14 DAY TRIAL // In the wake of the NSA scandal and the unwanted consequences of the United States having so much control over the Internet, many have called for an end to the country’s rule over something that the entire world uses.
While no one really got their hopes up that this would actually happen, it looks like this may be exactly the next step. According to various reports, including from the Washington Post, the federal government will relinquish control over the administration of the Internet. This means that the contract between the Commerce Department and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a nonprofit group that coordinates the global Internet’s systems of unique identifiers, ensuring a stable and secure operation, will soon come to an end.
“We look forward to ICANN convening stakeholders across the global Internet community to craft an appropriate transition plan,” said Lawrence Strickling, assistant secretary of commerce for communications and information.
“We are inviting governments, the private sector, civil society, and other internet organizations from the whole world to join us in developing this transition process. All stakeholders deserve a voice in the management and governance of this global resource as equal partners,” said Fadi Chehadé, ICANN's president and CEO.
The reactions were quick to come and, as expected, some were happy with the changes and some were not.
For instance, the Senate Commerce Committee Chairman, John D. Rockefeller IV, said that the decision was in line with the United States’ efforts to make the Internet free and open. On the other hand, Newt Gingrich was not happy at all and questioned the global Internet community that Obama wanted to turn the Internet over to.
Of course, the sole idea that a single country has so much control over the Internet is what led to the entire problem in the first place, especially following the NSA scandal and how the agency unashamedly taps into the Internet cables to gain access to all passing data, among many other techniques.
The ideal Internet is free and this is why no government should have control over it, an idea that’s been said over and over again, including by the inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners Lee.
Garth Bruen, a security fellow at the Digital Citizens Alliance, an advocacy group, believes the United States’ decision to relinquish control over the Internet is a simple “political bone” thrown to the world.
To make sure that no other single government gets to have the same control of the Internet as the United States has had so far, Australia believes that the transition must be made to a multi-stakeholder model. At the same time, Malcolm Turnbull, Australian Communications Minister, endorsed the United States’ withdrawal from Internet control.
“The internet is the most remarkable invention of our times and while it had its origins in research contracts with the US government its growth, its dynamism, its resilience have all been the result of collaborative efforts by the wide internet community not government regulation or fiat,” Turnbull wrote in a blog post.
He also mentioned that there was a lot of work left to be done for ICANN.