(May 9, 2000) The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) today announced the appointment of Election and Nominating Committees that will play key roles in the process by which five At Large Directors of ICANN will be selected later this year through a global online election.
The At Large Members of ICANN are individuals who have indicated an interest in participating in ICANN. They will vote to select five Directors for the ICANN Board, one from each of five defined geographic regions (Africa, Asia/Pacific, Europe, Latin America/Caribbean, and North America). With nearly 15,000 applications so far, ICANN's At Large Membership outreach effort has been greeted with notable enthusiasm among the members of the global Internet community.
Today's announcement marks the beginning of the first phase of this selection process. The Nominating Committee will nominate a set of At Large candidates. At the same time, ICANN's Election Committee will solicit and select an outside vendor for the online voting system, and complete detailed recommendations for ICANN's campaign and voting procedures, including independent oversight and monitoring.
Following this first phase, there will be
- a petition period, in which candidates who were not nominated by the Nominating Committee can seek a place on the ballot by attracting a minimum threshold of support from At Large Members in her/his region via online petition;
- a campaign period; and
- the vote of the At Large Members.
About the Election Committee
The Election Committee will develop detailed recommendations on the ICANN election procedures, subject to public review and comment prior to ICANN's next meetings in July. The Election Committee will propose the rules that will apply in this election for campaigning, voting, measures to prevent vote fraud, and independent oversight and monitoring. The Committee will solicit proposals from third-party vendors of online voting systems, and will recommend a vendor to the Board. To read more about the Election Committee, its charter, and its members, please see http://www.icann.org/committees/elcom/.
The Committee's membership includes experts in electronic voting, Internet infrastructure and security and election oversight and monitoring. The members of the Election Committee are:
- Greg Crew - Chair
Greg Crew is currently Chairman of the Australian Communications Industry Forum Ltd., Chairman of the Australian Information Technology Engineering Centre Ltd., and a non-executive director of ERG Ltd. (Perth) and of Silicon Wireless Ltd. (California). He was Chief Executive Officer of Mercury Communications Ltd. (UK) (1993-95) and Chief Operating Officer of Hongkong Telecommunications Ltd. (1991-93). He was one of the nine initial Directors of ICANN. He lives in Australia.
- Charles Costello
Charles Costello became director of the Carter Center's Democracy Program in December 1998. Previously, he was director of the Center for Democracy and Governance at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) since shortly after its creation in 1994. From 1993-94, he headed the USAID mission in post-conflict El Salvador, overseeing programs to help demobilize forces, support reformed political institutions, and rebuild civil society. At USAID since 1975, he also had headed USAID missions in Ecuador and Guatemala and served in Kenya and Bolivia. A former Peace Corps volunteer in Guatemala and staff member in Colombia, he earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan and a J.D. from the University of California at Berkeley. He lives in the United States.
- Lorrie Faith Cranor
Dr. Lorrie Faith Cranor is a Senior Technical Staff Member in the Secure Systems Research Department at AT&T Labs-Research Shannon Laboratory in Florham Park, New Jersey. She is chair of the Platform for Privacy Preferences Project (P3P) Specification Working Group and co-chair of the P3P Interest Group at the World Wide Web Consortium. Her research has focused on a variety of areas where technology and policy issues interact, including online privacy, electronic voting, and spam. Dr. Cranor received her doctorate degree in Engineering & Policy from Washington University in St. Louis in 1996. She lives in the United States.
- Patrik Fältström
Patrik Fältström works at Tele2/Swipnet. He works on technologies involving everything from directory services, indexing technologies, electronic mail and DNS, especially internationalization issues. He is one of two area directors of the Applications Area of the Internet Engineering Task Force, and is a member of the Internet Engineering Steering Group. He has been involved in Internet standardization since 1989. Since 1994 he has been helping the Swedish Tax Authorities to deliver live election results over the Internet to newspapers and radio and tv stations. He lives in Sweden.
- Ken Fockler
Ken Fockler is the President of Tenac Consulting, a company he founded in 1997 after the wrap up of CA*net Networking Inc., where he was President from 1992 to 1997. He is a Director of ICANN, chosen by the Address Supporting Organization. He lives in Canada.
- Hans Kraaijenbrink
Hans Kraaijenbrink is a member of the Executive Board of ETNO, the European Telecommunications Network Operators association, located in Brussels. He is also Manager, European Policy and Regulation with Royal KPN N.V., the Netherlands where he is responsible for European and international regulatory strategic affairs. He was one of the nine initial Directors of ICANN. He lives in the Netherlands.
- Nguyen Huu Dong
About the Nominating Committee
The Nominating Committee will identify and nominate outstanding candidates to stand for election to the ICANN Board. This committee will actively seek input (such as recommendations and expressions of interest) from all members of the Internet community. Procedures will be announced shortly. The Nominating Committee will complete its work by the end of July, after which the election process will proceed to the petition, campaign, and voting phases. For more information on the Nominating Committee, please see http://nomcom.icann.org/.
The members of the Nominating Committee are:
- Linda Wilson - Chair
Linda S. Wilson is president emerita of Radcliffe College, presently on sabbatical leave after serving as president for a decade, and one of the nine initial Directors of ICANN. She lives in the United States.
- Jean-François Abramatic
Jean-François Abramatic is Chairman of W3C, the World Wide Web Consortium, and a Director of ICANN selected by the Protocol Supporting Organization. He lives in France.
- Mads Bryde Andersen
Dr. Mads Bryde Andersen is a professor of private law at the University of Copenhagen. He is chairman of the Danish Internet Forum (the registrar for the .dk domain). He lives in Denmark.
- John Klensin
John Klensin is Internet Architecture Vice President of AT&T. He is also Chair of the Internet Architecture Board. He lives in the United States.
- Jun Murai
Jun Murai is currently Professor, Faculty of Environmental Information, Keio University (Japan); Adjunct Professor at the Institute of Advanced Studies, United Nations University; Instructor at Tokyo University of Art and Music; President of the Japan Network Information Center (JPNIC); General Chairperson of the WIDE Project (a Japanese Internet research consortium); Vice Chairperson of the Japanese chapter of the Internet Society; and Vice President of the Japanese Internet Association. He is a member of the board of the Internet Society, and one of the intial Directors of ICANN. He lives in Japan.
- Charles Musisi
Charles Musisi is an Internet consultant, and the delegated administrator of the ccTLD for Uganda (.ug). He helped build Uganda's first networks, and currently runs the East Africa Help Desk. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of AfriNIC. He lives in Uganda.
- Alejandro Pisanty
Alejandro Pisanty is currently Coordinator for Open and Distance Education at UNAM, the National Autonomous University of Mexico, in Mexico City, Mexico. He also serves as Chairman of the Board of CUDI, Corporación Universitaria para el Desarrollo de Internet, the Mexican Internet 2 Consortium, as well as of ISOC Mexico. He is a Director of ICANN, selected by the Domain Name Supporting Organization. He lives in Mexico.
About ICANN
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a technical coordination body for the Internet. Created in October 1998 by a broad coalition of the Internet's business, technical, academic, and user communities, ICANN is assuming responsibility for a set of technical functions previously performed under U.S. government contract by IANA and other groups.
Specifically, ICANN coordinates the assignment of the following identifiers that must be globally unique for the Internet to function:
- Internet domain names
- IP address numbers
- protocol parameter and port numbers
In addition, ICANN coordinates the stable operation of the Internet's root server system.
As a non-profit, private-sector corporation, ICANN is dedicated to preserving the operational stability of the Internet; to promoting competition; to achieving broad representation of global Internet communities; and to developing policy through private-sector, bottom-up, consensus-based means. ICANN welcomes the participation of any interested Internet user, business, or organization. See http://www.icann.org. For more information on ICANN's At Large Membership, see http://members.icann.org.