US Control of Internet Remains an Issue 303
Hugh Pickens writes "A UN-sponsored Internet conference ended with little progress on the issue of US control over the domain name system run by ICANN, a California-based nonprofit over which the US. government retains veto power. By controlling the core systems, the United States indirectly influences the way much of the world uses the Internet. As the conference drew to a close, the Russian representative, Konstantin Novoderejhkin, called on the United Nations secretary-general to create a working group to develop ''practical steps'' for moving Internet governance ''under the control of the international community.'' The United States insists that the existing arrangements ensure the Internet's stability and there's little indication that the US government and ICANN plan to cede their roles over domain names anytime soon. ''I think (there are) a small number of countries that are very agitated and almost don't care what the facts are,'' said Internet pioneer Vint Cerf, who stepped down as ICANN's chairman earlier this month. ''It's a very small vocal group bothered by this issue. ICANN has existed for eight years and done a great job with its plans for internationalization.'' With no concrete recommendations for action, the only certainty going forward is that any resentment about the American influence will only grow as more users from the developing world come online, changing the face of the global network. The next forum will held next year in New Delhi, India."
Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
This quickly spins into a ridiculous flame war consisting of something along the lines of "We invented it" - (A claim contested by swedish apoligists), or some kind of line about how Libya is in charge of the UN council on human rights, whatever that has to do with it.
These points, and many other historical arguements, are irrelevant. The only issue here is that the United States currently has control, and is being presented with no good (or even clear) reason why it should give that control up.
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Maybe one can find a majority that does not like it ( http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm [internetworldstats.com] ).
CC.
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Go for it. No one is stopping you.
Woosh! (Score:3, Funny)
Hint: I'm American.
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Why can't the international community create a parallel DNS system and administrate its own domains? I mean, bits are bits, right? Wouldn't just be as simple as setting your DNS servers to ones on a "WorldDNS" network that don't communicate with the US lead system?
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Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
But this isn't really what the people bitching about U.S. control want. They don't really want control over the system as much as they want to take it away from the U.S. I doubt they would do anything different if they had the opportunity (assuming good faith on their part, i.e. that they wouldn't build in some sort of horrendous censorship features, which I think is a serious risk), and honestly I can't imagine they have much interest in the day-to-day operation of what's mostly an automated system.
It's just a political football, nothing more. The countries involved know that the U.S. will never give it up, so it's an easy way to score points at little to no cost.
Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, not to be callous, but just because something is unpopular doesn't mean it's a bad thing.
I believe that a big reason a lot of people don't want the US in control is because that's the status quo, and people find reasons to dislike the status quo, deservedly or not. Another reason is the general ill will that exists towards the US government worldwide. Yes, there are concerns about network neutrality, and there are concerns about the US abusing its position.
However, when the time comes that the US implements policy that damages the internet in a meaningful way, then we'll see alternatives used. It's how the internet works.
For now, the status quo is fine. Why do we waste so much energy trying to fix something that works?
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Oh, you mean America's MOST USEFUL FRIENDS, the Saudis?
There, fixed it for you.
The U.S.'s dealings with most of the world are purely utilitarian. Assigning moral or social significance to them is a waste of breath or ink (or electrons), and trying to be sarcastic on that basis is just shooting blanks.
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Given a perceived difference between two groups, A and B, where A is nominally superior, B can either:
- Set about coming up with a superior solution, as in, say cel phone technologies,
- Go on and on, in the fashion of the baby with the full diaper.
One hopes that IPv6 mill eventually somewhat mitigate the latter squaking.Fa{ir|re} is what you pay to ride a bus.
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Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Informative)
It's not "people" who don't like US control, it's "people who run oppressive governments". Look at the summary: a Russian is complaining about US control at the same time his government is busy trying to copy the Chinese filtering techniques.
Let's look at the Internet Usage By Region graph linked above that innocently labels by continental land masses as if all populations of the world yearn to be free from the USA's oppressive Internet policies. Compare it to the Internet Censorship worst offenders list [wikipedia.org] on Wikipedia. Oh, look, apparently as a suprise to many
Of all the major players in the world, the US has the by far best track record (not perfect, just best) of keeping the internet open.
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The Guardian (UK: just above US on internet censorship list (ICL hereafter)), Haaretz (Israel: 13th on ICL) , Toronto Star (Canada: 5th on ICL) should apparently be more concerned about their own countries' internet censoring than the US's. This is a typical tactic to crack down on something and point the blame or direct attention
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We would if the people that think the General Assembly should be the Governing body for the World had their way.
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We would if the people that think the General Assembly should be the Governing body for the World had their way.
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What's next? The US complaining if countries X and Y decide not to trade oil to eachother anymore in US dollars, or if country Z decides not to use
Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod parent up. (Score:2)
I think it is telling that all these other countries have not gotten together and actually done so. If many other countries united and put together their own DNS system, lots of people would use it. They probably can't even agree and work together.
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or some kind of line about how Libya is in charge of the UN council on human rights, whatever that has to do with it
It has to do with the respectability of that institution in the eyes of a lot of people. To a lot of people the UN hasn't done anything morally just since the intervention in the Korean War. Many of us are leery of ceding control over anything to an organization that comes off as quite hypocritical in many areas (the human rights council being one of them).
Now I'm not looking for a flame-fest over the pros and cons of the UN. Just trying to explain the viewpoints of a lot of people. Personally, I al
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there are many legitimate reasons not to setup yet another TLD
Are there? Please enlighten me. I understand that the present system of TLD's was designed to be freely added to whenever required, without much fuss. However, allowing this to happen would make the domain name business a rather less valuable proposition, so this concept was quickly killed off. what I can see from where I am standing is that everything is run by a decidedly closed shop, with only pretenses to openness, and the whole thing happily handed over to a multi-billion dollar business with interest
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what I can see from where I am standing is that everything is run by a decidedly closed shop, with only pretenses to openness, and the whole thing happily handed over to a multi-billion dollar business with interests to protect
Agreed. ICANN sucks donkey balls. But how does that relate to the United States? The argument isn't "ICANN sucks", the argument is "We can't trust the United States". How the hell do you expect Americans to respond to that?
Are there? Please enlighten me. I understand that the present system of TLD's was designed to be freely added to whenever required, without much fuss
Let me qualify what I said. There are no reasons to add more English language TLDs. What the hell is the point of .info, .museum, .name, blah blah blah? Not that many people are using them. All they do is send more money to the pockets of ICANN and the domain registers beca
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ICANN sucks donkey balls. But how does that relate to the United States?...the argument is "We can't trust the United States"
Well, I'm not really into this whole "US sucks/US is teh awesomeness" debate. It applies to this issues with regards to the fact that the US has veto powers over ICANN. This makes me uncomfortable, but in the same way that I would find it uncomfortable if any other single nation would have that kind of control over the web. It isn't really about the US sucking. But, to answer your question, that is how it relates to ICANN.
What the hell is the point of .info, .museum, .name, blah blah blah? Not that many people are using them
So? if not many people use them, that inversely means that some people use them. It
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It applies to this issues with regards to the fact that the US has veto powers over ICANN
That's a legacy of the fact that the US Government funded the initial internet backbone and encouraged the growth thereof. It's your right to suggest changing that, but I think anybody looking at it rationally can understand why the US doesn't want to give it up and why your typical American citizen could have a problem with the UN being in charge of it (since that seems to be the most popular suggestion).
Sure, the United States has an agenda on the World stage. But so does China. And Russia. And ev
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I think the number one reason to keep US in "control" of the internet is domestic stability. This is why a lot of foreign countries keep there money here in the US. The fact that we are democratic takes a back seat to stable.
Face it, other than some stupid name resolution, what REAL control does the US have over the internet?
If it's infrastructure, then this can be fixed by the foreign countries laying more cable...
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Note to self: /s/There/Their.
Need more coffee...
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or some kind of line about how Libya is in charge of the UN council on human rights, whatever that has to do with it.
Not to degrade into that selfsame flame war, but here's the explanation on that: There is no way in hell the US should be willing to cede control of something as important as the internet to any organization that would put Libya in charge of human rights. It would be akin to walking over and handing the keys to your Porsche to some guy staggering out of a bar. You'd be an idiot.
Oh, and y
Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. I love America, but I recognize our many flaws, and am quick to point them out, in order to facilitate the making of a better America. But, come on. For starters, this is one of the few international projects that we've gotten almost completely right! Secondly, as a sys-admin, I (and many others on slashdot) will be first to tell you: "If it ain't broke, and the new model doesn't add any needed functionality, don't fix it".
I'm pretty sure this is just bitching about America because it's cool to kick the guy when he's down. If you're going to bitch about America, take a look at our foreign policy, our unilateral support for Israel on the UN security council, our plummeting currency valuation, our mixed-bag relations with China, our disappearing middle-class and rapidly-growing-richer upper class, or the state of our healthcare and education services. Leave ICANN alone.
~Wx
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I find a lot of parrallels between this and Europe's Galileo program(GPS Alternative).
I found figures that the program would cost 4 Billion - Whether you consider that an expensive duplication of effort or a cheap means of removal of European commercial and military dependence on
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It is good to see a pragmatic attitude in this matter - however, a truly pragmatic view would also include the fact that this seems to be an actual issue, even if there are no good technical or administrative reasons for changing things. The American government's stance demonstrates that they, at least, have strong reasons for not wanting to give away this control - so, they ar
Not really at all... (Score:2)
Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
"I do not sanction the grotesque pretense of an organization allegedly devoted to world peace and human rights, which includes Soviet Russia, the worst aggressor and bloodiest butcher in history, as one of its members. The notion of protecting rights, with Soviet Russia among the protectors, is an insult to the concept of rights and to the intelligence of any man who is asked to endorse or sanction such an organization. I do not believe that an individual should cooperate with criminals, and, for all the same reasons, I do not believe that free countries should cooperate with dictatorships."
Change out "Soviet Russia" for "PRC" (and to a growing extent Putin's Russia) and this still holds today.
I'm not American, don't get to vote for American laws, and I dislike, nay detest, many, many, policies of the American government. But I would rather have important elements of the Internet under the control of a single democracy than under an organisation that gives equal voice to completely undemocratic regimes of terror.
Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Ok, so there are two basic ways in which you can deal with these regimes, talk to them or bomb them back to the dark ages. The PRC may not be a paragon of virtue but they're a great deal better than they were. Why? Because they value the trade they get. And if you want the situation to improve to talk to them, and you keep talking to them.
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Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Funny)
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I'm astonished as someone that's not an American can be so much of a sycophant as to quote a barbaric speech, worthy of the most hardcore braindead conservative radio-shouters.
If you were to cut relations with all countries guilty of crimes you would end up alone in the World. And the USA have a very, very long resume on that, too.
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As a native citizen of a country that both is the oldest democracy in the world and has historically been attacked by Russia every 50 years or so, I'll tell you why you have to cooperate with dictatorships. As long as you keep talking they can't kill you.
The United Nations is far from perfect, we all know this. But it is what we got. Maybe you can afford to ignore it, and certainly Americans can, but I and my compatriots can't.
PS. I kn
Dude...Rand? (Score:2)
Re:Not really an issue (Score:5, Insightful)
1) I dont consider the UN 'neutral' consisting of a body of every nation does not mean they do not have a strong agenda
2) irregardless of their 'neutrality' the US built the internet put in all the investment and should benefit by control
3) There has yet to be a compelling reason presented other than 'Its not fair'. Nobody has been significantly damaged by US control.
But then again, taking into account how little US takes UN into account (well, not US, but the present administration) this doesn't surprise me a single bit.
Dont just peg it on Bush, many Americans (Anywhere between 20-40 percent) see the UN for what it is, a body a bureaucrats originally chartered, in spirit, with preventing war through a place of negotiation who have decided to ever justify their existance by meddling in every aspect of member (and non member) nations policy.
So, with that said, let them keep the control, and let the rest keep fighting for their principles and not only oil like some.
LOL I love this, how noble to have gotten rich raping the world and the worlds resources (Europe) and act so condescending to the US less than a 90 years after it all started to fall apart.
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Need I remind you how US was before WWI and why US didn't do jack before they were attacked?
I'm pretty sure you meant to say World War II.
And what to you mean, fall apart?
The GP was talking about the history of European countries with regards to the whole colonialism/imperialism/New Imperialism thing. See, for example, the stellar political situation in the aftermath of the "scramble for Africa." The 90 year figure may be a little off, but decolonization didn't really start till about the 1950's.
But yeah, we're clearly the ones that in the last century raped the worlds resources
Also, GP was trying to place the blame on Europe for the history of lusting after the worlds resources before the last century
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, we invaded two countries on a whim
Uhh, two of them on a whim? I'm pretty sure we had good reasons [wikipedia.org] for going into Afghanistan. Do you think that China or Russia wouldn't have done the same thing if 3,000 of their citizens were killed? Did you forget that NATO invoked it's collective self-defence clause? Afghanistan was hardly invaded on a 'whim' and you lose creditability by saying so.
and the world doesn't trust someone as crazy as the US with that power
WHAT POWER??? Everybody keeps talking about this "power" that the US has over the internet. Control of the DNS root != control of the internet. A
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Surely, by nobody you obviously mean FLAG Telecom?
I fail to see how your links to maps of submarine cables disproves my statement that nobody has bothered to build long haul links across Asia and in any case, I was basing it off the discussion the other day (in a diff story) where quite a few people posted traceroutes from Asia -> Europe that went through the United States for some reason.
Don't be a wiseass if you don't know it all.
If they do have those links, then why the fuck is all that traffic going though the United States? Do they need help setting up BGP or something? (there, now I
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obligatory (Score:2, Funny)
Internet is USA property now (Score:2, Funny)
Why don't we give the governance of internet stuff to somebody like Switzerland? They look like they could do a good job, they hav
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As a European, I do feel there is a need to do something with this issue
Why, what's the problem with the current arrangement other then European mistrust of the United States?
Just look at all the problems they have now (packet shaping, net neutrality, etc...)
Disputes over packet shaping on the individual ISP level lead you to think that ICANN can't govern the root DNS servers effectively? Your kidding, right? And traffic shaping is hardly unique to the United States [azureuswiki.com].
I feel that it has taken faaar too long to get the "ñ" in domain names
And you think the technical obstacles would have been overcome faster by adding more bureaucracy to the process?
Why don't we give the governance of internet stuff to somebody like Switzerland? They look like they could do a good job, they have the money and good reasons to do a good job on worldwide internationalization of internet.
Because Swiss neutrality is slowly being erased in favor of closer t
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It issues you cite: "packet shaping, net neutrality, etc..." are all end-user (ISP level) issues. They do not effect the backbones and international communications at all. Furthermore, there is still no legislation at all regarding these issues (though the packet shaping/tampering thing is currently being "worked on")
Putting things into the hands of the UN is a horrible idea, simply beca
sed 's/US/UN/g' (Score:2)
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The US does not "Rule the web" in the sense that it could actively prevent another country from doing whatever it wants. It just so happens that ICANN - the recognized authority that regulates certain aspects of the internet - can (but never has) be prevented from acting by the US government on a case-by-case basis.
The US President can veto an act of Congress. That is a far cry from saying he controls Congress.
Also, the solution to the problem is amazingly s
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As a European, I do feel there is a need to do something with this issue. Not to be disrespectful, but I don't think that USA are the best people for the job.
Mindless drivel. Euros are just out of joint because they didn't invent the internet but use it like heroin addict. And your governments foster this rhetoric as to them this is far too open and standardized for their liking. They would rather see government controls, like France for example on encryption. None of why governments want shared contro
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The long term solution to that being finding ways to reign in the US. Iraq wouldn't be the problem it is now if the US just left them alone. Sure, Saddam is evil, but there were no serious WMD development programs, and certainly no nuclear programs. For an administration that claimed to be certain to having known where those programs were, they haven't been able to find them.
And not being in Iraq would have meant not having diverted away the necessary support neede
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The UN should be more concerned about:
Getting a solution to Iraq/Afghanistan
First, why mix the two, they have absolutely nothing to do with each other; and why is it a UN problem? I don't recall either conflict being UN sanctioned.
International law and terrorists, making smaller countries comply
It can only do that when the larger countries start to lead by example. The UN only has the power of it's member nations, when the nations on the security council starts playing politics with the rule of law. It's the USA that consistently uses it's veto to block resolutions against Israel, why be surprised if the Russians and\or Chinese do the same in
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I disagree on that one. Written language (I speak german and french, so äöü and àèéêîôç are kinda common to me) may sometimes rely on "funny" letters, but using them in domain names is hugely impractical for everybody with the wrong keyboard layout (and it tends to make stuff harder to find). The internet is, by it's nature, an international idea and to pre
Internationalization is harder than EUisation (Score:2)
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Thats exactly why this can't be given to an international political body. They will just turn it into an unusable mess. I'm a Greek speaker, should Greek letters and accents be in domain names?
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L3, and all the backbone providers aren't shaping crap.
That being said, the UN handles the phones don't they? Somehow that's worked.
While yeah, I do get a littly snippy when my tax money was used to create the internet, at what point does it go from an
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The amount of corruption in the UN makes even the most corrupt areas of the USA look legit.
They're also ineffectual, there have been a number of times where the blue helmets have at least allowed genocidal slaughters to continue. For example, blocking the side being killed from arming themselves, but not engaging(or not being allowed to engage) the killers.
I wouldn't mind so much if it was just a place for diplomats and leaders of count
The economy is the only thing I worry about. (Score:5, Funny)
International community? oh yea despots & tyr (Score:2, Insightful)
Gee Just what I predicted (Score:5, Insightful)
To me this seems similar to a bunch of kids whining that the kid who owns a really nice toy that he shares and lets them all play with should "give up control" of it to the rest of them.
This is especially true since any sort of ceremonious handing over of control would do nothing to the reality of the situation. Sure the US could, in theory, tell ICANN they answer to the UN now (though there are limits to what they can legally make a private entity do). However it wouldn't change who really has ultimate control if everything remained in the US. If the government wanted to, they could still force ICANN to do what they said since, well, they have the guns.
It would be the same thing as if you used a server in my house. Let's say it was my hardware, hosted on my net connection, but I let you use it as you pleased. However you didn't have root to it, I maintained it for you. You demand that since it is your server, I "give up control" to you in the form of root. I do that. Ok great, but I didn't really give up anything. Why? I still physically and legally control the computer. So at some point in the future I decide I don't like what you are doing I tell you to stop, you say no. I just go and unplug the server and change the configuration offline. The "control" you had was an illusion, I was still ultimately in charge because I maintained physical control and legal ownership.
Hence for a real system that isn't US controlled, it requires other countries to set up their own services. Setup your own entity like ICANN, set up root servers that operate under it. Initially, have it just devoted to mirroring ICANN's zone file (there are some small DNS projects like this). However once you've got an established system that works well with good infrastructure backing it, then maybe you approach ICANN about splitting the zone. You take the TLDs relevant to your part of the world, they keep the rest, and you swap zone information. You might find they are quite open to something like that.
Now if that was done in a number of places all over the world, you'd end up with a real robust DNS system that nobody really controlled. If any of the top level entities flipped out, the others could just stop accepting updates from them and their roots would continue to work fine. There wouldn't be any way for a single group to mess up the Internet.
That's what I want to see, something where there really isn't ANY country in charge. However what all these idiots want to see is something where the US just pretends to give up control, we still have something the US retains ultimate control over, except that the day-to-day decisions become run by the UN and are incredibly bureaucratic.
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To me this seems similar to a bunch of kids whining that the kid who owns a really nice toy that he shares and lets them all play with should "give up control" of it to the rest of them.
This is a little harsh, but entirely true, I'd think.
Imagine, if you will, that the US said, 'fine, you can have ICANN.' And walked away. The 'world' gets control and is happy. Then the US goes about setting up a separate infrastructure to host its own content. Imagine that somehow all US content is migrated to this new infrastructure. What happens? Is there a great-big split in the internet? Do the networks never touch because of DNS issues?
Or would the world, wanting access to the US content, even
Time for a heart bypass? (Score:4, Insightful)
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That was the original idea... Back when it was a relatively small system. These days there are a lot of core systems. DNS isn't nearly as distributed as it should be. Someone could definitely take out root DNS servers with a few well-placed nukes. The Internet isn't as interconnected as it used to be either. Most traffic passes through a few specific backbone providers, which could also be taken out with some well-placed nuk
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1) There are core systems and networks that make the network more vulnerable to physical attack than was originally planned. I'm hopeful that going forward, in the best interests of low latency and high bandwidth, we'll see more and more of the giant backbone providers doing mesh-like interconnects with each other all across their respective networks, instead of thinking in terms of discrete exchange points.
2) "Routing traffic" isn't the issue. European traffic already stays in Europe (etc). This is an i
UN Hahaha (Score:5, Insightful)
I can't help but think it would be better off in the US as non-profit than the UN. The UN is political, not a technical organization. So any changes they made would be driven from a political source with ulterior motives. Think, if they messed up commerce because of poor decisions they could argue 18 months about it before making a decision.
And besides, there is nothing stopping any country from doing their own thing provided they are willing to pay for it them selves and not hide behind the UN. Last I checked every country does have their own 2 letter ISO code country assignments. I am not aware of any who are denied access to .com, net etc.
It must have been a slow day at the UN. As if the UN had their way, one must remember it is stacked with mostly poor countries with most of the votes. Why should these countries with the least to lose have more control? Most can't even manage their own .iso.
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So make your own! (Score:2, Interesting)
Americans dont trust the international community to do anything right except bitch about Americans.
If you dont like it, no one is gonna stop you from going your own way. Make your own.
Just stop complaining about it.
We'll sell it to you for... (Score:2)
I dont see any issues with it (Score:2)
and im no american. im turkish.
Start with the ccTLDs (Score:2, Insightful)
Start with regulating the ccTLDs. Today nobody cares about unethical principes by ccTLD owners, take a look at Nunames that revokes good
Where would it go? (Score:3, Interesting)
If we put it under NATO or UN control or something then where do the main authoritative servers get put? The UN doesn't own any territory, which means it would have to put it in the territory or a member state. Either that or they put it somewhere completely neutral (middle of the sea?) at which point the connection is terrible.
So, while it might be good to have it under less potentially influenced control, where would it all physically go?
* which, TBH, if the US Government have a veto on them then I don't really, but that's not important
Very Small Vocal Group (Score:2)
- Vint Cerf [nytimes.com]
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."
- Margaret Mead [wikiquote.org]
-kgj
Solutions (Score:4, Insightful)
Step2: Register domain names under your country code. ICANN has more or less promised not to fuck around with countries TLDs, and quite frankly they wouldn't be that stupid. If you happen to be a major international company that MUST have a
The problem with non-latin characters is technical, not merely political, and moving to a UN organisation won't make the technical issues go away. You would have to come up with something which doesn't break existing implementations, but is simulataneously sufficient enough that you won't have to revamp it again in ten years time. When somebody comes up with a working implementation for this that won't break thinsg across the globe, and if ICANN rejects it on political reasons, then one could start discussing it.
Of course, it would help if the US government would just stay the fuck out of ICANN decisions.
In other news... (Score:4, Funny)
Russia, Canada, Iceland, Finland, Sweden, Norway pressure the UN to force equatorial countries to give up their control of warm winters.
China, and other heavily industrial countries pressure the UN to force the pacific ocean to give up control of clean air.
America Bends Over Again (Score:2, Interesting)
It remains an issue? (Score:2)
Interesting parallel - GPS control? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a European, so no Bush fanboi, and I'm ashamed to say that we've got nothing better to propose. The EU, the UN? Hmmm...
I offer the only parallel I can think of, (a free, global system, originally developed by - and for - the military), namely GPS.
GPS is great - period. I travel all around the world, and my cheap GPS receiver always tells me where I am. Thanks to the Internet, I can even get maps/sat pics of 'forbidden' or 'unmapped' places beforehand, and find my way.
Russia's GLONASS and the EU's Galileo are not operational, (think 2010 earliest). (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_navigation_system)
The Internet works pretty well too. Except when I travel to....guess where! China, the UAE, Saudi Arabia....in places that have shitty oppressive regimes, esssentially.
So, tell me everyone, who do you want 'in charge' of the Internet?
IPv4 cost, DNSSEC, & control of root servers (Score:3, Interesting)
Specifically, what happens to IPv4 address [potaroo.net] allocation when there is no longer any freely available netblocks [ripe.net]. (Pay special attention to pages 27&29, and watch the accompanying video [ripe.net]). New allocations will come from returned address pools, so a queuing system will have to be implemented at the RIR level. Starting up a new ISP, or expanding your customer base and need more address space after 2010, and your request will go into a FIFO queue.
Now, economists see two distinct futures for a market based on scarcity. One is where cooperation and fairness ensure that everyone gets along, which is the current internet model, and the other is known as the "University of Chicago School of Free Market Uber Alles^W^W^W^WEconomics" government enforced monopoly, where a few select companies are allowed to charge whatever the market will bear with no real competition or alternatives. Maybe a US government sanctioned company called IPbay will become the sole broker to trade netblocks.
In the first scenario, the internet continues to function as it does now, companies needing new addresses will have longer and longer waits and will have to adjust their business plans accordingly. Into a system like this, where address space could be traded, stolen, pirated or worse, RIRs have no real powers to stop it falling into total anarchy. Except, the IETB, IANA, the RIRs, have a new tool in their arsenal to combat anarchy, called DNSSEC [rfc.net].
In the second scenario, one, or a very few, private companies based in the US, of course, take over the entire market for buying and selling IPv4 address space. Want to keep that nice
For router engineers, those who work with BGP and AS numbers on a regular basis, things have been pretty quiet until now. A few bogon filters, and you just generally believe whatever gets fed to you. The internet is mostly "best effort" and if some traffic doesn't reach it's goal, there isn't much that can be done beyond some simple tuning. There is some routing data in the routing registries, but it's rarely up to date and the accuracy depends on whatever random person did the update.
But in a few years, when companies start to get desperate for IPv4 address space NOW!, and can't wait for a proper allocation, they'll steal or buy a prefix. Companies with a large allocation not completely used will renumber internally, and sell the right to announce half their prefix to they highest bidder. Or companies will just find part of an unused block and announce it. Total anarchy! The most conservative estimates for 2012 with rampant de-aggregation and without DNSSEC is that the routing table will exceed 2,000,000 prefixes. Not much routing equipment out there today will be able to cope with that.
With DNSSEC, there will be cryptographically signed certificates [ripe.net] [pdf warning]for every allocation from an RIR [ripe.net][quicktime warning]. When you build your routing table in BGP, you will verify every prefix for origin and valid neighbors based on certificates stored in the RIR whois/routing registry. This will prevent the anarchy part of stealing a prefix and announcing it in the wrong AS. This wil
Re:Australia (Score:5, Insightful)
Uhh, what do you think you are using to connect to the internet? Tin-cans with string run all the way back to the US and plugged into our infrastructure?
Define infrastructure? Because there's an internet backbone in Australia. There's also at least three [wikipedia.org] DNS root servers in Australia. What's the problem here?
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Infrastructure = WoW servers.
They're extremely unhappy that they don't have any Oceanic WoW servers and they just won't STFU about it.
Re: (Score:2)
Do to the ways the ISPs charge, it's often cheaper to host your sites in the USA than to have the servers in Australia.
Re:Australia (Score:5, Informative)
But you do [apnic.net], in fact.
Content is not infrastructure.
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Then bitch to your telecom companies and/or Government until they upgrade their links to the rest of the world. This has nothing to do with ICANN's control over the DNS root.
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Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Nice (crack) pipe dream (Score:2)
Yep. Everyone will automatically switch over to an unproven provider, right off the bat.
ARE YOU NUCKING FUTS?
If they want to do this, they need to start small, prove they can be stable, take on more responsibility, then eventually, when they prove they can handle their portion of the load, assume authority over PORTIONS of it.
What you're suggesting is akin to some kid on a cablemodem setting up a Linux box and then telling everyone they shou
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Then write back from your prison cell about the evils of censorship and the lack of free speech in the US...