U.N. To Govern Internet? 1197
Falmarian writes "Apparently the rest of the world isn't happy about the US franchise on internet governance. A news.com article discusses the possibility that the U.N. will make a bid for control of such governing functions as assigning TLDs and IPs." From the article: "At issue is who decides key questions like adding new top-level domains, assigning chunks of numeric Internet addresses, and operating the root servers that keep the Net humming. Other suggested responsibilities for this new organization include Internet surveillance, 'consumer protection,' and perhaps even the power to tax domain names to pay for 'universal access.'"
Huh? (Score:5, Interesting)
The US _does_ control root, right?
It isn't broke... (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't care who controls it... (Score:3, Interesting)
In fact, get rid of them entirely. They aren't truly necessary except to maintain backwards compatability.
Screw the U.N. (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:get over it... (Score:2, Interesting)
More valuable than Lagrange points=US will keep it (Score:4, Interesting)
My bet is Bush'll nominate someone anti-UN to the UN to make it ineffective so this UN thing isn't an option. Oh....
Re:Yuk (Score:5, Interesting)
A false assumption here (Score:3, Interesting)
Air travel, news, food, and Earth's economy are just as "global", and yet there are no global entities in charge of those areas. Not only does there not need to be, there are good reasons to not have global (i.e. centralized) control of such things. 20th century history is full of examples.
One big reason to fear UN control beyond taxes: how long before they try to crack down on "hate speech," which will mean criticism of certain governments and certain religions? I leave it as an exercise to the reader to guess which ones the UN would not want criticized.
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Interesting)
A question of Rights (Score:3, Interesting)
Right now if I want I can spew all the hate-speech I like on the internet.
Right now I can arrange the sale of firearms over the internet.
Right now I can play addictive text-based MUDs that waste more lives than either of the above.
Will these be preserved by a governing body who disapproves of all three?*
(*number three was a joke)
Actually it is run by a incompetent politicians (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Anyone but the U.N. (Score:3, Interesting)
This is contradictory... power and protection for member states? How about we protect the member states by not giving the UN power?
The UN was supposed to be a framework for diplomatic cooperation of countries. A place for them to talk issues to death, to negotiate treaties and so forth. The failure we've seen has been in trying to expand the UN role beyond that. How about we get back to the roots?
As for freedom from corruption. Is that possible? Look at the United States. We've got one of the most corrupt administrations we've had since maybe US Grant and I don't see much of a call to do anything about it. The bribes keep flowing in and the payouts from the treasury keep flowing out and everybody seems happy about it.
net hackers (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Hmmm.... (Score:3, Interesting)
There is not a global government. The UN is a treaty organization that wants to become a government. Your attitude is to just hand over a national asset to a questionable body that is not accountable to anyone.
Besides, why not do something better? Create alternate directories and advertise the IP numbers for those nameservers. Let software developers work out the problems with multiple top level domains, and now you have your international system. Better yet, it prevents *any* nation from controlling it. Get to work people. Innovate. Create a "new" internet.
Jeez, I get something like 4 phone books delivered to my door. All a root server does is take a name and give me a number. Who says we need only one?
Kids, stop fighting (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sorry to have to agree though, the idea of the UN controlling the Internet is scary, for exactly the reasons that people have mentioned. It's currently largely unregulated (another word for that is "free", get it?). The comments from UN reps in other countries (e.g. Syria) revealed amazing ignorance of how the internet works, and an explicit desire to exert firm control over content. The complaint by Brazil about the
So far I have yet to hear either a good technical or policy-based argument against leaving it in US hands. I'm willing to be convinced, but so far all the arguments against US control have boiled down to, "we don't like you and/or don't want you to have it." Not good enough for me, sorry. I'm going to write my Congresscritters and ask them not to turn it over.
Re:Yuk (Score:5, Interesting)
At that point, I start lobbying Slashdot to bring alternic back up to snuff and in use. Screw that.
I *already* pay a tax for my domain name. It's called a domain name registration fee. The money goes to support those root servers (and to the pockets of the registrars, but hey).
Re:The UN (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The UN (Score:1, Interesting)
Last time I checked... (Score:3, Interesting)
The UN is inefficient, but bad stuff tends not to come out of the UN because too many people have veto power. As opposed to here.
I just keep thinking (Score:5, Interesting)
Looking at the U.N. myself though I don't really see an organization consistent enough to draw any conclusions about it. It is an evolving entity. Look at its state over time since oh, say, 1985, and you'll realize there are almost no points over this time period where the U.N. in practice clearly resembles the entity it was just five years before. The U.N. had a clearly defined role during the Cold War; now that the Cold War is over that role no longer applies, and it is trying to find its new role. I don't think there's any way to predict right now what that role is going to be. The U.S. has the option of taking an active hand in shaping the U.N.'s new role, if we want (there have been parts of the last 20 years where we've done this, though right now is not one of them); however, what we can't do is make the U.N. go away. It's going to stay around, and it's going to develop into something. That isn't our choice. Our only choice is, will it develop into something with us or without us.
One thing that it occasionally worries me the U.N. might develop into is a bloc organization that basically represents "everyone but the U.S.". That is, I think it is possible that as the U.S. increasingly acts only in its own immediate interest to the exclusion of anyone else's interests, other countries will use the U.N. as a platform on which to band together and represent their interests in common, until the U.N. eventually becomes something which pens in the U.S. the way NATO penned in the USSR. As an American, I don't think this situation would be good for me or my country. However, I think it is possible. I also think that trying to push hard against or de-emphasize the U.N. does more to make the above "U.N. vs U.S." outcome likely than it does to make the U.N. weaker. The U.N.'s potential strength stems from the countries which wish to align with it; it's exactly as strong if the U.S. appears hostile toward it as it is if the U.S. appears apathetic toward it. However if the U.S. appears hostile toward the U.N. we do begin to set the stage for a situation where the U.N. begins to behave antagonistically back.
I see this DNS thing as a small but noteworthy step toward this situation.
Four or five years ago if the U.N. expressed an interest in controlling the DNS servers (and they did) there would be no point in taking this suggestion seriously (and no one did) because there was already an independent and international body (ICANN) on track toward running the DNS system. Now the U.S. has decided to make ICANN no longer a meaningfully independent body, and the governance of the DNS servers a U.S. national issue rather than an international one. And now, as a result, we are starting to see movements where service providers and governments outside the U.S. [slashdot.org] are starting to look into ways to break away from the U.S.-commerce-department-controlled ICANN system and into nameserver independence. In this light, the U.N. proposing they control nameservers takes on a very different tone. It underscores that if the U.S. does not wish to administer the nameservers under its control in an international fashion, there are other entities perfectly willing to assume that job.
If other nations choose to break away from the U.S. controlled nameservers, well, it's likely they'll do so together, meaning that we will have the U.S. commerce department running DNS for the U.S. and an international body running DNS for "everybody else". And who will run this international body? Well, the U.N. is a likely choice. The steady smear campaign against the U.N. doesn't exist in the same way outside the
Why not allow unlimited TLDs? (Score:3, Interesting)
For example, it seems silly to rely on something like
If you need something authoritative, private authorities could use public/private keys as proof to do that. Indiviuals could then decide which private authorities have standards worth trusting. The U.N. could set up such an authority to authenticate government sites. When a user visits a government site, it could refer the application to the whichever authorities it chooses.
Limiting TLDs just creates conflict as different powerful interests vie for their own distinctions. Sure people can more quickly categorize this way, but the limitations seem to outweight the benefits.
Re:Yuk (Score:3, Interesting)
Wow! That's huge news! I had no idea that all African farmers were a single "African Economics Expert"! My army of cloner geeks will want to hear of this immediately.
had been raping the women
This has already been discussed in earlier comments. Of over 10,000 troops, everyone even remotely involved in the allegations was sent home; grand total, 77. And this is one of 16 current UN operations worldwide. Meanwhile, the troops fighting in the Congo have killed and raped several *MILLION* people, and the presence of UN troops has been widely viewed as successful at helping bring about the ongoing fragile ceasefire.
Re:Yuk (Score:3, Interesting)
"Come on now, be civil. The Internet belongs to the world."
One BIG reason why US refuses is because the UN doesn't have a working LEGAL system.
I.E. Courts to resolve disputes and contract issues, courts to review lower court decisions, etc.
The UN would be hard time pressed to come up with a replacement legal system.
Heck the UN can't even police their own personal. I.E. Witness the Oil for food debacle.
I suspect that the US Dept of Commerce also took notice on how easy it was for ICANN to get rid of the, "at large members", of the Board [networkworld.com]. That didn't go over too well and is another reason why ICANN wasn't given addditional control [eweek.com].
Misoanthropy rising! Must .. resist... (Score:1, Interesting)
The situation with numbers is a little trickier, but when it comes to names, US control is entirely defacto. Anyone who doesn't like the US having the final word, can simply decide the US doesn't, and that's that. Point your resolver at a different set of servers.
Everyone is free to do this. But they don't want to. They don't really want to be free or determine things for themselves; they want to control others. It's not enough that you can use OpenNIC [opennic.org] or whatever -- you want to force other people to do the same. Everyone essentially votes on who is in control, and ICANN is still getting 99% of the votes, and that is pissing some people off. But instead of educating the voters, they want to essentially take over ICANN's defacto authority.
This is wrong. Your laziness in this regard, is the very reason your politicians (completely outside the scope of internet issues) suck. You're just like us Americans who are too cowardly to vote for someone other than republicans and democrats, so we try to influence the republicans and democrats and then wonder why our elected leads still do the wrong things.
Voters have to take responsibility and vote intelligently. Quit fucking with the candidates, that's not the answer.
Let's not and say we did. (Score:4, Interesting)
It is really bad as it is now. Every independent board member that has overseen ICAAN actions has said this. But putting it into the hands of the UN per se would just make matters much worse.
Also I have the strong feeling that many people don't have the slightest clue what the UN really is and what it does. The funny thing is everyone seems to have an opinion about it. Either they hate it or love it or like it or dislike it. Germans like it and left leaning Americans like it. French like it and conservative Americans dislike it. I don't know about Americans, but I know that Germans don't have a clue what it is they like.
Some basics:
The UN is made up of different bodies to which countries are elected. Each world region (like Africa or Asia) has a certain quota for how many countries they can vote into a certain comitee. Then there are also organizations for specific purposes. Like UNAIDS or the UN high comissionare for refugees.
The UN is very good for diplmacy for example. All nations can go there and resolve conflicts instead of starting wars. Granted, it hasn't work very good and could be made better, but I don't see any alternative. Kofi Annan for example pushed through some very important reforms in his first two years of office.
Anyways, I could go on for hours, but maybe You can just check their webpage. It is quite informative.
Just reading the UN Charta would most likely be very invormative to many people here I suppose.
The UN is many, many things at the same time. Maybe if a sensible set of rules would be put together for some kind of organization under the UN umbrella it would appear international and at the same time remain efficient. But is not going to happen anyways. So keep cool and keep cursing Verisign and their control over ICANN.
US to retain what? (Score:4, Interesting)
The other root servers could stop mirroring A, ISPs could stop pointing to the current root servers, or the end users could stop using their ISPs domain servers.
If the UN wants to set up and control their own root server, they should just do it, there's nothing stopping them.
-- Should you trust authority without question?
Just a thought... (Score:2, Interesting)
As for taxation, enforcement, or any other government action, forget it. I might consider it if I were allowed to vote (directly or through representation) on any regulations involved.
Such attacks are not about the UN (Score:4, Interesting)
From a year ago for example, a large number of leading indicators showed progress in Iraq's infrastructure. Compare that to the Congo or Haiti in which the UN is running peacekeeping operations.
Pardon me for being Mr. Obvious here but there is a big difference from running a peacekeeping operation and trying to rebuild a country after largely destroying it (first with sanctions, then with bombs).
"Men from roughly 50 different countries make up the U.N. forces in Congo, and the United Nations does not conduct background checks. Furthermore, U.N. troops are exempt from prosecution in Congo."
Can you say "International Criminal Court?"
While the US has made mistakes on the ground dealing with Iraqi and Afghani Prisoners and civilians, at least widespread allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse of women, boys and girls havn't been happening like they are happening in the Congo.
As others have pointed out, this never happend in Vietnam or anything, right?
Also a lot of this type of activity in the Congo has been happening between the warring factions. Sorry, but blaming the UN for their actions is like blaming the US when insurgents attack an Iraqi police station.
"Didier Bourguet, a U.N. official from France, is pictured here in an image found on his hard drive, which was obtained by ABC News. Also on the hard drive were thousands of photos of him having sex with hundreds of young Congolese girls."
If that is the case, then someone has an obligation to prosecute him. IANAL, but last time I checked, I think the country of nationality had the first right to prosecute in these matters, followed by the country where the crimes were committed, and following that, there is no reason why the ICC couldn't prosecute. Oh, wait, the ICC is a dirty word here in the US, sorry I forgot...
I would further point out that there is a large contingent of French, British, and German troops in the Congo under the EU (*not* NATO) flag, the first EU peacekeeping deployment outside Europe.
People forget that a large extent of the issue is that conservatives (the media insofar as most large media outlets are owned by other corporations such as Disney, GE, etc have inherent in their organizations a conservative bias) are largely upset that the US is no longer the dominant power in the world (except militarily). Every major trade war with the EU has ended in a US defeat. The EU has a larger population and a higher per GDP than the US. And the have two permanent seats on the UNSC, and many seats in both the GA and the WTO. Compare that to *1* for the US in each organization.
We in the US can hold our own against China and any other nationalist state. However, because we don't see internationalism as a worthy goal, we cannot hold our own against states who work together to set up common economic policy, as the EU has done.
Note that the parent poster, like many, seems to equate the UN with "France" and/or "Germany." This is further evidence of the building propaganda war against the EU. But what will happen if the EU ends up with three seats on the UNSC at some point (if, say, Russia were to join)?
I fear we are heading into a new type of cold war against an opponent we cannot hope to defeat. Thanks "New American Century..."
Re:NPR Slave (Score:2, Interesting)
Why not just link directly to the source??
http://www.newamericancentury.org/ [newamericancentury.org]
My 2c.
Israel (Score:5, Interesting)
You don't get off so lightly. What about the Carter (and later Reagan) Administration's "Join the Jihad" campaign aimed at recruiting militant Islamists and getting them together in Afghanistan (with training from the US) to fight the Soviets?
See, it is all the fault of two presidents from different political parties... At least as far as Al Qaeda and any collegiate international terrorism organization goes.
And Regarding Israel--- The history of the founding of Israel between WWI and 1949 is quite interesting and full of material that will make almost anybody uncomfortable regardless of political disposition. However, it was all started by the British who claim to have wanted to reward those Jews who fought for Britain in WWI by trying to promote British Palestine as a place where they could go to as a homeland provided that the existing Palestinians were not displaced (read the Balfour Declaration). The time between the end of WWI and 1949 was full of terrorism on the part of the Zionists and Arabs (continuing today often on both sides despite efforts of moderates on either side). And, most interestingly, the attempted collaboration between the ELHI brotherhod (in part lead by Yitzak Shameer) and Hitler (one might add that the ELHI brotherhood had no shortage of good things to say about the Nazis). As punishment for his efforts and sympathies, Shameer was later elected Prime Minister which should tell you a lot about Israeli politics.
Re:Yuk (Score:1, Interesting)