NTIA’s oversight of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority...

NTIA’s oversight of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) functions “had the benefit of two things: lightweight and simple,” said Google Chief Internet Evangelist Vint Cerf at NETmundial Thursday afternoon in Sao Paulo, Brazil, which was webcast. If the transition becomes “too complicated, you will make it really hard for the Internet to grow and serve its users” the way it has for the “last 30 years,” he said: “Don’t screw this up.” Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers’ accountability review and the IANA transition are “interrelated” and should be put on the same “timeline,” said CEO Fadi Chehade. ICANN’s accountability review (http://bit.ly/1nsuCaK) begins next week, said an ICANN spokesman, saying no official announcement of the review has been released. ICANN’s Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) “has not formed a particular view on the suggested modalities” of the transition and it may not reach a “consensus view,” but that won’t keep it from being involved, said GAC Chair Heather Dryden. “We are well-equipped to work with the NTIA in their transition,” said Jonathan Robinson, ICANN’s Generic Names Supporting Organization chair. Country-code top-level domain operators don’t have a “contractual relationship” with ICANN and IANA, said CEO Byron Holland of the Canadian Internet Registration Authority, which manages the .ca domain. The lack of a binding contract makes the transition “relatively unique” for country-code operators because of “issues of sovereignty,” said Holland. “Governments have a particular interest in country-code matters” and they should “be resolved at the national level,” said Dryden.