• News
•  

The ICANN Board agreed to provide a contribution to the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) Secretariat. The WGIG was established by the Secretary General of the United Nations in order to "develop a working definition of Internet governance" and "identify the public policy issues that are relevant to Internet governance." The WGIG will prepare a report for consideration for the second phase of the World Summit on the Information Society, to be held in Tunis in 2005.

The WGIG Secretariat is responsible for supporting the WGIG and its work, including the preparation of materials, reaching out to stakeholders, and preparing the draft report of the WGIG as input to the WSIS. The WGIG consists of 40 members and includes members of the ICANN community.

The work of the WGIG is already underway, trying to come to terms with issues such as affordable Internet access for all, and cross-border cooperation on spam, cyber-security and cyber-crime (see WGIG inventory of public policy issues and priorities). Today's contribution demonstrates ICANN's support for the International community's efforts to address these important issues. As part of that understanding of Internet governance, it is particularly important that there is a sound understanding of the areas for which ICANN is responsible and its impact to date.

The ICANN community is closely following the WSIS and WGIG discussions, and is seeking to ensure a broader understanding of how the ICANN framework functions.