Ominous update on the IANA transition

Wed May 6 07:45:04 EEST 2015

At 11:04 AM 5/5/2015, Paul Rosenzweig wrote:
>Isnâ€™t the real problem here that there is no 
>way of knowing, ex ante, whether the mechanisms 
>will actually work?Â  I have spent a lot of time 
>on the IRP and if it works as I hope it will, it 
>would be a strong bulwark against mission creep – but what if it doesnâ€™t?
>
>Part of me wants to say that the formal 
>transition should be delayed 5 years until ICANN 
>has lived under an implemented transition system 
>and has adequate experience.Â  I fear, however, 
>that such a solution is untenable, politically 
>and practically.Â  We must, I think, take a leap (of faith?) 

>Paul

It's a big problem - there is absolutely no way 
to know precisely how, e.g., the IRP is actually 
going work, let alone the whole mechanism.  The 
best one can do is making sure it stays as 
transparent as possible (so that at least we'll 
be able to figure out how it's working and what's 
going on in real time) and that there's some kind 
of reasonable error-correction mechanism so that 
the scheme can be adjusted (or adjusts itself) over time.

It's also an argument, I think, for 
simplification - for my money, the whole scheme 
as it is developing seems vastly over-complicated 
(as ICANN itself seems vastly 
over-complicated).  I think that will make it 
much harder to guard against mission creep and/or 
other abuses of power down the road.

D.

>From: David Post [mailto:david.g.post at GMAIL.COM]
>Sent: Tuesday, May 5, 2015 8:44 AM
>To: NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
>Subject: Re: Ominous update on the IANA transition
>
>At 07:17 AM 5/5/2015, Brenden Kuerbis wrote:
>
>Hi, David,
>[SNIP]
>On this point, please see the recently 
>releasedÃ‚ Cross Community Working Group (CCWG) 
>Accountability Initial Draft Proposal for Public 
>Comment,Ã‚ 
><https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/cwg-accountability-draft-proposal-with-annexes-04may15-en.pdf>https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/cwg-accountability-draft-proposal-with-annexes-04may15-en.pdf 
>
>Would you agree that the proposed update to 
>ICANN's Mission Statement (pg 15) which limits 
>ICANN scope, in conjunction with proposed 
>community empowerment mechanisms address this concern adequately?
>
>
>Brenden
>
>The Mission Statement changes do go a long way 
>to addressing this concern - so the question 
>becomes: will it actually serve as an effective 
>constraint on ICANN's powers, or, Soviet 
>constitution-style, just a bunch of nice words?
>
>It's a little too early, for me, to say whether 
>the proposed community empowerment mechanisms 
>will do the job adequately; the devil really is 
>in the details, and a lot - everything, actually 
>- depends on how those details get fleshed 
>out.  The proposal has a lot of good things in 
>it - the enhanced Independent Review Panel, 
>recall mechanisms for Directors, community power 
>over the budget - and is a good step forward, in 
>my view; but there are lots of substantial gaps 
>and open questions about how it all will 
>actually work [No criticism at all of the many 
>folks who worked on this is intended, but just 
>as a statement of fact]. There's a fine line 
>between, say, an IRP that is effective and one 
>that isn't (as the last 15 years have shown), so 
>I guess I'm not ready to say it's been adequately addressed quite yet.
>
>David
>
>
>
>Ã‚
>On Mon, May 4, 2015 at 2:49 PM, David Post 
><<mailto:david.g.post at gmail.com>david.g.post at gmail.com > wrote:
>[Apologies for cross-posting]
>This really is starting to look, as Milton said, 
>ominous - coupled with the pressure being placed 
>upon ICANN to regulate message content, see
><http://www.internetcommerce.org/senate-judiciary-to-ip-czar/>http://www.internetcommerce.org/senate-judiciary-to-ip-czar/
>
>my take on this is here:
><http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/05/04/internet-governance-what-if-the-sky-really-is-falling/>http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/05/04/internet-governance-what-if-the-sky-really-is-falling/<http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/05/04/internet-governance-what-if-the-sky-really-is-falling/> 
>
>If the final proposal does not have real 
>safeguards against ICANN's content-regulation powers, we're all in trouble.
>
>On this point, please see the recently 
>releasedÃ‚ Cross Community Working Group (CCWG) 
>Accountability Initial Draft Proposal for Public 
>Comment,Ã‚ 
><https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/cwg-accountability-draft-proposal-with-annexes-04may15-en.pdf>https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/cwg-accountability-draft-proposal-with-annexes-04may15-en.pdf 
>
>Would you agree that the proposed update to 
>ICANN's Mission Statement (pg 15) which limits 
>ICANN scope, in conjunction with proposed 
>community empowerment mechanisms address this concern adequately?
>Ã‚
>And I am starting to wonder whether the USG is 
>interested in making sure those safeguards are 
>in place, or, as suggested in the above, making 
>sure that they're NOT in place. . . .
>
>I agree there will continue to be pressure put 
>on ICANN by IP rightsholders interests, using 
>any available route. But if the above is adopted 
>it seems it would go a long way toward mitigating that pressure.
>-- Brenden
>Ã‚
>David
>At 09:27 AM 4/30/2015, Milton L Mueller wrote:
>
>Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ 
>Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚
>Dear NCSG:
>ItÃ¢€™s now official: l: ICANN doesnÃ¢€™t even 
>want to let the IETF have a a choice of its IANA functions operator.
>Ã‚
>Those of you who read my 
><http://www.internetgovernance.org/2015/04/28/icann-wants-an-iana-functions-monopoly-and-its-willing-to-wreck-the-transition-process-to-get-it/>blog 
>post on ICANNÃ¢€™s interactions with the he 
>numbers community will already know that ICANN 
>is refusing to accept the consensus of the 
>numbers community by recognizing its contractual 
>right to terminate its IANA functions operator 
>agreement with ICANN. In that blog, I referred 
>to second-hand reports that IETF was 
>encountering similar problems with ICANN. Those 
>reports are now public; the chairs of the IETF, 
>IAB and IETF Administrative Oversight Committee 
>have 
><http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ianaplan/current/msg01680.html>sent 
>a letter to their community noting that ICANN is 
>refusing to renew their supplemental service 
>level agreement because it includes new 
>provisions designed to facilitate change in IANA 
>functions operators should IETF become dissatisfied with ICANN.
>Ã‚
>These are truly shocking moves, because in 
>effect ICANNÃ¢€™s legal staff is is telling both 
>the numbers and the protocols communities that 
>they will not accept the proposals for the IANA 
>transition that they have developed as part of 
>the IANA Stewardship Coordination Group (ICG) 
>process. In both cases, the proposals were 
>consensus proposals within the affected 
>communities, and were approved by the ICG as 
>complete and conformant to the NTIA criteria. 
>Thus, ICANN is in effect usurping the entire 
>process, setting itself (rather than ICG and 
>NTIA) as the arbiter of what is an acceptable transition proposal.
>Ã‚
>The key point of conflict here seems to be the 
>issue of whether ICANN will have a permanent 
>monopoly on the provision of IANA functions, or 
>whether each of the affected communities – 
>names, numbers and protoocols – €“ will have the 
>right to choose the operator of their global 
>registries. Separability is explicitly 
>recognized by the Cross community working group 
>on Names as a principle to guide the transition, 
>and was also listed as a requirement by the 
>CRISP team. And the IETF has had an agreement 
>with ICANN giving them separability since 2000 
>(<https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2860>RFC 
>2860).Ã‚  Yet despite the wishes of the 
>community, ICANN seems to insist on a monopoly 
>and seems to be exploiting the transition process to get one.
>Ã‚
>Of course, a severable contract for the IANA 
>functions is the most effective and important 
>form of accountability. If the users of IANA are 
>locked in to a single provider, it is more 
>difficult to keep the IANA responsive, efficient 
>and accountable. Given the implications of these 
>actions for the accountability CCWG, I hope 
>someone on that list will forward this message 
>to their list, if someone has not noted this event already.Ã‚
>Ã‚
>Milton L Mueller
>Laura J. and L. Douglas Meredith Professor
>Syracuse University School of Information Studies
><http://faculty.ischool.syr.edu/mueller/>http://faculty.ischool.syr.edu/mueller/ 
>
>Internet Governance Project
><http://internetgovernance.org/>http://internetgovernance.org
>Ã‚
>
>
>*******************************
>David G Post - Senior Fellow, Open Technology 
>Institute/New America Foundation
>blog (Volokh Conspiracy) 
><http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/david-post>http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/david-post 
>
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>Moose)Ã‚ 
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>Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚ Ã‚
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>
>*******************************
>David G Post - Senior Fellow, Open Technology Institute/New America Foundation
>blog (Volokh Conspiracy) 
><http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/david-post>http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/david-post
>book (Jefferson's 
>Moose) 
><http://tinyurl.com/c327w2n%A0%A0%A0%A0%A0%A0%A0>http://tinyurl.com/c327w2n 
>
>music 
><http://tinyurl.com/davidpostmusic%A0>http://tinyurl.com/davidpostmusic 
>publications 
>etc.  <http://www.davidpost.com         />http://www.davidpost.com
>*******************************

*******************************
David G Post - Senior Fellow, Open Technology Institute/New America Foundation
blog (Volokh Conspiracy) http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/david-post
book (Jefferson's Moose)  http://tinyurl.com/c327w2n
music http://tinyurl.com/davidpostmusic 
publications etc.  http://www.davidpost.com
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