Public Comment
Proposed Final 2013 RAA
Open Date
22 April 2013 23:59 UTC
Close Date
13 May 2013 23:59 UTC
Staff Report Due
3 June 2013 23:59 UTC
Brief Overview
ICANN is seeking public comments on the Proposed Final 2013 Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA). This is the culmination of 18 months of intensive negotiations.
Section I: Description and Explanation
After an extended period of negotiations, ICANN is posting a proposed 2013 Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA) for public comment.
On 7 March 2013, ICANN posted its version of the 2013 RAA for public comment, noting some areas of disagreement between ICANN and the Registrar Negotiating Team (NT). In addition, some of the specifications posted for comment were ICANN versions only. Since the 7 March posting, the Registrar NT has engaged in frequent negotiation sessions with ICANN in order to bring to closure to all of the open negotiation topics and to consider the community comments received from the 7 March posting. As a result, at ICANN's public meeting in Beijing, ICANN and the Registrar NT announced that they had reached agreement in principle on each of the outstanding items highlighted in the March posting version. The documents posted today reflect ICANN and the Registrar NT's agreements and are the Proposed Final 2013 RAA. This proposed 2013 RAA is a cornerstone of ICANN's efforts to work to improve the image of the domain industry and to protect registrants through a further updated contractual framework. It is ICANN's intention to have the 2013 RAA completed and approved in the near future for use in the New gTLD Program.
To allow for transparency into the proposed final version of the 2013 RAA and community input on the changes from the 7 March posting, ICANN is opening a full comment forum.
ICANN thanks the Registrar Negotiating Team (NT) for its continued engagement in good faith negotiations on the RAA. The RAA posted today reflects hard-fought concessions on many of key issues raised throughout the negotiations.
A fuller discussion of the status of negotiations and areas of difference is available in ICANN's RAA Posting Memorandum [PDF, 65 KB].
Update on 8 May 2013: On 6 May 2013 ICANN hosted a webinar to provide further information on the 2013 RAA. The recording of the webinar can be accessed here and the presentation from the webinar can be accessed here [PDF, 314 KB].
Section II: Background
The current round of negotiations over the RAA began in October 2011. ICANN and the Registrar Negotiation Team have presented updates to the community at each of ICANN’s public meetings since that time. Information on the history of the negotiations, including previously released documentation, is available at the community wiki at https://community.icann.org/display/RAA/Negotiations+Between+ICANN+and+Registrars+to+Amend+the+Registrar+Accreditation+Agreement. This includes the group of documents posted in June 2012, which demonstrated the progress to date in the negotiations.
Section III: Relevant Resources
There are multiple documents for review as part of this posting. The new RAA is anticipated to be a base document with a series of specifications attached. Each specification is an integral, enforceable component of the RAA. This posting includes all documents that are currently anticipated to be part of the 2013 RAA. As noted above, a fuller discussion of the status of negotiations and areas of difference is available in ICANN's RAA Posting Memorandum [PDF, 65 KB]. A summary [PDF, 59 KB] of how the 12 law enforcement recommendations are incorporated into the RAA is also provided.
The base RAA documents:
- Proposed 2013 RAA [PDF, 311 KB]
- Redline Showing Changes Between Proposed 2013 RAA and 7 March 2013 RAA Posting [PDF, 293 KB]
- Redline Showing Changes Between Proposed 2013 RAA and the 2009 RAA [PDF, 343 KB]
- A Summary of Changes from the 2009 RAA [PDF, 496 KB] is also available.
The Proposed Specifications and Addendums:
Section IV: Additional Information
A Report of the Public Comments submitted in response to the 7 March 2013 posting of the RAA is available here [PDF, 178 KB].
Comments Closed
Report of Public Comments