Government domain veto watered down
A US proposal to grant governments the right of veto over new top-level domains has been watered down by ICANN’s Governmental Advisory Committee.
Instead of giving the GAC the ability to block any TLD application on public policy grounds, the GAC’s official position would now allow the ICANN board of directors to make the final decision.
The move means the chances of a .gay application being blocked, to use the most obvious example, are much lower.
The original US position, which was was leaked last month, read:
Any GAC member may raise an objection to a proposed string for any reason. If it is the consensus position of the GAC not to oppose objection raised by a GAC member or members, ICANN shall reject the application.
If this policy had been adopted, all potentially controversial TLDs could have found themselves pawns of the GAC’s back-room negotiations.
A petition against the US proposal has so far attracted almost 300 signatures.
The newly published official GAC position is based on the language in the US document, but it has been tempered substantially. It now reads:
Any GAC member may raise an objection to a proposed string for any reason. The GAC will consider any objection raised by a GAC member or members, and agree on advice to forward to the ICANN Board.
GAC advice could also suggest measures to mitigate GAC concerns. For example, the GAC could advise that additional scrutiny and conditions should apply to strings that could impact on public trust (e.g. ‘.bank’).
In the event the Board determines to take an action that is not consistent with GAC advice pursuant to Article XI Section 2.1 j and k, the Board will provide a rationale for its decision.
This still gives the GAC a key role in deciding the fate of TLD applications, but it’s one that can be overruled by the ICANN board.
To use the .gay example, the GAC could still advise ICANN that the string has been objected to by a handful of backward nations, but it would be up to the ICANN board to decide whether homophobia is a useful policy to embrace in the DNS.
The GAC proposals, which you can read here, are not policy yet, however.
ICANN and the GAC will meet in Brussels next week to figure out what GAC advice is worth implementing in the new TLDs program.
UPDATE: via @gTLDNews, I’ve discovered that US Department of Commerce assistant secretary Lawrence Strickling recently addressed this topic in a speech.
He seems to believe that ICANN “would have little choice but to reject the application” if the GAC raised a consensus objection. According to his prepared remarks, he said:
We have proposed that the ICANN Board use the already-existing GAC process to allow governments collectively to submit objections to individual applications to top level domains. The GAC already operates on a consensus basis. If the GAC reaches a consensus view to object to a particular application, that view would be submitted to the Board.
The Board, in its role to determine if there is consensus support for a given application (as it is expected to do for all matters coming before it), would have little choice but to reject the application.
Does he have a point?
ICANN has never explicitly rejected GAC advice; the forthcoming San Francisco meeting is probably going to be the first time it does so.
My reading of the ICANN bylaws is that the board is able to reject GAC advice whenever it wants, as long as it provides its rationale for doing so.
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Ask the GAC how they define “consensus.” I’m quite sure it’s not the same as used by ICANN or its working groups. Such semantic and cultural differences appear key to the mutual misunderstandings (misgivings?) between the parties.
I happen to agree with Lawrence Strickling. ICANN could be shut down or worse if it objects to a GAC veto. As long as the GAC is getting this much power none of the internet is safe from governmental censorship.
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