In a seemingly never-ending row of news on hacks of websites now the news in which 2.3 million individual cases of privacy sensitive data were accessible through a leak in the websites of most public broadcasting stations in the Netherlands. To make the news more cheerful, the accessible data was, if compiled, sufficient to successfully steal a complete identity. What were thoughts that came to my mind after hearing this news on Friday? more
One thing that ICANN clearly lacks is a set of well documented and often referenced founding principles. This leaves the awkward position where everyone who has been around since the beginning has a different position on what those principles should have been and all those that have joined later know that there is something fundamental missing. The missing principle vexing me this week is that of fair competition. Even now, long after the gTLD vote, the argument still runs on... more
It was fascinating last week to read coverage of congressional hearings around the SOPA bill, or Stop Online Privacy Act. The bill has strong support from the Motion Picture Association of America, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and big pharmaceutical companies. It's opposed by most technology and telecom companies, plus consumer advocate groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Public Knowledge. more
The ITU launched its latest statistics report, the World in 2011: ICT Facts and figures, which revealed impressive growth in a number of areas such as global internet use, particularly in developing countries. The report included further key details such as: "One third of the world's population are forecast to be online by the end of 2011..." more
Law enforcement demands to domain name registrars were a recurring theme of the 42d ICANN public meeting, concluded last week in Dakar. The Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) took every opportunity at its public meetings with GNSO and Board, and in its Communique to express dismay, disappointment, and demands for urgent action to "reduce the risk of criminal abuse of the domain name system." more
Among the hottest topics at the Broadband Leadership Summit, which was held during the ITU Telecom World 2011 in Geneva, were the issues in relation to the security of the various aspects of the digital economy. The key issue in relation to the governance of the internet relates to the many political, social and cultural differences between countries. This is one of the most contentious issues. more
Just back from a week of ICANN meetings in Dakar. Is it just me, or is the new top-level domain program starting to feel like a TLD triathlon, where everyone's now jockeying for position in the final stage -- a grueling marathon? When ICANN's board approved the new gTLD plan in Singapore, it came with the promise of small but substantive changes to improve the program. I hope that wasn't empty rhetoric... more
The Internet Society (ISOC) has addressed human rights issues related to Internet access stating "[t]he increasing pressure to limit access to the Internet has escalated the sense of urgency in addressing this situation." ISOC, in the announcement, reaffirmed its policy area and its work to bring attention to the impact of Internet freedom on other aspects of human rights. more
Cybersecurity regulation will take its place alongside environmental regulation, health and safety regulation and financial regulation as a major federal activity. What is not yet clear is what form the regulations will take. FISMA controls, performance standards, consensus standards and industry-specific consortia standards are all possible regulatory approaches. What is not likely is an extended continuation of the current situation in which federal authorities have only limited, informal oversight of private sector cyberdefenses (or lack thereof). more
A reader recently brought to my attention an upcoming conference in London in the UK -- The Oil and Gas Cyber Security Forum. Here's a little blurb: "Despite investments into state of the art technology, a majority of the oil and gas industry remain blissfully unaware of the vulnerabilities, threats and capability of a malicious cyber attack on control systems..." I bring this up because it is relevant to the trends in cyber security that we see this year - that of the Advanced Persistent Threat. more
Recent articles in the press have outlined how sites including MSN and Hulu are now using an advanced version of the old cookie file to track user behavior. These "supercookies" are very hard to detect and delete, and can track user behavior across multiple sites, not just one. These tricky little trackers have lawmakers pressing the FTC to investigate, and the IAB scrambling to defend industry practices. more
A paper titled, "Civil society involvement in ICANN: Strengthening future civil society influence in ICANN policymaking," written by Robin Gross, examines the historical role that civil society has played at ICANN in policymaking. more
A funny thing happened in Nairobi last week... I showed up for an Internet Governance Forum (IGF) panel discussion on the use of the Internet during times of political and social unrest, and a truly multi-stakeholder dialogue broke out. It turned out to be my favorite session during an incredible IGF week that, thanks to our Kenyan hosts, exceeded every expectation. The session, formerly known as "The Internet in the Post-Revolution Phase – Challenges of Political Engagement and the Safety of Citizens" was cancelled for reasons unknown. Perhaps it was a conflict of schedules, or maybe the topic was deemed by the organizers or certain governments to be too sensitive for the official agenda. more
Signing Email is now a Draft Standard! Signing email transitioned from a proposed standard to a draft standard (RFC6376 -- one of the new RFCs) over at the IETF a few days ago. The other is RFC6377. Let's go through a brief history of DKIM RFCs to refresh our memories... more
I read with interest the piece by the Chairman of the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), Garry Elliot, in Advertising Age, which was partly prompted by my commentary in the same publication describing why new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) could be an opportunity for some brands. He says: "From all I've seen, no matter how one tries to justify ICANN's process or the benefits it speculates will occur, it is simply impossible to defend the economics of the ICANN proposal. That is the Achilles' heel of this entire exercise. To paraphrase an old saying, 'It's the economics, stupid.'" more
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