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Press Release: Tripti Sinha Re-Appointed Chair and Chris Chapman Appointed Vice Chair of ICANN Board of Directors

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ISTANBUL - 14 November 2024 - The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is pleased to announce the re-appointment of Tripti Sinha as Chair of the ICANN Board of Directors, and the appointment of Chris Chapman as Vice Chair. Both appointments are effective immediately, following the Board's 81st Public Meeting in Istanbul from 9-14 November 2024.

Sinha, who joined the ICANN Board in 2018, has a notable background in cyber-infrastructure and global Internet policy. Her depth of technical knowledge, paired with her strategic perspective on global Internet needs, will enable Sinha to continue to champion ICANN's efforts to maintain a secure, stable, and globally accessible Internet.

"I am honored to continue to serve as Chair working alongside our dedicated Board members and the ICANN community to ensure a secure, reliable, and global Internet for all," said Sinha. "Our multistakeholder approach, rooted in collaboration and shared responsibility, has supported a unified global Internet, enabling exponential growth for more than 40 years. ICANN's mission is essential to keeping the Internet open and inclusive, guided by core principles. This commitment will continue to drive us forward, ensuring the Internet remains inclusive and trusted."

Since joining the ICANN Board of Directors in October 2022, Chris Chapman has shown a strong commitment to ICANN's mission. With a deep understanding of telecommunications and digital policy, and a wealth of experience in regulatory bodies and international organizations, he brings valuable insight into Internet policy, and stakeholder engagement. Notably, Chapman chaired the CEO Search Committee to select ICANN's next president and CEO. As Vice Chair, he will work closely with Sinha and the Board to advance ICANN's strategic priorities and support an open, globally connected Internet.

Chapman also shared his appreciation, saying, "Serving as Vice Chair is a great honor and responsibility. I look forward to collaborating with Tripti, the Board, and our global stakeholders to meet the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead for ICANN and the Internet community."

The Chair and Vice Chair of ICANN's Board of Directors serve one-year terms. The Board is made up of 20 voting members representing diversity in geography and professional expertise, demonstrating ICANN's dedication to global representation and technical skill in Internet governance.

About ICANN

ICANN's mission is to help ensure a stable, secure, and unified global Internet. To reach another person on the Internet, you need to type an address – a name or a number – into your computer or other device. That address must be unique so computers know where to find each other. ICANN helps coordinate and support these unique identifiers across the world. ICANN was formed in 1998 as a nonprofit public benefit corporation with a community of participants from all over the world.

Media Contact

Luna Madi
Senior Director, Global Communications, EMEA
Istanbul
Mobile: +90 (533) 031 35 05
Email: [email protected]
or [email protected]

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."