ICANN Privacy, .Amazon Issues Unresolved as ICANN Meeting Closes

EU privacy rules and the .Amazon feud remained unresolved Thursday as the ICANN Abu Dhabi meeting wound down. The board took no action on either topic, and the debates over how ICANN should comply with the general data protection regulation (GDPR) and whether Amazon should be granted the generic top-level domain (gTLD) .amazon over the protests of the Brazil and Peru continued unabated. The gathering said goodbye to Chairman Stephen Crocker and other directors, and ICANN confirmed it plans its March meeting in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

The Governmental Advisory Committee and ICANN board discussed how to resolve "apparent problems" with access to Whois data (registrants' information) in light of the GDPR, GAC's Wednesday statement said. Governments urged ICANN urgently to "use its best efforts to create a system" that continues to give access to the data for legitimate law enforcement, consumer protection, intellectual property rights protection and other purposes.

ICANN "cannot accept to go away from a full Whois," CEO Göran Marby said. During this period of uncertainty -- and on the condition a registrar or registry share any planned deviation from the existing Whois model with the internet body -- enforcers will defer action for noncompliance in handling domain registration data, he said. The proposed model "should reflect the reasonable recommendation of existing contract obligations and the GDPR and should be accompanied by analysis explaining how the model reconciles those two," Marby said. Contract compliance staff won't refrain from enforcement if the proposed model abandons Whois obligations, he said. A statement from Contractual Compliance is here.

There are lots "if's and when's" about the GDPR issue but no data model on which further work can be based, said Thomas Rickert, representing the German Internet Industry Association. "There were hopes that this could be worked on in collaboration with ICANN but so far this has not come to fruition," he said Thursday. ICANN floated a plan for asking the European Commission and data protection authorities for information about GDPR requirements but that's not good enough, he said. Rickert urged the corporation to suspend its outreach efforts for now, saying ICANN has been aware of EU data protection and Whois issues for over 15 years and shouldn't approach the EC until it has a model for discussion. Marby responded that ICANN is working hard on the issue and "in discovery," and "positive discussions" were held during this week's meeting.

On the question of whether Amazon should be granted the gTLD .Amazon (see 1710270001), the GAC advised ICANN to "continue facilitating negotiations" between Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization members and online retailer Amazon to find a mutually acceptable solution. It's "unrealistic" to expect the issue to be resolved by the board at this meeting, emailed Georgia Institute of Technology School of Public Policy professor Milton Mueller, an Internet Governance Project member. "It looks like it is turning into a war of attrition." Amazon's application should be granted, said Jay Sudowski, speaking for the Internet Infrastructure Coalition of which Amazon is a member. Coalition members are sympathetic to the position of the governments of Peru and Brazil, he said, but they're "impressed with the extensive efforts that Amazon has undertaken in order to assuage as many of those concerns as possible." The board has the opportunity to "show the entire community" it stands by its applicant guidebook, community-developed bylaws and independent review process, he said.

The board agreed to study security and stability implications of placing "collision strings" of names such as .corp, .home and .mail into the domain name system, and how to mitigate identified risks. It asked Marby to develop a consultation paper on whether all supporting organizations and advisory committees that don't use a due diligence screening process similar to the board Nominating Committee should "seriously consider" doing so to vet proposed voting directors and nonvoting liaisons.

Since Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico, where the ICANN meeting is slated for March10-15, "I've been fielding a lot of questions about whether or not we're actually going to take the ICANN meeting there," said Nick Tomasso, vice president, global meeting operations and managing director-Middle East and Africa. "Yes, we are planning to go," he said to applause. "We feel it's important to provide some meaningful economic and moral support for that storm-battered community."