After nearly 20 years of fighting a domain name war, the United States is one step closer to officially giving up its right to manage Internet domain names. On March 10, 2016, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) quietly submitted a plan to the U.S. government in preparation for breaking away from its ties with the U.S. government.
Countries such as China and Russia may feel temporarily satisfied with this result. In their eyes, the United States has monopolized the Internet for too long and can even be called "unruly"; Americans may not be happy. It seems that last week, Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz and two other senators opened an open letter to ICANN, questioning the risks that may arise from the agency's departure from US control.
If you want to know why the Obama administration has voluntarily given up its role as the top administrator of Internet domain names, and if you want to know what Ted Cruz is objecting to, you must first know whether the United States has truly "taken over" Internet domain names, and how ICANN What exactly is it.
The Internet has been operating as a U.S. government project since its birth. Before 1998, the regulation of Internet domain names was almost completed by one person, Jon Postel. ), who is a professor of computer science at the University of Southern California. Postel was one of the early members who created the Internet in the 1960s; for the next 30 years, he supported and managed the Internet on behalf of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.
On the surface Postel makes technical decisions, such as deciding who will operate the country's top-level domain names. The Internet was so new at the time, and top-level domain names like ".uk" were allocated not to the British government but to private individuals given that governments' monopoly on telecom operators hindered the development of communications. By the mid-1990s, both the United States and some other countries began to realize that the Internet could not be regulated in such a hasty manner.
In 1998, the Clinton administration began a comprehensive privatization of the Internet. The question faced at that time was, if Uncle Sam does not regulate the Internet, then who should regulate it? Many governments believe that this important work should be done by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a department of the United Nations that regulates international telecommunications services; other governments, including the Clinton administration, are concerned that, like the ITU, Such a UN sector, dominated by state-owned telecommunications companies and government regulators, would strangle the Internet in its cradle.
In order to ensure the openness of the Internet, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a unique non-profit organization, came into being. ICANN has an agreement with the National Telecommunications and Information Administration under the U.S. Department of Commerce, but has a private identity, which helps keep the Internet free of political interference. ICANN has two main responsibilities. First, ICANN is responsible for managing the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. This system allows you to enter "google.com" in your browser and jump to the correct page based on the corresponding IP address. google website.
ICANN is also the allocator of the global top-level domain name system (top-level domains). Each country has its own top-level domain name. The United Kingdom has ".uk", France has ".fr", and Canada has ". .ca", governments of various countries pay annual authorization fees to ICANN for these top-level domain names and manage their own top-level domain names on their own.
Other top-level domain names include ".com", ".org", and ".net". ICANN does not take care of them personally. Instead, it authorizes these top-level domain names to wholesalers like Verisign. The wholesalers then work with companies like Godaddy. Retailers work together to assign specific domain names to specific customers—for example, nytimes.com to The New York Times.
After the birth of ICANN, many foreign governments are still unyielding and firmly believe that Internet domain names should be managed by the International Telecommunications Union, because national governments have the final say behind the scenes. Although ICANN is more like a private organization that allocates telephone numbers and area codes around the world, and although the wholesalers who take top-level domain names from ICANN have no superior-subordinate relationship with ICANN, and the U.S. Department of Commerce has almost no involvement in ICANN's operations and decision-making, Countries still continue to express doubts about the huge power of the US government. In particular, developing countries expressed their anger when they noticed that ICANN's 15 board members are only subject to the jurisdiction of the California prosecutor and U.S. law.
During the 2003 Iraq War, the United States stopped domain name resolution of the Iraqi top-level domain name ".iq". This behavior was viewed by the Chinese media as an example of the United States' unilateralism. A Chinese newspaper said, "The U.S. government can wave the sword hanging over the heads of all countries at any time, and all countries have no power to fight back."
But in fact, the top-level domain name ".iq" in Iraq was in 2003 It was not authorized to the Iraqi government before, but was authorized by Postel mentioned above to a private user, Bayan Elashi, in 1997. The reason for Professor Postel's authorization is that Ailash is a Palestinian and holds a master's degree in computer science from Purdue University in the United States. In 1992, Ailash founded the hosting company InfoCom in Texas, USA, to host Arabic or Muslim websites. website. Moreover, Iraq's Internet infrastructure was very poor at the time, so it was natural to assign the domain name to a U.S. company with technical capabilities.
What Postel did not expect was that in December 2002, Bayan Ayrash was arrested. In July 2004, Aylash and his InfoCom company were found guilty of violating Libyan and Syrian sanctions laws (selling computers) and laundering money for the terrorist organization Hamas. At the same time, ICANN temporarily took back its control of ". iq” top-level domain name. Paul Bremer, the special envoy sent by the Bush administration to Iraq, requested to authorize the ".iq" domain name to the new Iraqi government, but was rejected several times by ICANN, which believed that the situation in Iraq was not yet stable at that time. In other words, this suspension of analysis has no direct relationship with the US government.
Not only do foreign governments have little decision-making power over ICANN, they also have to fight for top-level domain names and American companies. Starting in 2010, ICANN opened the door to top-level domain name applications. As long as they can pay US$186,000, anyone can theoretically register a new top-level domain name. Google applied for ".google" and ".youtube", Microsoft applied for ".azure" and ".hotmail", and some other companies applied for ".sucks" and ".sex".
The problem then emerged. In 2013, an American outdoor sports company named Patagonia applied for the top-level domain name ".patagonia". This move was strongly opposed by the Argentine government, because Patagonia is a plateau area between Argentina and Chile. This area is also known as the "outdoor hiking mecca." Similarly, the ".amazon" top-level domain name applied by Amazon in the United States has attracted the attention of relevant countries. The Amazon is a river that flows through Brazil, Peru, Colombia and other South American countries. In addition, Brazil also has an Amazon state (Amazonas).
How does ICANN resolve domain name disputes? If multiple individuals, organizations or governments apply for the same domain name, all ICANN has to do is convene civil society groups, governments, intergovernmental organizations and network operators to review the applicants to ensure that all "stakeholders" can The final domain assignment has a voice of its own. This multi-stakeholder model promotes the innovation, growth and information flow of the Internet, and also makes it impossible for individuals, companies, organizations or governments to truly control the Internet.
Argentina faced an uphill battle at the time because, according to ICANN guidelines, Patagonia was not a geographical area with clear boundaries. To be classified as a geographical area, you'd better be a city, or a province/state. The top-level domain name ".texas" in Texas, USA, is a suitable example. In addition, the outdoor sports company Patagonia already owns "Patagonia.com" and had no problems with foreign governments when registering the Patagonia trademark.
ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee saved Argentina at a critical moment. At first, all countries recommended rejecting Patagonia's domain name application. Only the United States disagreed with the government advisory committee's interference in ".patagonia". But then the United States changed its attitude to neutrality, which meant that except for the United States, the government advisory committee reached a unanimous objection (consensus objection), essentially declaring the ".patagonia" application invalid. Later, Patagonia did withdraw it. Apply.
In any case, ICANN's decision-making process is bottom-up and based on knowledge, and it must consider the interests of the Internet community around the world. Although the Argentine government ultimately won, the decision-making process was much more transparent than those closed-door meetings at the United Nations. After all, the Patagonia Company almost obtained the ".patagonia" top-level domain name. After all, the government advisory committee has long exercised the right to make recommendations. , rather than the right to vote, only “unanimous” committee decisions are valid.
Since the establishment of ICANN, the U.S. Department of Commerce has created a free environment for ICANN. Without the decentralization of the U.S. Department of Commerce and the multi-stakeholder model of ICANN, the Internet as the world is now familiar with it would cease to exist. So, when the Obama administration decided to abandon regulation of ICANN in March 2014 and give up its management rights over Internet domain names, would it turn ICANN into a government-dominated institution? Will ICANN be hijacked by governments that do not believe in an open and free Internet? Has the Obama Administration abdicated its responsibility to protect Internet freedom?
The Obama administration has denied that its current efforts to cut off ties with ICANN are not to appease foreign governments frustrated by U.S. surveillance, but to follow the trend of openness. But the above concerns are not groundless. Not only are countries like Iran gnashing their teeth at ICANN, but Russia, Brazil and France are also eyeing ICANN's power. They believe that the influence of national governments in the new structure is still insufficient. As recently as December 2015, the United Nations General Assembly discussed that it should consider promoting a new path for Internet governance.
Russia’s statement sounds bad, “We need to consider continuing to promote the government’s role in Internet governance, strengthening the International Telecommunication Union’s activities in this field, and obtaining UNESCO’s recognition of the Internet Ethical guidance on use helps. "EU countries generally oppose the Russian proposal, but the French government also wants to make the top-level domain names of ".wine" or ".vin" available only to users who strictly abide by geographical rules when labeling wine; the French government It is also hoped that only those authentic French Champagne origins will be able to use URLs containing "champagne."
Theoretically, whoever controls the domain name-IP address book controls the Internet. Websites without domain names can no longer be discovered.
However, the American conservative magazine The Weekly Standard published an article saying that many conservatives’ concerns are actually unnecessary. In the past and in the future, ICANN has not played a role in aiding evildoers. ICANN currently controls only 13 domain name root servers in the world. Some root servers are directly operated by the US government, and some root servers are run by US universities and US private companies. It is politically impossible for them to succumb to pressure from ICANN and censor website domain names at the same time.
If nothing else happens, ICANN’s separation from the US government is already a certainty. Thomas Rickert, one of the members of the German negotiating committee, said that the new ICANN is like a country and it has Government (the organization's board of directors), Constitution (the organization's charter, which includes its mission and core values), Judiciary (independent review process), and Citizens (advisory committees and supporting organizations). The question is, how long can ICANN maintain transparency and accountability after it is separated from US management? Can it resist the temptation to be taken over by governments?