By Dan Calabrese ——Bio and Archives--March 19, 2014
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While the ultimate goal was to transition the technical coordination of the Domain Name System to the private sector over time, the U.S. government wisely retained supervisory contractual control over ICANN, IANA, and the root servers to ensure the security and stability of the Internet and to make sure that ICANN was indeed fulfilling its responsibilities in an accountable and transparent manner. These arrangements have been extended and amended multiple times, most recently in 2013. ITIF has argued before that U.S. government oversight has played an essential role in maintaining the security, stability, and openness of the Internet and in ensuring that ICANN satisfies its responsibilities in effectively managing the Internet’s Domain Name and Addressing System. This supervision has provided the necessary assurance to the millions of companies around the world that invest in and use the Internet for business that it will continue to be governed in a fair, open, and transparent manner. And under this supervision, we have witnessed an incredible amount of innovation and social benefits for consumers. Given the continued importance of the Internet to the global economy, it is important that the U.S. government continue to support an Internet governance structure that protects the economic and social benefits of the global networked economy. Without the U.S. government providing an effective backstop to ICANN’s original operating principles, there would be no mechanism in place to stop foreign governments from interfering with ICANN’s operations. For example, Internet users and businesses worry that countries such as Russia or China may manipulate ICANN to censor online content that is outside their borders. Currently, the U.S. government acts as a deterrent since it has publicly committed to ensuring that ICANN operates openly and transparently. It is unreasonable, however, to expect all foreign governments to continue to respect ICANN’s operating principles in the absence of the U.S. government’s oversight and protection of core values.Obama doesn't like to acknowledge this, but the United States provides a much stronger defense of freedom, and a much stronger check against tyranny, than the "international community." Or at least, the United States did before Obama was president. It is in the interest of freedom-loving people all over the world if the U.S. maintains control of the Internet's Domain Name and Addressing System. And as Castro warns darkly, once we give it up, we can never get it back. So why give it up at all? The only plausible answer is that Obama doesn't really believe the U.S. has the moral or legal right to control the Internet, and he doesn't agree that the U.S. is the best protector of freedom (or he doesn't think it's important, a theory his performance as president would tend to bear out). So if you're horrified at the thought of how Russia, China or other freedom-unfriendly nations could manipulate the Internet once the U.S. is no longer exercising control over it, just know that Barack Obama didn't think this was a serious enough problem to do anything about. Then again, we're used to Obama mocking the idea that Russia is a threat.
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