EU, UN to Wrestle Internet Control From US 1974
Anonymous Coward writes "The Guardian is reporting that the EU, obviously unimpressed with the US's refusal to relinguish control of the Internet, will be forming several comittees and forums with a mind to forcibly remove control of the Internet from the United States." From the article: "Old allies in world politics, representatives from the UK and US sat just feet away from each other, but all looked straight ahead as Hendon explained the EU had decided to end the US government's unilateral control of the internet and put in place a new body that would now run this revolutionary communications medium. The issue of who should control the net had proved an extremely divisive issue, and for 11 days the world's governments traded blows. For the vast majority of people who use the internet, the only real concern is getting on it. But with the internet now essential to countries' basic infrastructure - Brazil relies on it for 90% of its tax collection - the question of who has control has become critical."
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:2, Informative)
Ummmm yes it was... DARPAnet (the predecessor to the Internet) was funded pretty much (if not entirely) by the US Department of Defense. Thus, the Internet is an outgrowth of the much-reviled Military-Industrial complex [wikipedia.org].
Also, control over root DNS != control of the internet.
Re:This again? Where's the problem? (Score:2, Informative)
And the only reason you now pay for the relevant servers is because you will not relinquish control to the UN! So to say you pay for it and use that as a reason for keeping it is insane.
The UN will have control one day, perhaps after we're gone, but or course it will happen
No one will notice (Score:5, Informative)
But you know what? To the extent that the data coming out of the latest alt-roots conflict with the ICANN, they will be generally perceived as broken, particularly but not exclusively from the point of view of users in the US. For example, domain names will fail to resolve, or will resolve to the "wrong" place. If the new alt-roots do much of anything differently, users will start pointing their DNS clients at nameservers that resolve up to the ICANN. So for example if China sets up something that won't resolve (say) freechina.net, the individual users will soon learn to point their DNS clients at US nameservers.
The only way I can see these new alt-roots being heavily subscribed is if they make sure they agree with the ICANN everywhere ICANN has a route to a name, and if their use is legally mandated so that ISPs are forced to go through the hassle of changing. If they do that, the only value that they could possibly add would be of including extra domains that resolve for the alt-roots, and that ICANN does not yet have. Is there really a lot of demand for such a thing? I'm not sure.
Re:Please god not the UN (Score:1, Informative)
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:5, Informative)
Couple that with anycast [wikipedia.org] and other emerging redundancy methods and I'd say we have a pretty global effort to maintain DNS going on.
Again, according to wikipedia.org:
Re:This again? Where's the problem? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Coup (Score:3, Informative)
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.mikenew.com/un-debt.html [mikenew.com]
WWW != The Internet (Score:4, Informative)
It is neither; it is IP, TCP, UDP, DNS and so on. These were all invented in the US. And the specific item in question is not the internet at large, but DNS in particular.
Y'know, I expect my grandmother to fall into the fallacy of believing that the World Wide Web is the same thing as the Internet, but I expect more from a Slashdot reader. Silly me.
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.unausa.org/site/pp.asp?c=fvKRI8MPJpF&b
Re:Coup (Score:3, Informative)
Hacking? Force?
The only reason the root servers are the root servers is because everyone queries them. If the EU or the UN wanted to "take over", all they have to do is establish new servers and ask the ISPs to reconfigure so that all queries go to the new servers and the international registrars to provide updates on domains. No hacking involved, and no american needs to be "forced" to do anything.
The US will probably have a number of ISPs refer
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:5, Informative)
"In December 2000, the Assembly agreed to revise the scale of assessments to make them better reflect current global circumstances. As part of that agreement, the regular budget ceiling was reduced from 25 to 22 percent; this is the rate at which the United States is assessed. The United States is the only member that meets that ceiling, all other members' assessment rates are lower."
So make no mistake, without US backing, the UN would be nothing.The US is the largest financial contributor. (Score:5, Informative)
"The United States is the largest financial contributor to the UN, and has been every year since its creation in 1945. U.S. contributions to the UN system in 2003 were well over $3 billion. In-kind contributions include items such as food donations for the World Food Program.
The U.S.-assessed contribution to the UN regular budget in 2003 was $341 million, and to UN specialized agencies was over $400 million. The United States also contributed $686 million in assessments to the peacekeeping budget; $57 million for the support of the international war crimes tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia; and $6 million for preparatory work relating to the Capital Master Plan to renovate the UN Headquarters in New York. Moreover, each year the United States provides a significant amount in voluntary contributions to the UN and its affiliated agencies and activities, largely for humanitarian and development programs."
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:3, Informative)
Who Built What? (Score:3, Informative)
But the modern internet?
Methinks that CERN should receive the bulk of the credit since Mr Berners-Lee/CERN is credited with inventing the web - you know, the part of the network we use everyday (right now in fact!)
Americans might well notice that it's called the WORLD wide web, not the AMERICAN wide web...
Do any of the nay-sayers know how much influence the US Gvt actually exercises over those servers? While I don't know, I suspect there is very little interaction/influence.
As for Brazil's taxes ...uhm, couldn't they (by design) ensure that regardless of being cut-off from the outside, their taxes still get collected within their physical borders? The root servers just direct traffic that gets to them...
Am I missing something?
Re:Please god not the UN (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Devils Advocate (Score:3, Informative)
Don't be silly. The Internet "as we know it today" consists of cables laid by the world's telecoms companies; routers and servers installed by the world's ISPs; it was paid for by shareholders and customers from all over the world.
The world doesn't want the US government to have so much power over the network we've built together. It's time for them to step aside.
Re:View in a larger context (Score:2, Informative)
Sorry, we don't have religious leaders, and besides, it was Venezuela. Pat Robertson is a private citizen, and has no authority whatsoever, despite being a well known asshat.
Re:This again? Where's the problem? (Score:4, Informative)
He never dreamed that the "Web" would become anything like it has become. The idea that he was standing over people's shoulders and forging the Web from red-hot steel with his bare hands is totally misleading. Yes, he put up the first web site (info.cern.ch) on August 6, 1991. Big deal. Who created the sockets library he was using? Who created the RFC system that let him publish his RFC? What country invented the programming language he wrote it in? Heck, what country built the machine he wrote it on? And what country produced the Apple HyperDeck that inspired him to use internal hyperlinks? When he wrote HTTP, there were new protocols hitting the Net almost every day. His just happened to be the one to catch on because it was mind-numbingly simple.
If this is your "reasoning" that the EU should own the Internet, then I imagine that you'd want to enslave everyone in the World, after all Francis Crick was from England, and he discovered DNA. Let us all hail our new EU overlords.
bad analogy, coming through (Score:3, Informative)
Europe designed and built the world wide web and should control it. End of story. If Americans want to use it, great, and they should be thankful to us, like they should be thankful to us for a great many things, for opening it up to everybody around the world. There was no requirement for us to do so.
How are they going to... (Score:3, Informative)
"It will be officially raised at a UN summit of world leaders next month and, faced with international consensus, there is little the US government can do but acquiesce."
They say there is little the U.S. can do about it but just how are they planning to wrestle control away? By force? By hacking? I don't see any good way for them to get control if the U.S. doesn't want to give it up.
From the ICANN site:
"ICANN is governed by an internationally diverse Board of Directors overseeing the policy development process. ICANN's President directs an international staff, working from three continents, who ensure that ICANN meets its operational commitment to the Internet community."
and
"ICANN's Board has included citizens of Australia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, France, Germany, Ghana, Japan, Kenya, Korea, Mexico, the Netherlands, Portugal, Senegal, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States."
If this information is correct then there already is international representation for setting policies and top level domains. What are they hoping to gain by doing this? Has the U.S. been censoring countries or something?
I'm sorry if any of this is redundent but anyone who could explain to me how they will force the U.S. to hand over control and what possible benifits they (UN, EU) could gain by doing so.
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:3, Informative)
1. Yes I would feel comfortable if the ICANN resided in China the entire time, and no serious issues had arisen. This is very similar to how we Amercians are generally comfortable with relying on Chinese manufacturing and imports.
2. Has there been a "skirmish" between the EU and the US? How about other UN counties?
3. If I could trust China to hold to its commitment to ICANN even in time of war, then yes, I would trust them. (The US, BTW, has to my knowledge ever modified the root servers or any other part of the internet because of war.)
Also, I find it funny that you keep referring to the UN as a bureaucracy. Surely, in the USian utopian you live in such thing does not exist.
I'm not quite certain what you mean by this, but if you're referring to the US government as a "bureaucracy", then you are correct. It is one. That's why ICANN is a private company, not a government entity. It was felt that a private company would do a better job than the US government.
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:3, Informative)
Wow, they need to check their facts. I got back from Kosovo (1 s) in March. When we left we were replaced by a fair number of troops. I'm not allowed to disclose exact numbers but well over 1,000 soldiers replaced us in just our small area of operations. So, either you can't read, or the web site whose facts you borrowed (without linking to) are wrong.
Thanks, and have a nice day.
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:2, Informative)
Close, but ICANN stands for Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Number. Still, I understand what you're saying...until ICANN'T, EUCANN wait.
Vint Cerf invented the Internet , _NOT_ the U.S. (Score:2, Informative)
"As a graduate student at UCLA, Vint Cerf was involved in the early design of the ARPANET. He was present when the first IMP was delivered to UCLA. He is called the "father of the Internet." He earned this nickname as one of the co-authors of TCP/IP-the protocol that allowed ARPA to connect various independent networks together to form one large network of networks-the Internet."
Furthermore, the people involved in the design of the ARPANet were schools: UCLA, Stanford, the University of Utah, and UC Santa Barbara. And that's a group of ACADEMICS, not a bunch bureaucrats who bought votes with propaganda.
So, if someone must take control of the internet, it should be Vint Cerf, UCLA, Stanford, University of Utah, and UC Santa Barbara. _NOT_ the US government. Let's ask them: Who should control the DNS servers? Eh?
Re:This again? Where's the problem? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:What problem is this addressing? (Score:2, Informative)
On another note: No country will give up national control over its domains. And nobody is asking for that. But regarding international matters, nobody is going to tolerate one nations control over international communication any longer.
Sidenote: US scientists invented the internet. An european one created the WWW - and made it work by giving it as a gift to the world, something an us researcher would be physically unable to do.
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:3, Informative)
There's the resolution you pointed to (1441).
Please explain to me the part where it says "The UN Authorizes any member state to invade if these terms are not met," because I'm just not seeing it.
In fact, the only UN resolution to ever authorize military force (with relations to Iraq) was 660 / 678, in response to the invasion (AKA Gulf War I). These resolutions did not grant the rest of the world a free hand to invade at will. They were written to allow force to be used to restore Kuwait. Not invade Iraq.
So, I ask you again, where does Resolution 1441 state what actions may be taken by member states? Where does it authorize the US/UK to invade and occupy? Yes, Iraq was in material breach of said resolution, but most people outside the White House and Downing Street acknowledge that Resolution 1441 was no basis for invasion. It was, if anything, equivelant to Resolution 660: A statement that there's a problem. You then need something like Resolution 678: actual authorization to invade. Otherwise, you're just making the rules up as you go along.
You say the UN never wanted to enforce this resolution. I ask you, when did the US / UK even try to get a resolution passed to authorize their invasion? Colin Powell comitted political suicide at the UN and still no resolution was passed. Maybe that has something to do with the 'factual' nature of pre-war intel.
Re:This again? Where's the problem? (Score:2, Informative)
There is an entire day between being on one side of the line and the other. This is why we call it the Date Line. If you're on the GMT/UTC+12 side of the line, you are exactly one day ahead of the people on GMT/UTC-12 side of the line.
As of this post, the time was about 5:30 AM on Friday in Wellington and 8:30 AM on Thursday in Anchorage, Alaska.
Re:The US is the largest financial contributor. (Score:1, Informative)
We got $10 milion medical equipment with disclamer that for the life of it the contract services and spare parts worth $100 mln must be bought from U.S companies. Go and put such help in your arse.
Same attachments come with food programs or crop modified that would not grow more than 1 year.
Then illusions like that are fed to american public who believes in everything what media say
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:1, Informative)
Assessment values are not the number you should go on.
The complete quote [wikipedia.org]"As part of that agreement, the regular budget ceiling was reduced from 25 to 22 percent; this is the rate at which the United States is assessed. The United States is the only member that meets that ceiling, all other members' assessment rates are lower. On the other hand, it is in arrears with hundreds of millions of dollars (see also United States and the United Nations). Under the scale of assessments adopted in 2000, other major contributors to the regular UN budget for 2001 are Japan (19.63%), Germany (9.82%), France (6.50%), the U.K. (5.57%), Italy (5.09%), Canada (2.57%) and Spain (2.53%)."
If you follow the see also link in the wikipedia article. You see the US is in arrears of about 1.3 billion dollars. Not only that but other developed countries are paying proportionatly more. Canada with less than 1/10th of the GDP of the US. Is paying about 10% more proportionatly. While the 5 EU nations pay for more (30% ) than the US total, while the US economy is generally considered a liitle better than the entire EU economy. The UN would lose about a third of its budget if the EU leaves (assuming the other EU nations are only required to give 3-4% combined) and only a quarter if the US leaves. So while the US dosn't pay nothing it also dosn't pay its fair share.
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:3, Informative)
see:
http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/dpko/faq/q7.htm [un.org]
and draw your own conclusions.
Lesson? Don't go back on your deals (Score:5, Informative)
Back in July the US surprised everyone by saying that despite the previous agreement that ICANN control of root servers would end in Sept 2006, they would instead keep control into the future, not matter what everyone else thought. [theregister.co.uk]
Everyone else was understandable miffed, particularly when they saw it was being driven politically, by Bush, and that ICANN continued to be ICANN and were trying to tax domain registrations, including country specific domain registrations [theregister.co.uk] (.de, .uk, etc.)
Work was ongoing to redefine things on the run up to the expected ending of ICANN control, including automated management functions [theregister.co.uk] and working groups to define future structure [theregister.co.uk]. I'm sure Bush and his fundamentalist Christian take on the .XXX domain [theregister.co.uk] was just the last straw.
I expect that given the preceeding agreement, and the relative simplicity of changing control of the root servers that live outside the US, the UN, EU, and the rest of the world expected negotiation at the recent PrepCom3 conference [theregister.co.uk]. What they got however was arrogance and statements that made it clear the US failed to understand they didn't have the choice to ignore past agreements.
So, the timetable is clear. ICANNs contract ends between March-Sept 2006 and during that time the new body will take control. Given the likelihood that they won't charge the registrar tax (remember that automated system), just about everyone will switch and Bush will end up with egg on his face. Thus I'll bet that in the real summit in November he will have to give in an acceptable change, since he really has no control of the matter.
Re:The UN has finally lost it (Score:2, Informative)
" 1. Decides that Iraq has been and remains in material breach of its obligations under relevant resolutions, including resolution 687 (1991), in particular through Iraq's failure to cooperate with United Nations inspectors and the IAEA, and to complete the actions required under paragraphs 8 to 13 of resolution 687 (1991);
2. Decides, while acknowledging paragraph 1 above, to afford Iraq, by this resolution, a final opportunity to comply with its disarmament obligations under relevant resolutions of the Council; and accordingly decides to set up an enhanced inspection regime with the aim of bringing to full and verified completion the disarmament process established by resolution 687 (1991) and subsequent resolutions of the Council;"
Now read this last bit VERY carefully
"33. Declares that, upon official notification by Iraq to the Secretary-General and to the Security Council of its acceptance of the provisions above, a formal cease-fire is effective between Iraq and Kuwait and the Member States cooperating with Kuwait in accordance with resolution 678 (1990);
34. Decides to remain seized of the matter and to take such further steps as may be required for the implementation of the present resolution and to secure peace and security in the area."
Seems pretty clear that by violating 1441, they failed to meet the terms of their cease fire. CEASE FIRE. It also appears 678 authorizes the use of force to "secure peace and security" in the area.
Have a nice day!
Re:what a crock of shit (Score:3, Informative)
93% of the losses of the German Armed Forces were on the Eastern Front.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3777161.s
The western front was a mopping up operation only.
Re:i suggested this in the previous discussion (Score:3, Informative)
The location of the root servers do not matter to the people who are making these decisions, only who controls them. This is true. At present, no one controls them. The UN, or rather a small number of people within the UN, wants to regulate them via the WGIG which has been set up precisely for this purpose. The EU is backing them because they are pissed at the US for a whole lot of reasons, Brazil because they are pissed at ICANN, and Chile, China, and the other Usual Suspects for obvious reasons. The UN (or, again, a small number of people in the UN) are doing it for control. Needless to say, I believe this is an incredibly unbelievably bad idea but the large number of slashdotters who seem to be saying "Its ours, fuck off the rest of the world" annoys me even more than the WGIG's proprosals. These are the same people who also believe the US 'controls' the Net, and that all the root servers are located within the States (or, more to the point, don't know what a root server is).
However, I would take issue with your statement that ICANN is controlled by the DoC. ICANN, an international corporation, has proved itself to be a) international b) un-controllable and c) grossly incompetant over the years.