[Fwd: [council] Public comments are invited on GNSO Council's WHOIS reports and recommendations.]

[Robin Gross]

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	[council] Public comments are invited on GNSO Council's WHOIS
reports and recommendations.
Date: 	Mon, 17 Sep 2007 00:06:32 +0200
From: 	GNSO.SECRETARIAT at GNSO.ICANN.ORG <gnso.secretariat at gnso.icann.org>
To: 	'Council GNSO' <council at gnso.icann.org>



[To: ga[at]gnso.icann.org; announce[at]gnso.icann.org]
[To: council[at]gnso.icann.org]
[To: liaison6c[at]gnso.icann.org, regional-liaisons at icann.org]

http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-2-14sep07.htm
Public comments are invited via email until 00:00 UTC (17:00 PDT) on 30
October 2007 on the GNSO Council's WHOIS reports and recommendations.

Submit comments to: whois-comments-2007 at icann.org.
View comments at http://forum.icann.org/lists/whois-comments-2007/.

Background

In March, 2007, a WHOIS Task Force convened by the GNSO Council in June,
2005 completed its final report. The Task Force was asked to address
important questions related to WHOIS. Key questions included the purpose
of WHOIS service, which information should be available to the public,
how to improve WHOIS accuracy and how to deal with conflicts between
WHOIS requirements and relevant privacy laws. In the final report, a
simple majority of members of the WHOIS Task Force endorsed a proposal
called the "Operational Point of Contact" (OPOC).

Under OPOC, every registrant would identify a new operational contact
and the technical and administrative contact details would no longer be
displayed. The final WHOIS Task Force Report of 12 March, 2007 is posted
at
http://gnso.icann.org/issues/whois-privacy/whois-services-final-tf-report-12mar07.htm.

Following completion of the Task Force Report and public comment period,
on 28 March the GNSO Council issued a resolution creating a WHOIS
Working Group to examine three issues and to make recommendations
concerning how current policies may be improved to address these issues:

   1. to examine the roles, responsibilities and requirements of the
OPOC, and what happens if they are not fulfilled;
   2. to examine how legitimate interests will access unpublished
registration data; and
   3. to examine whether publication of registration contact
information should be based on the type of registered name holder (legal
vs. natural persons) or the registrant's use of a domain name.

The Whois Outcomes Working Group Report was finalized on 20 August,
2007. It is posted at
http://gnso.icann.org/drafts/icann-whois-wg-report-final-1-9.pdf [PDF,
213K]. On 6 September 2007, the GNSO Council approved a resolution
which, among other things, establishes a schedule for consideration of
the WHOIS Task Force Report and the WHOIS Working Group Report. This
schedule includes solicitation of further public comments and culminates
in a public Council discussion and vote on 31 October 2007 during the
Los Angeles ICANN.

In addition, the resolution calls for ICANN staff to prepare a type of
"draft final report" that references the Task Force Report, the Working
Group Charter and the Working Group Report and which includes an overall
description of the process. The following document, entitled, Staff
Overview of Recent GNSO WHOIS Activity [PDF, 77K], has been prepared in
response to the Council Resolution. It contains the full text of the
GNSO resolution and the schedule for GNSO Council consideration of the
reports.

Again, further public comments are invited via email until 00:00 UTC
(17:00 PDT) on 30 October 2007 on the GNSO Council's WHOIS reports and
recommendations referenced above and summarized in the Staff Overview of
Recent GNSO WHOIS Activity [PDF, 77K]. Submit comments to:
whois-comments-2007 at icann.org. View comments at
http://forum.icann.org/lists/whois-comments-2007/.
--
Glen de Saint Géry
GNSO Secretariat - ICANN
gnso.secretariat[at]gnso.icann.org
http://gnso.icann.org