing you have an interest in history, and so have read quite widely on the subject, but try to think back and see if you can remember how much you were taught in school about the Pacific theatre in WWII. Here (in the UK) I don't remember being taught much more than 'oh, and the Japanese, Chinese and Americans were having a bit of a fight over there too'.
Some of the early war films and books in the USA were written based on accounts of US servicemen, but these had a very skewed view of the war; they missed out on all of the early actions in Europe, weren't aware of how much intelligence for the invasion came from various resistance groups, and very few of them came into contact with the Russian war machine that trampled over the Eastern Front. From their perspective, the Americans arrived, landed in Britain, dropped in to France, marked to Berlin, and then went home.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Talk about confirming our stereotypes of Europeans. The US government are christo-fascist lunatics, therefore islamo-fascist lunatics in Iran would be better? God damn, man, get some perspective.
How such an important function was run by a single country. The problem is how do you structure such an important organisation so that it is run by the international community and actually get things done, rather than just debate and run around in circles!
That's what I fear. Pleading for them to get their hands on it, without properly setting up a structure for the take-over/transition/whatever they want to call it will spell certain disaster.
"The truth points to itself." - Kosh, Babylon5
There is a Cracked.com article in there, somewhere.
There is a war going on for your mind.
That was way back in 1958
Ummm, no. The first two computers in the nascent Internet were linked in 1969, and Cerf and Kahn didn't start designing TCP until 1973.
things could have moved on by now considering North America only contains 5% of the World's population.
So... majority rule? Give the most control to India (with more religious factionalism and caste poverty than you can shake a stick at) and the PRC (which is a paragon of tolerance and enlightenment if there ever was one)?
STOP SMOKING THAT ADULTERATED WEED!!!!!
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Why do they have a point? I would like this explained to me.
The Internet, and the protocols it uses, were invented in the United States. Until recently, the vast majority of users were still in the United States. If others wanted to follow suit and join in... fine. The United States formed an organization to oversee the network. But it isn't "theirs". They have no "rights" to it. If they don't like it, they can always just form their own damned network.
Imagine that I invented a cool new kind of telephone network. I build up a network in my own neighborhood, complete with switching station. Then, other nearby towns get wind of the network, and want in. So, out of the goodness of my heart, I let them hook up to my network, and I even update my switching station to handle the traffic.
Then, after they have used it for a while, and decide they like it, those neighboring towns start demanding that I turn my switching station over to them. The one that I built, with my own time and research and money.
Huh? By what right do they presume to demand such a thing?
What is the relation between ICANN and WW2 ?
None !
What is the benefit of your proposed action?
We should do this WHY precisely?
To give the PRC, Saudia Arabia, and every other two bit tin horn dictator a shot at democratically censoring the web?
So that Germany, France, the U.S., and others can censor the web to remove torrents over Intellectual Property concerns?
I'm REALLY failing to see an upside to any action at all!
Insulting the French is a national pastime for us. I don't really know why, it doesn't make much sense to me. Wikipedia suggested it might be because we have few French immigrants compared to other nationalities, so in effect we're excused from trying to be politically correct to you.
For your information, the people who make jokes about France surrendering often actually believe that France is weak and that their proximity to the Nazis had nothing to do with their country falling. It's an excellent example of the Ugly American archetype.
Evidently, the key to understanding recursion is to begin by understanding recursion. The rest is easy.
You imply that the EU acts as one nation with more than one vote, but the nations in the EU rarely agree on anything, in the UN or anywhere else. France is about as likely to vote alongside the UK as the USA is to get in a voting cabal with North Korea. There's barely anything resembling a concensus in the EU's own parliment, for crying out loud. And Eurovision's been edging towards a nuclear stalemate between the former Soviet Bloc and the Republic of Ireland for years now.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
While I agree the GP needs to be a bit more respectful, you go to far yourself.
"...while the Yanks made excuses and sat around eating ice cream in Times Square..."
I believe the excuse is "nobody declared war on us", which is a damn good one. The more I read about history, the more I believe that a major issue we have in the US is taking sides in wars that do not involve us. We should let other people fight the wars and have the bravery it takes to sit them out. If that means more disengagement from the world to prevent being dragged-in, so much the better.
Yes, that means we sit idly by while the Germans put up concentration camps. Yes, that means watching the slaughter occur in various places in Africa. Yes, that means...you get the picture.
The only wars we should get involved in are defense of our borders, or defense of allied borders, and we should be very, very picky about who we call "ally".
-Jeff
Please learn the difference between a dissenting opinion and a troll before you moderate.
Yah, it's not like they helped you at all in your rebellion of the 1770's.
Nobody declared war on Britain or France either- they both declared war in support of the Polish.
And there's a reason for this: far and aside from humanitarian arguments, Britain & France both reached the conclusion that Nazi Germany probably wasn't going to stop at Eastern Europe. The realisation that you were probably in the firing line anyway will do a lot to make you stick together with your fellow targeted neighbours.
What do we think would have happened to the United States once all of Europe, Asia and Africa were under fascist regimes? And how well would they have fared, with no allies and the industrial might of a whole world poised against them?
We actually don't really need to ask this. Hitler demonstrated quite amply with his treatment of the Soviets. At the beginning of the war Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact. As soon as the Nazi regime decided that they were able to take them, they turned their attentions on the Soviets. And of course, the US was attacked by the Japanese as soon as they thought they could win, too, despite not having declared war.
All the US could have achieved by staying out of the war longer would have been to deepen the hole they would have needed to get out of. It is good for us and good for history that it didn't turn out this way, and that both the USA and USSR were dragged into the war before it was too late.
Sorry I haven't read all the posts before replying, but a lot of them seem to be off topic. I would like to reflect on some of the conclusions presented here... So what if we (United States) happen to control the ICANN. Why would another country or the EU want to control it? The only answer would be to control OUR Internet! Think about it... If we screwed up the Internet for Europe, for example, they could simply cut us off from the rest of the world, as some have said. DNS is decentralized. only the naming conventions and the addressing scheming is ICANN controlled. Any country who wishes to could create their own ICANN at any time and set up any addressing scheme they choose. IPV6 is an option now and it could be adopted in a European country at anytime with a gateway to the IPV4 land. Or they could simply cut the US from the Internet to the rest of the world. The problem is, the creme of the Internet is here in the US! Cutting us off is not an option. Even the Arab countries who desperately hate us and call us Infidels haven't isolated themselves from the whole US-based Internet because they like our content. The terrorists who were responsible for 9/11 apparently used hotmail for communications! I believe that the US should keep ICANN because WE-CANN. :) I do not see the dangers or the risks in us keeping it. There has been no major problems as of yet. There has been no impropriety yet. The Internet is freely configured and any country or government entity is free to isolate themselves if they wish. The actual intent here with this request to take over ICANN is to take over the US-based internet, otherwise they would just create their own.
The US created the Internet and the world piggy-backed onto it. The US didn't threaten to charge a fee to access it. The US didn't censor content from the rest of the world, although the US government has put restrictions on encryption, but that would have nothing to do with whether we controlled ICANN or not. The US has done some stupid things in the past, but the people who "run" the ICANN so far have behaved fairly.
It is simply a pride issue. I remember way back when I worked in a data-center that had Novell servers and we all had the supervisor password. Then some admin types moved in from out of town and decided that we network-operators didn't have to have the supervisor password, and we all got pissed. The internet is too important and too fragile to make any command changes when there is no reason to do so. If ICANN were to suddenly take the internet hostage and make demands and abuse their powers, then that would be a different issue. Until then, I just hear a bunch of whining babies who wish .COM was in their country instead of ours, even though it doesn't really matter anyway except for marketing convenience.
Show me an unfair situation where the US is bullying the world over the ICANN control or a major problem that was caused by, or ignored by, ICANN and maybe I might change my position...