Organization: ITU

ITU and Internet community despair of each other over ITRs

"We are tied together, we are almost married," explained Alex Ntoko, the head of ITU Corporate Strategy, to a number of representatives of the Internet community last week in Geneva. If Ntoko is right, it quickly became clear that this is a loveless marriage.

During a polite but tense meeting, Ntoko outlined his organization's plan to revise a global treaty known as the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs). The ITRs were created in 1988, went into effect in 1990, and have not been touched since. They form one of the four treaties of the ITU - which are reviewed every four years, although it has taken 24 in this case - and they will be updated in December this year at the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) in Dubai.

It's time for Internet organizations to ditch the palace politics and grow up

Starting next week, the United Nations in Geneva will host a series of back-to-back meetings with a broad focus: deciding the ways in which the future of the Internet will be decided.

Most meetings are open and attendance is free. And yet, despite the low barriers to entry, one key demographic is largely missing: business.

For example, of the 300 people registered with an online website covering the first of four conferences (the WSIS Forum), only 26 identify themselves as coming from the private sector, and of them, only 11 are not from specialist Internet infrastructure companies.

The same pattern is repeated at the conference that follows: consultations over the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). And business numbers will fall even further for the last two: "enhanced co-operation" and the annual meeting of the Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD).

ITU Secretary-General Hamadoun Toure gave a speech where he warned that the world needed to "move beyond the rhetoric and the fear of the unknown" over revision of the international telecommunication regulations (ITRs). The ITU is reaching out the business around the world and a proper review of the ITRs would mean greater broadband access worldwide, he argued. The speech comes in response to a US-led campaign which claims the United Nations is trying to take control of the Internet.

It is rare that the verbose and determinedly unsexy world of Internet governance hits the mainstream press. So how has it happened twice in one month?

First, on 9 March, there was The Huffington Post warning us that "Internet freedom is again under fire".

Of course, the Huffington Post's editorial policy is based more on how important the author is than what they actually have to say (in this case Washington insider and high-end lobbyist Ed Black).

Internet governance issues hit the mainstream press

But then, in this month's Vanity Fair nothing less than a full and lengthy article titled World War 3.0 has appeared. Internet governance is about to enter the broader populace's minds.

[Copy of transcript and audio available on 12 March 2012 ICANN and the Internet Governance Landscape session page]

Bill Graham: I think we should get started, I’m very pleased to see such a large group here for this interesting, I hope, I’m sure will be an interesting session. I want to congratulate all of you who found the place, because I know there’s been confusion about the time and the room, and I truly apologize for that. But some last minute changes were required and that has been the result. But anyway you’re here and I’m very pleased to see you.

I am Bill Graham; I am a Director on the ICANN Board. Markus Kummer beside me is the Vice President of Public Policy for the Internet Society, and we will be co-chairing this event.

ICANN's two most powerful bodies, the GNSO and GAC, are due to approve extraordinary special protections for the Red Cross and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on the Internet. But is the decision based on shaky legal advice?

Update: The GNSO has deferred a vote on the issue until a special meeting of the Council in just under two weeks.

Under proposals put forward by the GNSO - ICANN's main policy body - and due to be agreed to by the GAC - the governmental advisory committee, the world-famous international organizations will be given permanent control over their names, as well as any names that are similar to their names, wherever they appear across the Internet.

The basis for this extraordinary level of protection is that both organizations stand apart globally since they have their names protected by treaty and within the laws of a number of countries.*

According to the GAC chair, Heather Dryden, it has carried out "legal research" that "confirms that only the IOC and Red Cross qualify for unique levels of protection". In a letter from Dryden to GNSO chair Stephane van Gelder, it was also noted that: "No other international not-for-profit or non-governmental organizations have been afforded this threshold of protection at both the international and national levels." A full list of the protections granted to both was then provided in a letter created by GAC members.

The following op-ed was published in the Wall Street Journal on 21 February 2012.

Written by FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell it outlines US government concerns about the WCIT conference in Dubai in December and the effort to change the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs). Read on the Wall Street Journal website.

The U.N. Threat to Internet Freedom

Top-down, international regulation is antithetical to the Net, which has flourished under its current governance model.

Robert McDowell

On Feb. 27, a diplomatic process will begin in Geneva that could result in a new treaty giving the United Nations unprecedented powers over the Internet. Dozens of countries, including Russia and China, are pushing hard to reach this goal by year's end. As Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said last June, his goal and that of his allies is to establish "international control over the Internet" through the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a treaty-based organization under U.N. auspices.

Two memos by the State Department have thrown a crucial telecoms strategy by the US government into disarray.

Outlining the purported US position with respect to the renegotiation of the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs) later this year, the memos were provided to civil society and business groups this month for feedback and have been met with a mixture of confusion and disbelief.

More worryingly, they appear to have caught the rest of the US government by surprise and threaten to undermine a carefully formulated strategy involving the NTIA, FCC and other departments who specialize in telecoms regulations.

Going directly against recent warnings by US officials, the first memo argues that the US government’s stance has been successful and “there are no pending proposals to invest the ITU with ICANN-like Internet governance authority". It advocates a change in position since “most of the world… may not be ready to embrace the US Government's minimalist position".