AW: [governance] Milestone Agreement Reached Between ICANN, and F Root Server Operator, Internet Systems Consortium

[Kleinwächter, Wolfgang]

Stephane
 
here is an excerpt from the "Background Report" (www.wgig.org) which covers the root server issue
 
 

"(iii)      Root server system management

 

86.               The root zone file contains records for all TLDs and is managed by the distribution master root server. 

 

87.               There are many steps involved in the root server system: standard setting, initiation, selection, editing, and the IANA functions of allocation, authorization, publication and mirroring. Some of the activities are purely technical or operational while other activities include a public policy dimension. The system is managed on the basis of numerous bilateral and multilateral cooperative agreements, MoUs, sponsorship agreements, contracts, statements of work, and voluntary arrangements. The main actors in management/governance of the root zone file and root name servers are ICANN, the IANA functions, the US Department of Commerce (US DoC), VeriSign Inc. and the root server operators themselves.

 

88.       The operators of root servers restrict themselves to operational matters and are not involved in policy making and data modifications. Some have expressed concerns about the current situation and consider that the following issues should be addressed:

*	They have no clearly defined responsibilities and accountability, especially in relation to the stability and secure functioning of the Internet;
*	The decision making procedure for the authorization of the publication of modifications, additions or deletions to the root zone file or associated information that constitute delegation or redelegation of top-level domains ('approval' of IANA function recommendations by the US DoC) is neither multilateral nor democratic and does not involve other governments, private sector, civil society or international organizations;
*	The existing system is mainly based on trust, not on a treaty. The system reduces the governmental participation in the authorization of modifications, additions or deletions to one single government, which has no contractual relationship with other governments with regard to the execution of this function." 

 

With regard to the "physical location" of the root server this was indeed raised by a number of (governmental) members. There was an undefined fear that one government could control the whole root server system. There was no discussion that some root servers are operated by govenrmental bodies (dOD) and other by private or academic bodies. And there was also a unspecified expectartion that if "our country" has a root server this will strengthen our independence and souvereignty. Insofar, anycast was seen as a "step in the right direction".  But, as said in an earlier mail, the heat of the discussion was cooled down in the process and in the "Chateau" this was no really an issue anymore. 
 
Wolfgang

________________________________

Von: Stephane Bortzmeyer [mailto:bortzmeyer at internatif.org]
Gesendet: Di 08.01.2008 13:58
An: governance at lists.cpsr.org
Betreff: Re: [governance] Milestone Agreement Reached Between ICANN, and F Root Server Operator, Internet Systems Consortium



On Mon, Jan 07, 2008 at 11:05:01AM +0100,
 Kleinwächter <Kleinwächter> wrote
 a message of 107 lines which said:

> The issue of formal or informal agreements/contracts with root
> server operators played an important role during the discussion
> within the UN Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) in
> 2004/2005. [...] They also critisized that ten of the 13 root
> servers are based in the US.

Any public texts (position papers, speech transcripts, etc) about
these discussions? They seem very difficult to find.

> With regard to the 13 root servers the counter argument here was
> that the number of the existing root servers is limited for
> technical reason

Do note that it was not completely true (and is now quite
false). There was never a hard limit of 13 name servers. There was a
limit of 512 bytes in the response (which translates to *roughly* 13
or 14 name servers) but this limit is now mostly historical, as
indicated in the ICANN SSAC report on the introduction of IPv6
addresses in the root-servers.net zone.

> but that the system of Anycast (root) servers (now more than 100 all
> over the world) would also reduce the capacity for "political
> misuse" of the root server system by one single government close to
> zero.

Someone really said so? This is quite ridiculous since the physical
location of the machine certainly does not matter, it's the location
of its operator which is important.
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