ICC meets new ICANN CEO and applauds US Commerce Department approval of IANA transition plan

  • 10 June 2016
ICC Digital Economy

On the sidelines of the European Dialogue on Internet Governance (EuroDIG) in Brussels today, ICC BASIS Director and Senior Policy Executive for Digital Economy Elizabeth Thomas-Raynaud met with ICANN Chief Executive Officer Goran Marby, as he starts his third week of a five-year appointment. On the heels of yesterday’s announcement by the US Commerce Department, noting that the proposal of the global Internet multistakeholder community meets the criteria it set out two years ago, ICC used the timely occasion to express support and encouragement on behalf of companies from all regions for the important step.

This is an important milestone in the process for the transition of the US Government’s stewardship role for the Internet domain name system (DNS) technical functions, known as the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) functions to the global multistakeholder community.

Members have seen this transition proposal as necessary and positive for the on-going integrity, security and stability of the Internet that is paramount to global trade and commerce for companies of all sizes and in all sectors.

“ICC has been an active advocate for members from all countries in supporting an IANA transition plan to global multistakeholder stewardship, with necessary accountability mechanisms,” said Ms Thomas-Raynaud. “Members have seen this transition proposal as necessary and positive for the on-going integrity, security and stability of the Internet that is paramount to global trade and commerce for companies of all sizes and in all sectors.”

“Serious and diligent work was invested across all stakeholder communities in the development and review of the proposals,” said ICC Commission on the Digital Economy Chair Joseph Alhadeff, who represented ICC members in the transition steering group that oversaw the development of the proposal. “The proposals maintain the security, stability and integrity of the Internet and are sourced from and supported by the breadth of the multistakeholder community.”

ICC told ICANN it remained committed to constructively engage and share global and broad business perspectives to help assure these priorities are kept through the implementation of these proposals.

About the IANA transition

IANA is responsible for coordinating some of the Internet’s technical functions, such as allocating and maintaining the unique codes and numbering systems that allow the Internet to operate smoothly.

Thorough consultations seeking global stakeholder views on the principles and mechanisms for the transition and enhanced accountability got underway after the US Commerce department announced its intention to transition stewardship of this fundamental technical Internet function to the global multistakeholder community in March 2014.

The comprehensive package approved yesterday combines requirements for the transition coordinated by the IANA Stewardship Transition Group (ICG), in which ICC participated to offer both a broad and global business perspective. The package also includes plans to strengthen accountability of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) as an independent organization, and is the result of an inclusive, global discussion among representatives from government, business, technical community, civil society and academia, as well as end users. Implementation of the plan is expected to be completed prior to the expiration of the contract between US Commerce department and ICANN in September 2016.