US Resists UN Push For Control Over Internet

sl4shd0rk writes "At present, several non-profit U.S. bodies oversee the Internet's specifications as well as DNS. The Unitied Nations, however, has expressed an interest in transferring control of the Internet from the United States. The UN's Dr. Toure says any change to the governance of the internet must be supported by all countries. The U.S. has refused, arguing that 'existing multi-stakeholder institutions, incorporating industry and civil society' will continue to oversee the 'health and growth of the interenet and all its benefits.' According to earlier reports, the push is backed not only by Russia, but China, Brazil and India as well."

Comments

Maybe...

[Anonymous Coward]

...they should start their own Internet.

Re:Maybe...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

No way could they get agreement on blackjack and hookers from the general assembly...

Re:Maybe...

[Black Parrot]

...they should start their own Internet.

That's what will eventually happen. The internet will be balkanized along national boundaries, every country will control their slice however they see fit, and everyone will be happy.

Except the users.

Re:Maybe...

[BMOC]

Entirely privatized darknets are just around the corner. They'll be slower, but totally unregulatable.

Re:Maybe...

[Antipater]

Except the users.

That's fine. We'll just put them on the gaming grid.

Re:Maybe...

[Anonymous Coward]

yes .... which is happening already. Try to watch netflix outside the US, the BBC olympic coverage outside the UK, buying certain products from overseas, and so on. Sure, yeah, proxies, but if those are ever used by more than a trivial % of users, they'll be shut down. For normal users, the internet is already balkanized.

Re:Maybe...

[Anonymous Coward]

Entirely privatized darknets are just around the corner. They'll be slower, but totally unregulatable.

Whose to say they aren't here now?

Whose to say they haven't been with us all along?

Re:Maybe...

[Baloroth]

All of those "balkanizations" are performed by the provider themselves. There is no separation between two parties that want to communicate, except for places like China and Iran. In other words, nothing is stopping Netflix from providing their services to everyone in the world aside from Netflix themselves (and of course their agreements with other people). The Internet itself is not fragmented: certain websites are, but that is their problem and their doing.

Re:Maybe...

[sneakyimp]

Yeah I'm not really worried about balkanized Internet and I'm a total pinko. Metcalfe's Law provides a pretty strong incentive for the connections to work.

Re:Maybe...

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact, forget the internet!

Re:Maybe...

[wbr1]

W

...they should start their own Internet.

That's what will eventually happen. The internet will be balkanized along corporate boundaries in democracies, and socieo-religio-political boindaries elsewhere every entity will control their slice however they see fit, and everyone will be happy.

Except the users.

Fixed that for you

Re:Maybe...

[aurispector]

You know, it isn't popular to say that the US does a good job at anything these days. Maybe it's even true, but the fact is we do a better job at running the internet than anyone else would or could.

Imagine an internet with China in control? The only possible outcome there is less freedom.

Fuck the UN. The US has guaranteed security for so much of the world for so long they think it's always been that way and that it happened all by itself as the result of good wishes.

Re:Maybe...

[Amiga Trombone]

Well, you know how it goes. Provide a socialist with a service, and in a week he'll be calling it a human right.

Re:Maybe...

[lsatenstein]

...they should start their own Internet.

That's what will eventually happen. The internet will be balkanized along national boundaries, every country will control their slice however they see fit, and everyone will be happy.

Except the users.

Actually, they will start their own internet, and eventually, the USA will be alone. Noone wants 1 nation to conrol the Internet/www.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Black Parrot]

by UN one world government. Google Obama Agenda 21 for details.

It's hilarious to see the right wing nutters getting their panties in a bunch over the Obama / Agenda 21 conspiracy, since Agenda 21 was established in 1992.

UN control would be worse

[betterunixthanunix]

UN control of the Internet would kill the Internet as we know it. Long distance fees, requirements that you respect censorship laws in other countries, unique identification requirements, different regulatory classes for "service providers" and "consumers" are all on the table for the UN. Sure, they would do a great job of ensuring that everyone is happy -- everyone being defined as the governments that are represented in the UN, which include several powerful governments with strong and pervasive censorship campaigns.

Re:UN control would be worse

[drinkypoo]

Also, there is no reason whatoever to hand control of the internet to the UN. Literally none. The internet is intended to be a network of networks. There's no reason why that wouldn't include a network of national networks of networks, and lots of reasons why not. Unless, of course, you've got one world government.

Re:UN control would be worse

[cpu6502]

Yes.
The UN is not democratic or even representative of the People it is bossing around. I don't have a gentleman representing me & making my voice heard in the world government. None of us do. The UN running the internet is an illegitimate use of power. (Similarly: This is why I refuse to pay any income or sales tax to a state or country where I do not live/have not set foot inside. No taxation without representation.)

Re:UN control would be worse

[davidwr]

NOT removing control from a single country will end the Internet as we know it, only in a different way.

Balkanization, inability to reach sites in other countries even if they don't mind you reaching them, requirements that you use only breakable encryption or no encryption at all, etc.

In other words, it's heads the world loses, tails the governments that want to make the world lose win.

Re:UN control would be worse

[ambidextroustech]

Besides, the United States of America is where it is unlawful to hinder free speech is the best place for this communication engine: the Internet.

I would not want to hand this over to a body, where I do not know its established law. The UN is over-stepping its bounds; it's supposed to be a place where countries can meet and circumvent wars, such as world wars, etc.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

All the arguments against the UN could equially be made of the US. Additionally it's not at all clear to me why I have to pay an American company to maintain my .com registration. Certainly there's no indication it was chosen as being the best value for money.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

> No taxation without representation.

Unless you're an immigrant on a green card to the US.

Re:UN control would be worse

[betterunixthanunix]

Indeed, but there is no strong push for handing control of the Internet over to its users. The choice we have right now is this:

1. ICANN, under US jurisdiction (but autonomous within the boundaries of US law).
2. ITU, which has a goal of satisfying the regulatory and policy demands of all countries simultaneously, and which is part of the UN, which consistently seeks to respect "national sovereignty."

So don't get me wrong -- I would love if the Internet were truly a "network of networks" and if peering was not reserved for large telecom monopolies. ITU control will get us further away from that goal, at least if their approaches to other global communications systems and the Y series recommendations are any indication.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Ghostworks]

The fear of a one-world government is unfounded. The UN is not set up to function as such a body, nor could it even cope with such a task if it decided to seize an opportunity. It is a patchwork of bodies, funds, institutions, and loose alliances. It is basically a loose network of international do-gooders, with a completely useless general assembly and an incredibly important security council. That's why there's so much pressure lately to expand the security council to include more countries, rotate countries out, and have them handle more mundane issues like pollution as a "global risk". They're the only body set up to make a resolution then actually back it up.

And, while this may sound a little patronizing to other nations, the UN is at it's most effective when it is aligned with the U.S. It promotes what used to be first and foremost "American values" (real values, like democracy, human rights, an autonomy), which have successfully promoted as just good, fully human values in the past century. It relies on the U.S. for a lot of funding, and almost all of its strength. When the U.S. forgets about the UN, both suffer, because the UN has the unenviable task of taking all the good parts of long-term U.S. policy and convincing other countries to go along with it despite how pissed off they get over the bad parts of short-term U.S. policy. They are the sly left and strong right hands of the same philosophy.

What this is is balkanization by the back-door. The long-feared balkanization of the internet has already happened, with countries like Iran and China essentially experiencing completely different 'nets than other parts of the world. And it will continue to splinter. What the movement in the ITU is about is ameliorating the worst parts of balkanization, when reclusive regimes find that the accidentally broke something they would rather keep. They want to be able to censor gracefully, with someone in their corner to get things fixed when their ridiculous schemes bite them technically. While I can sympathize with countries who don't feel entirely comfortable with the net in American hands, dumping this much power into a relatively new, weak body of the UN can only serve oppressive regimes.

Re:UN control would be worse

[betterunixthanunix]

See, I disagree on this; my view is that control should be decentralized. The fact that giving the UN control would worsen the situation does not mean that ICANN should remain in charge. We need to lower the barriers to entry when it comes to peering, develop a better system for domain names, and get IPv6 deployed -- then we can say that anyone with networking equipment and a minimum level of technical knowledge can participate in running and governing the Internet.

Re:UN control would be worse

[bsDaemon]

That's just called the price of admission.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Sir_Sri]

or live in D.C.

Re:UN control would be worse

[MightyMartian]

Except that, good or bad, the US's governance of the Internet is a known quantity. It may not be perfect and may have its own inherent risks, but thus far, the US has been a reasonably good steward. Handing it off to the UN, where some major players are unabashed censors of the Internet and would have considerable motivation to undermine certain aspects of how it works, carries significant risks, and risks we may not even be aware of.

This is a situation where I say better than devil we know than the devil we don't.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Sir_Sri]

No taxation without representation

Every country in the world has a representative to the UN general assembly. That's actually better than if you're in Syria, China, or a plethora of other places where you have no representation, and are obliged to pay taxes.

Technically by the way, that narrowly foolish talking point that 'no taxation without representation' doesn't even apply to the US, where if you live in D.C. for example you are subject to federal taxes but can't vote for federal representatives. Nor does it include people who are intentionally disenfranchised from being able to vote. The UN *does* have a mechanism to disenfranchise people by suspending their representation to the security council.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Sir_Sri]

unlawful to hinder free speech is the best

What if the US isn't doing the best job of defending free speech?

The UN charter states explicitly that "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers" From 1948, in it's non legally binding charter, and essentially the same thing in its legally binding agreements that only about 150 countries have signed on to.

Press Freedom from 2005 puts the US at 44th, and significantly lower than say, denmark, finland etc. So why shouldn't one of those countries get control of the internet then, since they are demonstrably more free than the US.

. The UN is over-stepping its bounds; it's supposed to be

The UN is supposed to be whatever the member states want it to be. That's how democracy works. If all of the member states agree that every tuesday everyone in the world has to wear a pink hat, then that can be made binding law. The UN has a collection of agencies of varying efficiency and effectiveness that are tasked with making sure people are fed, that there are international telecommunications standards, that Aircraft all conform to certain guidelines, that there are labour, education and human rights standards everywhere and so on. Now obviously if people don't want to do anything to uphold those rules then the UN doesn't have any capacity to act on its own. Just the same as if the south in the US tried to bring back Jim Crow laws the federal government would have to decide what, if anything, it was prepared to do about it.

Re:UN control would be worse

[lsatenstein]

QUOTE

UN control of the Internet would kill the Internet as we know it. Long distance fees, requirements that you respect censorship laws in other countries, unique identification requirements, different regulatory classes for "service providers" and "consumers" are all on the table for the UN. Sure, they would do a great job of ensuring that everyone is happy -- everyone being defined as the governments that are represented in the UN, which include several powerful governments with strong and pervasive censorship campaigns.

ENDQUOTE

The idea that some single country controls a global resource is not acceptable to countries that are not congruent with USA political policy. Suppose the Internet was controlled by a non -USA country, that does not agree with USA policies? How would the US feel? How would the the USA control its utilities, since many use the web for managing their infrastructure. The USA has already wrongly turned off the switch on at least one service company, putting the company at a major financial disadvantage in its trying to regain operations.

The extreme set of rules that you listed are rules that the USA already has in place via the US's largest private ISPs, only they are imposed on you and you shrug them off as the cost or rules on how you may use the net.

What eventually will happen is that a parallel internet will be created, which will contain a majority of the worlds countries and populations. The USA will have to decide to go it alone or merge with it. Most countries will switch over because of the desire to be part of a global marketplace.
I am not in the know, but do the rules governing the internet respect International Law?

Yes, change is coming, albeit slowly.

A switch over will be a few wiring changes, and the data will now be available in the new globally owned internet. Most end-users will not notice any difference.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Dishevel]

It is my honest belief that one of the things that is worse than the current US control of the internet would be UN control.
In fact it may be the worst decision that could be made. I think that the internet would be better off being controlled by China than by the UN.
North Korea and a few of the Arab states would be the only things I can think of that might be worse than the UN.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

How much does the US owe the UN?

Re:UN control would be worse

[Algae_94]

So the Chinese and Syrian people have a representative in the UN. That's great, but how does it represent those people in any way? They are not choosing who represents them, the government they have no say in is choosing these people. I believe that was the GP's point.

Re:UN control would be worse

[drinkypoo]

The internet is intended to be a network of networks. There's no reason why that wouldn't include a network of national networks of networks, and lots of reasons why not. Unless, of course, you've got one world government.

The fear of a one-world government is unfounded.

Your statement about fear is unfounded. I don't think that this is what is being attempted, nor did I state such. How are you getting along with that straw man? I was trying to avoid the "one world government" trolls and instead I got a "no one world government" troll.

while this may sound a little patronizing to other nations, the UN is at it's most effective when it is aligned with the U.S.

"Effective" cuts both ways.

Re:UN control would be worse

[timeOday]

The internet is intended to be a network of networks. There's no reason why that wouldn't include a network of national networks of networks, and lots of reasons why not. Unless, of course, you've got one world government.

Actually, a sort of One World Government is precisely what makes it possible to reach the same resource when you type http://google.com/ from anywhere in the world. A flat address space and flat naming space are only possible if everybody coordinates at some level, and the global Internet would be awfully convoluded without those things.

Right now the One World Government of the Internet is the United States, which is fine with me because I think we do a better job than the global average. But I can see why benevolent dictatorship is less attractive to those outside of it.

Re:UN control would be worse

[heypete]

All the arguments against the UN could equially be made of the US. Additionally it's not at all clear to me why I have to pay an American company to maintain my .com registration. Certainly there's no indication it was chosen as being the best value for money.

The .com registry (VeriSign) charges $7.85/year for registration at the wholesale level (plus an $0.18 ICANN fee), regardless of if you're Joe Schmoe Blogger or Google. That seems like a pretty reasonable expense for maintaining a registry of 100+ million domain names with 100% uptime since it was founded.

Would it be nice if it cost a bit less? Sure. I'm still not that worried about it -- the fee is less than I paid for lunch yesterday and the savings of a dollar or two in terms of an annual registration are basically not even worth discussing in terms of practical savings.

VeriSign certainly seems to know how to handle the registry side of things pretty well, and I don't really see any technical or financial reasons why I should be concerned. /I never thought I'd be in a position to defend VeriSign, but in this case they seem to be doing a darn good job.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

Every national government in the world has a representative in the UN general assembly.

FTFY

Thats not the people's rep, thats the government's rep. Subtly but very very important difference.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

The internet is intended to be a network of networks. There's no reason why that wouldn't include a network of national networks of networks, and lots of reasons why not. Unless, of course, you've got one world government.

The fear of a one-world government is unfounded.

Your statement about fear is unfounded. I don't think that this is what is being attempted, nor did I state such. How are you getting along with that straw man?

I refer to your own "one world government" comment.

I was trying to avoid the "one world government" trolls and instead I got a "no one world government" troll.

So you said something you didn't mean, then felt insulted by the person who disagreed with you (that is to say, who actually agreed with you). And HE'S the troll. Interesting interpretation.

Re:UN control would be worse

[SecurityGuy]

You don't. You can register in a country-specific TLD. The current system is really rather stupid, with the TLDs becoming all but meaningless. If you want wide exposure, get a .com, regardless of whether you're a commercial enterprise or not. Better yet, get .*, because you wouldn't want anyone else to "steal" your name, even if they happen to run a nonprofit, school, or whatever else with a similar name to yours.

Re:UN control would be worse

[betterunixthanunix]

The extreme set of rules that you listed are rules that the USA already has in place via the US's largest private ISPs,

What? I used to run my own webserver out of my room at my mom's house, using a typical residential ISP, when I was in high school and for most of college. None of the rules I listed are a reality in the US; I am free to criticize the Thai leadership and send that criticism to Thai citizens, I am free to post anonymous messages, I pay no extra fee for access websites across international borders, and so forth.

I am not in the know, but do the rules governing the internet respect International Law?

When did international law start governing communication between people? That's all the Internet is: a really good way for people to communicate (which has a lot of good side effects).

A switch over will be a few wiring changes, and the data will now be available in the new globally owned internet. Most end-users will not notice any difference.

The Internet is not "globally owned" if it is run by the UN; the UN is only a democracy between governments, and many of the powerful voices in the UN do not come from democracies. An Internet that China has a say over is an Internet that is not "globally owned" by any stretch of the imagination.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

This is pure and utter FUD.

The comment from the ITU guy himself shows exactly why it SHOULD be the ITU that controls the internet:

""We never vote because voting means winners and losers and you can't afford that," Dr Hamadoun Toure, the ITU's secretary-general told the BBC.

"Whatever one single country does not accept will not pass.""

This demonstrates that ITU control would actually be, without question, much better, because it would mean even things like ICE domain seizures of international domains by the US authorities wouldn't be possible. You're right that the US is a known quantity and that's ultimately the problem, we know that the US censors the global internet via domain seizures, under the ITU this simply wouldn't be possible, and the above demonstrates why. It demonstrates that the ITU requires international consensus over these sorts of things so both Chinese government censorship and US corporate censorship would equally get blocked, and the only things that would pass would be the common sense things - solutions to technical issues and challenges and such. This is exactly what whoever controls the internet should be limited to - the technical aspects of it's growth and nothing more. The US has shown it can't keep to doing just this, whilst the ITU has shown with it's many years of the international telecommunications networks that it can.

Yes, yes, I know I'll get modded down by angry patriotic Americans who feel slighted that anyone dare suggest they shouldn't control something international, and yes, I know I'll get all the arguments about how some random commission at the fringe of the UN has Iran in it which obviously means the whole of the UN is broken, and yes I know I'll even get the new world order kooks telling me how the UN is actually out to take over the world run by a super-secret organisation of elf-magicians who eat pixies for lunch or whatever the conspiracy theorists have cooked up now.

But ultimately it doesn't matter, because the ITU is still the only organisation in the world that has shown it is capable of handling this sort of thing in an objective manner.

Organisations like the ITU really just aren't political, they're technical organisations staffed by some of the most succesful academics in their relevant fields. A lot of people don't get that, they see UN security council failure to act on Syria and assume the whole UN is bad, but that's really just like saying because you met a grouchy Red Cross guy once, they shouldn't be responsible for delivering any kind of aid, ever. Really, the comments thus far in this thread are nothing but 100% fear mongering, they have absolutely no basis in fact, they demonstrate actually no understanding of how the likes of the ITU are governed and act, and who by. They're simple kneejerk reactions to a perceived slight against American internet mismanagement.

Despite this, as is always the case with discussions regarding the UN on Slashdot, bring on the ignorant uninformed nutjobs in 3...2...1...

Re:UN control would be worse

[drinkypoo]

So you said something you didn't mean

No, I said precisely what I meant: There is no reason to hand over control to a single body unless you have one world government. Since we don't have one world government (and I never said we did) that means there is no reason to hand over control to a single body.

The writer implies, and the reader infers. In this case, the reader inferred something I didn't say.

Re:UN control would be worse

[tnk1]

Every governing regime in the world has a representative to the UN general assembly.

FTFY

The point is, the UN might well represent the interests of nations, but if so, that is entirely coincidental. The only representation in the UN is that of the people who are recognized as controlling the government.

And disenfranchisement is unlikely to happen for a cause like "not being a good government" because none of those regimes wants a precedent of the UN removing governments for actions they take as sovereign states. Even the liberal democracies are not going to normally want the UN to turned into a rump assembly of only liberal countries. You want Iran and Syria in the UN to keep the UN useful as a negotiating forum, but that also means that they get to participate in things like Human Rights committees and this proposed internet scheme.

Re:UN control would be worse

[kheldan]

Agreed. With the UN in control, the internet would become totally useless in no time at all. You think that the level of tracking and intrusions into our privacy are bad now? Just wait until some big guns in the UN decide that everything has to be sifted and censored, including our private emails. You want to be extradited to Thailand because you said their ruler is a douchebag? Don't think it's too far-fetched an idea.

Re:UN control would be worse

[tnk1]

That would be better, of course, but the reason for control is that control tends to be needed to some extent. You don't organize compliance with all the initiatives you have suggested without someone able to keep people on track.

Take Linux for example. A lot of work has been done on the kernel and things that wrap around it by lots of people, but that has had a guiding hand in the person of Linus Torvalds. Like the Internet, you're free to do what you like with the Linux kernel on your own, and you can add or subtract whatever you like from it, but you're probably not going to do that because it would be a big waste of time, so you accept the kernel that he project manages and move on to other things.

Mind you, project management of the kernel is useful, but it has not been enough to bring Linux successfully to the desktop to match its dominance in the server room. There have been many solutions, of course, but even now, it is still big news when Valve even starts working on getting games up and running for Linux while it has probably been running Linux servers in its data center spaces for as long as it has been around. The reason for this lack of focus is the fact that the desktop work has been forked and decentralized for so long. I bet if you could get Valve, EA, and Activision Blizzard to put their weight behind one reasonable desktop solution which was adequately project managed, you'd probably have the Year of the Linux Desktop.

While it may eventually produce a useful result, the inefficiency of the fully decentralized approach for the desktop is pretty much proven as this point. There is no reason to believe it will work any better in internet management.

My point is, I think you are right about creating decentralized *operational* capabilities for services, but without some sort of guidance that everyone respects and follows, necessary projects don't move forward on the most efficient path. Someone needs to set the standard and occasionally swing the axe.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

Really given how utterly ineffectual the UN is wouldn't they be better? Not because of any motivations but because they're (thankfully) not able to exert much power at all.

Re:UN control would be worse

[MightyMartian]

I simply don't believe it. I'm not saying the US is a completely reliable steward, but it's known quantity. You live in a fantasy land if you think wresting the Internet from the US is going to make nonsense impossible.

Until we have full-blown mesh networks and other ways of networking equipment together and central control of any kind becomes irrelevant, I'm sticking with the current management.

Re:UN control would be worse

[rtb61]

It makes not one bit of difference what the US believes or wants when it comes to governance of the internet both IP address and DNS space. It boils down to each country deciding for itself what it wants to do. The change will occur regardless of what the US wants, much the same as the US is now starting to be excluded from what is going on with regard to 'American' North and South, associations.

Everyone knows the US will be a puppet to US corporate shenanigans as the seek to capitalise and profit off of control of the internet. Other countries will be driven by their corporate interests to take control over their part of the internet. What is inevitable rather than direct, DNS root control, countries will mirror what they choose and change to resell what they choose.

IP addressing will remain pretty clean but Domain Names are going to be exploited for profit a trend started by the US.

Re:UN control would be worse

[tnk1]

The world has always been able to create a parallel Internet. The reason they haven't done that is the same reason no one has created a completely parallel Linux kernel, there's no need.

Given the US's policies on free speech, it makes a good standard for the operation of the internet, which is one reason it actually exists now and is popular.

You're right, parallel networks can certainly pop up any time. However, unless they pop up because US policy directly affected the usability or freedom of the Internet, you can actually expect those networks that are being set up will leak users back to the "old" internet faster than East Germans scooted through the broken Berlin Wall.

You're looking at this as some sort of national pride issue, but in reality, most people could give a shit about that. Who needs a "global marketplace" when there already is one? And what makes you think the purportedly "extreme" rules of the US will not similarly crop up in networks managed by groups of countries who don't even give lip service to free speech or free trade?

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

"The fear of a one-world government is unfounded. The UN is not set up to function as such a body..."

Not only is that cart-before-the-horse, it is also false. The fact that the UN is incapable of doing it has not bearing on the fear of a one-world government. The fear is very real, and the UN has very little to do with it. Most people recognize that the UN is just a big pile of BS.

"And, while this may sound a little patronizing to other nations, the UN is at it's most effective when it is aligned with the U.S."

And maybe it WAS, but that has happened pretty rarely lately.

"It promotes what used to be first and foremost "American values" (real values, like democracy, human rights, an autonomy)"

It's SUPPOSED to do that. Doesn't mean that it actually does. The UN has lost its purpose (weak as it was to begin with) and now has its OWN agenda, which is not in line with the U.S. Constitution.

Take off your blinders, forget what it was originally DESIGNED to do, and look at what it is actually doing.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

"Actually, a sort of One World Government is precisely what makes it possible to reach the same resource when you type http://google.com/ from anywhere in the world"

NO, it isn't. Organization, but with a LACK of government, is what allows that. Your argument is exactly backward.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

So the Chinese and Syrian people have a representative in the UN. That's great, but how does it represent those people in any way? They are not choosing who represents them, the government they have no say in is choosing these people. I believe that was the GP's point.

It's not universally agreed that democratic elections produce governments that more effectively enforce the will of their people. Like it or not, the governments of China, India, and Russia represent their nations at the U.N.. These 3 nations speak for roughly 38% of the population of the Earth. At most, the U.S. government speaks for about 4%.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

First Pisss, eh?

Look up SWIFT and what we are doing to international financial data transmissions. It is far worse and criminal compared to internet browing being in the hands of the UN.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

"Everyone knows the US will be a puppet to US corporate shenanigans as the seek to capitalise and profit off of control of the internet."

So... a NON-PROFIT corporation, which is advised by A PANEL CONSISTING OF GOVERNMENTS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, is a US-corporate shill? You're dreaming.

Now, it is true, ICANN has made a number of recent blunders. Not only its TLD auction, which some saw as blatant money-grubbing (although, again, it is a non-profit), to its method of deciding name disputes, which it assigned to a "target-shoot", requiring the disputants to send an http request at precisely a specific time... the closer to the target time wins. (This was a particularly stupid move, as it is amendable to automation, and favors those with low latency. A lottery would have been far preferable.)

Nevertheless, one cannot say these things have anything at all to do with the U.S. government.

And your proposed DNS fragmentation will never work, in the long run.

What the Internet needs, is a new DNS-free protocol. That would solve ALL of these problems.

"IP addressing will remain pretty clean but Domain Names are going to be exploited for profit a trend started by the US."

It was NOT. ICANN made that move but it was NOT "the US". Repeat: ICANN is advised by governments all over the world (I think it would be fair to say "most governments", today). NONE of its decisions in recent years -- as dumb as some of them have been -- have been unilateral on the part of the United States. To claim that they were is an admission of ignorance.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

That should have read "amenable", not "amendable".

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

Well said. As I have stated before many times, we need a decentralized addressing system. It would be a disaster if this were handed to the UN before then.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, yes, I know I'll get modded down by angry patriotic Americans who feel slighted that anyone dare suggest they shouldn't control something international, and yes, I know I'll get all the arguments about how some random commission at the fringe of the UN has Iran in it which obviously means the whole of the UN is broken, and yes I know I'll even get the new world order kooks telling me how the UN is actually out to take over the world run by a super-secret organisation of elf-magicians who eat pixies for lunch or whatever the conspiracy theorists have cooked up now.

and then we have

But ultimately it doesn't matter, because the ITU is still the only organisation in the world that has shown it is capable of handling this sort of thing in an objective manner.

Firstly, don't give up your day job to become a defense attorney. The UN is fucked up. About the only positive thing I can possibly say on its behalf is that I appreciate what UNICEF does.

Organisations like the ITU really just aren't political, they're technical organisations staffed by some of the most succesful academics in their relevant fields.

Irrelevant. With respect to decision making engineers and scientists nearly always lose to the politicos... pay attention.

They're simple kneejerk reactions to a perceived slight against American internet mismanagement.

All of them? Really? Hmm.. were you in the office asking around today? That must have been right between lunch and that code commit that gave me indigestion. ;)

Lighten up, Francis. Not all of us believe an unelected unaccountable body is the best solution for the interwebs.. espescially us insular Yanks. We've got the ball right now, and maybe some day when an accountable body is created we can talk. Until then feel free to Balkanize.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

And let's not forget that not all countries "represented" by the UN are represented equally. It was designed, from the very beginning, to give certain countries more say than others.

So don't look to the UN for equity or equality. You will never find it.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

"The UN charter states explicitly that "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers" From 1948, in it's non legally binding charter, and essentially the same thing in its legally binding agreements that only about 150 countries have signed on to."

Right. And what this means in practice is that the UN supports the "right" of governments to censor... because they are individually free to develop their own standards of expression.

Re:UN control would be worse

[infinitelink]

A large number of inhabitants within D.C. are the representatives, their staffs, lobbyists and their staffs...it's not exactly like they're unrepresented, just better-connected and less-proxied than the rest of the U.S.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Sir_Sri]

Yes... And?

Governments have that power. They've always had that power and always will. The US has its standards, that are, as I pointed out, not even all that good compared to lots of other countries. Without UN oversight each country will definitely start enforcing its own censorship on their own little corner of the Internet. With UN oversight they might actually not be able to do that, in exchange for being plugged into everyone else.

Re:UN control would be worse

[oakgrove]

It's not universally agreed that democratic elections produce governments that more effectively enforce the will of their people.

It also isn't universally agreed whether the earth is more round than flat. Or whether we evolved or just appeared all at once 6000 years ago. Thanks for pointing this very important fact out.

Re:UN control would be worse

[oakgrove]

Without UN oversight each country will definitely start enforcing its own censorship on their own little corner of the Internet. With UN oversight they might actually not be able to do that, in exchange for being plugged into everyone else.

You are fantasizing.

Re:UN control would be worse

[timeOday]

If you want to make a distinction between Organizations vs. Governments, the US is clearly more of a Government than the UN, so it's not clear why moving ICANN under the UN would make it more government-controlled than it is now under the US.

Re:UN control would be worse

[lsatenstein]

The world has always been able to create a parallel Internet. The reason they haven't done that is the same reason no one has created a completely parallel Linux kernel, there's no need.

Given the US's policies on free speech, it makes a good standard for the operation of the internet, which is one reason it actually exists now and is popular.

You're right, parallel networks can certainly pop up any time. However, unless they pop up because US policy directly affected the usability or freedom of the Internet, you can actually expect those networks that are being set up will leak users back to the "old" internet faster than East Germans scooted through the broken Berlin Wall.

You're looking at this as some sort of national pride issue, but in reality, most people could give a shit about that. Who needs a "global marketplace" when there already is one? And what makes you think the purportedly "extreme" rules of the US will not similarly crop up in networks managed by groups of countries who don't even give lip service to free speech or free trade?

It has already. Freedom or free speech, RIAA, SOPA, and other attacks, such as sudden lawsuits by American Law-firms asking $$$ because your web-design or website action (kind of mouse click, etc), is patented. Amazon is the example in a severe way that attempts to maintain marketing supremacy applies as well to the web.

We don't believe that algorithms, example such as a simple conversion from Centigrade to Farenheit should be patentable. Once control is passed to a global institution outside of the USA, creativity will be restored.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

In what way is the US running the internet representative of the 95% of the world that is not, in fact, a part of the US? Or are you offering the rest of us a vote in your government?

Re:UN control would be worse

[Sir_Sri]

Depends on the oversight. That's why these things *don't* happen. The US likes the oversight it has, and doesn't want to hand that over to anyone else. Everyone else doesn't like the US oversight, and wants their own, and they can't agree on a neutral lack of oversight.

The UN actually can force compliance though. Believe it or not. They did this with the postal union to libya eventually. Don't pay your bills, don't get mail. It's a slow, laboured process, but it does have its advantages. You can't meaningfully threaten china. You can however threaten the north african, arab and middle eastern countries with being cut off from everyone else, and have them care. The same goes for europe and south america (although those places are much less likely to do things that would warrant being cut off). Africa, the US, india, china, Russia, they care a lot less, all for different reasons.

Put another way, what should be done to preserve internet freedom in Hungary and Romania right now? Can the current US centric structure do anything for them? (No, it can't), could a UN centric one? Yes, it could, because it can put layers of pressure on them, and it could threaten to disconnect them from the rest of europe (and all of their money) for not behaving if it was well constructed, but neither case could do much to big countries.

Re:UN control would be worse

[epyT-R]

Seriously, the last thing the internet needs is another fucking government entity sitting on top of it, enforcing all sorts of totalitarian political favoritism (mostly towards the left) under the guise of 'freedom.' The US used to stand up to this rubbish.. I wish it still did.

1. The Human rights council is largely made up of islamic states. it's been effectively bored out from the back end and is demonstrated by the ban on criticism of sharia and other islamic tenets. the UN is has a long history of 'hate speech' censorship for certain groups. the left wing bias on what constitutes human rights is blatantly obvious.

2. I don't know if an axiom exists for this or not, but organizations tend to collect power to themselves while redistributing the responsibility for use of them as far as possible. I don't claim a 'conspiracy', but I can almost guarantee that the 'globalization' push has not gone untalked about and/or actively pushed by various subcommittees for the sake of some cause or other. Really, the only way to prevent this is to actively resist it. It's the only way to protect individual rights. I want my government to do this, but alas it is not to be it seems.

3. As an american, the fact that an empowered UN could pull end runs around the US constitution in terms of rights and taxation certainly bothers me. hell my own government has been attempting and partially succeeding at this for the last 50 years. It's bad enough with what we have already, thanks. I don't want another government on top of the feds that's even less accessible to the average citizen than they are.

4. The UN's obsession with the israel/arab conflict is a serious issue, to me anyway. It's a case of worrying over the past instead of looking towards the future. those states need to fucking grow up, or have their shitty war without the rest of us getting involved. maybe we should let them have at it, sans support from the civilized world.

Anyway, having them run the internet will reduce freedom of expression and activity on the network. It will NOT increase or protect it. the US government is just as guilty as china of censorship, just in economic areas, so balkanization is already here. The UN would simply give countries like china, india, and the islamic states even more power to dictate user behavior on a global scale. Personally, I do'nt care what china/india/islam does with their networks as their citizens have the responsibility to stand up to their own overlords if they're unhappy, but I certainly do not want their interests enforced here in the states. The borders protect peace.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

What you described certainly will not happen. I have a concrete example: the WTO. Certainly, WTO regulates many international trade. Does it enforce anything to individual countries? No. Similarly, UN control Internet facilitate fair allocation of Internet resources. It by all means wont impose any more controls in terms of the portion of Internet a country has. And it certainly will help remove some of the censorship applied in some countries now.

US refuses to do so obviously is an act of preserve its own advantages in information tech. This is understandable, I mean, Internet is invented by US. Why should US share the benefits with other countries?

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

IT ISN'T UNDER "GOVERNMENT CONTROL", any more than any other non-profit in the United States is under "government control".

Well, perhaps there is a BIT more government influence than your typical non-profit, but it's questionable just how much that influence it is, since ICANN has a committee representing most of the governments of the world advising it. ICANN has repeatedly declined to take U.S. government's advice on quite a few matters, in fact.

THAT'S why moving it under UN would be bad. Not only WOULD it be under government control, that control would be exerted by diverse countries with individual and special interests. It would be a disaster.

Re:UN control would be worse

[cavreader]

God knows the US might not do everything right but the UN has done nothing right. Anytime a country decides on a course of action they do it regardless of what the UN dictates. Countries pretend to follow UN mandates only when the issue has nothing to do with them. The situation in Syria is a good example of how a country could care less what the UN demands because the UN, like the ICC, have no way to enforce their dictates. Both the powerful and not so powerful countries routinely give the UN the finger when make decisions they feel are best for them. The UN should follow the path of the League of Nations. Also the US stewardship of the Internet root domain servers has been reliable and apolitical. The UN request for taking over the management is being driven by countries who want the power to control the content. Outside of copyright enforcement the current management has not interfered or blocked the content. The simple question is how would the UN do a better job. If countries have a problem with the current management they can create their own Internet infrastructure or firewall thier incoming Internet traffic like China has tried to do. China has the technology and money to firewall themselves in but they are fighting a losing battle. Their Twitter equivalent, Baidu, is giving the Chinese government fits because the twitter like messages get transmitted so fast the censors do not have the chance to censor the messages. The best they can do is monitor for certain words and phrases in the message in real time but it is easy to circumvent those default filters if you are careful.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Aighearach]

Suppose the Internet was controlled by a non -USA country, that does not agree with USA policies? How would the US feel?

We would have simply built our own. Oh, wait, we did!

We would never have simply waited for somebody to build it for us, and then asked for an equal stake in controlling it. The stake in control comes from having built it, it doesn't just float down on your head as a reward for having been born on planet Earth. US control certainly didn't originate from our arrogance or manifest destiny. We didn't invade anybody and steal plunder their interwebs and bring them home.

Our military asked for it, our research universities and telecom companies built it for them, and then our elected representatives allocated resources to make it public. The only reason it is international is because it improves trade, and we happen to like trade. If somebody doesn't like to play by our rules, they're certainly not going to take our ball and go home. They're welcome to go home and buy their own ball, though.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

"The US likes the oversight it has, and doesn't want to hand that over to anyone else. "

And what kind of "oversight" do you fantasize that it has?

ICANN is a non-profit corporation in California. While government may have some little degree of input, ICANN has repeatedly refused to take the U.S. governments advice (or demands, if you really want to put it that way) seriously. It has repeatedly refused to comply with government interference.

While at the same time, ICANN has a large international panel of advisors.

No matter how dumb you think ICANN's actions have been in recent years, they haven't been the result of US government policy.

Re:UN control would be worse

[elashish14]

The UN is not democratic or even representative of the People it is bossing around. I don't have a gentleman representing me & making my voice heard in the world government.

And how would this be any different from the current situation? America itself is hardly democratic and even if it were, what kind representation do non-Americans have on the council?

Not that I really have an opinion on the issue. It doesn't seem right that the US should have the only say on the direction of the Net. But I doubt the UN would do a better job.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Dr Damage I]

What is proposed is not removing control for the US government and handing it to the US, but removing control from non profit organizations that happen to exist in the US and handing it to the UN. Given the UNs structure, the US government would have more control over the internet if the internet were under the control of the UN.

The US government does not have the only say on the direction of the net as is. By contrast, the UN would have the only say on the direction of the net if control was transferred to it. A body in which few people place a great deal of faith.

Re:UN control would be worse

[lsatenstein]

Suppose the Internet was controlled by a non -USA country, that does not agree with USA policies? How would the US feel?

We would have simply built our own. Oh, wait, we did!

We would never have simply waited for somebody to build it for us, and then asked for an equal stake in controlling it. The stake in control comes from having built it, it doesn't just float down on your head as a reward for having been born on planet Earth. US control certainly didn't originate from our arrogance or manifest destiny. We didn't invade anybody and steal plunder their interwebs and bring them home.

Our military asked for it, our research universities and telecom companies built it for them, and then our elected representatives allocated resources to make it public. The only reason it is international is because it improves trade, and we happen to like trade. If somebody doesn't like to play by our rules, they're certainly not going to take our ball and go home. They're welcome to go home and buy their own ball, though.

In this regard I agreewith you. It may very well be that the status quo remains for another 20 years or so..

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/Pages/CurrentMembers.aspx
Angola, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso,Cameroon, Chile, China, Congo, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czech Republic, Djibouti, Ecuador, Guatemala, Hungary India, Indonesia, Italy, Jordan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Libya * Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico, Nigeria Norway, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Qatar, Republic of Moldova, Romania, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand Uganda, United States of America.

So, you claim that these countries are largely islamic states?

The amount of proganda and lies you are fed in your in your country is astounding. I know fighting against it is like trying to stop a tsunami with one's bare hands, but sometimes I can't help myself.

Re:UN control would be worse

[rtb61]

The internet already has an non-DNS protocol it is IPv4 changing into IPv6, DNS is a 'decorative' layer on top. Do you know who really controls DNS, I do, I choose which DNS server my computer points to. Just like you control your version of the internet by your choice of DNS server. The breakup already exists, it is just a matter of countries choosing to establish their own root servers and, hmm well, there is the crux, they either request that their ISPs sneak those DNS servers onto their customers or legally required it, tricky to do as the customer can reset it.

So whether people choose to use their own countries controlled root DNS servers or what ever version of international servers, is really quite a nebulous and something the existing control freak the US or the new players seeking control can really force under current protocols. People can already choose to go to truly independent DNS servers like Google who could establish their own rules if they choose with their own fee structures. Hell, you can create your own DNS address database out of discovered IP addresses and tell the US government to go get knotted.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Anonymous Coward]

Well done on proving the AC's point - that you simply do not understand the UN and especially the ITU whatsoever.

"The UN is fucked up. About the only positive thing I can possibly say on its behalf is that I appreciate what UNICEF does."

This is the first thing that proves this point. The UN is such a disaparate entity that it makes absolutely no sense to make a sweeping statement. It's a bit like saying America is a bunch of uneducated rednecks, when really that only describes parts of America - obviously silicon valley is completely different to some backwards swamp-town in Alabama.

"Irrelevant. With respect to decision making engineers and scientists nearly always lose to the politicos... pay attention."

This is the second thing that proves the GP's point, "politicos" have no power at the ITU, and it would require international consensus to change that, which would mean to achieve that, America would have to be part of it. So I don't know how you expect them to "lose" to them. The ITU isn't political beyond requiring international consensus to change it's mandate- beyond that politicians have no power to meddle.

"Lighten up, Francis. Not all of us believe an unelected unaccountable body is the best solution for the interwebs.."

You mean like ICANN and the US government then? Tell me, as a non-US citizen, where is the accountability for censoring the internet for me through ICE domain seizures? I did not vote the corrupt cockwards in that allowed this that's for sure, you lot did. The stewards running the internet in the US are entirely unaccountable.

"We've got the ball right now, and maybe some day when an accountable body is created we can talk. Until then feel free to Balkanize."

This attitude is precisely why you had 9/11 coming to you. You bully the rest of the world and try and control it and eventually it comes back to bite you. Don't expect the rest of the world's sympathy next time you piss off the wrong people. Well, that's if you haven't all shot each other to death in batman films and so forth due to your love orgy with guns first.

Re:UN control would be worse

[ultranova]

It boils down to each country deciding for itself what it wants to do.

It boils down to each country's government deciding for its subjects what it wants to do. In some countries these subjects have some kind of say over some issues, in most they don't - and in none do they have any control over what gets censored, since there's too much money and power riding on that for the powers that be to not become involved. But having the US manage things means that non-US governments need to jump through hoops to censor, and every little bit helps.

Re:UN control would be worse

[drinkypoo]

So... a NON-PROFIT corporation, which is advised by A PANEL CONSISTING OF GOVERNMENTS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, is a US-corporate shill? You're dreaming.

I'm not saying that ICANN is a US-corporate shill, but your logic doesn't hold here. The US government is run by corporations more than it is by The People, the US government decides who can do business and how. Kind of like how the FCC is in charge of who can broadcast and what.

Re:UN control would be worse

[mjwx]

UN control of the Internet would kill the Internet as we know it. Long distance fees,

Really, because the UN has done more than the US to eliminate that via supporting free trade agreements. Some of which the US has opposed. "Long Distance Fees" are the imagination of an extremely xenophobic person. They haven't existed in years.

requirements that you respect censorship laws in other countries,

As an Australian, this is already a requirement with the US's DCMA, not to mention things like ACTA or whatever it's called this week which are continually foisted on non US nations.

unique identification requirements,.

You mean like not being able to buy a .com domain unless it a certain country allows you to?

different regulatory classes for "service providers" and "consumers" are all on the table for the UN.

You mean there aren't already two sets of rules for plebs and businesses (hello net neutrality, we have it in Oz).

Sorry, but everything you have said has already come to pass. If control of the internet was turned over to the UN five years ago nothing at all would have happened as things like the DCMA would be stuck in a committee between the US, China and Saudi Arabia because they wont ever agree on what they want blocked, the US wants copyrighted material blocked, the Chinese want seditious material blocked and the Saudi's want porn blocked. they'd never agree to each others demands in a million years. But instead we have results removed from searches thanks to the US's DCMA.

Re:UN control would be worse

[ebvwfbw]

This is a situation where I say better than devil we know than the devil we don't.

It's better than that. Right now the Department of Commerce is running it. They are afraid of screwing it up. Not many people are actually involved. Move it to the UN, you get hundreds more people with input. Sure recipe for disaster. Too many assholes with an opinion. To be sure, some will be a tyrant. It isn't broken, let's not fix it.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

But that doesn't work both ways. Is the Salvation Army a government shill? Or the ACLU?

Yes, they have to play by the "non-profit" rules of the US, but there is nothing else saying they have to listen to D.C.

In fact (I don't remember the details off-hand), a year or so ago the US government threatened to cut off some of its donation money if ICANN didn't change its position on an issue. It refused.

Re:UN control would be worse

[kingturkey]

To be pedantic, every State in the world has a representative in the UNGA. It just so happens that each State is represented by a government and that government appoints their ambassador.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Sir_Sri]

That's still more representation than they'd have with a US corporation.

It's not like democratic governments represent more than 30 or 40% of the population at a time anyway. I'm in canada, the present conservative government got just over 40% of the vote on a 60 ish percent turnout. So on a good day they are honestly representing ~30% of canada in their choice to represent us at the UN. Randomly picking someone.. anyone to represent us would, over time, have a fairly representative conservative/liberal/other split and would at least be better than the representation we get with US corporations, which is none.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Sir_Sri]

So don't look to the UN for equity or equality. You will never find it.

Just like the US senate! Or the House of Lords. or ....

My point is only that it's less bad than control being held by a single country that most of us don't trust and don't like.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Jane Q. Public]

"My point is only that it's less bad than control being held by a single country that most of us don't trust and don't like."

No, you MISSED the point. ICANN is not run by "the U.S."

The government has very little, if any, say in what ICANN does. Not very long ago, ICANN defied the U.S. government in regard to some of ICANN'S policies.

You are trying to raise issues that simply don't exist.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Wolfrider]

--I agree 100%, the US should maintain control. DARPA built the Internet, it's ours, keep your incompetent "committee" hands off of it.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Stuarticus]

But Europe built the web.

Re:UN control would be worse

[Algae_94]

I don't think it's correct to assume that all of the people that don't vote in an election are not represented by the winner of the vote. And even if that is the case, they had the ability and the right to vote in that election. That 40% that didn't turn out could have easily swayed the election. Wasting one's vote does not give them the right to complain that they aren't represented properly.

That's off the track anyway. If person A lives in a country that rules with an iron fist with no input from the population and no free elections, person A has 0 representation for their self. That leads to 0 representation for person A in the UN, even if the rulers of the country send someone there. 0 cannot possibly be more than what they'd have with a US corporation, even if said US corporation gave them 0 representation. That would just be an equivilantly bad situation for Person A.

Why should the US remain in charge?

[davidwr]

If I were other countries, I'd ask myself why any one country should be "in charge" of things like DNS.

Having any one country "in charge" greatly increases the temptation to further "balkanize" the DNS system, where ".com" means something in "most of the world" but something else in countries that force their ISPs to use an in-country, government-controlled DNS provider. By having an international body handle things like this, countries that don't get their way but who at least respect the process will be less likely to run their own DNS.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Black Parrot]

If I were other countries, I'd ask myself why any one country should be "in charge" of things like DNS.

If I were other countries, I'd ask why anyone expected me to be in a club where I'm a second class citizen. I'd start my own UN before I bothered with my own internet.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[betterunixthanunix]

If I were other countries, I'd ask myself why any one country should be "in charge" of things like DNS.

No one country is in charge of DNS; some important domain names fall under the jurisdiction of the US government, but country-specific TLDs belong to specific countries. IP allocations are a different story, but ICANN is not controlled by the US government, it is just under the US government's jurisdiction.

I know full well that there are countries that do not like the job ICANN is doing. Countries that have national firewalls -- not the weak attempt by ICE (DNS hijacking), but real firewalls that actually inspect packets and kill connections -- want to change the rules to make censorship easier. China would prefer if other countries would just require servers to refuse to give "objectionable" information to Chinese citizens. The reason those sorts of countries are turning to the UN is that unlike the US, the UN actually respects those censorship campaigns (after all, national sovereignty must be respected, even if it violates the UN's definition of human rights) and will try to force everyone else to respect those campaigns.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[PickyH3D]

If I were any other country, I would probably ask myself that too. Then, I would look at one of the most corruptible global organizations and reconsider, unless I was one of the countries hoping to corrupt the process to begin with: e.g., Russia, China, India, or any of the Middle Eastern nations.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Kenja]

America is where most of the hardware is, its where the project originated, its based of work from DARPA, etc. If anyone should be "in charge" it should be us. Not that there's anything stopping other countries from managing their own segments.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[BMOC]

IPv6 adoption should also eliminate most of ICANNs inflated power.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[jellomizer]

Because we own it.

Why should we give up one of our national assets?

Bla Bla Bla Greater good.... Each country it looking out for itself. Besides Moral reasons, they only reason why the US doesn't just Nuke the rest of the world, is because they offer things that could benefit us more then the benefit of nuking the rest of the world. When ever you have a county give up their hard fought/well deserved assets. They will not like it and reject and fight against it.

Why did the US allow the current tyrants to get into power during the cold war? Because it was better then allowing the USSR back leaders. Which would extend our enemies interests. Sure we will probably will need to take them out in the future. But Afghanistan War+Iraq War (1 and 2)+Vietnam War+Korean War is still better than World War III.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[sneakyimp]

unlike the US, the UN actually respects those censorship campaigns (after all, national sovereignty must be respected, even if it violates the UN's definition of human rights) and will try to force everyone else to respect those campaigns

I've heard other people assert this same thing. I was wondering if there's any evidence of the UN actually doing something like this.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

America is where most of the hardware is,

Which hardware?

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[betterunixthanunix]

Well, take a look at some of the ITU-T Y series recommendations if you want to know where these ideas come from. A lot of it is technical e.g. protocols and ways to interoperate, but some of it is related to policy -- like requirements for non-repudiation in "next generation networks."

In general, the UN respects national sovereignty i.e. the UN will not authorize intervention in a country's laws or government unless the violations of human rights are extreme (and even then, they show their bias -- like sending peacekeepers to central Africa and ordering them to not discharge any firearms). This is mainly because countries like China and Russia would never have bothered with the UN if they would have been required to change their laws. The UN was originally created to prevent another world war, not to spread freedom or democracy.

Unfortunately, this means that the UN is not going to do anything that threatens the Great Firewall or similar national firewalls if they gain control of ICANN or otherwise have a say in Internet policy and governance. More likely, the UN would listen to the complaints of China -- those horrible Americans with their NY Times and Google -- and work to create a system that forces countries to respect each other's Internet laws (including censorship). That is how we keep the peace.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[MrNaz]

You know, I always wondered if people with your opinions actually existed, or if they were just used as hypothetical examples of the most extreme form of patriotic idiocy imaginable.
Turns out they do actually exist. Who'da thought?

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

America is where most of the hardware is,

Which hardware?

The Cloud hardware, durrr. Herpa derp click click dirt. Don't be a dirt clicker.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, you can be in charge of IP-addresses (I assume these were included in the networking that DARPA created) while France get to be in charge for all DNS names, HTML and CSS (since that's where the HQ for CERN is, and CERN is where Sir Tim Bernes-Lee worked when he created the WWW).

On a more serious note, the Internet consists of many interoperating techniques and ideas. The hardware is distributed throughout the world, as are the users. Because of the importance of the Internet it's risky to give politicians power over it, regardless of where they happen to live. It is also risky to give corporations or other entities too much power since there is way too much money to be earned, which gurantees corruption.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[zlives]

there is a difference in being a pragmatist and being a douche.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[DrPeper]

Ok *HERE* is the real problem with that (I will spuriously term that as) "logic". Those "other" countries are predominately run by either dictatorships (where is the logic in a dictatorship?), socialist agendas, or completely egregiously corrupt governments. *THAT* very fact alone should be enough to argue that the current governance is adequate.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[jellomizer]

I am not trying to sound like a nationalistic win-bag here. But the point, controlling the internet is the US national interests to keep controlling it. Just because an outside source says they want it, it doesn't mean the the US will just give it to them out of the goodness of their own heart.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Zontar The Mindless]

Besides Moral reasons, they only reason why the US doesn't just Nuke the rest of the world, is because they offer things that could benefit us more then the benefit of nuking the rest of the world.

And the fact that there are at least a couple of them that could nuke the US right back.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[tlambert]

If I were other countries, I'd ask myself why any one country should be "in charge" of things like DNS.

If I were a computer scientist, I'd ask myself what kind of computer scientist doesn't know that the DNS system is a hierarchical database.

Next, I'd ask myself what kind of computer scientist doesn't understand that "hierarchical databases" are by their nature "hierarchical".

Then I'd ask myself what kind of computer scientist, who doesn't know the top level DNS server is actually named ".", not ".com", and has records for other servers named ".com", ".org", ".us", ".uk", and so on, is qualified to discuss necessary locking arbitration on creating new entries in the flat namespace of particular server for a node embedded in that hierarchy.

Then I'd ask myself how that computer scientist graduated university, since without at least a gross understanding of hierarchy, they would likely be unable to find the locations of books in the university library, which is also organized as a hierarchical database.

Oh wait, I am a computer scientist.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[tnk1]

Hyperbole. Unless you are unaware of history, you know plenty of people hold or held the same opinions. That's how the listed wars got started to begin with.

If you don't share his opinion, fine, but don't try to argue your case by attempting to make the person appear isolated. He may well be the only person on Earth to ever hold that opinion and he can still be right, and everyone else wrong.

Now if you have some facts to share, I am sure we will all be relieved to know that it is possible to avert global thermonuclear war without having to have dozens of low intensity proxy wars.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who expected you to do anything?

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[gorzek]

I've never seen jellomizer post anything that wasn't psychotic, jingoistic (but I repeat myself!) drivel.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[abuelos84]

Those "other" countries are predominately run by either dictatorships (where is the logic in a dictatorship?), socialist agendas, or completely egregiously corrupt governments. *THAT* very fact alone should be enough to argue that the current governance is adequate.

1- Some countries are ruled by individual dictators, others by corporate dictators
2- Socialist "agendas" in many many countries are VOTED by their respective people. Every policy has an "agenda", the US has an imperialist capitalism agenda. So that doesn't mean much (only to people who believe socialism=dictatorship)
3- corrupt govt's: again, you shouldn't generalize.

I really dislike this (part-of-north) american concept that the 100+ countries besides them are on the most part shitty and only the mighty US has "real democratic values" (which is a pretty uninformed concept)

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

Modding that funny deserves modding funny itself.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a facetious and disingenious argument that conveniently glosses over the abuses the US government apparatus has poured out over the system it claims so loudly to protect. Even if it was "just" judges in Ohio and Kentucky ordering foreignly-registered-and-operated domains to be handed over to whichever new federal agency you've invented this week (there's well over a thousand of them already), to the rest of the world that looks like government meddling in a non-ccTLD.

No, I don't care for arguments why your poop shouldn't stink. It does, regardless of what other governments' poop smells like. And if it has to stink world-wide, well, that's exactly what the UN is there for. So they have a much better argument than this one upstart overly-powerful country can ever have. You don't have to agree with the logic to see the obivous outcome: The UN will continue to push this until you give in.

And no, I don't want to see the UN winning this tug of war, just as I don't want to see the US keeping the status quo. The US government are crooks and to about 7e9 people (minus only some 310e6 provincials) they're not even "our" crooks, so that excuse doesn't fly. The UN have a better claim there, too, and it's not like the US won't retain a say somehow.

The only way to solve this and really ensure and insure freedom on the internet and all that, despite various other governments' transgressions to freedom of speech and whatnot, is to take this thing lock stock and barrel including all agencies and bodies and things, and keep it out of UN reach in a way that the UN cannot assail, that's so solid that all the other governments cannot but acquiesce.

You don't do that by sitting on it and going "neener, neener". Pointing out that all the others combined are worse than you just doesn't garner brownie points, and since that's really the only defense the US has, it will not stand indefinitely. That lack of maturity in the US government, that lack of long-term vision back when Postel was still alive is what is causing trouble now.

There is a way to fix it, and it's a way that would be good for internet users world-wide. But it is something the US government is institutionally unable to do. It involves handing power to a new country that exists just for keeping the keys of the internet and backing it to the hilt even if there's not a single American in the new country's government. It would be good for freedom and liberty and whatnot. It wouldn't be American[tm].

And that, that is the real sticking point.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Aighearach]

Who'da thunk that asking you not to covet our stuff after being allowed a little access would be called an extreme form of patriotic idiocy? LMAO

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea, it's OK for American fucktards to talk about the world "coveting their stuff" while forgetting that the bulk of their high tech industry came from German scientists strongarmed into moving to the US after WWII. Now that that generation of scientists are retiring, the US is reverting to the dumb bunch of barely post-industrial farmer assclowns you've always been. Even then, your ability to be barely post-industrial farmer assclowns was based on stealing land from native American whom you outnumbered and outgunned, but still barely defeated in battle.

Oh, and in case you haven't noticed, the US can no longer manufacture anything more complex than a digital wristwach. It's just a matter of time until the rest of the world decides to stop putting up with your bullshit and forcibly remove all of your toys because you fuckwads DON'T FUCKING DESERVE THEM.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[downhole]

I always thought it was funny that so many people think it's just fine when every other country in the world looks out for itself and its own interests first, but the USA is supposed to give up its own interests to promote whatever somebody thinks is the "greater good", and thinking that the USA should look out for itself first is "the most extreme form of patriotic idiocy imaginable". What country do you live in, and when was the last time that country ever gave up anything really important for the greater good?

Meanwhile, anyone who actually supports western values like free speech, democracy, capitalism, etc ought to acknowledge that the US actually has given the world a tremendous good though defeating the Soviet Union and Communism, though we did it primarily for our own benefit. Funny how, at the time they existed, the USSR was an unbeatable colossus, but now that the US was able to destroy them without a single shot fired, the same people want to pretend that they never existed and were never a threat to world freedom. Lots of things were done that weren't pretty at the time, but the end result is much better for everyone than if we had let the USSR take whatever it wanted with no resistance or fought a hot war with them.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea, because statements like this:

the only reason why the US doesn't just Nuke the rest of the world, is because they offer things that could benefit us more then the benefit of nuking the rest of the world

are just legitimate expressions of self-interest.
And cut it out with that "spreading values" crap, who ever said US values were better? And what makes you think the rest of the world wants them anyway? And Even if you believed that "spreading values" crap, where do invasions, assasinations, drone strikes and massive civilian casualty rates fit in with that? Americans might believe that shit, the rest of the world knows that "spreading values" is just PR talk for "bombing the shit out of anyone so we can steal their natural resources".
That's fine, the bully always gets his day on top in the playground. Britain was the bully for the 19th century, the US had the 20th. Given how your economy is going I doubt you'll have much more of the 21st.

Re:Why should the US remain in charge?

[davidwr]

I think the phrase for a powerful country doing what is in their national interests without regard to fairness or other countries' well being is "Pax Romana." It works as long as you can enforce it, but as soon as your country starts breaking down internally, you won't have any friends to help you out.

OK, I know, "Pax Romana" doesn't literally mean this, but I think you get the idea.

At first, I thought UN control might be ok

[BMOC]

Then I got slapped, and I realized all the crappy things the UN does to try to expand it's own power.

You may make any and all complaints about U.S. control/dominance of the internet, and I accept them. I do not accept that UN control would be better, in fact I'm convinced it would be much worse.

Re:At first, I thought UN control might be ok

[BMOC]

The purpose of posting anonymously is to say things coherently that might not otherwise be said if you put a name on it. You wrote something incoherent that should have been left in the bin of broken troll posts.

Re:At first, I thought UN control might be ok

[Anonymous Coward]

At first impulse I had the same feeling. UN? Eh, why not. Internet's an international thing nowadays. .. Then I was reminded that Russia and China were there. Ha! Fuck no. Sorry.

For all of the fucked up, twisted things we do in the US we're doing an OK job on this one. I don't care how many "issues" we have. We don't need the keys handed to a corrupt human rights abusing dictatorship, and an ex secret police murdering madman with delusions of grandeur.

Re:At first, I thought UN control might be ok

[Anonymous Coward]

Putting a name on a post does not ensure the post will be coherent.

As much as I dislike...

[Mashiki]

the way the US has done things, they're the lesser of evils compared to the UN. Especially when you toss Russia, and China, and other dictatorships, neo-dictatorships into the mix. The best solution in the end will end up being decentralizing the entire thing and keeping it away from any national body.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[bhagwad]

Don't underestimate India's capacity for Internet censorship even though it's not run by a dictator. You need countries that fight against censorship, and don't care about "protecting people's sentiments". Only those countries deserve the stewardship of what is arguably on the greatest inventions of mankind.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[BMOC]

Well, at least the men of the west would allow you to use Encryption as you see fit. I would imagine the great power in the east might try to outlaw it.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[drinkypoo]

Only those countries deserve the stewardship of what is arguably on the greatest inventions of mankind.

And when you consider who is really running the UN (permanent members only please) you learn rapidly that the UN does not deserve that stewardship.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[Mashiki]

Don't underestimate India's capacity for Internet censorship even though it's not run by a dictator.

India fits firmly in the pot of a neo-dictatorship. I thought that would have been self-evident, they have a very keen interest in censorship because they have neighbors nearby with a much higher standard of living, while they have rampant corruption, and a much lower standard of living. Those are the conditions for mass riots. Unless they try and control the flow of information, India will collapse with the free flow of information. That's inevitable.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[bhagwad]

Nonsense. Just ensure that people are swiftly punished for violence and see how quickly all riots stop. Right now riots are politically motivated and the perpetrators are not afraid of the law. Change that one little aspect and everything falls into place. Regular people don't care about rioting. If there's a mob you can be sure it's political.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[Anonymous Coward]

I would go one step further.

Saying the US is the lesser of two evils compared to the UN is like saying cyanide is the lesser of two evils compared to a cocktail of cyanide, arsenic, and strychnine. Handing control of the internet over to the UN doesn't even get rid of the evils of the US. It merely adds the evils of all the other countries into the mix.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[scharkalvin]

Let's just give each nation their own block of addreses (which will be easier when ipv6 is universal) and let them assign them as they wish. Let them all have their own name servers to control their block of addresses and they will have to cache other name servers for other countries to be able to address content not their own. They can also erect whatever firewall they want where their country meets the world (wireless networks via satelite might be a problem, T.S.). However, no filtering will be done on outgoing packets by countries that don't want to filter their output to the world (like in the US, except maybe for what the RIAA or MPAA manage to get into law).

Re:As much as I dislike...

[Anonymous Coward]

Especially since the prudes to the west of me are less likely to ban porn than the prudes to the east of me.

Also, the religious nuts to the west of me are less likely to crucify me for liking porn than the religious nuts to the east of me.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[illumastorm]

Yeah, this method is working great for Syria

Re:As much as I dislike...

[Chris Mattern]

Don't underestimate India's capacity for Internet censorship

Just wait until India gets the right to take action against websites anywhere that post the actual border with Pakistan. Hoo boy, that's gonna be a sh*tstorm, and no mistake (and for that matter, Pakistan as well. In *either* country, if any representation is made that all of Kashmir doesn't belong to *them*, the government screams like a banshee).

Re:As much as I dislike...

[bhagwad]

Syria is not a democracy. People there have to riot to be heard. They can't just vote out the dictator. India however has many mechanisms in place for change to occur without violence.

Ask any Indian if they've ever seen a riot without political backing of some kind or the other. And ask them if the perpetrators of those riots were afraid of punishment. Bingo. You have your answer.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[Anonymous Coward]

What good is encryption when they can throw you in prison for not giving them the keys? The world's loyalties are shifting East, you know it, I know it.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[Mashiki]

Nonsense. Just ensure that people are swiftly punished for violence and see how quickly all riots stop.

Wrong. So very wrong, riots are multifaceted especially in developing countries like India. Especially when there are large gaps between rich and poor. Right now it's not a pressing issue. Let's take the power issue of the other day, extend it to a week. Up the number of people by another 100m. Reduce wheat yields for the year by 40%, and cut access to clean water by 30% due to the lack of power.

Now, we toss in the current government which is wholly corrupt. Not spending enough on infrastructure. We have the open sewer problem, lack of fuel and poor sanitation. And we have...what? A peaceful open, well ordered society, with access to plenty of information about their neighbors to the east? I don't think so. What we now have is a teapot ready to boil over, because they know that even their neighbors next door in vietnam have better living conditions.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[Zontar The Mindless]

...they [India] have neighbors nearby with a much higher standard of living,

Um... No. Not really.

In fact, that's simply not the case at all.

Re:As much as I dislike...

[bhagwad]

All that is speculation. When it happens we'll see. As of now, all riots in India are politically motivated and take place only because people are not afraid of the consequences. If every rioter knew that he would be jailed and made to pay for the damage out of their own pocket swiftly and without hesitation, good bye to all violence and hello peace :)

I'd rather have the US than the UN anyway...

[Anonymous Coward]

In general, the US can be browbeaten into keeping things neutral. SOPA/PIPA got shot down when China notified the US that blocking access to one of their sites would be similar to a naval blockade -- an act of war.

However, with the UN, this wouldn't happen. They can block sites at will, with zero recourse. Say someone in the US makes jokes about the Thai rulers. Their website can be dropped off the net. Similar if there is a site pointing out brutality in China or India. Poof, it is history, and there is no way to deal with it. The UN is subject to no law or no checks and balances.

it should be an anarchy

[Anonymous Coward]

No one, the USA nor the UN should "control" the internet. Anyone should be free to set up DNS servers and anyone else free to use any they want.

Anyone having "control" only means that control will be used for evil purposes in time. It's inevitable. The internet is too important for that. Technical standards should be set by an apolitical body of engineers. There should be no other influence of governments or political bodies. No nation's laws should apply outside their borders.

So far the USA has caused some problems, but the UN will cause worse ones as it will grant more control to authoritarian governments which want religious based censorship.

Re:it should be an anarchy

[cpghost]

Anyone should be free to set up DNS servers and anyone else free to use any they want.

The issue is with DNS itself. We need a fully distributed, and censorship-resilient name system, and not something that can be attacked at or near the root(s).

But all this DNS-talk is moot anyway: the REAL potential for censorship takes place at 1/ the Tier-1 backbones (withdrawing BGP route announcements), 2/ at international gateways (with selective access lists, e.g. the Chinese Firewall) and 3/ within corporate-owned mega-backbones, think Comcast and other big providers. This kind of censorship is distributed and doesn't depend on one single big central authority to enforce it.

Other countries are free to roll their own...

[gestalt_n_pepper]

If control is what they want, they should invent, and pay for the development of their own internet equivalent themselves. Right now, all they own is their own servers and communications infrastructure.

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[Anonymous Coward]

And this is exactly what will happen if the US tries to further monopolize the internet. It could even be internet minus the US.

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[Anonymous Coward]

What, this old stupidity again? Inventing or discovering something does not mean you get to control it; after all, do you think American car manufacturers check with Germany every time they want to make a new car model? Does Italy get to dictate radio spectrum?

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[jank1887]

" they should invent, and pay for the development of their own internet "

why? it's not patented. RFC's aren't private knowledge. if they currently are part of the internet, they likely have most or all of the hardware they need.

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[zlives]

and why is this a bad thing...

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[gestalt_n_pepper]

It's the issue of control. The fact that they have their own hardware, doesn't, in my opinion, give them the right to control anything about the system outside of their own borders.

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[scarboni888]

This post's rating was brought to you by home grown American jingoism.

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[gestalt_n_pepper]

Feel free to elaborate. Why is this jingoistic? What obligates the USA to gift control of their inventions to the rest of the world, gratis? Are you under the impression that we have a moral obligation to turn over all of our technology to the rest of the world as we discover it because we should be nicer? How about nuclear technology?

So, what's up? Why do you think what you do, whatever that is?

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[Xiaran]

So does that mean all of the non-US contributions to the Internet as we know it can be removed from the US?

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[scarboni888]

You know the corporations already figured out long ago that there's no such thing as distinct nations in the real world it's about time the proletariat wised up to it and dropped their nationalistic nonsense so that the corps aren't the only ones to benefit from said realization.

Nation-States are legal fictions supported only by those who haven't yet realized what instant communication and global transportation really means and those who benefit from the ignorance of those who haven't yet come to terms with that reality.

Not only that but the arpanet didn't come out of a vacuum or out of a space of knowledge which the US had a sole monopoly over. Everything they used to build the arpanet was knowledge accumulated by all kinds of people from all over the globe throughout history. Yes - we were globalized even before instant communications but ever since that happened I think that only a fool can deny it.

Planet earth is local to everyone and while war is already obsolete (they've all failed miserably to accomplish anything meaningful since WWII) the sooner people realize it's one planet rather than the distinct and separated nation states we thought it was for most of our history the better.

You may live in "America" or "Canada" or "United Kingdom" but you don't live in a vacuum, all by yourself. The reality is we all live on a chunk of rock, spinning around in a vacuum, all by ourselveS.

So when you share knowledge and technology it's not because you should be nicer. It's should be because you understand that doing so is the only other alternative to ending civilization because we were too thick-skulled to pull it together. Of course maybe that's fine with you. But to me it's really quite tedious, monotonous, and just more of the same old primate games.

Re:Other countries are free to roll their own...

[gestalt_n_pepper]

Content or structure?

Times have changed

[fustakrakich]

It's not like the Old Days, when we can do anything we want. A refusal is not the act of a friend. If Don Corleone had all the judges, and the politicians in New York, then he must share them, or let us others use them. He must let us draw the water from the well.

Re:Times have changed

[jfalcon]

Why do I have to pay for your well? Drill your own damn well is what Don Corleone should have said.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Kenja]

1992, the VERY YEAR that Obama stopped directing Illinois Project Vote. Coincidence?! Yea, probably.

Typo in summary

[DanTheStone]

"Unitied Nations", seriously?

Re:Typo in summary

[Eddy_D]

"Unitied Nations", seriously?

I guessed you missed the typo in the word internet then. I can understand a typo for UN in slashdot, but "interenet"... really? Hang your geek head in shame.

Re:Typo in summary

[Anonymous Coward]

You are correct, but I can forgive that one. It's extremely common to have typos in link text, and it's also spelled correctly 3 times (though with inconsistent capitalization). Just more poor editing.

Re:Typo in summary

[Anonymous Coward]

I guessed you missed the typo in the word internet then.
I can understand a typo for UN in slashdot, but "interenet"... really? Hang your geek head in shame.

Not to mention "internet" instead of "Internet".

Re:Typo in summary

[Antibozo]

Not to be confused with the Unitard Nations, which sets international standards for superhero costumes.

Being a Brazilian I say ...

[superflit]

Do NOT handle ANY control to the brazilian government .
The first thing they will do is take down everything that will speak against their major corrupt politicianS (with big Plural) .
And the Brazilian LAW FORBIDS anonymity.

Brazil govt: PLEASE GO AWAY

There is several reasons why we buy: iphone (designed in US), use Facebook (made in US) and use Google (made in us).

And one of the reasons is that the US law and business way is more 'clear'.
(if you think I am wrong..do business in Brazil and you are going to see the red-tape/bribe Hell)

Russia and China?? Serious?? the same homies that are supporting the crazy lunatics?

The US president can be 'bad' but they are not MEAN like others.

Keep US control is the LESSER evil.

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[lsatenstein]

Do NOT handle ANY control to the brazilian government .
The first thing they will do is take down everything that will speak against their major corrupt politicianS (with big Plural) .
And the Brazilian LAW FORBIDS anonymity.

Brazil govt: PLEASE GO AWAY

There is several reasons why we buy: iphone (designed in US), use Facebook (made in US) and use Google (made in us).

And one of the reasons is that the US law and business way is more 'clear'.
(if you think I am wrong..do business in Brazil and you are going to see the red-tape/bribe Hell)

Russia and China?? Serious?? the same homies that are supporting the crazy lunatics?

The US president can be 'bad' but they are not MEAN like others.

Keep US control is the LESSER evil.

Today in the news, Brazil made Canadian Headlines by an announcement of major criminal charges against politicians, and friends. Bribes in the millions of dollars and scandals. Almost 50% of the opposition politicians were part of the corruption charges. More news at 11pm.

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[Lisias]

You, my friend, forgot one of the nastier laws in this God forsaken land: YOU CAN BE ARRESTED FOR TELLING THE TRUE.

If I publicly state a fact, but someone gets offended by that fact, he can sue me for damages. Every corrupt politician uses this law when convenient. Defamation, in Brazil, is a felony against the "honor" - and we consider defamation *anything* that detriments the public image of someone, no mater being true or not.

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[Frederico Camara]

What a troll! Interesting? I hope not.

Being myself a brazilian I say this troll's views on brazilian government are somewhat wrong. I don't deny the existence of corruption in Brazil, but it's not as bad as in the other part of the world (Brazil is ranked #73 in the 192 countries participating in Corruption Perceptions Index).

In reality, there are some very successful brazilian business. The "bribe hell" he talks about is probably the fate of businesses that would not want to pay due taxes (counts as corruption). Problems in law are constantly being reviewed, public opinion has usually been taken in consideration.

Also, corrupt politicians in Brazil do not have the power to take down anything, and the brazilian law that forbids anonimity, in the same paragraph ensures the freedom of expression of thought.

The "reasons we buy" argument is completely fallacious.

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Add India to the list as well!!

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[superflit]

Today in the news, Brazil made Canadian Headlines by an announcement of major criminal charges against politicians, and friends. Bribes in the millions of dollars and scandals. Almost 50% of the opposition politicians were part of the corruption charges. More news at 11pm.

This is NOT news.... NEWS will be when they:

1) will be in jail
2) Recover the money

People really do not know how things are in 'developing' countries...
One of our 'leaders' is wanted by interpol [1] and is only wanted because the US caught him laundering BIG money. IF was in Brazil he will be innocent and will earn money for defamation.

and It is very friend of our last 'great' 'populist' Lula [2]

1 - http://www.interpol.int/Wanted-Persons/(wanted_id)/2009-13608
2 - http://g1.globo.com/sao-paulo/noticia/2012/06/maluf-oficializa-apoio-ao-pt-em-sp-em-encontro-com-lula-e-haddad.html

Again I know it is 'fancy' and 'intellectual' bash US but they are still the less evil

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[tnk1]

You may have a point, but compared to allowing anonymous communications, a "guarantee of the expression of the freedom of thought" is pretty weak. The best way to ensure that freedom is to make sure no one knows who they need to attack to silence that expression.

The Soviet Union's constitution, as well as all constituent republics, had similar freedom clauses... even more far reaching ones, in some cases. Many un-free countries tend to do that. The problem is, they also have clauses that effectively subordinated those freedoms to the needs of the Party or made those freedoms technically legal to express, but left the people expressing them completely open to extrajudicial punishment for doing so.

There are words, and then there is the ability to realistically express them. Freedom of Speech is worthless if you can be targeted for expressing it.

Oh, and not saying that Brazil is a dictatorship or anything, just making the point that not all freedoms are created equal.

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[Frederico Camara]

Brazil was a dictatorship.

Brazil Constitution was a reaction to that period in which it was ruled by the military, appointed by the state (themselves), and most civil liberties were suspended. It was written from scratch by a Constituent Assembly elected in 1986 (wikipedia), many different parties represented there. I agree that constitution itself is not a representation of how freedom really is. Anonimity itself gives only a perception of safeness, and you can always act anonymously regardless of what the constitution says.

I agree that the constitution should have granted, to the individual, the right to be anonymous. Brazil constitution says, translation is mine (IANAL):

IV - It is granted the freedom to expression of thought, being denied anonymity.

Reasoning in Brazil's Constitution is you can't be anonymous as you publish diffamatory content or hate speech, or else it can be taken down judicially. And you can be prosecuted by publishing diffamatory content if identified. It is a controversy if this clause applies to other areas besides freedom of expression of thought.

On the other hand, my perception is that veiled persecution is stronger through major companies than by any other means, and that this is as anywhere else. Most major companies acting in Brazil are originally from other countries, maybe it is common practice.

Re:Being a Brazilian I say ...

[downhole]

Thank you for being honest rather than jumping on the Hate America bandwagon. Yeah, we're not perfect, but we're a hell of a lot better than most of the rest of the world. The US, western Europe, and a handful of other countries are about as free as us, but most of the rest of the world is a clusterfuck of corrupt dictators enforcing all sorts of censorship. Give the UN control of the internet, when China and Russia and Iran and every other tin-pot dictator out there have equal say? No thanks, it'd be locked down tight in no time flat. If you think the things the US has pulled are bad, you ain't seen nothing compared to what would happen if these guys had control of things. I hadn't thought of Brazil as particularly bad, but you live there, so I'll take your word for it.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Sarten-X]

You don't get it. The next presidential term will start in 2013, which is 21 years after 1992. This is obviously meant to commemorate the fact that the National Minimum Drinking Age act was passed two years after Obama turned 21, after it safely wouldn't affect him.

Don't you see? This is the Illuminati once again ensuring that its elite members can go out and party while us common folk get screwed, and then they have the balls to remind us all of how we're just complacent sheep!

Don't you see? Conspiracy theories make perfect sense if sanity isn't an issue for you!

All people should resist all central control

[udachny]

All people should resist any central authority trying to take control over the Internet. Basically it is absolutely irrelevant who tries to do it, whoever gains control over the networks becomes the single point of failure, and if the control is real (true control with ability to shut networks down, disconnect networks etc.) then the question only becomes not 'if' but 'when' this central authority will use it for its nefarious purposes, and all purposes are nefarious when it comes to shutting down parts of the Internet (or the entire thing). Even little power in hands of people with an agenda is detrimental, never mind power to do the same over the entire Internet.

Conspicuous by their absence

[mooingyak]

the push is backed not only by Russia, but China, Brazil and India as well

Names I *don't* see up there are ones like UK, France, Germany, or just about anyone in Europe.

Re:Conspicuous by their absence

[cpghost]

Because the MAFIAA/IFPI-bought politicians in Europe are happy with the way the US censors^Wcontrols DNS already. In their minds: no further action needed. Copyright-based censorship is already in place, and they can blame the 800lb gorilla USA for enforcing it with domain seizures, so they don't have to take the heat for doing it themselves. It's the OTHER censorship, the political one, that the U.N. is trying to implement, in addition to the Copyright-based one.

Re:Conspicuous by their absence

[Anonymous Coward]

Right because in countries like China, Russia and India, corruption is non-existant. Their is absolutely no way the media companies could ever bribe member of the UN. Everyone knows the US is the only place that you can literally walk into a government officials office with a suitcase full of cash and walk out with what you want.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Mashiki]

Meh. Agenda 21 is by far less a conspiracy theory than some things people think, plenty of cities(including my own) have already included some of their platform into their urban planning, so does it exist? Yep, is it real? Yep. Is it evil and insidious? Well I suppose that depends on how tight your tinfoil cap is. Is it "one world government" material? Meh..that's crackpot stuff. Personally, I'm leery of any supernational body where someone isn't elected giving "strong suggestions" on how to do something to a local government. It's kinda like the EU, don't like it.

Personally, I'd figure more Americans would be worried about their own DOJ and Holder, blackballing the committee hearings on illegal gunrunning to Mexico and killing 300 people, while letting the guns walk. That entire thing is a pretext for "see, look at all those guns--they're in the hands of criminals and they're getting back into the US and all the rest." That's not conspiracy work, that's already happened. The guns flowed both ways. And before, someone get's their panties in a twist and go "Bush did it too" indeed, though their guns were tracked. Holder, just let their guns go free, no tracking, notta. The DoJ has already backwalked on that one.

Give it some time.

[gatfirls]

There's a lot of interest in controlling the medium of communications that is bridging us into the future. Don't accept the lesser of two evils, promote a better solution. We're always on H.R. away from turning the internet into a carnival fairway.

Re:Give it some time.

[BMOC]

Total freedom is better than government control, that's easy to accept. The topic here is whether the UN would be better than the US at it.

Re:Give it some time.

[betterunixthanunix]

Don't accept the lesser of two evils, promote a better solution

Here is something that would go a long way: reduce the barriers to entry for peering with ISPs. The requirements many ISPs have for peering make it impossible for a small, community-run network to become part of the Internet; such networks generally wind up paying for service from a telecom monopoly.

A global network can be governed by its users (or at least those who have the equipment and expertise needed to participate); Fidonet comes to mind here.

Re:Give it some time.

[Chris Mattern]

And the answer would be: the US isn't very good at it, but the UN would be much, much worse.

Re:Give it some time.

[Attila Dimedici]

Yes, but the topic of conversation right now is about accepting the greater of two evils (U.N. control over the Internet). Coming up with a governance solution that is better than the current one (more or less--and more less--U.S. control over the Internet) would be great. When someone suggests such an idea we can talk about it.

Re:Give it some time.

[tnk1]

You know, I get what you are saying, but a lot of those rules come about because small community-run networks will increase the peering complexity and if you're going to peer, you need to make sure you can be trusted to not fuck up everyone elses' interconnects. This is better known as "Fun with BGP".

Re:Give it some time.

[Aighearach]

Don't accept the lesser of two evils, promote a better solution.

Refusal to choose the lesser evil in the short term takes your hand off the controls, and accepts whatever level of evil is provided. If you can't even make a rational short-term decision to lessen the effects of evil, how can you possibly claim to propose some sort of long-term solution that will then have to defeat both lesser and greater evils to be enacted?

Re:Give it some time.

[betterunixthanunix]

if you're going to peer, you need to make sure you can be trusted to not fuck up everyone elses' interconnects

I see no reason to assume that a large ISP would not screw things up. In fact, I recall this counterexample:

http://www.technewsworld.com/rsstory/71258.html

FUCK THE UN

[SensitiveMale]

I said. Fuck 'em. Corrupt organization run and used by tyrants. Fuck them.

Re:FUCK THE UN

[lsatenstein]

I said. Fuck 'em. Corrupt organization run and used by tyrants. Fuck them.

It is possible that the USA has its own form of UN veto and hence corruption.

Better solution:

[Anonymous Coward]

Rebuild EVERYTHING.

Since most of these people only care about the web, we will discuss the web.

Each country has its own ccTLD already.
Let them censor the hell out of that, let them regulate or not.
Create global TLDs. To be registered in these, you must operate in at least 3 or more countries. (they don't need to be physically present in said countries, selling directly there is enough)

Make a layer of common ID between each of these separate networks.
These can be used or not used, depending on the group in question.

PROBLEM SOLVED.
Oh, wait, the web already is like this now...

The Steve Jobs '95 Interview

[ciderbrew]

I think Jobs summed it up all very well in 1995. The Internet needs to be run as a public trust.

Here is the text (See The Internet section)
http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/comphist/sj1.html

And for those that have not seen it before, here is the video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=121ofj_l6vM

I've never had the money to be a fan of apple stuff, but I like old tech interviews, especially when they talk about the future of the industry.

Re:The Steve Jobs '95 Interview

[ciderbrew]

Skip an hour in for the internet bit.

Re:The Steve Jobs '95 Interview

[Anonymous Coward]

If that fucking moron was so smart how come he's dead? (eating lentils instead of seeking actual medical advice for his cancer.)

Meaningless - we already have interrupt devices

[WillAffleckUW]

Pretty meaningless, the US Navy already has cutters on most transoceanic cables and all the satellites have interrupt circuits.

The Internet is owned by America.

Re:Meaningless - we already have interrupt devices

[Anonymous Coward]

...the US Navy already has cutters on most transoceanic cables...

[citation needed]

Re:Meaningless - we already have interrupt devices

[WillAffleckUW]

This isn't published data. Look, I know you'd like to believe we play fair, but we don't. And we never have.

Healthy?

[gmuslera]

An internet where US lobbiers of patents, media and others pushes their own agendas over the government that controls internet, and had so many abuses over that so far? Maybe won't be so different if the UN is in charge, but is in pretty bad shape now.

And right now it is

[Sycraft-fu]

The US has "control" only in so far as everyone uses infrastructure (at least with regards to DNS) that is ultimately accountable to US companies. This is just de facto control, not de jure control. Anyone is free to set up their own alternate root system, from an individual up to a bloc of nations. Indeed there are other ones out there, just small ones. Larger ones can be set up. Nothing is stopping the EU from running their own root authority.

I can handle that kind of US control because it means that if push comes to shove, other people can do their own thing. The US has control only because others don't choose to exert the control they can have, it is a real anarchy. I do not want a system where the UN has statutory control, where people can't do their own thing because it is illegal per international treaty.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Anonymous Coward]

the tinfoil is strong with this one =]

The UN is not a government

[Anonymous Coward]

International Relations is basically "civilized anarchy", the UN is a device for governments, which ALL can act as they please, to coordinate, exchange information, etc. nothing more nothing less.

Because, as we've seen with Syria

[JBMcB]

When the majority of the U.N. really, really wants to solve a problem, the U.N. can manage to accomplish nothing.

No!

[interval1066]

Of all the things the UN needs to devote its attention to control of the internet is not one of them.

For all it's failures...

[physicsphairy]

The one thing the US does much better is protecting free speech. We can post pornography, hate speech (who defines that, by the way?), how to make bombs, things that our society and often our government both view as repugnant, but somehow, it's still legal. Not that we don't have occasional attacks on that, but our free speech tends to hold up in the end.

There are few places that would be as good as the United States to to host a network of free discourse. It may well be because of that that the most successful such network is based there.

The UN is a constituency of pro-censorship entities. The only reason they want to control the internet is so that they can control the internet.

Re:For all it's failures...

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe we should change tact then, we allow the UN to take over when all UN members agree to support freedom of speech and free discourse as well as human rights, have it be a treatie and any violation of such treatie be an act of war. At least it will remove the incentive to censor the net. Not to mention that there is just about zero chance of this happening, cause China and Russia won't sign off on those ideas.

That's not the half of it

[betterunixthanunix]

Say someone in the US makes jokes about the Thai rulers. Their website can be dropped off the net

You seem to think that ITU would continue the policy of "anything with an IP address can be a service provider (e.g. a web server)" -- I think ITU would divide Internet hosts into three or more classes: government, commercial service provider, and consumer. Government systems would have special privileges / no restrictions, but would have to serve a function of government (perhaps this could include propaganda). Commercial service providers would be things like Facebook, Youtube, etc. -- potentially run by the government, but not classified as government systems. Service providers would be required to obey the laws of any country whose citizens they provide service to so e.g. if you make fun of the Thai leader, you must not serve pages to Thai citizens. Consumers would not be able to operate servers at all, except as needed to participate in some system (e.g. a video game might need to listen on a particular port, but it would be illegal to run a web server or IRC server that listens on such a port).

So rather than a website that jokes about Thai monarchy being knocked off the net, the website would be required to refuse service to Thai citizens. Thus China would not need to block the NY Times with its Great Firewall; the NY Times would be required to refuse service to Chinese citizens.

What do you think ITU cares about more: national sovereignty, or promoting some hacker ideal about free communication?

Re:That's not the half of it

[jonamous]

So you think we should not be allowed to run our own web or IRC servers? Are you serious? Right now, I can grab a $10/mo VPS and set up my own mail and web server. That's part of what makes this network so flexible.

Re:That's not the half of it

[betterunixthanunix]

No, I think that any system with an IP address should be able to act as a server for whatever protocol the operator wants. My point was that the ITU would almost certainly change that, so that different systems have different service classes.

Having a VPS will not really help; if you are providing a service, you will need to follow the rules for your service class. Do you think your rented VPS will somehow escape rules that require you to refuse service to people whose governments' object to that communication? Do you think your VPS host will even allow you to provide service to other countries?

What makes you think proxy servers, Tor, etc. will still be possible after the ITU starts make "recommendations" (i.e. rules) for the Internet? In the Y series recommendations, you can find suggestions for "non-repudiation" in "next generation networks" -- i.e. that users should not be able to disassociate their names from their online activities.

Simple, UN

[ThatsNotPudding]

Build your own Internet. Then turn total control over it to power-mad dictators like Putin and the PRC, as is your wont...

Re:Another conspiracy

[Black Parrot]

the tinfoil is strong with this one =]

LoL

Lesser evil -- and now a direction

[betterunixthanunix]

1. US -- ICE hijacks DNS entries and can be circumvented with a browser extension.
2. Countries pushing for UN control -- national firewalls, a constant cat-and-mouse game to circumvent those firewalls, requirements that ISPs participate in censorship, censorship of political opinions, censorship of news (facts), criminalization of the act of circumvention in addition to distributing circumvention tools, etc.

Now, I am not one to defend ICE or any of the US government's Internet censorship, but let's be clear: the difference between what China, Russia, and others are doing and what the US does is the difference between night and day.

Re:Lesser evil -- and now a direction

[gmuslera]

May be day, but what Russia and China does affects mainly their own citizens, or at least people/sites being in these countries.

Re:Lesser evil -- and now a direction

[betterunixthanunix]

What China does only affects their own citizens?

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2011/06/02/gmail-hacked-from-china-google_n_870126.html

Really, when ICE hijacks a DNS entry, they are not stepping outside of US borders; you can register your DNS name as a .co.uk or whatever for your country, and the US will not legally touch you (or your government will cooperate, but at least that is your government and not some hack).

What we really need is a decentralized system of Internet governance, but transferring to the UN is basically a step in the opposite direction.

Re:Lesser evil -- and now a direction

[zlives]

right... so lets give them control of all the internets...

Churchill

[ThatsNotPudding]

Except that, good or bad, the US's governance of the Internet is a known quantity.

Kinda like what Churchill said of Democracy: the worst system, except for all the others.

Re:Churchill

[Anonymous Coward]

Plato considered Democracy not the worst system, however placed Aristocracy higher for many reasons. Read "The Republic".

Re:Churchill

[aurispector]

And Plato can't be wrong?

Re:Churchill

[Stuarticus]

You forgot "that have been tried from time to time" most of the arguments here seem to be "America is doing fine, why bother considering anything else" seemingly forgetting which nation is the most anal about copyright and IP protection... DMCA, CISPA, SOPA, etc.

Governments are corrupt, which makes the UN...

[couchslug]

... the sum of many corrupt entities.

Consider that befor you YIELD YOUR FREEDOMS to the United Nations.

IS there a lesser of two evils here?

[Chas]

Speaking honestly, as an American here.

The US government could fuck up a wet dream to the point one would long for the sensation of having one's genitals removed with belt sander.
And the UN is no different. Just multinational.
While both were founded with the right idea, they've both gone GREIVIOUSLY astray, to the point that they're generally more harmful than helpful.

HOWEVER, the US government DOES, occasionally do things "correctly".
I really, REALLY wish I could say the same thing about the UN.

At this point, the US stewardship of the Internet isn't the most desirable outcome. But it's a damn sight better than handing it over to an (at best) wildly ineffectual and horrifically subverted organization like the UN.

Handing over control of free speech and open access to information to people who have every intention of demolishing both? Are you fucking nuts?

I hate the bloated panopticon monster my government has become, and I seriously think that it needs to be pared back, by armed conflict if necessary. But I'd have the politicians here where we can get at them and remove them, than some asshat in a bunker in China where we'd have to start a war to remove them.

They'll BRIC the internet!

[divisionbyzero]

Seriously though, I think those countries are just about last on my list of countries that should have any say at all over how the internet is run. I'm sure France would love it too since they want to "civilize" the internet. NFW!

Re:this thread is all the evidence needed

[SecurityGuy]

Hyperlinking? A BT invention. HTTP? Swiss.

The WWW is not the Internet. You're looking a little black, there, Kettle.

NWO

[Anonymous Coward]

We already know the globalist are working to form a one world government and one world currency, the only question is which "country" is to be the capital of the world government. If the Obama administration or any other part of the US government goes along with this in any way, then it will be very clear, of their treason against the American people, if it isn't already.

That will likely mean some bad things will happen.

Who's worse?

[manaway]

UN control of the Internet would kill the Internet as we know it. Long distance fees,

Are long distance fees anything like paying different amounts for different content from different locations? If so, then US corporations are lobbying hard to end net neutrality.

requirements that you respect censorship laws in other countries,

Country laws cross country borders? Check (see US vs. Kim Dotcom and MegaUpload). For censorship, see below.

unique identification requirements,

Large push for "real name" authentication? Check (all non-cash purchases recorded with ChoicePoint? double-check).

different regulatory classes for "service providers" and "consumers"

Check (US common carrier exemption).

powerful governments with strong and pervasive censorship campaigns.

What happens to whistleblowers (e.g. Wikileaks) in the US? Strong and pervasive campaigns. Check.

This doesn't prove that the UN would be any better than the US; but it does suggest that if your points have merit, there are problems with the current controllers.

Re:Who's worse?

[Aighearach]

Are long distance fees anything like paying different amounts for different content from different locations? If so, then US corporations are lobbying hard to end net neutrality.

Well, to be fair, other US corporations are lobbying hard to create net neutrality.

By the way, you can't end what you never had.

One of the things you may not realize about the US is that over here, every contentious issue has corporations lobbying hard on multiple sides. Especially something like net neutrality, where different industries are effected in different ways. In many cases only one view is strongly represented in the media coverage, but that is not actually what "lobbying" is.

Re:Who's worse?

[manaway]

Fair enough. US corporations lobby on different sides (choosing based on profits), UN countries vote for various sides (choosing based on many notions).

Other countries have a choice.

[Anonymous Coward]

If another country wants to set up an alternative DNS and an alternative addressing scheme, there is nothing stopping them. Then we will have the "Internets" that George Bush predicted.

From the point of the U. S., why would we want to cede control of our most effective weapon? Countries are falling left and right to the human power that the Internet amplifies so readily.

THE very best way to screw things up.

[DrPeper]

If you really want to kill the internet, then by all means put it in the control of the UN. Show me any any project (thatis supposedly successful) that is run by the UN and I will show you corruption, extortion, and gang mentality. I would wager that I could also show you almost every other form of blasphemous egregious violation of human rights and offenses to freedom and democracy.

You don't have to pay a US company for a .com

[tlambert]

Get a [mydomainname].co.[ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country code] domain instead.

Perhaps what you are bitching about is that when you type "foo" into some browsers, the search order ends up being "foo.", then "www." + foo." + "com"?

So use a browser where the address bar is actually an omnibar, and the search order is "foo.", then "[preferred search engine]?" + "foo".

I suggest Chrome.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Rakarra]

Oh no the guns were tracked with Bush but thanks for playing....and where the heck are all the supposed gun control laws that are supposed to come out of this conspiracy theory that the obama administration let the guns walk so they could enact gun control laws....nice one zippy.

Four years ago, the story was that Obama was going to enact all the gun laws to take everyone's guns away.

Now the story is that he needed to get re-elected so he had to bide his time. Now, in his second term, he'll REALLY take everyone's guns away.

What the US owes the UN depends...

[tlambert]

How much does the US owe the UN?

It depends... how much did the US borrow from the UN in the first place?

Re:What the US owes the UN depends...

[Jane Q. Public]

The UN doesn't loan money... it is subsidized by the member nations. (I make that statement with full realization that you were probably being sarcastic.)

The US has "membership fees" which it has recently been reluctant to pay... and with good reason. But many people seem to forget that the UN is *IN* the United States; its building is supported with US government money; UN representatives are give care and perks courtesy of the US government (i.e., American taxpayers).

If it ISN'T going to support the U.S. Constitution (and in many ways today the UN is actively inimical to it), then I say let it move elsewhere. I don't want my tax money supporting it.

Re:this thread is all the evidence needed

[Anonymous Coward]

Hyperlink was coined by Ted Nelson (an American) based on writings by Vannevar Bush (an American), and it was first implemented by Douglas Engelbart (an American). HTTP was invented by Tim Berners-Lee, who is British but currently resides in the US.

Why such anti-UN sentiment

[jeremypbennett]

I am always surprised at now negative Americans (specifically those from the United Stated) are about the UN. Remember the UN has been in charge of international telephony standards for years (the ITU is a UN agency), and on the whole international telephony has worked OK.

If you aren't American, and even if you are a friend of America, American control over key parts of the Internet is a concern. An important utility is controlled by a foreign power. How would US citizens feel if their water or electricity supply was under the control of the British government? We are a democracy and have been good friends of the US for a long time, but I bet US cititizens would be agitating for those utilities to be under US control.

Re:Why such anti-UN sentiment

[Dr Fro]

Your point would mean more if the UN representatives from any country were elected democratically. If this goes through, the "controllers" of the Internet as far as a Briton would be concerned, are just as accountable as they are today.

Re:Why such anti-UN sentiment

[Dr Damage I]

Your comment is based on a false premise: that the US government controls the internet. The US government does not control the internet. Control of the internet, such as it is, comes from organizations that are located within the borders of the United States but are not government departments or under the direct control of the US government except inasmuch as they are subject to US law. That, in my opinion, is a vastly superior situation to that which would obtain if the UN controlled the internet. And I say this as a non citizen of the US.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Intropy]

Sounds like someone's been compromised by the reverse vampires.

Re:Another conspiracy

[Mashiki]

Oh no the guns were tracked with Bush but thanks for playing....

That's what I said.

and where the heck are all the supposed gun control laws that are supposed to come out of this conspiracy theory that the obama administration let the guns walk so they could enact gun control laws....nice one zippy.

That's part of the question, especially since the contempt charge was blocked by the democrats. Which means that other avenues are now needed to find out exactly what was going on and where, and exactly what watergatish type BS was going on. And exactly how far the rot goes. Either Holder did this all on his own, or Obama signed off on it as well. In which case there's a lot of stink. There's no conspiracy theory here, only facts, and pretexts. You might have missed the news back about 3 weeks or 4 weeks ago, back before the Aurora shooting of the Dem's wanting to push back in the Assault weapons ban, and several other things all at once "just in time" for the election.

Funny how a lone Canadian occasionally paying attention to your news catches this and you don't.

Moderate parent up.

[Kludge]

Dear Other Nations of the World:
Run yer own damn DNS.

Just learned bout this yesterday. Odd...

[Anonymous Coward]

BRIC. Lookitup.

Re:Another conspiracy

[genner]

Sounds like someone's been compromised by the reverse vampires.

Stupid sun craving reverse vampires.

Yes, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

This comment was blocked by the U.S. Government as it was detected to be sent from a terrorist state. Move along, citizen.

UN internet

[nonicknameavailable]

Blasphemy laws from islamic countries would be enforced for everybody in the world

Re:Another conspiracy

[FatdogHaiku]

Don't you see? This is the Illuminati once again ensuring that its elite members can go out and party while us common folk get screwed, and then they have the balls to remind us all of how we're just complacent sheep!

So, we are being screwed and we are sheep... So the Illuminati are screwing sheep?
You would think with all that money and power they could do better...
Or is there something about sheep that's being kept from the common people?
OMG, I see it now!
It does all make sense!
I am upgrading from tinfoil to Stainless Steel foil at once!

You are in the US , right ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because from the point of view of so,mebody NOT living in the US, the US is not a dem ocraty representative of their NON US citizen interrest. As for the rest of the crap I see in this thread, this is typical smearing of the UN by US ignorant. The UN does a *lot* on the technical, medical and otehr levels. Jsut because youa re all ignorant of it and "buy" the propaganda that the UN is corrupt does not mean it is actually more corrupt than your own frigging governement which sucks the dicks of the various firm it is beholden to. But let me guess, the UN does not "ply" to US wishes ? Might be why it is seen as corrupt and dangerous. But the truth is that in the hand of the UN, it would NOT be udner the control of china as the propaganda try to make you swallow. That does not make sense on any level and is transparent propaganda to make US folk decry this. The same way the ITU is not udner china control and censorship reign. You are all a bunch of "useful idiot".

Re:You are in the US , right ?

[Aighearach]

If you don't like it, don't use our internet. ;) Oh, that's right, we're the useful ones. Idiot.

Fuck the UN...

[Anonymous Coward]

and the communists and socialists they represent!!!

Tell the UN to go jump in a lake

[p51d007]

I'd really like to say what I think of the U.N. (useless nations) which really can be said in mixed company. If the UN wants control over something that the U.S. started, they can go build their own internet. If the U.N. gets control over the DNS, you will start to see massive censorship of the internet, things that the "UN" thinks shouldn't be on the web will be blocked. NO! If the UN wants control, build your own d*mn internet! Personally, I'd love to see the UN kicked OUT of the USA, and placed somewhere else.

irony intended

[Anonymous Coward]

uhh... yeah, this is a great idea, because the UN never screws anything up

Re:this thread is all the evidence needed

[Anonymous Coward]

What the fuck are you reading this with? Fucking cinary???

No.

HTTP.

Ignorant fuckwit.

Re:Another conspiracy

[shutdown -p now]

Ironically, in the meantime Obama has actually signed a law that relaxed gun control (the one that permits carrying in national parks).

A new protocol

[thegarbz]

The US is a known quantity of evil unlike the UN. Really the less countries like Pakistan and China have to say about how the internet is run the better. The internet would go downhill very quickly if it was subject to design decisions by committee of countries, rather than corporate interests pushing their weight around.

The real answer is we need to incorporate a new protocol, or add amendments to HTTP. There needs to be better reporting and a new response code. I suggest "Error: 666 - Due process error" this can incorporate several of the problems we have currently. i.e. replacing TLDs with corporate interest against the will of the internet community, booting domains off the internet without the owner being found guilty of a crime, or *gasp* someone using a self signed SSL certificate. The new protocol will have self correcting error methods such that an Error 666 will lead to the identity of people responsible and send packet data to them. Then any time the error is encountered the person responsible for the error is put though physical pain. Eventually we'll stop seeing Error 666 on the internet.

I call it BIAV/IP. "Balls In A Vice over Internet Protocol"

This is of course rife for abuse. It won't be long before someone registers a TLD, hosts it full of pirated music, and uses a self-signed SSL certificate. The directors of Verisign, ICANN and the DHS will all collectively have their balls explode as soon as I post a link to it on Slashdot.

Mod parent up

[OneAhead]

Despite the lack of style, parent has a valid point. In most democratic nations, the UN is well-respected for all the things its diverse branches do, but not so in the US. And this seems to have mainly started with the war in Iraq. Although that war has since proven baseless and a generally bad idea, just as a majority of people in the majority of countries that voted against it (no it wasn't only France - you can count the *proponents* on your fingers) knew all along because their media retained their integrity (as opposed to the post-9/11 patriotic media in the US), the anti-UN sentiments in the US got a life on their own, and even the "intelligentsia" on /. seemingly haven't escaped the media's wave of brainwashing.

There are good reasons to hand over control to the UN. Most importantly, the 95% of the world that aren't US citizens are not democratically represented in the US government. (And no, most of us don't see the US as an international mainstay of fairness, freedom, democracy and human rights. Where in the world did you get that idea anyway? It's more like a faltering war-happy giant with a highly corrupt and dysfunctional government and a population half of whom are so clueless that they vote straight against their own interests because the TV tells them to. A faltering war-happy giant that happens to be on our side right now but that could become a really big menace really fast.) In the UN, items are voted on by delegates of member nations, who are usually appointed by democratically elected official. Yes, that's an indirect democracy, but that makes it no less a democracy. Otherwise, what about electoral colleges? Is that so much different?

Is it so difficult to understand that a lot of people outside of the US really would rather see the internet in more impartial hands?

Go ahead, mod me down for disagreeing with me. It's all worth it!

Euphemismland

[obscuro]

The UN has a human rights commission packed with some of the worst offenders on earth. Its has a body of appointed representatives who act at a very great distance from the people they "serve." It's not surprising that India, Russia and China are backing this proposal. They are accustomed to providing less freedom, less representation and poor service to large swaths of people. Even the proposal to shift to "international" control of the Internet is a euphemism for shifting to socialist asian control of the Internet. The US isn't perfect by any means but I'd like to keep the Internet core here, thanks.

If the UN wants to control the Internet they can start by standup a big bunch of Internet services that are better than what we've got now.

If it aint broke, don't fix it.

[Anonymous Coward]

At all costs, the US must continue to flatly say no. If other nations don't like the way the Internet works, they are free to setup their own private nets. Switching to multi-national oversight by a committee of nations, with each nation having its own view of what the Internet should be, would destroy it.

Stop saying, More doing

[seansobes]

Let them kill the internet. Pissing everybody off at once might make us get off our asses and stop complaining on useless websites.

the U.S. has refused

[KingBenny]

they never learn do they ... first the refusal lead to europes own gps system ... next, the net split halfway down ?

So, a Vatican for the Internet? Or scary movie?

[davidwr]

If not, then I think I've seen this movie.

Non-profit and ICANN?

[the_arrow]

Considering the large sums involved in the new TLD debacle, could it really be called a "non-protif"? Although, it probably costs quite a lot to fly the board around to all those exclusive places and have their conferences in those five star hotels.

No one ever played CIVILIZATION?

[Anonymous Coward]

Internet is a maximum achievement of Occidental, American civilization. Why those countries whining so much about underdevelopment dont just go and produce it themselves again alone having already the example? They cannot. In Civ an achievement is whatgives your civilization the advantage... it should worry all these people here that there was no war because of computers and internet... Really worry people here.

Geocities closed: no backup. Account suspended...

[Anonymous Coward]

Solve these two issues and that is control. I want to pay some accounts: no way to do so. Trust them to provide service continuously. Try getting replies on any suspension. Or recovering a hacked account, personally. Be sure no one is stealing important email from your account. Get the same donwloads again. Find the same old page version. Do not let that guy take your nickname. Negotiate homonyms. Is the server down temporarily or they just closed shop and are gone? Get hold of SOMEONE in person. Etc. Pressure may be going the right way. Non profit is not the best decision maker actually... But if all these cannot be solved for free here, it will not be solved for free by a coalition of countries.