No agreement on control of Web
The last preparatory meeting ahead of November's UN World Summit on the Information Society failed to reach an agreement on the control of the Internet. US representatives reiterated US intentions to retain the country's historical role as the medium's principal overseer, rejecting the EU proposal for a new cooperation model, which would involve governments in questions of naming, numbering and addressing on the Internet. The EU proposal represents a political shift from the Union's previous support of US pretensions to keep total control, and aims at unblocking the impasse provoked by the US' opposition to any compromise that addresses the demands of many countries, particularly developing ones, that no single country ought to have ultimate authority over such a vital part of the global economy. These countries wish to see a UN body to take over. The EU proposal is to create an intergovernmental body that would set principles for running the Internet. The UK Presidency of the EU explained that it was intended to help parties from both ends of the spectrum to reach agreement. A stalemate over who should serve as the principal traffic cops for Internet routing and addressing could derail the summit, which aims to ensure the fair sharing of the Internet for the benefit of the whole world. The EU proposal states that the role of governments in this new cooperation model should be mainly focused on issues of public policy, excluding any involvement in day-to-day operations, adding that the new model 'should not replace existing mechanisms or institutions'. The new model would also create procedures for changing the Internet's 'root zone file', the managers of country domains (such as .uk or .de), creating a new arbitration service for the Internet, and producing rules to cover the domain name system (DNS). It is the fact that the proposal leaves open the possibility that the United Nations could have some future governing role that is unpopular with the US. At stake is a new version of the current overseeing body ICANN and thus, an end to the US overall control of the DNS. This contentious debate dates back to the previous UN World Summit on the Information Society, in December 2003, when World leaders could not agree on a structure for Internet governance. A UN panel has recently recommended that no single country should dominate, and that a new global forum for governments, industry and others should be created for the discussion of key issues such as spam and cybercrime - areas not currently handled by ICANN. The US control stems from the country's role in creating Internet technology as a Pentagon project and funding much of its early development. But some countries have resented the fact that the United States, together with European countries that got connected first, hoarded most of the available addresses required for computers to connect, leaving developing nations with a limited supply to share. These countries also want greater assurance that as they come to rely on the Internet more for governmental and other services, their plans will not be derailed by any future US policy. David Gross, the State Department official in charge of the US' international communications policy, declared that the United States is 'deeply disappointed' with the European Union's proposal. The official argument is that such a system would lead to unwanted bureaucratisation of the Internet. Since 1998, ICANN has overseen the Internet's master directories, which tell Web browsers and e-mail programs how to direct traffic. Internet users around the world interact with them every day. ICANN is a private organisation with international board members, chosen by the US Commerce Department, which ultimately retains veto power.