ICANN Now The Ultimate Overseer of Domain Name System

[engine]

A move to block the U.S. Government's relinquishment of overseeing the Domain Name System has failed, and ICANN is now the ultimate overseer of the system.

Some ask if the U.S. Government has given away the Internet?

A judge in Texas has rejected a last-ditch legal challenge to halt the final handover of internet naming power from the US government to a non-profit group.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) has administered the naming system since 1998.

ICANN Now The Ultimate Overseer of Domain Name System [bbc.co.uk]

[creeking]

if things get crazy, I can start using a couple nice .US domains that I have in my domain warehouse. :)

[graeme_p]

ICANN has been running things anyway.

ICANN is not doing a particularly good job, but every attempt to improve things is blocked by someone.

[tangor]

The transfer of ICANN has not reached the US population ... until recently, ie., after the deed has been done. Congress and some techies fought the transfer, and truthfully, this has been on going through a couple of administrations, but Obama made it happen. The people, however, are hearing about it now:

(Trigger warning, tech article on a website which is political news)

A new Breitbart/Gravis poll released Wednesday shows that more than two-thirds of registered voters oppose President Barack Obama’s surrender of control over the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to a multi-stakeholder group that includes foreign governments.

[breitbart.com...]

[graeme_p]

The US cannot expect to control global infrastructure indefinitely - it is not a satisfactory set up from anyone else's point of view. The US government is also a lot less trusted than it was few years ago.

Whether the new set up is a good one is another question - but I am not impressed with ICANN in recent years anyway.

[bill]

ICANN was already an international organization, and had been run by that organization for years. The US government connection had some oversight, but it wasn't like the US government ran the thing. This was just a contract that wasn't renewed if I understand it correctly. The whole "the US is ceding control of the Internet" angle seems to come from people who don't understand the organization or how the Internet works. They've got an agenda to push...

[graeme_p]

@bill, what is the agenda? Given what you say, is it essentially no change?

[bill]

The agenda seems to be to make this into some sort of political issue, as per the original article cited.