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ICANN Documentary Information Disclosure Policy

NOTE: With the exception of personal email addresses, phone numbers and mailing addresses, DIDP Requests are otherwise posted in full on ICANN¹s website, unless there are exceptional circumstances requiring further redaction.

ICANN's Documentary Information Disclosure Policy (DIDP) is intended to ensure that information contained in documents concerning ICANN's operational activities, and within ICANN's possession, custody, or control, is made available to the public unless there is a compelling reason for confidentiality.

A principal element of ICANN's approach to transparency and information disclosure is the identification of a comprehensive set of materials that ICANN makes available on its website as a matter of course.

Specifically, ICANN has:

  • Identified many of the categories of documents that are already made public as a matter of due course
  • Developed a time frame for responding to requests for information not already publicly available
  • Identified specific conditions for nondisclosure of information
  • Described the mechanism under which requestors may appeal a denial of disclosure

Public Documents

ICANN posts on its website at www.icann.org, numerous categories of documents in due course. A list of those categories follows:

Responding to Information Requests

If a member of the public requests information not already publicly available, ICANN will respond, to the extent feasible, to reasonable requests within 30 calendar days of receipt of the request. If that time frame will not be met, ICANN will inform the requester in writing as to when a response will be provided, setting forth the reasons necessary for the extension of time to respond. If ICANN denies the information request, it will provide a written statement to the requestor identifying the reasons for the denial.

Defined Conditions for Nondisclosure

ICANN has identified the following set of conditions for the nondisclosure of information:

  • Information provided by or to a government or international organization, or any form of recitation of such information, in the expectation that the information will be kept confidential and/or would or likely would materially prejudice ICANN's relationship with that party.
  • Internal information that, if disclosed, would or would be likely to compromise the integrity of ICANN's deliberative and decision-making process by inhibiting the candid exchange of ideas and communications, including internal documents, memoranda, and other similar communications to or from ICANN Directors, ICANN Directors' Advisors, ICANN staff, ICANN consultants, ICANN contractors, and ICANN agents.
  • Information exchanged, prepared for, or derived from the deliberative and decision-making process between ICANN, its constituents, and/or other entities with which ICANN cooperates that, if disclosed, would or would be likely to compromise the integrity of the deliberative and decision-making process between and among ICANN, its constituents, and/or other entities with which ICANN cooperates by inhibiting the candid exchange of ideas and communications.
  • Personnel, medical, contractual, remuneration, and similar records relating to an individual's personal information, when the disclosure of such information would or likely would constitute an invasion of personal privacy, as well as proceedings of internal appeal mechanisms and investigations.
  • Information provided to ICANN by a party that, if disclosed, would or would be likely to materially prejudice the commercial interests, financial interests, and/or competitive position of such party or was provided to ICANN pursuant to a nondisclosure agreement or nondisclosure provision within an agreement.
  • Confidential business information and/or internal policies and procedures.
  • Information that, if disclosed, would or would be likely to endanger the life, health, or safety of any individual or materially prejudice the administration of justice.
  • Information subject to the attorney– client, attorney work product privilege, or any other applicable privilege, or disclosure of which might prejudice any internal, governmental, or legal investigation.
  • Drafts of all correspondence, reports, documents, agreements, contracts, emails, or any other forms of communication.
  • Information that relates in any way to the security and stability of the Internet, including the operation of the L Root or any changes, modifications, or additions to the root zone.
  • Trade secrets and commercial and financial information not publicly disclosed by ICANN.
  • Information requests: (i) which are not reasonable; (ii) which are excessive or overly burdensome; (iii) complying with which is not feasible; or (iv) are made with an abusive or vexatious purpose or by a vexatious or querulous individual.

Information that falls within any of the conditions set forth above may still be made public if ICANN determines, under the particular circumstances, that the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the harm that may be caused by such disclosure. Further, ICANN reserves the right to deny disclosure of information under conditions not designated above if ICANN determines that the harm in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

ICANN shall not be required to create or compile summaries of any documented information, and shall not be required to respond to requests seeking information that is already publicly available.

Appeal of Denials

To the extent a requestor chooses to appeal a denial of information from ICANN, the requestor may follow the Reconsideration Request procedures or Independent Review procedures, to the extent either is applicable, as set forth in Article IV, Sections 2 and 3 of the ICANN Bylaws, which can be found at http://www.icann.org/en/about/governance/bylaws.

DIDP Requests and Responses

Request submitted under the DIDP and ICANN responses are available here: http://www.icann.org/en/about/transparency

Guidelines for the Posting of Board Briefing Materials

The posting of Board Briefing Materials on the Board Meeting Minutes page (at http://www.icann.org/en/groups/board/meetings) is guided by the application of the DIDP. The Guidelines for the Posting of Board Briefing Materials are available at http://www.icann.org/en/groups/board/documents/briefing-materials-guidelines-21mar11-en.htm.


To submit a request, send an email to didp@icann.org

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."