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<font face="Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif">David, <br>
<br>
I must again thank you for all the authoritative details which have
been very illuminating, even if we seem to slip into disagreements when
expressing opinions about how actors may behave in different situations
etc.<br>
<br>
I take form the discussion that you and many of the so called tech
community are convinced that US government cannot do anything bad to
the Internet's architecture vis a vis what has been called the CIRs and
the associated phenomenon. According to you the system is too well
distributed for this to happen. Now, let me accept for the sake of my
present argument that this is indeed true. If so, why would you and
others be against giving a UN body exactly the same role as the US gov
has at present, as long as the relevant guarantees that the distributed
system will be maintained as present vide an international agreement,
which inter alia cannot be changed without US and its allies agreeing
to any change. Can you please specifically answer this question. While
as you say, that UN body will not be able to do anything bad to the
Internet, as you claim at present US government cannot do, such an
arrangement will satisfy so many in the non US world, and then we can
have a smooth cordial sail for ever, and much of the acrimony which so
regularly arises on this count will be gone. Is it not a worthy goal to
seek.<br>
<br>
In other words, why does an arrangement looks so innocent when when in
the hands of the US government, and the same arrangement when shifted
to an international body backed by inviolable international law
becomes the resounding shrill cry of 'UN control of the Internet'. Can
you help me understand this apparent paradox.<br>
<br>
And there can be no doubt that US law and exercise of US's executive
power is much more liable to arbitrary use and possible sudden changes
than international law and its execution. The fact that many US based
and pro US actors simply dont accept this simple and patently clear
fact is quite, well, bugging to most non US actors, if not outright
disrespectful of equality of people, groups and countries, which is a
very very serious thing. One should realise that an international law/
treaty based organisation simply cannot but act in strict adherence to
the law, and the law cannot be changed without the consent of all, or
at least of a very big majority, and certainly certainly not without
the consent of US, EU etc. Be absolutely assured of this.... So
creating this spectre of a China along with an Iran suddenly starting
to dictate how the Internet will be run is such a big a lie and
deliberate delusion, and it is also such an affront to people's
intelligence. At the same time I am all for civil society to be very
watchful of what happens at the UN or ITU etc as we are watchful what
happens with the US gov or India gov. But a sense of balance will do us
all good. <br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
</font><br>
On Thursday 07 June 2012 12:51 AM, David Conrad wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:21F33E8D-CCDC-44C0-822F-9D9BACD96661@virtualized.org"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">We're mixing a couple of threads here. A clarification:
On Jun 6, 2012, at 7:30 AM, McTim wrote:
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">I think what drc is trying to tell you (from his vast firsthand
experience) is that IF in the incredibly unlikely
event that the IANA created a rootzone that excluded say .in AND NTIA
signed off on this change, the TCRs
from around the world would have to fly to a rootsigning ceremony,
recreate the keys that are used to sign the
key that signs the rootzone (a bit of a simplification for ease of
readability), resign the new zone and then send
it to Verisign for publication.
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap="">
As mentioned previously, IANA doesn't create the root zone. In the normal course of events, a TLD admin sends an update to IANA. ICANN personnel make sure the request comes from an appropriate entity and makes sense, then submits the change requests to NTIA. NTIA, after making sure ICANN followed documented policies and procedures, authorizes those changes. Verisign edits the zone, signs it with the Zone Signing Key, and distributes it to the root servers. The root server operators then publish the zone to the Internet.
If the USG decided .IN should no longer exist in the root zone, they would bypass ICANN and would force Verisign to remove the .IN entry from their database, generate a new zone, sign it, and distribute it to the root servers. The root server operators would then have to publish the zone. The point being that even in the worst case, there can be no unilateral action.
The TCRs would only be involved if the private keys stored in both sets of the DNSSEC hardware security modules were destroyed or otherwise made unusable. In such a case, the TCRs, acting together, can regenerate the DNSSEC Key Signing Key private key. That key is used to sign (make valid) the Zone Signing Key used by Verisign. TCRs were brought up in response to Norbert's idea of having multiple Key Signing Keys, not in the context of keeping the USG from going rogue.
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">In that incredibly far-fetched scenario, all the root-ops would have
to accept that new zone. I suggest that at least some would not.
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap="">
Exactly.
Regards,
-drc
</pre>
</blockquote>
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