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That was supposed to be "scratch my back" of course...<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 15-01-26 9:36 AM, Stephanie Perrin
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote cite="mid:54C650FE.202@mail.utoronto.ca" type="cite">
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I think you have said this very well Ed. Governments have been
using their position to put intense pressure on ICANN to do what
they have been unable to solve through the Cybercrime treaty,
mlats, and other mechanisms. It appears to be an unholy bargain
of the scratch my back and I will let you do this variety, and it
interferes with human rights. Having a solid position on this
point should be front and centre in our framing of the human
rights discussion, and the public interest discussion, because
this has been going on in the name of the "public interest". If
we as civil society disagree strongly on this point, we had better
start thrashing it out in an organized fashion.<br>
cheers Stephanie Perrin<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 15-01-26 7:50 AM, Edward Morris
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote
cite="mid:CAHdAZHbGgFRS8+1KYcgbK00-JoGn1XAvh_3C_ea-4DbGLvpNEA@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">Hi Avri,<br>
<div hspace="streak-pt-mark" style="max-height:1px"><img
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color="#ffffff" size="1">ᐧ</font></div>
<div class="gmail_extra"><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
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<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#330033"><br>
Aren't various government and intergovernmental
actions forcing ICANN to take action based on content.</div>
</blockquote>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>In the two instances mentioned, I'm unaware of any
jurisdictionally appropriate court order "forcing" ICANN
to engage in quasi law enforcement activities. Perhaps
I'm wrong but I'm unaware of any ICANN staff member or
official being detained or physically threatened, a.k.a.
"forced", to assist law enforcement in tracking down <i>alleged</i> criminals.
How is ICANN being forced to do anything? </div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>"Pressured" might be a better term and, of course,
ICANN is often pressured to do many things. One of the
things I would hope the Board could clarify for us is
how ICANN determines which pressures to respond to and
which pressures not to respond to. For example, there
are jurisdictions that classify gay and lesbian sexual
activity as being deviant and impermissible behaviour
equivalent to that of adult sex with children. Does
ICANN cooperate with law enforcement authorities in
identifying those responsible for putting online gay and
lesbian content? One mans terrorist is another mans
freedom fighter: is it ICANN's role to assist law
enforcement in identifying those responsible for
websites some may believe aids and abets terrorism while
others believe the same websites assist "freedom
fighters"? Who decides what pressures to yield to? What
is the procedure for making such decisions? Should there
not be transparency in such processes so that those
making the decisions are held responsible for their
judgement and actions?</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
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<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#330033"> Unfortunately we
keep saying they have no business discussing content
based issue, yet, others impose these issues on
ICANN. How do we give the Board and Staff guidance,
recommendations and advice on how to handle the
contents tissue imposed on ICANN without dealing with
it?<br>
</div>
</blockquote>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Pressure goes both ways. If ICANN Board and staff
perceive no blow back from their incursions into content
regulation they will continue to do it. Why not? At the
NCPH meeting Fadi reached out to the community for
guidance: in some ways it could be seen as a plea to
"blow back". If we in the noncommercial community
strongly direct ICANN to stay out of content regulation
it gives Fadi and others something to point to to
justify resisting pressures to get involved in content
control. If we remain silent in response to Fadi's
invitation to direct ICANN in this matter, then it
would inappropriate to hold ICANN responsible for
decisions made to ban content we actually like. First it
was child pornography, now ICANN is considering getting
involved in intellectual monopoly violations, what is
next? </div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Our direction to ICANN should be "just say no". There
may be times ICANN is commanded through legal processes
to do certain things. When those things involve content
ICANN should resist to the fullest extent permitted by
applicable laws. ICANN's response needs to be uniformly
"we don't do content". Period.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Yet if ICANN is going to do content, something beyond
it's mission statement and appearing nowhere in it's
Bylaws, there need to be procedures developed so content
regulation no longer continues to be done on an ad hoc
basis. There should be procedures in place, the
community needs to be involved, standards need to be
promulgated and publicised. I, as a noncommercial user
without extravagant resources, should have the same
ability to "force" ICANN to delete content I find
objectionable as the i.p. industry does to "force" ICANN
to chase after Bulgarians whose content they find
objectionable. Personally, I find the militarisation of
the internet to be far more objectionable and dangerous
than websites offering allegedly "stolen" telenovelas. I
believe certain online actions by governments contravene
international humanitarian law. I know ICANN has the
technical capability to stop some of these illegal
actions. Should I not be able to "force" ICANN to act to
prevent these illegal actions? I hope the answer is 'no'
because ICANN does not do content, but if it does...</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Once ICANN gets involved in content it's a slippery
slope with a final destination I presume many of us
would find unappealing. One only has to look at the
United Kingdom for an indication as to what might
happen. Here in the U.K. filters initially designed to
ban child pornography are now used to ban many types of
material some find objectionable. One of the latest
sites to run afoul of the censors was the Chaos Computer
Club ( <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.ccc.de/en/updates/2014/ccc-censored-in-uk">http://www.ccc.de/en/updates/2014/ccc-censored-in-uk</a>
). As bad as national filters are they pale in terms of
what ICANN has the capability of doing.. </div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>So, Avri, the direction to ICANN should be to stay
out of content regulation. Period. However, if they are
determined to have a California public benefits
corporation engage in censorship with global effect it
needs to be done in an open, transparent manner with
defined conditions and standards available to all with
community participation. </div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Ed</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
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<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#330033"> <br>
avri<br>
<br>
<div>On 25-Jan-15 20:33, Edward Morris wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">
<p class="MsoNormal">Hi Rafik,</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I’d like to suggest a topic
that has not had high visibility in our
stakeholder group in recent years, yet is a big
part of the NCSG DNA: the belief that ICANN
should not be involved in content control. It’s
part of our belief in free expression and it’s
something that very slowly ICANN is getting
involved in fairly blatantly. I think it would
be productive for us to raise the flag in this
area to get word to the Board that we’re
noticing this and that we do not approve of this
mission creep.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">ICANN has always been
involved in content to some degree. The most
visible activity in this area came during the
.XXX battles where contractual language
specified forms of prohibited content. Obviously
the new gTLD programme involves, in many ways,
content classification. But recently…</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This autumn we learned that
ICANN had employees going through corporate
records of firms in Panama to help law
enforcement track down an alleged child
pornography ring. ( <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://domainincite.com/14842-icann-helps-bust-russian-child-porn-ring"
target="_blank">http://domainincite.com/14842-icann-helps-bust-russian-child-porn-ring</a>
). Now Fadi tells us they are attempting to
figure out what to do with the case of a
Bulgarian man with servers in Costa Rica who is
allegedly putting i.p. ingringing content online
( NCSG – CEO meeting, NCPH intersessional
transcript, p. 19-20). This is certainly a long
way from names and numbers. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">We know Fadi’s perspective.
According to Mr. Chehade, ICANN is under
pressure. It’s one of the reasons ICANN is
supposedly getting involved in the NMI. Yet
during the interessional meeting Fadi also
stated several times that ICANN needed community
input to help determine “how far does ICANN want
to go?” on matters like these (intersessional
transcript, p. 10). We need to tell him that
ICANN has no role to play in policing content
online.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Although we know Fadi’s
position (both revelations mentioned above came
as a result of Fadi speaking extemporaneously)
and expressed confusion on these matters we
haven’t really heard from the Board about
situations like these. On the one hand we’re
told during the transition that ICANN has a
limited remit and is going to stick to it. On
the other hand we have ICANN employees searching
through Central American corporate records to
assist authorities in policing content. I think
it would be appropriate for us to express
concern about ICANN’s incursions, both actual
and contemplated, into content and to try to get
clarification as to the Board’s views and
intentions on the matter.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Ed </p>
<div><img moz-do-not-send="true">ᐧ</div>
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<div class="gmail_extra"><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Sun, Jan 25, 2015 at
10:23 PM, Rafik Dammak <span dir="ltr"><<a
moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:rafik.dammak@gmail.com"
target="_blank">rafik.dammak@gmail.com</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote">
<p dir="ltr">Hi everyone,</p>
<p dir="ltr">We need to get 3 topics to
discuss with the ICANN board at singapore
meeting.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Best, </p>
<p dir="ltr">Rafik </p>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Jan 20, 2015 10:32
AM, "Rafik Dammak" <<a
moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:rafik.dammak@gmail.com"
target="_blank">rafik.dammak@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br type="attribution">
<blockquote class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr">Hi everyone,
<div><br>
</div>
<div>like every time in preparation for
ICANN meeting, we have to discuss what
kind of topics/issues we want to raise
with ICANN board members when we meet
them.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>we will try to get 3 topics and
send them 1 week prior to the
session. </div>
<div>please propose topics and suggest
short descriptions . we will conduct
later a polling to pick-up the 3
topics among the proposals.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Best Regards,</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Rafik</div>
</div>
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