By agreeing to transition its oversight of domain names and other Internet architecture aspects to the international community, the U.S. is taking a step in the right direction of global, open Internet governance, a spokesman for the secretary general of the United Nations has said.
The U.N. for the past 15 years has suggested that the U.S. Commerce Department relinquish its position overseeing sales and agreements of Web domains like .com or .org, including at the 2005 World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Tunis which supported a "multi-stakeholder (global) model of Internet governance."
"The Secretary-General takes note of this important development (and) encourages government, intergovernmental organizations, civil society, the private sector and the Internet technical community to engage in furthering the process to ensure a single, open, free, secure and trustworthy Internet," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in a U.N. News Centre press release.
The move also received support from the ITU, whose secretary-general Hamadoun Toure said "the Internet is a global public good and therefore all nations and people should have an equal say in its running and development. This development will lead to improved and productive cooperation between the telecommunications and Internet communities" and is a step in ensuring "a more equitable and accessible Internet for all."
For more:
- see this United Nations press release
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