Posted on 06/30/2005 10:52:15 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The US government will indefinitely retain oversight of the main computers that control traffic on the Internet, ignoring calls by some countries to turn the function over to an international body, a senior official has said.
The announcement marked a departure from previously stated US policy.
Michael D Gallagher, assistant secretary for communications and information at the US Commerce Department, shied away from terming the declaration a reversal, calling it instead "the foundation of US Policy going forward."
"The signals and words and intentions and policies need to be clear so all of us benefiting in the world from the Internet and in the US economy can have confidence there will be continued stewardship," Gallagher said on Thursday in an interview with The Associated Press.
He said the declaration was in response to growing security threats and increased reliance on the Internet globally for communications and commerce.
The computers in question serve as the Internet's master directories and tell Web browsers and e-mail programmes how to direct traffic. Internet users around the world interact with them every day, likely without knowing it. Policy decisions could at a stroke make all Web sites ending in a specific suffix essentially unreachable.
Though the computers themselves - 13 in all, known as "root" servers - are in private hands, they contain government-approved lists of the 260 or so Internet suffixes, such as ".
In 1998, the Commerce Department selected a private organisation with international board members, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), to decide what goes on those lists. Commerce kept veto power, but indicated it would let go once ICANN met a number of conditions.
Thursday's declaration means Commerce would keep that control, regardless of whether and when those conditions are met.
"It's completely an about-face if you consider the original commitment made when ICANN was created," said Milton Mueller, a Syracuse University professor who has written about policies surrounding the Internet's root servers.
ICANN officials said they were still reviewing Commerce's statement.
The declaration won't immediately affect Internet users, but it could have political ramifications.
The announcement comes just weeks before a UN panel is to release a report on Internet governance, addressing such issues as oversight of the root servers, ahead of November's UN World Summit on the Information Society in Tunisia.
Some countries have pressed to move oversight to an international body, such as the UN International Telecommunication Union, although the US government has historically had that role because it funded much of the Internet's early development.
If Hitlery is elected, this will go to an "international body" in a heartbeat.
"What US policy? From the blown one? We invented it, we own it."
Maybe they should consult the inventor. Ya know, that nutty former senator from Tennessee. ;-)
if foreigners want to control the internet, they can build their own damned internets.
and to hell with giving it up to the UN.
whatever they are smoking, it is bad for their minds.
I'd only turn it over to an "international body" if he were the man in charge.
Kofi Annan couldn't run anything if even his son Kojo helped him IMO.
I love it when the world ENVIES the US of A.
ROFLMAO
Maybe they should add a 14th "root server" to add some capacity and speed up the web. Then we might all have better luck with the internet and fewer "lost" data packets.
In other news, the United States takes back the Panama Canal.
Okay so I am dreaming.
Yep, development was funded by the US taxpayer. We own it, and we ain't giving it away to anyone.
I don't even want to try to imagine what the internet would be like under the UN.
But I'm sure that free speech would be the first thing to go and second they would slap a gigantic tax on every person who signed on, every email sent and every website and and and and and.........YIKES!
"How dar they ruin the great name of the United States of America!"
O well, shucks, since its the UN... Go ahead, take mah baby before I cry.
Al-jizz would be promoted to the next level.
Call it the abu-net.
The day of reckoning is coming shortly for the Democrats, and all those who back these delusional Democrats
bttt
Exactly. They can create all the .un.scandals.graft.dictators.porn.terror/slime.html they want.
Anyway there is a great axiom to consider. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. I can think of nothing worse to do to the internet than to let a government manage it, except for letting a wanna be government like the UN manage it.
Aside from the fact that ARPA had the most to do with "inventing the Internet," keeping the root servers in the security of the USA is important. Security is the main issue, and the USA is the most secure country that can administer the root servers.
The USA also has the strongest culture and Constitution for administration of the Internet. Putting administration in the discretion of an organization that is at all like the UN lessens the security strength of it. That's why alternate plans for landline/radio networks should be maintained.
Wow.
Stuff-I-Never-Knew BUMP!!
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