[Internal-cg] proposed summary of comment related to RZM

[Mueller, Milton L]

Here is my assessment of the RZM comments and how ICG should present them in its report. I've incorporated some of Joe's language, but feel that a much more detailed treatment of the issue is required.
--MM

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Multiple comments from a wide range of stakeholder groups expressed concern about the intersection of the NTIA-Verisign cooperative agreement and the ICG proposal.
In its March 2014 announcement of the transition, the NTIA said it would coordinate "a related and parallel transition" in the responsibilities related to the Verisign cooperative agreement. The NTIA's decision to coordinate those aspects of the transition means that many RZM issues are outside the remit of the names operational community proposal, and thus outside the remit of the ICG. While the ICG accepts that there are dependencies between the resolution of the RZM issues and the IANA transition, they were specifically excluded from our process.

At the same time, the NTIA itself has recognized that "aspects of the IANA functions contract are inextricably intertwined with the VeriSign cooperative agreement." Thus, it is difficult to assess the ICG proposal's impact on the security and stability of the DNS root without knowing how the cooperative agreement and the roles of Verisign and ICANN will be modified.

In mid-August 2015 NTIA published a proposal it had solicited from ICANN and Verisign regarding the Root Zone Administrator and Root Zone Maintainer roles. Most of the public commenters addressing the RZM issue felt that the ICANN-Verisign proposal, while unobjectionable in substantive terms, left many questions unanswered and/or raised concerns about the transparency and trustworthiness of the transition process. KIGA noted that "we would like to be assured that a new [RZM] arrangement will be established in consultation with the global multistakeholder community before the actual transition takes place." KIGA's concern was echoed by USCIB (81), CCAOI (69), ICANN GNSO Business Constituency (92), Internet Association (103), Public Knowledge (102), INTA (110), Centre for Communication Governance in India (113), Rishabh Dara (23) and others. Additionally, Nominet UK (47) asked that "the operational communities should now be requested to confirm that the Verisign/ICANN proposal on RZM meets their requirements," and two business groups want IGC to ask ICANN's Security and Stability Advisory Committee to review the ICANN-Verisign proposal.

A subset of commenters highlighted a concern related to separation of duties; specifically, the potential that ICANN may at some point take over some RZM functions.
The CWG proposal pertaining to root zone management cites as a "Principle" the following:

2) Control of Root Zone Management: Currently, updating the Root Zone requires the active participation of three parties: the IFO, the Root Zone Maintainer and the NTIA. ...Post transition there will only be the IFO and the Root Zone Maintainer. The CWG-Stewardship is not recommending any change in the functions performed by these two roles at this time. The CWG-Stewardship is recommending that should there be proposals to make changes in the roles associated with Root Zone modification, such proposals should be subject to wide community consultation."

The ICG observes that If the NTIA process does not permit wide community consultation on any changes in the RZM and IFO roles, there is a risk that support for the ICG proposal would deteriorate. The ICG calls attention to the comments of the Internet NZ (123) in this regard:

InternetNZ invites the ICG to consider whether the final transition proposal should do more to specify and clarify that this separation, which has been in place since before ICANN was formed, should continue for the foreseeable future - perhaps being encapsulated as a Fundamental Bylaw in ICANN's rules.

There is evidence that other ccTLD operators share this opinion and would reassess their support for the ICG proposal if it did not embody this principle.

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Dr. Milton L. Mueller
Professor, School of Public Policy
Georgia Institute of Technology


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