The U.N. (ITU) thinks about tomorrow's cyberspace and it role in regulating the Internet

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "Robert J. Berger" <rberger () ibd com>
Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2005 14:32:04 -0800
To: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>, Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
Subject: The U.N. (ITU) thinks about tomorrow's cyberspace and it role in
regulating the Internet

The U.N. thinks about tomorrow's cyberspace

By Declan McCullagh

http://news.com.com/The+U.N.+thinks+about+tomorrows+cyberspace/2008-1028_3-5
643972.html 

Story last modified Tue Mar 29 04:00:00 PST 2005

The International Telecommunication Union is one of the most
venerable of bureaucracies. Created in 1865 to facilitate
telegraph transmissions, its mandate has expanded to include
radio and telephone communications.

But the ITU enjoys virtually no influence over the
Internet. That remains the province of specialized organizations
such as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers,
or ICANN; the Internet Engineering Task Force; the World Wide
Web Consortium; and regional address registries.

The ITU, a United Nations agency, would like to change
that. "The whole world is looking for a better solution for
Internet governance, unwilling to maintain the current
situation," Houlin Zhao, director of the ITU's Telecommunication
Standardization Bureau, said last year. Zhao, a former
government official in China's Ministry of Posts and
Telecommunications, has been in his current job since 1999.

Though Zhao is far too diplomatic to state it directly, the
ITU's increasing interest in the Internet could presage a power
struggle between ITU, ICANN, and perhaps even the
U.S. government, which retains some oversight authority over
ICANN and appears content with the current structure.

In a series of speeches over the last year, Zhao has suggested
that the ITU could become involved in everything from security
and spam to managing how Internet Protocol addresses are
assigned. The ITU also is looking into some aspects of voice
over Internet Protocol--VoIP--communications, another potential
area for expansion.

"Countering spam is just one of many elements of protecting the
Internet that include availability during emergencies and
supporting public safety and law enforcement officials," Zhao
wrote in December. Also, he wrote, the ITU "would take care of
other work, such as work on Internet exchange points, Internet
interconnection charging regimes, and methods to provide
authenticated directories that meet national privacy regimes."

CNET News.com recently spoke with Zhao about the ITU's increased
interest in the Internet and its involvement in a series of
meetings that will conclude in November with a U.N. World Summit
on the Information Society in Tunisia.  Q: How do you see the
ITU becoming involved in Internet governance over the next few
years?  Zhao: As you know, Internet governance was one of two
hot topics left from the first phase of the U.N. world
summit. Unfortunately we did not have a clear definition of
Internet governance. Therefore the group established by Mr. Kofi
Annan still has to work on these definitions.

Anything which concerns the future development of the Internet
will be part of the question of Internet governance. It covers a
very wide range of topics not just related to technology
development, service development, but also policy matters,
sovereignty, security, privacy, almost anything.

According to ITU's definition of "telecommunications,"
telecommunications covers almost anything. Therefore according
to our own lawyers, the Internet is one of these
telecommunications mediums. Others argue that
"telecommunications" is too wide and it does not include the
Internet.

What do you think? Should the ITU be involved in Internet
governance?  Zhao: Yes, for sure. ITU should be part of Internet
governance. But ITU cannot cover everything.

Does that mean an inevitable conflict with ICANN?  Zhao: I don't
think so. Whether we have a conflict with ICANN depends on (many
things).

I do not consider ICANN an enemy. We are founding members of
ICANN's Protocol Supporting Organization. I myself signed that
paper on behalf of the ITU. We tried to support ICANN as far as
we could, but on the other hand you see that ICANN's mandate
seems to be a little bit unclear...The U.N. working group on
Internet governance provides us with a very good opportunity to
look at this issue.

You mentioned a lot of topics--perhaps spam and content could be
in there as well. Which ones should the ITU be directly involved
in?  Zhao: You can say that the ITU should address those,
including spam and security. We have a different concept of
security. As far as the (legwork) of security, ITU has worked on
this for many, many years...

On privacy, I think that a lot of things are not related to
technology only; those are policy matters. Those can be done by
the national authorities, regional cooperation and international
cooperation. On freedom of speech, I don't see it as a pure
technical issue. In my opinion, freedom of speech seems to be a
politically sensitive issue. A lot of policy matters are behind
it. It's not in ITU's competence, but of course we can make some
contributions.

Should ITU run or manage any top-level root servers (the key
servers that let people get around on the Internet)?  Zhao: That
is a question discussed by a lot of people. Today the management
by ICANN (is something that) people consider to be management by
the United States, by one government. People definitely want to
see some changes. I think everyone would agree that a better
arrangement is something that we're looking for.

The ITU is trying to ensure its value. Any public network of
communications is naturally of interest to ITU. ITU has a lot of
expertise and a lot of experience. (Editor's note: An ITU lawyer
said in a follow-up conversation that though the organization
may wish to oversee the operation of root servers, it would not
run them itself.)

We assign country codes. Some people consider that the top-down
approach. I made a proposal for IPv6, that we could look for a
new approach based on the experience we have in top-down
approaches. Can we find something different? Nobody seems to be
confident that ITU's top-down approach is best for IPv6. But
nobody is sure that IPv4 bottom-up is best. Can we find
something in between? I'm paying attention to that. I have a lot
of opinions from ITU members.

Does that mean the ITU would be in the IPv6 allocation business,
saying, for instance, that Norway gets 10 trillion addresses and
Sweden receives 20 trillion?  Zhao: Yes. I raised that
possibility. (I discussed it) not only with government bodies
but with industry experts. I did not see them deny that we
(could) do that.

But I know this would affect a lot of things. For stability of
Internet service, for effective development in the future, we
need good cooperation. Right now IPv6 is still not that known to
many people in the world. If we have a good understanding of
this system, a good management of this, we can avoid problems in
the future.

If more and more phone calls move to VoIP, do you see the ITU as
becoming irrelevant?  Zhao: I don't have that worry at all. ITU
was created in 1865. It has 140 years of history. I don't know
if you noted recent news that a very respected academy in the
United States said ITU is among the world's most enduring
institutions. (Editor's note: This is a reference to a December
2004 report by consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton.)

ITU's situation is similar to the U.S. Constitution. ITU is very
dynamic. We try to keep abreast of the latest development of the
market and to give assistance to human society for future
development. Remember, ITU was created in May 1865 to develop a
system for telegraphs.

What do you see as the likely outcome, if any, of the September
2005 World Summit on the Information Society?  Zhao: That is a
very good question. If you have a very specific wish to get
something from this meeting, and you find that is not the case,
you may be disappointed. On the other hand, people find that
it's a unique opportunity for us to work together.

If you could get everything you wanted out of the meeting, what
would that be?  Zhao: If I could get everything from this
meeting....I think all international efforts may not be able to
satisfy everybody. We try to get a compromise. In this meeting
we won't make everyone happy.

I understand it may not happen. But if ITU got what it wanted,
what would it be?  Zhao: If I could give you my personal views,
I would say that if they can charge the U.N. to continue to work
on this issue, that would be nice.

People talk about whether we should have a new agency rather
than give it to an existing agency. But if ICANN, ITU, UNESCO
(United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization) and WIPO (World Intellectual Property
Organization) see each other as complementary and try to work
together, we don't need to have a special (Internet regulatory)
agency to be established.

ICANN is supposed to be independent of the U.S. government. But
when DENIC (DENIC registers Internet domains under the German
top level domain .de) executives wanted the contract to run the
.net registry, they headed to Washington, D.C., to lobby
Congress and the Bush administration. Is U.S. government
involvement viewed as a problem?  Zhao: To some extent,
yes. That is why people are raising this issue as a very
important one to be debated at the U.N. and in the (World
Summit) process. Some people argued very strongly that ICANN's
establishment based in California gives people some
worries. This issue should be addressed.

If ITU were to allocate addresses, anybody could have a choice
between their national assignment or a regional or international
assignment. That would be good for the development of the
Internet.

The World Summit is being held in Tunisia, which a Paris-based
journalist group has called a "predator of press freedom." Does
the choice of Tunisia send a symbolic message?  Zhao: I noted
this kind of opinion from a very early stage that the decision
was announced to have two phases, in Geneva and Tunis. The media
seems to have no problem with the first phase in Geneva but they
don't think it's a great choice to have the second phase in
Tunisia.

I think finding the right place to host an international event
is not an easy job. There were not many volunteers to host the
second phase. The media thinks that country is not very
transparent and open, and therefore that country is not
transparent and open. I don't think so.

When a country promises to host a U.N.-type conference, they
have to respect the U.N. rules. The U.N. rules are quite clear:
If any journalist comes to join this meeting, and a Tunisian
authority tries to impose any sanction--I don't think that would
happen.

What changes in Internet governance structures might be
necessary?  Zhao: First we have to understand what the problem
is today. Then we can perhaps understand what will happen.

One of the most important changes was the early stages, when the
Internet started, when ICANN started in 1998. The purpose was to
exclude governments (but that didn't work). People realize today
that the governments worldwide have to play a role.

People say the Internet flourished because of the absence of
government control. I do not agree with this view. I argue that
in any country, if the government opposed Internet service, how
do you get Internet service? If there are any Internet
governance structure changes in the future, I think government
rules will be more important and more respected.  



--
Robert J. Berger - Internet Bandwidth Development, LLC.
Voice: 408-882-4755 eFax: +1-408-490-2868
http://www.ibd.com



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