October 30, 2006 5:52 AM PST
U.N. proposes changes to Net's operation
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Speaking during opening ceremonies at a four-day U.N. summit here, Yoshio Utsumi criticized the current rules for overseeing domain names and Internet addresses, stressing that poorer nations are dissatisfied and are hoping that this week's meeting will erode U.S. influence.
"Many of them are tired of hearing 'You just don't understand,'" said Utsumi, a lawyer and former government official who is the secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union, a U.N. agency. "Many do understand."
He added: "No matter what technical experts argue is the best system, no matter what self-serving justifications are made that this is the only possible way to do things, there are no systems or technologies that can eternally claim they are the best."
Human rights groups, however, have warned that many of the nations most critical of the current arrangement--Tunisia, Cuba, Iran, China--rank among the world's most repressive. The worry: If those governments have their way, the current, virtually limitless amount of free expression on the Internet may come to an end.
The Paris-based advocacy group Reporters Without Borders last week called those reform proposals alarming and asked: "Do we really want the countries that censor the Internet and jail cyberdissidents to be in charge of the online flow of information?" (The group also noted that the United Nations Commission on Human Rights counted, as members, nations such as Libya and Sudan, no champions of human rights themselves.)
Similarly, Amnesty International has sent a delegation here to the Internet Governance Forum to emphasize the need for protecting free speech. "The Internet Governance Forum needs to know that the online community is bothered about free expression online and willing to stand up for it," said Steve Ballinger, part of Amnesty's delegation.
Since 1998, domain names and Internet addresses have been overseen by the California-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, under an agreement with the U.S. Department of Commerce. The U.S. government has occasionally used that unique relationship to its advantage, for instance when the Bush administration objected to a .xxx adult domain--an objection that ended with ICANN abruptly reversing itself and rejecting the domain suffix.
Recent changes (click here for PDF) to the Commerce Department-ICANN relationship haven't been enough to quiet anti-U.S. rumblings at the Athens summit.
The prime minister of Greece, Konstantínos Karamanlís, took a swipe at the U.S. during his opening speech, saying attendees should work to "enhance democracy in the Internet itself." Nitin Desai, an adviser for U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, called this week's event a "harbinger of a new type of multilateralism."
The only speaker on Monday who dwelled on free expression for more than a moment was Viviane Reding, the European Commission's Commissioner for Information Society and Media.
"Freedom, ladies and gentlemen, is sometimes seen as a threat to those who do not value human rights or want to impose their vision of the world or their religious belief" on others, Reding said. She urged the attendees to preserve the Internet as an "open and censorship-free zone."
The official purpose of the Internet Governance Forum, which was created at a similar U.N. event last year in Tunisia and is scheduled to convene annually for five years, is to discuss everything from domain names to spam and security. But many critics of the United States hope that the forum will contain the seeds to an organization to supplant ICANN, perhaps organized under the auspices of the United Nations.
Even though the U.S. has the most sophisticated Internet infrastructure, last year's meeting was held in Tunisia and this year's in Greece. Not one meeting is scheduled to be held in North America, though Brazil, India, and Egypt have announced their plans to host future ones. In addition, no U.S. government representative spoke during opening ceremonies.
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Don't rip & replace. VoIP as you are
It will remain US controlled. There is no problem there.
I do no want future censoring by the UN.
I do not even think the UN should exists.
The UN exists today as a source of power for politically oppressive, weak, and/or economically insignificant countries to push their agendas on others, most often the US or some other "western" nation.
The whole notion is ridiculous, why try to fix what isn?t broken? This is a typical attempt to weaken US influence when all that would be accomplished would be a weakening of the internet both in terms of openness/freedom as well as actual infrastructure.
Your network administrator sits at the same level with upper management; why should the internet administrator not sit at the same level as the other international standards bodies?
So far I've heard nothing but emotional arguments for why this is such a bad thing.
If it can be managed by an international body who can keep the open standards from being invluenced or abused by more opressive country members of the UN then what's the issue?
Oh right, I remember, why better human existance on this lonely little rock if your not getting significant personal gain in return.
The U.N. should be more concerned with the genocide in Sudan, the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran. Who does what with DNS should not be a U.N. problem for them to worry about.
So then democracy is this superior being that gives enlightenment to countries, just as what happened on the 19th century when Royalty gave the same kind of powers.
C'mon on. The U.S. is as represive as Cuba when
its interest are at stake. Just remeber the AT&T case, and know the H.P. scandal.
Free Internet speech must prevail, without the U.S. stronghold.
If American's want true change in Nov. then don't vote for a republican or a democrat. As long as you do you don't want real change. Real change comes with the two main parties are shattered and dispersed with other lesser parties. Give the lessers a chance if you want real change.
Robert
get it".
I kind of hope you do.
Remember the USS Maine. "You fournish the drawings, I'll fournish the war" said Hearst to a reporter.
I see more and more, how "American" minds are poisoned by Bush's propaganda against Iran, N. Korea and now Cuba. They are all bad, no good.
Now they even wan't to censor good-'all Internet.
USS Maine all over again.
Keeps me reminding me of Mel Gibsons frase on Apocalypto trailer:
?A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within.?
I see world wide web than the american broadband network or NET NATO. I see fools rush in for your money america as you exit stage right.
If the UN does a better job than ICANN, the UN DNS system will grow and the US DNS system will disappear. If the USA does a better job, our DNS system will remain dominant.
Lets see some genetic diversity and some competition.
- I want the UN to set up there own root servers.
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by ralfthedog
October 30, 2006 12:23 PM PST
- Anyone can set up there own root servers. It is not hard to do. If the UN Internet is better, then everyone will use it. If the US Internet is better, people will keep using it.
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See all 111 Comments >>Genetic diversity is a good thing. Lets have more competition.