Latest news of the domain name industry

Recent Posts

ICANN lays out new rules for navel-gazing

Kevin Murphy, June 4, 2026, 04:27:06 (UTC), Domain Policy

ICANN is set to cut back on the amount of navel-gazing it carries out, dramatically scaling back how often it reviews its own structure and performance.

The community’s unashamedly meta “Review of Reviews” has produced fruit on schedule, with a set of principles set to be opened for discussion at the ICANN 86 meeting in Seville, Spain which kicks off this weekend.

The Cross Community Group that came up with the new framework would see some reviews that are currently mandated by ICANN’s bylaws eliminated altogether and others put on a substantially longer cycle.

The CCG is recommending that only two reviews are mandatory, the Accountability & Transparency Review, which would occur every five years, and an ICANN Structural Review which would run every 15 years instead of the current five.

The Registration Directory Service Review, which according to the bylaws has to review Whois policy every five years, does not appear to feature in the new recommendations. Either does the Competition, Consumer Trust and Consumer Choice Review.

The five-yearly Security, Stability, and Resiliency Review would now be treated as an “On-Demand Review”, a new category of review that can be called for by the community if a very high voting threshold is met.

The proposals already have their detractors among the community’s constituency groups.

The Non-Commercial Stakeholders Group has concerns that they would favor highly resourced interest groups at the expense of marginalized communities, for example, while the Intellectual Property Constituency believes eliminating some of the reviews poses a risk of DNS abuse and IP infringement.

There will be a session on the proposals in Seville on Monday.


Domain Incite relies on support from readers like you to survive. Please consider making a one-off or recurring donation via PayPal. Please support Domain Incite, the independent source of news, analysis and opinion for the domain name industry and ICANN community.

Tagged: ,

Add Your Comment