SENATOR DENOUNCES REPORT CALLING FOR UN GLOBAL INTERNET CONTROL

[seriousstan]

The headline is Drudge but I included a link to the actual press release of the Senator.




July 29th, 2005 - Washington, D.C. - Senator Norm Coleman today submitted a statement into the Congressional Record denouncing a final report issued by the United Nations’ Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) suggesting that the U.N. assume global governance of the Internet. Since its inception and creation in the United States, the U.S. has assumed the historic role of overseeing the Internet’s growth and has overseen its development. The U.N. taskforce report suggests that in addition to terminating the U.S.’s leadership role, the authority and functions of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a non-profit organization overseen by the U.S. Department of Commerce, should be transferred as well. Senator Coleman strongly opposes these measures.

“My probe of the U.N. as Chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations revealed management that was at best, incompetent, and at worst corrupt,” said Coleman. “The first priority for the United Nations must be fundamental reform of its management and operations rather than any expansion of its authority and responsibilities. The Internet has flourished under U.S. supervision, oversight, and private sector involvement. This growth did not happen because of increased government involvement, but rather, from the opening on the Internet to commerce and private sector innovation. Subjecting the Internet and its security to the politicized control of the UN bureaucracy would be a giant and foolhardy step backwards.”

“Recently, I introduced UN reform legislation with the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations, Senator Dick Lugar (R-IN), known as the Coleman-Lugar UN Reform Bill, to help put an end to a culture of corruption that was exposed by the Oil for Food scandal, peacekeeping sexual abuse scandals, and other instances of organizational failures at U.N.,” Coleman said. “Putting the U.N. in charge of one of the world’s most important technological wonders and economic engines is out of the question. This proposal would leave the United States with no more say over the future of the Internet than Cuba or China—countries that have little or no commitment to the free flow of information.”

---cut---


“In light of this report, I also plan to consult with experts and stakeholders regarding Internet governance, and will assess whether legislation is needed as a remedy,” Coleman continued. “The U.S. is willing to work with other countries that have an interest in the management of their own country code domains but UN control is out of the question. We will continue a dialogue with the rest of the world on these issues as we go forward.”

http://coleman.senate.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressReleases.Detail&PressRelease_id=707

http://www.drudgereport.com/flash7.htm

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. I mean really...

About how much about the internet does Normie The Moron really understand?

Right about none of it.

[KoKo]

5. Now he has Bolton as his conduit. It's all going according to "The Plan."

:-(

[merwin]

2. "My probe of the U.N...revealed management that was at best, incompetent,

and at worst corrupt".

Funny, my probe of our administration revealed the exact same thing!

[journalist3072]

13. You hit the nail on the head!!

[applegrove]

3. Think how much more power the UN would have had over Saddam if

they could have said - Saddam - we are turning you off. Why they could just turn off Saddam's computers and leave the computers of the private people on. With bugs & shit. I think that yes - the UN would do good to have this control.

We know that if Bush could have gotten away with it he would have 'turned off Venezuela'.

UN should have some power too.

[applegrove]

4. Think how much more power the UN would have had over Saddam if

they could have said - Saddam - we are turning you off. Why they could just turn off Saddam's computers and leave the computers of the private people on. With bugs & shit. I think that yes - the UN would do good to have this control.

We know that if Bush could have gotten away with it he would have 'turned off Venezuela'.

UN should have some power too.

[napi21]

6. This is just another power struggle. Read it carefully!

"functions of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)"

As I understand this, they're talking about insuring that each person has a unique ID. This sounds like a deliberate attempt to make people THINK that the US, the UN or anyone is talking about "controlling the internet"! That's NOT true, at least in this case.

[LifeDuringWartime]

22. thats not what ICANN does

ICANN makes sure each web host has a unique name and address

[wli]

7. there is less to this than meets the eye if it's what I think it is

If it's what I think it is, this is the planned termination of US control of root nameservers in favor of distributing the root nameservers around the world and regulating them with some new international organization.

The US actually doesn't get anything out of this, apart from rendering nameservice more vulnerable to interruption of service due to conditions within the US. It is, of course, not particularly difficult to set up replacement root nameservers or even to set up a system of alternative root nameservers while the US root nameservers are still in operation.

It really is not anywhere near as meaningful as "control of the internet."

[0rganism]

9. The "internet" IS the root servers

Do you have any idea what the consequences of "set(ing) up a system of alternative root nameservers" are to global communications? It's very difficult to explain this to naysayers, but ICANN and IANA are among the very heaviest of the heavy hitters the USDOC has on its bench.

The day your company has a range of public IP addresses allocated for its web services that the root servers in Uzbekistan suddenly decide to re-allocate for a kiddy-porn site, you will understand.

[wli]

11. it really isn't that much control

The ranges of IP addresses are still split up by countries. So if the rest of the world wants to leave the US behind and do nameservice for non-US IP ranges with an alternative set of nameservers, not much really happens.

[0rganism]

21. And who split up the IP address ranges? Oh, that would be...

ICANN and IANA.

Go read the wiki on alternate roots, you'll notice this parenthetical:
"currently consisting of 13 nominal root nameservers working in agreement with ICANN"

Did you catch that?

The only reason you can even talk about "non-US IP ranges" is because the Internet you know and love has been subdivided by ICANN and IANA, and all the other countries temporarily accepted their oversight. If you're ready to have your international traffic hard-filtered, all we have to do is keep going the way bush's GOP is pushing this. Then we really will have a whole bunch of internets, and every one of your "non-US" packets can go through cybercustoms.

[bananas]

16. Alternate root servers have been operating for years

I think @HOME even used the "new.net" alternate dns system for a while.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternate_DNS_root

[0rganism]

20. Did you read the wiki article you just posted?

"The possibility of such conflicts, and their potential for destabilizing the Internet, is the main source of controversy surrounding alt roots."

It can be done, but it has to be done carefully, and the gateways between alternate networks have to be well-maintained with up-to-date mappings.

[sandnsea]

10. Corporate trademark control

Off the top of my head, one problem I can see is protecting trademarks, which ICANN currently does. I don't know that the UN would, since trademark laws aren't respected everywhere. I haven't had any ICANN problems in a long time, so I don't know what this could be about for certain.

[wli]

12. I think you just discovered the reason why there's a fuss.

Anyhow, ICANN is more like ICAN'T, all it really takes is enough countries getting pissed off at the US.

[0rganism]

24. It doesn't have to be that way

> all it really takes is enough countries getting pissed off at the US.

Are you ready for the isolation that comes along with that process?

We could have let ICANN go global and the same coherent numbering structure would have worked all the way up to the switchover to IPV6. Now "all it really takes is enough countries getting pissed off" and you won't even be able to get to their networks anymore or vice-versa.

Chinafication. Fantastic, so glad you approve.

[wli]

26. it's not that I approve at all

It's that there isn't really much standing in the way.

For instance, what are they going to lose? Well, we're getting close to being considered the enemy by just about everyone if we aren't already. Everyone's long-since figured out our news is pure propaganda, if not half or more fabricated.

Their disincentives are dropping like flies, and a few good incentives will have them pulling the plug on us.

[0rganism]

27. The people this hurts most is the American public

and ironically, most of us don't get it yet. Politicians like Snotty Norm might even think they're doing us some kind of favor by keeping a short leash on ICANN.

If and when the other nations "pull the plug" on us, we're going to be the big losers in the deal.

[0rganism]

23. The only reason we can talk about "one Internet" is a global agreement

All the other countries agreed to play our game, temporarily, with the understanding that the system would eventually (i.e., this year) revert to international oversight.

We like to laugh at bush when he babbles about "the internets", right? It's great fun.

Now imagine that instead of a damned fool, he's a prophet.

What's at stake is the coherent interconnectivity of the USA to the rest of the planet. If the world turns away from the US in establishing a DNS system, the only way the American internet stays up is by filtering all international traffic through translative gateways. And if the USDOC decides not to establish a mapping for an entire international domain, blammo. That's a whole big chunk of folks that you just got effectively cut off from. And I mean, really cut off. Not just your ISP isn't allowing certain e-mail through or filters certain websites by default. No, you could ISP hop all day and if it wasn't in the translation table for the gateway, you wouldn't be able to see it.

The entire non-USA internet would become as opaque to American users as a private numbering system. You know, the 10s or the 192.168s that people like to use for their LANs. And if there wasn't a mutually-agreed mapping to establish NAT, you wouldn't ever know it existed.

That's what this is about.

[Fridays Child]

8. Mustn't do anything that might keep big biz from sticking it to the public

Norm is such an obedient little corporate whore. He brings his own jar of Vaseline and everything.

[lovuian]

14. Does this ha ve National Security implications???

:bounce:

[Pepperbelly]

15. Awkward ... I really despise control of the net but OTOH, Coleman...

everything he is sucks so that's a tough one to thread the needle on.

[susanna]

18. LOL. Now THAT said it all.

Thanks, Pepperbelly! I thought just about the same thing but you said it much better.

[0rganism]

25. So you trust the USDoC more than you trust an international body TBN?

Better the devil you know, I guess.

Just keep hoping the international community thinks the same way about it.

[Zorra]

17. Isn't Normie Coleman Karl Rove's pet asshole? The traitors' parrot?

The guy Rove installed in the Senate after he had Paul Wellstone, er, I mean, after Paul Wellstone was killed?

Who listens to him?

[bemildred]

19. Ignorant drool. Political posturing. Drivel.

And leave us not forget shameless UN bashing. I can hardly wait to hear what Joltin Bolton has to say about this and other burning issues.