FT article on ICANN and IRT issues

[Robin Gross]

ICANN in today's Financial Times:
http://tinyurl.com/l8uvgv

Dot organisation
By Maija Palmer

Published: July 16 2009 03:00 | Last updated: July 16 2009 03:00


A couple of weeks ago, Sarah Deutsch got a typical call. The  
associate general counsel at Verizon spoke to a lawyer friend who  
informed her that someone was selling the internet address  
Verizonwirelessstorm.com on eBay for $1m. For Ms Deutsch and her team  
of five trademark lawyers, it triggered another weary process of  
trying to track down the seller and reclaim the web name.

"We get reports of thousands of violations each day and it is  
difficult to prioritise which ones we go after," she says.

Verizon, the US telecommunications operator, owns a portfolio of  
10,000 domain names, everything from the obvious verizon.com to  
misspellings such as verison.com and names such as verizonsucks.com,  
which they would prefer to keep out the hands of mischief-makers or  
competitors. This is typical for large companies. Microsoft, for  
example, owns more than 24,000 domain names.

Ms Deutsch's job is about to get much harder. Next spring the  
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers - the agency that  
runs the web's day-to-day operations - plans to allow a dramatic  
expansion of the 268 "top-level" domains, or everything after the  
dot. Currently these range from the generic - ".com" or ".org" - to  
the country-specific, such as ".uk". But the US-based body now plans  
to open the floodgates and let anyone register a new top-level domain  
- as long as they can pay the $186,000 (£113,000, €132,000)  
registration fee. Icann estimates that there will be about 500 new  
ones, ranging from the person or company-specific (".verizon") to the  
generic (".books").

This opening up of the internet represents one of the biggest shifts  
yet seen in the underlying structure of the online medium. Its  
implications are complex and controversial - and extend well beyond  
the concerns of the commercial enterprises that see the Web as little  
more than a virtual global shopping mall.

A representative of the Pope, for instance, has written to Icann with  
concerns over how it would ensure that sensitive religious domains -  
".catholic", ".muslim" or even ".god" - would not fall into the wrong  
hands.

Public interest groups, meanwhile, fear that the changes mark part of  
a more general rewriting of the rules of the internet that could see  
free speech lose out to commercial interests.

Such concerns, in turn, have prompted renewed questions about the  
structure and governance of the internet - an issue that has never  
been far below the surface in recent years. Icann, a non-profit  
corporation that is still ultimately at the behest of the US  
Department of Commerce, has faced challenges before to the way it is  
organised, most notably from a European attempt to put it under the  
control of the United Nations.

The coming expansion of the internet's naming system is a central  
part of Icann's attempt to prove that it truly operates in the  
interests of a fast-growing global audience. The Roman alphabet, for  
instance, still dominates the internet naming system, yet the world's  
biggest internet audience is now in China. Arab nations have also  
bristled under long delays in Icann's efforts to come up with a  
system that suits their needs.

If Icann fails to appease these interest groups, the consequences  
could be severe. Getting it wrong could lead to schisms over the  
underlying naming system of the internet - in effect, leading to a  
fragmentation that turns the single global online medium into a  
series of separate systems.

With an end to the years of work it has taken to create a new naming  
system now in sight, it is large corporations that have been making  
the loudest noise.

The costs and risks for any big company that does business over the  
internet are considerable. Although some domain names can be  
registered for a few dollars, if they are already owned by someone,  
it can cost around $2,000 to buy them back. If ownership is disputed  
in court, the costs are considerably higher.

Yet big advertisers like Verizon cannot afford to ignore the  
opportunists - so-called cybersquatters - who register variations of  
its trademark name online. As well as confusing people, fake sites  
can damage a company's brand in the eyes of their customers. Verizon  
estimates that at least 9m customers could have been lured away onto  
fake websites, had it not fought to take control.

As a result, big brand owners are trying to ensure that Icann has  
procedures that will protect their rights when the onslaught begins -  
ways to get trademark-infringing sites taken down quickly, for example.

However, these are proving controversial with other parts of the  
internet community, such as non-commercial groups, who are concerned  
that these would choke free speech online.

"In Iran the protesters were able to communicate with the outside  
world because of proxy servers that allowed them to remain anonymous.  
But there are working groups within Icann working to prevent  
anonymous proxy servers because they might interfere with  
trademarks," says Robin Gross of IP Justice, an international civil  
liberties organisation.

While tensions are high, few dispute that opening up the naming  
system is a necessary step to creating a more lasting foundation for  
the internet, and one that will benefit hundreds of millions of users.

Fans of the expansion of domains say that it could make navigation of  
the internet easier. Looking for plumber.london might, arguably, give  
a clearer indication of what and where a business is, than many  
variations of A1plumbers.com.

"We spend a lot of time and money trying to drive people to websites.  
Anything that makes it easier to find things on the web is a good  
thing," said Tom Eslinger of Saatchi & Saatchi, the advertising agency.

Others add that the high costs of the new naming system will diminish  
over time. Nick Wood of Com Laude, a domain name management company  
which works for multinational clients such as Nestlé and AstraZeneca,  
says that while fees may be initially high, they will "inevitably" fall.

"When dotcom domains first started to be sold in 1994 they cost $200.  
Now they can be registered for $6. That will happen for top level  
domains. When the registration falls to $18,000 or $9,000, many  
companies will want to apply," he says, adding that he is already  
aware of 54 companies in the UK and northern Europe alone that are  
interested in applying for their own domain name.

Yet the last-minute efforts by large corporations to ensure the new  
naming system protects their interests have brought a wider backlash,  
exposing the deeper tensions inside Icann.

A recent meeting of Icann in Sydney descended into full-blown  
conflict over the issue.

"It was a very hostile environment - even for an Icann meeting, which  
is generally a hostile environment for [intellectual property] owners  
and representatives. We had people shouting at us, saying we were  
tyrants and blog postings comparing us to Ahmadi-Nejad," said  
Kristina Rosette of lawyers Covington & Burling, who were involved in  
drafting recommendations to Icann on trademark protection when the  
new domain names are released.

Much now rests on the shoulders of Rod Beckstrom, Icann's new chief  
executive. A former cyber-security tsar at the US Department for  
Homeland Security, Mr Beckstrom has been striving for a neutral  
stance in his first days in office - though his comments have done  
little to calm the worries of corporations.

"You can look at domainers in many ways. Some see them as  
cybersquatters, some look at them as entrepreneurs. I think there is  
a rich and healthy debate to be had," he says, adding, "There is no  
solution where everyone will get what they want."

Trademark owners worry that such comments show Mr Beckstrom is not  
listening to their concerns.

"There is definitely potential for a showdown between Icann and  
trademark owners," says Ms Rosette, who describes Mr Beckstrom's  
statements as "disconcerting". If Icann does not demonstrate that it  
genuinely intends to prevent abuse of trademarks, the two sides could  
end up in court, she warns. "It's no secret that there are trademark  
owners that would love to sue Icann for infringement."

Public interest groups, on the other side, also warn that a damaging  
division may lie ahead. "If non-commercial users feel like our voices  
are not being heard at the meetings, we can't get people to  
participate in Icann," Ms Gross said.

Ultimately, the danger for Icann - and for internet users around the  
world - is that these tensions could destroy the delicate consensus  
on which the global internet directory is founded. If Icann loses the  
confidence of countries that sign up to its system, that could even  
lead to rival naming systems emerging, breaking the online world into  
a series of fragmented networks.

Additional reporting by Abadesi Osunsade and Farah Halime

Tug-of-war over cyber gatekeeper

There have been many calls to make Icann less tied to oversight by  
the US government.

Founded in 1998, Icann is a not-for-profit organisation which is  
contracted by the US Department of Commerce to manage the world's  
internet domain names. Its founding documents contained the idea that  
over time it would become more globally influenced.

The United Nations, the International Telecoms Union and countries  
such as China and Brazil have all questioned the influence of the US  
over Icann and thus the internet. Viviane Reding, the European  
Union's information society commissioner, has urged the US to  
transfer accountability of Icann to an international body.

This September, a key contract between Icann and the US government  
expires and Icann plans to take a small step towards independence.  
But many are wary of Icann striking out on its own.

People are sceptical of the idea that states such as Libya, North  
Korea and China should share oversight of Icann, as they want, says  
Nick Wood of Com Laude, a domain name manager. "The US government is  
the least horrible option." There is also worry that Icann could be  
overtaken by commercial interests, such as the registrars that sell  
internet names.

US congressmen questioned Icann last month over whether it was doing  
enough to fight cybercrime, whether staff were overpaid, and whether  
a not-for-profit entity should be running a surplus of $7m (£4m,  
€5m), as it did last year.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009





IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA  94117  USA
p: +1-415-553-6261    f: +1-415-462-6451
w: http://www.ipjustice.org     e: robin at ipjustice.org



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