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ICANN POLICY UPDATE | Volume 09, Issue 02 – February 2009

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http://www.icann.org/en/topics/policy/

CONTENTS:

  1. YOUR INPUT NEEDED NOW ON POLICY-RELATED ISSUES
  2. IDN CCTLD FAST TRACK IMPLEMENTATION PLAN ON AGENDA FOR MEXICO CITY
  3. E-CRIME & DNS ABUSE FORUM SLATED FOR MEXICO CITY
  4. AT-LARGE PREPARING FOR HISTORIC SUMMIT IN MEXICO CITY
  5. GNSO IMPROVEMENTS IMPLEMENTATION EFFORTS KICKING IN TO GEAR
  6. GLOBAL IPV4 POLICY SUBMITTED TO ICANN BOARD
  7. CCNSO SENDS SILBER TO ICANN BOARD, GOMES RE-ELECTED AS GNSO VICE CHAIR
  8. WORKING GROUP TACKLES ICANN GEOGRAPHIC REGIONS FRAMEWORK
  9. SSAC WORK CONTINUES ON A RANGE OF ISSUES
  10. REGISTRATION ABUSE POLICIES GET CLOSER LOOK
  11. CCNSO STRATEGIC AND OPERATIONAL PLANNING COMMITTEE FORMS
  12. FOCUS NARROWS ON POTENTIAL WHOIS STUDIES
  13. GNSO CONSIDERS EXPIRED DOMAIN NAME RECOVERY CHANGES
  14. MAKING IT EASIER TO TRANSFER DOMAINS BETWEEN REGISTRARS
  15. HOW DO WE DEAL WITH FAST FLUXING CYBERCRIMINALS?
  16. DISTANCE LEARNING...AUDIO POLICY BRIEFINGS ON MANY TOPICS NOW AVAILABLE

The ICANN Policy Update contains brief summaries of issues being addressed by the ICANN community’s bottom-up policy development structure, as well as information on related policy development activities. ICANN’s Policy Staff publishes these monthly updates to maximize transparency and encourage broad community participation in ICANN’s policy development activities.

Links to additional information are included and readers are encouraged to go beyond these brief summaries to learn more about the ICANN community’s work. As always, the Policy Staff welcomes comments and suggestions on how to improve its policy communications efforts. Please send these comments to policy-staff@icann.org .

ICANN Policy Update Available in Russian, Chinese, Arabic, French, Spanish, English

The ICANN Policy Update is available in all six official languages of the United Nations: English (EN), Spanish (ES), French (FR), Arabic (AR), Chinese (Simplified -- siZH), and Russian (RU). The Policy Update is posted on ICANN’s website and available via online subscription. If you would like us to send these updates directly to your inbox each month, simply go to the ICANN subscriptions page , enter your e-mail address, and select “Policy Update” to subscribe. This service is free of charge to subscribers. More information is available at:

What’s on the Calendar for today?

Keep up-to-date on what’s happening in ICANN policy development by visiting the online calendars of ICANN’s policy development bodies. Three of the most active calendars include:

Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) Master Calendar, including links to agendas and MP3 recordings of meetings, at http://gnso.icann.org/calendar/index.html

1. YOUR INPUT NEEDED NOW ON POLICY-RELATED ISSUES

As of this writing, public comment periods are open on four issues of interest to the ICANN community. Act now for the opportunity to share your views on:

2. IDN CCTLD FAST TRACK IMPLEMENTATION PLAN ON AGENDA FOR MEXICO CITY

At a Glance

Discussion of the IDN ccTLD Fast Track implementation plan and a range of related issues will take place at the ICANN Meeting in Mexico City.

Recent Developments

The comment period on the first draft of the IDN ccTLD Fast Track implementation plan closed 9 January 2009. The draft drew 17 comments from participants in 11 countries. Those commenting included business owners, ICANN Supporting Organizations, domain name industry players and government officials. ICANN Staff will publish a consolidated overview of the comments received prior to the Mexico City meeting. The ccNSO will conduct several sessions at Mexico City to discuss and work towards consensus on various aspects of the plan.

The Draft Implementation Plan provides the roadmap and many implementation details for the Fast Track process. Plan modules include: Fast Track eligibility requirements; TLD string criteria and requirements; technical committee considerations; Fast Track request and evaluation process; and TLD Delegation Process.

Next Steps

At ICANN Mexico City meeting, the ccNSO will meet on a range of IDN ccTLD implementation-related topics. These are expected to include:

  • Documentation of responsibility issues (the mandatory nature of IDN ccTLDs; the extent of sovereignty; grandfathering of existing ccTLDs; implementation timing and language);
  • Financial contribution issues (mandatory nature; funding models, such as application and annual fees, annual contributions, fixed amounts, fixed rate per domain, and percentage of revenue; sovereignty and grandfathering);
  • IDN tables (fast track process discussion, in line with comments received on the implementation plan; an IDN guidelines and IANA procedures update); and
  • Processes and documentation requirements (more specificity in defining IDN ccTLD requirements).

The meeting will also include discussion of aligning the fast track process with the new gTLD process. Expected topics here will include:

  • Timing of the two processes, in particular the most recent GNSO Council resolution, and how to deal with it;
  • Inter-process contention and the issue of geographic names; and
  • IDNA progress;

Background

The IDN Fast Track process is a mechanism recommended by ICANN’s broad-based IDNC Working Group focused on the introduction of a limited number of non contentious IDN ccTLDs, associated with the ISO 3166-1 two-letter codes, to meet near term demand, while an overall IDN ccTLD policy is being developed.

At the ICANN meeting in Paris (June 2008) the IDNC Working Group submitted its Final Report to the ICANN Board, including statements of the GAC and ccNSO on the proposed methodology for introduction of a limited number of IDN ccTLDs. The Board directed Staff to: (1) post the IDNC WG final report for public comments; (2) commence work on implementation issues in consultation with relevant stakeholders; and (3) submit a detailed implementation report including a list of any outstanding issues to the Board in advance of the ICANN Cairo meeting in November 2008.

Subsequently, ICANN Staff posted the IDNC WG Final Report for public comments, and commenced the implementation work as directed. Staff posted a Draft IDN ccTLD Fast Track Implementation Plan for public comment.

As part of the implementation process, ICANN sent letters to all countries and territories requesting information about their interest in participating in the Fast Track process. The request for information included a brief questionnaire intended to ascertain interest in the Fast Track Process. A summary of the results has been posted and a public report will be provided on the responses.

More Information

Staff Contact

Bart Boswinkel, ccNSO Policy Advisor

3. E-CRIME & DNS ABUSE FORUM SLATED FOR MEXICO CITY

At a Glance

ICANN’s Mexico City meeting will feature “ E-Crime and Abuse of the DNS Forum: a global perspective” on Wednesday, 4 March.

Recent Developments

ICANN Staff is working with community members to organize this public forum at ICANN’s Mexico City meeting in conjunction with the At-Large Advisory Committee. The Forum provides participants with an opportunity to discuss numerous activities and issues related to e-crime and DNS abuse that involve a broad array of international actors. While only a few of these items fall within ICANN’s narrow mission, the Forum will serve to facilitate public dialogue and working relationships among members of the global Internet community, at the request of ICANN stakeholders.

The Forum will build upon the short “ E-crimes Briefing and Q&A” held at the ICANN Cairo meeting in October. The Forum will feature briefings by experts from the private sector and law enforcement on Internet-based crime, case studies on global criminal attacks, information on abuse response, and discussions of the role of ICANN, ccTLD registries, and ICANN stakeholders. The Forum also will include several Break-Out Sessions to facilitate in-depth discussions on the Internet communities’ concerns and priorities.

More Information

Check the Mexico City meeting schedule in the near future for more information.

Staff Contact

Margie Milam, Senior Policy Counselor

4. AT-LARGE PREPARING FOR HISTORIC SUMMIT IN MEXICO CITY

At a Glance

An At-Large Summit will be held 28 February through 5 March in conjunction with ICANN’s Mexico City meeting. The Summit will enable representatives of over 100 At-Large Structures (individual Internet user groups) to advance their work with ICANN.

Recent Developments

Since the ICANN Board approved an At-Large Summit proposal, the At-Large Community and Staff have been working to organize the event. The At-Large Summit provides a chance for a representative of each of the more than 100 At-Large Structures participating in ICANN’s At-Large Community to meet and develop the community’s capacity for engagement with ICANN, to highlight the successes of the community in recent years, and to build upon their efforts to ensure that the interests of the world’s more than 1 billion individual Internet users are well represented in the development of Internet name and number policy.

The At-Large Summit is an historic meeting: it is the first time that representatives of the entire community of individual Internet users participating in ICANN will be together in one location. (“At-Large” is the term ICANN uses for individual Internet user community).

As proposed by ICANN’s At-Large Community, the Summit has the following objectives:

  • Develop the community’s capacity for engagement in ICANN by increasing the community’s knowledge and understanding of the key issues confronting ICANN and ICANN’s roles and responsibilities;
  • Provide an opportunity for the community to finalize and present its advice on some of the most important issues facing ICANN today; and
  • Highlight the successes of the community in recent years and build upon them to ensure that the interests of the world’s 1 billion+ individual Internet users are well represented in the development of Internet name and number policy.

Summit activities include:

  • An opening and closing General Session of all participants;
  • Five Working Groups on key policy issues being addressed by ICANN;
  • Ten Thematic Sessions (workshops on topics submitted by community members for inclusion in the Summit program); and much more!

The structure, format, and content of the Summit have been developed in a completely bottom-up process. With support from ICANN staff, a working group of community members from all geographic regions has been planning and developing the Summit for more than a year.

For example, the five policy working group topics were chosen by surveying the entire At-Large community. Members were asked to rank their priorities for policy work during the Summit, and the top five choices were then automatically selected as the subjects for the five working groups to tackle.

The subjects are:

The members of each Working Group are already meeting by teleconference throughout February to begin the work they’ll finish at the Summit.

The ten thematic session subjects are all community driven, too. Community members were asked to propose topics for these sessions, and the Summit working group has incorporated the proposals in the schedule, either as a part of the Ten Thematic Sessions or at other times during the Summit.

These sessions are designed to provide representatives of At-Large Structures greater understanding of At-Large and ICANN mandates, structures, and processes, and supply the tools needed by At-Large to better involve and engage their members in ICANN activities and policy development processes.

The opening General Session on Saturday will consist of a full schedule of briefings and panel discussions on current work in ICANN, many led by community members with expertise in the subjects concerned, such as DNSSec, IDNs, and the IPv4-IPv6 transition, among others.

The Closing General Session on Thursday morning will provide a wrap up of key outcomes and deliverables and identify next steps for the At-Large Community. This event will be a tour-de-force of At-Large community activities, and will include a number of questions to provoke thinking in all ICANN stakeholder communities on many different issues, using a very audiovisual format that should keep everyone engaged.

The At-Large Summit is also co-sponsoring the public workshop on Wednesday entitled “eCrime and Abuse of the DNS Forum” which is sure to be a popular and thought-provoking event.

The Summit isn’t just for At-Large Community members, though; all of its sessions are open to all ICANN meeting attendees.

More Information

The At-Large Summit Website: http://www.atlarge.icann.org/summit

Staff Contact

ICANN At-Large Staff

5. GNSO IMPROVEMENTS IMPLEMENTATION EFFORTS KICKING IN TO GEAR

At a Glance

The Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) community is working to implement a comprehensive series of organizational and structural changes designed to improve the efficiency, effectiveness and accessibility of the organization. Interested community members are encouraged to offer their expertise and brainpower by volunteering to participate in the effort.

Recent Developments

Progress is being made in overall implementation, coordination and planning for transition to a newly structured GNSO Council, and discussions are continuing on constituency and stakeholder group formation efforts. The GNSO Council has created a new Operations Steering Committee (OSC) and a new Policy Process Steering Committee (PPSC) to manage the large number of improvements recommendations endorsed by the ICANN Board in June 2008. The Council recently called for volunteers to participate in five distinct Work Teams that have been formed to address specific work items.

Next Steps

As directed by the ICANN Board, implementation of and the transition to a newly structured GNSO Council are following their own specific timetable. The Board expects a new Council to be seated at the June 2009 ICANN Meeting in Sydney, Australia. The current GNSO Council is discussing the transition to the new Council structure. The OSC, PPSC and the new Work Teams are scheduled to conduct face-to-face meetings in Mexico City to continue these efforts. There are five primary ways that interested individuals can participate in the GNSO Improvements effort:

  • Participate in starting/building/launching a new GNSO Constituency;
  • Assist as your constituency reconfirms its charter with the ICANN Board;
  • Help to establish new Stakeholder Groups;
  • Participate in one of five new GNSO Improvements Work Teams being formed; and
  • Provide input as various GNSO Improvement-related proposals are posted for public comment. (see http://www.icann.org/en/public-comment/)

Starting/Building/Launching New GNSO Constituency

A two-step process, including templates, for establishing a new constituency has been developed by Staff and is available on the GNSO Improvements webpage. Staff has received several inquiries recently from individuals and groups interested in forming new GNSO constituencies. Below are just two of the community activities that are still in the early stages of formation:

  • Members of the At-Large community are engaged in discussions on how to potentially create additional non-commercial oriented constituencies that would enable the voice of individual Internet users to be represented in a way that is not duplicative of the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC). Email At-Large Staff for more information and contacts.
  • A group tentatively named the Cybersafety Constituency submitted a “Notice of Intent To Form A New GNSO Constituency” (NOIF) to ICANN. To date the group has not yet filed a formal petition/charter for Board recognition.

All “Notice of Intent” forms received by the ICANN Staff will be posted and linked on the GNSO Improvements web page.

Reconfirming Current Constituencies

All six existing GNSO constituencies submitted their charters for re-confirmation to the ICANN Board in late January and early February. Those submissions have been posted on the ICANN web site and members of the community have until the last week of February to submit comments regarding any and/or all of the constituency submissions.

Creating New Stakeholder Groups

Some members of existing GNSO constituencies and prospective new constituencies have been discussing the formation of the four over-arching Stakeholder Groups and how to fulfill the Board's expectation that they submit new petitions/charters in late February for consideration during its March and April 2009 meetings. Staff has developed a Stakeholder Group template and additional information to assist in this effort. To become familiar with the GNSO's new structure and organization, including the role of Stakeholder Groups, please see the discussion and diagrams on the GNSO Improvements webpage.

Individual Users and the GNSO

One of the central issues in forming the NonCommercial Stakeholders Group, in particular, has been the appropriate role of individual Internet Users within the GNSO. At the direction of the ICANN Board, the Staff opened a 30-day public consultation forum in late October, asking interested community members to provide comments on this topic. Commenters were asked to consider addressing the inclusion of registrants and individual users in the GNSO in a manner that complements the ALAC and its supporting structures and ensures that the gTLD interests of registrants and individual Internet users are effectively represented within the GNSO. ICANN Staff published a report summarizing and analyzing the various comments submitted in the forum. In an 11 December 2008 resolution, the Board requested a specific community recommendation on this matter and after a brief extension of time, Board members agreed to accept all community comments submitted through 20 February 2009 for Board consideration.

Joining GNSO Work Teams

The GNSO Council established a framework of five special Work Teams to develop specific proposals, processes and mechanisms for implementing the ICANN Board’s GNSO Improvement Recommendations in the following five areas:

  • A new and improved Policy Development Process (PDP)
  • A standardized Working Group model for GNSO policy development
  • GNSO Council operations
  • Stakeholder group and constituency processes and operations; and
  • An effort to improve the various communications functions in the GNSO community that will lead to broader and more effective participation in all policy development activities.

These Teams conducted some of their first meetings in February 2009 and they remain open to all ICANN stakeholders, providing an opportunity for broad sharing of insights and expertise. Volunteers can still send a message to gnso.secretariat@icann.org indicating which Work Team they would like to join. Please include in the message your name, affiliation (constituency or individual), company/organization, position/title, email address, time zone, telephone numbers, and describe your specific interest (professional and/or personal) in joining the team. All personal information will be kept confidential.

On 30 January 2009, ICANN Policy Staff circulated the results of a survey that collected constituency member feedback on a number of GNSO Improvement recommendations, including: developing a standardized "toolkit" of services; creating a centralized membership registry or database; providing knowledge/skill training for GNSO leaders and members; and generating recruitment/outreach programs associated with growth and expansion. The survey results will be available to constituencies and GNSO improvements work teams as basic information and raw material to help them develop consistent and productive recommendations for all GNSO constituencies.

Comment on GNSO Improvement Efforts

As the efforts noted above move forward, public comments will be strongly encouraged and notices will be posted on ICANN’s public comment page.

Background:

Through a series of decisions at its February, June, August and October 2008 meetings, the ICANN Board of Directors has endorsed a series of goals, objectives and recommendations for improving several aspects of the Generic Names Supporting Organization’s (GNSO) structure and operations. These decisions are a culmination of a two-year effort of independent review, community input and Board deliberations.

Click here for more background details.

More Information:

Staff Contact

Robert Hoggarth, Senior Policy Director

6. GLOBAL IPV4 POLICY SUBMITTED TO ICANN BOARD

At a Glance

Regional Internet Registries have adopted a policy to allocate the remaining IPv4 address blocks and submitted the policy for ratification by the ICANN Board

Recent Developments

A proposal for allocating the remaining IPv4 address blocks was submitted to the ICANN Board for ratification on 4 February 2009. All five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs) have approved the proposed policy. ARIN, LACNIC, AfriNIC and RIPE had previously adopted the measure and final adoption in APNIC took place on 20 November 2008. The Number Resource Organization Executive Committee and the Address Supporting Organization Address Council reviewed the proposal and, on 8 January 2009, approved forwarding it to the ICANN Board.

Next Steps

The proposal will shortly be posted for public comments on the ICANN website. In line with the ASO MoU, the ICANN Board has a 60-day window to respond to the proposal, meaning that a decision is required before 5 April 2009.

Background

Click here for more details.

More Information

Staff Contact

Olof Nordling, Director Services Relations

7. CCNSO SENDS SILBER TO ICANN BOARD, GOMES RE-ELECTED AS GNSO VICE CHAIR

At a Glance

The ccNSO Council selected Michael Silber as ICANN Board Director number 12. Chuck Gomes was re-elected unanimously as GNSO Council Vice Chair.

Next Steps

Silber will replace Demi Getschko on the ICANN Board in May 2009. Gomes will serve as GNSO Council Vice Chair from 1 February 2009 until the newly structured GNSO Council is seated and a new Vice Chair is elected.

More Information

Staff Contact

Gabriella Schittek, ccNSO Secretariat and Glen de Saint Gery, GNSO Secretariat

8. WORKING GROUP TACKLES GEOGRAPHIC REGIONS FRAMEWORK

At a Glance

Last November, the ICANN Board authorized the formation of a community-wide working group to review the organization’s system of geographic regions to help ensure effective international diversity in ICANN’s structures. Interested ICANN structures have named their participants for this effort.

Recent Developments

The GNSO and ccNSO have appointed representatives to the Community-Wide WG on Geographical Regions: for the GNSO -- Olga Cavalli, Nominating Committee Appointee, GNSO Council, and Zahid Jamil, Commercial and Business Users Constituency (CBUC) Representative, GNSO Council; and for the ccNSO -- David Archbold, .ky, and Fahd Batayneh, .jo. The ALAC representatives are – Cheryl Langdon-Orr (ALAC Chair) and Carlton Samuels (LACRALO Secretariat). The working group held its first meeting on 3 February and is working to develop a draft charter for community review and comment prior to the ICANN Mexico City meeting.

Next Steps

The Board expects the working group, as its first order of business, to draft and seek community input on a proposed charter, and to submit the draft document for community review. The draft charter will likely be the subject of wide-ranging discussions during the March 2009 ICANN Meeting in Mexico City, Mexico. In drafting the charter, the Board expects the working group to focus, but not limit, its work on the criteria for assigning countries, dependencies and recognized geopolitical entities to a Geographic Region.

Background

The ICANN Bylaws currently define five geographic regions as Africa, North America, Latin America/Caribbean, Asia/Australia/Pacific and Europe -- and also expand the concept that "persons from an area that is not a country should be grouped together with the country of citizenship for that area" so that the area or territory itself was similarly allocated to the region of the "mother country."

Over time, various community members have developed concerns about the ICANN Geographic Regions and related representational issues, and the ccNSO recommended a review. Last year, the ICANN Board determined that because any change to ICANN Geographic Regions could have widespread effect in ICANN, the views of Supporting Organizations and Advisory Committees should be sought by the Board.

Click here for more details.

More Information

Staff Contact:

Robert Hoggarth, Senior Policy Director

9. SSAC WORK CONTINUES ON A RANGE OF ISSUES

At a Glance

SSAC pursues a range of studies and activities aimed at assuring the security and stability of the Internet.

Recent Developments

SSAC continues to pursue a full set of initiatives aimed at preserving the security and stability of the Internet. These include:

  • Completing work on a registrar abuse contact recommendation;
  • Completing work on the impact of IDN on WHOIS;
  • Continuing work on a DNSSEC status report. SSAC held a meeting in Bethesda with members of the DNSSEC deployment and (TLD) operations communities at Shinkuro and made substantive progress on the report;
  • Initiating study of the combined effect of IPv6, DNSSEC, and IDN on the DNS infrastructure in collaboration with RSSAC;
  • Publishing its comments on the ICANN Strategic Plan; and
  • Continuing work on measures to protect registrant high value domain name portfolios.

More Information

SSAC: http://www.icann.org/en/committees/security/

Staff Contact

Dave Piscitello

10. REGISTRATION ABUSE POLICIES GET CLOSER LOOK

At a Glance

The GNSO Council will take a closer look at registration abuse provisions in registry and registrar agreements. A public discussion at ICANN’s Mexico City meeting in March on this topic is being planned.

Recent Developments

The GNSO Council voted at its meeting on 18 December to form a drafting team to create a proposed charter for a working group to investigate the open issues documented in the issues report on Registrations Abuse Policies. The drafting team was formed and met for the first time on 9 January 2009. They are finalizing a charter for a Working Group to further investigate these open issues, such as the difference between registration abuse and domain name use abuse; and how effective existing registration abuse policies are; and which areas, if any, would be suitable for GNSO policy development to address registration abuse . A public discussion on this topic is being planned to take place at ICANN’s Mexico City meeting in March.

Next Steps

The drafting team is expected to present the proposed charter for a working group to the GNSO Council in time for its meeting on 19 February.

Background

On 25 September 2008, the GNSO Council adopted a motion requesting an issues report on registration abuse provisions in registry-registrar agreements. The objective of the issues report is to identify existing provisions in registry-registrar agreements relating to abuse as well as to identify and describe potential options for further Council consideration. At its meeting on 20 November, the GNSO Council reviewed and discussed the registration abuse policies issues report and decided to vote on whether to initiate a policy development process (PDP) at the following meeting.

More Information

Staff Contacts

Margie Milam, Senior Policy Counselor, and Marika Konings, Policy Director

11. CCNSO STRATEGIC AND OPERATIONAL PLANNING COMMITTEE FORMS

Recent Developments

Byron Holland, .ca was appointed Chair of the ccNSO’s Strategic and Operational Planning Committee Working Group. The Working Group is currently drafting its charter and will provide input into the ICANN Strategic Plan.

Next Steps

The working group will present and discuss the proposed charter during the ccNSO meeting in Mexico City.

Background

The goal of the committee is to coordinate and organise participation of ccTLD managers in ICANN's Strategic and Operational planning processes. In issuing guidelines for the new committee in November 2008, the ccNSO noted that it cannot nor should not represent the view of ccTLD managers in these processes, but that it may facilitate their participation.

More Information

Committee: http://www.ccnso.icann.org/workinggroups/sopiwg.htm

Bart Boswinkel, Senior Policy Advisor

12. FOCUS NARROWS ON POTENTIAL WHOIS STUDIES

At a Glance

WHOIS is the data repository containing registered domain names, registrant contacts and other critical information. Questions persist concerning the use and misuse of this important resource. The GNSO Council must decide whether studies of this matter are warranted and, if so, which topics need to be addressed.

Recent Developments

Following a series of weekly calls, on going since the Cairo meeting, the GNSO Council has prepared a draft motion on potential WHOIS studies. The motion, reflecting the input of all ICANN Constituencies but the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC), covers several key areas for study:

    • The extent to which public WHOIS data is misused to generate spam or other illegal or undesirable activities, including abuse of personal data, identity theft, etc.;
    • The extent to which proxy and privacy services are being used for abusive and/or illegal purposes, and the extent to which privacy and proxy services complicate the investigation of phishing sites, sites that host malware, and other sites perpetrating e-crime;
    • Whether a significant percentage of registrants who are legal entities and/or operating sites for a commercial purpose are providing inaccurate WHOIS data that implies that they are natural persons and/or acting without commercial purpose;
    • Whether the majority of domain names registered by proxy/privacy services are used for commercial purposes and not by natural persons; and to study whether most requests to reveal the identity of registrants who use proxy services are directed toward registrations made by natural persons;
    • The extent to which proxy and privacy services disclose registrant data when presented with reasonable evidence of actionable harm as required to avoid liability under RAA 3.7.7.3., or relay information requests to registrants/licensees when requested to do so.

Input from ALAC and additional comments from the Government Advisory Committee (GAC) are expected soon.

Next Steps

The Council will decide which studies should be conducted and the Policy Staff will provide cost estimates and feasibility assessments for the selected studies. Working definitions in certain studies will also be clarified. A vote on the study motion will take place at the upcoming ICANN meeting in Mexico City.

Background

Click here for more details.

More Information

Staff Contact

Liz Gasster, Senior Policy Counselor

13. GNSO CONSIDERS EXPIRED DOMAIN NAME RECOVERY CHANGES

At a Glance

To what extent should registrants be able to reclaim their domain names after they expire? An Issues Report requested by the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) on this topic was submitted to the GNSO Council on 5 December 2008.

Recent Developments

ICANN Staff provided the GNSO Council with clarifications on the questions raised in a motion that was adopted at its 18 December meeting. The GNSO Council reviewed these clarifications during its meeting on 29 January and agreed to create a Post-Expiration Domain Name Recovery drafting team to eventually propose a charter and provide recommendations.

Next Steps

A drafting team will be formed shortly and will start working on creating a charter for a Post-Expiration Domain Name Recovery Working Group.

Background

During the ICANN meeting in Cairo, the ALAC voted to request an Issues Report on the subject of registrants being able to recover domain names after their formal expiration date. The ALAC request was submitted to the GNSO Council on 20 November 2008. ICANN Staff prepared the Issues Report on post-expiration domain name recovery and submitted it to the GNSO Council on 5 December 2008.

More Information

Staff Contact

Marika Konings, Policy Director

14. MAKING IT EASIER TO TRANSFER DOMAINS BETWEEN REGISTRARS

At a Glance

The Inter-Registrar Transfer Policy (IRTP) aims to provide a straightforward procedure for domain name holders to transfer their names from one ICANN-accredited registrar to another. The GNSO is reviewing and considering revisions to this policy.

Recent Developments

New IRTP Issues -- Set A

The Working Group published its Initial Report and a public comment period ran until 30 January 2009. Three relevant comments were received. A summary of these public comments has been posted on http://forum.icann.org/lists/irtp-initial-report/msg00004.html.

Next Steps

New IRTP Issues -- Set A

The Working Group will now review the public comments received and will work on finalizing its report in the coming weeks.

Background

As part of a broader review of this policy, the first in a set of five PDPs is currently ongoing. This first PDP addresses so called ‘new IRTP issues’ dealing with questions relating to the exchange of registrant e-mail information, the potential for including new forms of electronic authentication and potential provisions for "partial bulk transfers."

Click here for more details.

More Information

Staff Contact

Marika Konings, Policy Director

15. HOW DO WE DEAL WITH FAST FLUXING CYBERCRIMINALS?

At a Glance

Fast flux hosting refers to techniques used by cybercriminals to evade detection by rapidly modifying IP addresses and/or name servers. The GNSO is exploring appropriate action.

Recent Developments

The GNSO’s Fast Flux Working Group published its Initial Report and opened a public comment period that closed 15 February. The Working Group's Initial Report discusses a series of questions about fast flux hosting (see background information) and the range of possible answers developed by its members. The Report also outlines potential next steps for Council deliberation. These next steps may include further work items for the Working Group or policy recommendation for constituency and community review and comment, and for Council deliberation.

Next Steps

The Working Group will review the comments received and consider these in the development of a Final Report.

Background

Following an SSAC Advisory on Fast Flux Hosting and an Issues Report, the GNSO Council launched in May 2008 a Policy Development Process (PDP) on Fast Flux Hosting.

Click here for more details.

More Information

Staff Contact

Marika Konings, Policy Director

16. DISTANCE LEARNING…AUDIO POLICY BRIEFINGS ON MANY TOPICS NOW AVAILABLE

At a Glance

ICANN’s Policy Department offers a series of multilingual webcasts specifically designed as a fast, efficient introduction for stakeholders across the ICANN community to a range of important policy issues.

More Information

Staff Contact

Matthias Langenegger, At-Large Secretariat

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Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."