2016-05-20

IANA & ICANN: Cruz, Lankford & Lee Letter to Pritzker & Strickling

Senate Commerce Hearing on ICANN & IANA Transition, LIVE, Tuesday, May 24 at 10am ET

Embedded below is U.S. Senators Cruz, Lankford & Lee's May 19th letter to U.S. Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and NTIA's Larry Strickling concerning the IANA Stewardship Transition proposal currently under review by NTIA.

The letter touches on several hot-button issues, including:
  • endangerment of internet freedom;
  • power of foreign governments over the internet under the proposal;
  • opening the door to regulation of internet content;
  • transfer of U.S. government property issues;
  • ICANN's U.S. jurisdiction subject to change after the transition;
  • an unaccountable ICANN Board of Directors;
  • ICANN ex-CEO Fadi Chehade's failure to respond to specific questions about his involvement with the Chinese government's World Internet Conference;
  • other issues unaddressed by the proposal, including future of .mil and .gov TLDs, ICANN's antitrust status, ICANN's potential to "impose global taxes" without U.S. government oversight;
and the letter concludes: "In light of all these concerns and the magnitude of the potential consequences, we respectfully request that you extend NTIA's IANA functions contract with ICANN."



See also on Domain Mondo:




DISCLAIMER

Domain Mondo archive