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Note to my loved ones: When I have discarded this mortal coil, please feel under no obligation to put cheesy seasonal decorations around my gravestone. Wherever I end up, I have passed beyond all interest in tinsel, foil and plastic fake trees.
Thanks for understanding.
(Seen at Mountain View Cemetary, Oakland.)
Listed below are the top ten most popular news, blogs, and industry updates featured on CircleID in 2011 based on the overall readership of the posts for the year. Congratulations to all the participants whose posts reached top readership and best wishes to the entire community for 2012. Happy New Year!
Top 10 Featured Blogs in 2011:
Top 10 News in 2011:
Top 10 Industry News in 2011 (sponsored posts):
Written by CircleID Reporter
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More under: Access Providers, Broadband, DNS, DNSSEC, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, IP Addressing, IPv6, Law, Malware, Mobile, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
The debate continues as to whether ISP's can effectively filter DNS results in order to protect brand and copyright holders from online infringement. It's noteworthy that there is no argument as to whether these rights holders and their properties deserve protection — nobody is saying "content wants to be free" and there is general agreement that it is harder to protect rights in the Internet era where perfect copies of can be made and distributed instantaneously. What we're debating now is just whether controlling DNS at the ISP level would work at all and whether the attempt to insert such controls would damage Secure DNS (sometimes called DNSSEC).
After I finished reading this op-ed, I began to see that there is not a clear understanding among DNS laymen as to the difference between "end to end" and "hop by hop" signaling systems. I hope to illuminate this difference and its relevance to the policy debate about DNS controls as contemplated by the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). I will use the story of DNSSEC's treatment of NXDOMAIN as an illustrative example. My goal is to move the underlying debate forward to a new stage where the questions being debated are respectful of both the laws of physics and the rules of the DNSSEC protocol.
DNSSEC is an "end to end" system, where digital signatures are applied to DNS data by the originator of that data — who is the owner of the DNS name. So, only the United States Government (USG) can authoritatively state that the Internet address of INTERWEB.NIC.MIL is 207.132.116.20, because only USG and its contractors possess the private signing key that is known used by NIC.MIL. If any ISP who carries this DNS information decides to modify it in any way, then the digital signature will be wrong. Any DNSSEC capable name server or web browser would discard the modified DNS information because its digital signature would not match the signing key for NIC.MIL. Similarly, any DNS answer that arrives without any digital signature at all would also be discarded, since the receiving DNS server or web browser would know that NIC.MIL is signed and so would have to assume that any unsigned response is a "man in the middle" attack of the kind popularized by Dan Kaminsky in 2008.
DNS has several possible response codes, of which two (0 for "success" and 3 for "name error") are end to end, meaning that they are assertions which can only be made by the owner of a name. To secure the DNS it was necessary to add digital signatures for both of these response codes. Continuing from the above example, only USG and its contractors possess the signing key needed to authoritatively state that FOO.BAR.MIL does not exist. If any ISP between the USG name servers for ".MIL" and the end user's name server or web browser modifies a response to assert that something does not exist when it actually does exist, then this modification will be detectible by the absence of a digital signature, or by the presence of an invalid digital signature. There is just no way for intermediaries to successfully insert lies into the DNS data stream once DNSSEC is in use.
The other DNS response codes, such as 1 for "format error", 2 for "server failure", 4 for "not implemented", and 5 for "refused", are "hop by hop" codes. They tell an end user's name server or web browser nothing about the name they are looking up. Rather, these codes are statements about the name server itself. Because digital signing keys are associated with domain names and not with name servers, none of these other response codes is secured by DNSSEC. So, when an end user's name server or web browser receives a DNS message containing one of these response codes, there's a viable possibility that the message was generated by an attacker — a "man in the middle". Secure systems including both DNSSEC itself as well as any applications based on DNSSEC will necessarily ignore these unsigned responses or else they would be susceptible to a "downgrade attack". If a banking application is trying to start up in its most secure mode and sees a "NOTIMP" or "REFUSED" response, its reaction will be to try other name servers hoping to find one that is not broken in the same way. Failures and attacks have an identical appearance to a properly secured system.
It may be possible to design "hop by hop" security into DNSSEC. However, this was not a development goal during the major DNSSEC development effort from 1996 to 2009. Doubtless there are strong governments around the world who would like to be able to modify DNS data in flight without triggering any suspicion by their end user citizens or by secure applications. It is not too late for such governments to form a work party for these features and to offer their detailed design to the the IETF for consideration in a future edition of the DNSSEC protocol, and if successful, work to incorporate these new features into the Internet's operating DNS. Until and unless that is done, DNSSEC will remain tamper-proof.
It would be ignorant and wrong-headed to codify in law a requirement that hop by hop security features be used before there is proof that these features can be defined and deployed in what is today an end to end security system.
Written by Paul Vixie, Chairman and Chief Scientist, Internet Systems Consortium
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More under: Censorship, DNS, DNSSEC, Domain Names, Law, Policy & Regulation
For the last day of the year, my cousins had the brilliant idea to do a casual, 5 mile "fun run" from Crissy Field to the Golden Gate Bridge and back. It was a gorgeous Bay Area winter morning, in the mid-50s, sunny, windless and clear. Folks were out jogging, biking, walking their dogs and taking pictures. A perfect running day.
The run itself was mostly on packed dirt, passing by beautiful views of the city and the Bay. I hardly noticed the effort as we chatted and admired the scenery on the way. Before I knew I, was at the foot of the bridge, touching "Hoppers Hands."
After the jump is a 3D flyover of our route, if you'd like to do it yourself, either as a stroll, a bike or a run...
3D Flyover of Golden Gate Bridge Run , from iMapMyRun <a href=" [www.mapmyfitness.com] _mce_href=" [www.mapmyfitness.com] mi Run in San Francisco on Dec 31, 2011 11:09 AM</a> and more routes in San Francisco, CA on MapMyFITNESS. <a href=" [www.mapmyfitness.com"] _mce_href=" [www.mapmyfitness.com">Find] route</a>After our run, we treated ourselves to a decadent brunch in the Marina, at the Eastside West cafe. I splurged on a calorie-ific French Toast / bread pudding concoction that was amazing -- although the eggs benedict on other people's plates looked great too.
Sitting in the sunshine, sipping mimosas and bloody mary's, snacking on bruchetta and fried calamari, we toasted in the new year. We should do this every New Year's Eve. So perfect.
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| Image via Wikipedia |
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| Courtesy Rabab Khan's blog here. |
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| Image courtesy of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Official party website here. |
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| Image courtesy Teeth Maestro's Blog here. |
Here's one of my favorite video clips from 2011 -- the world's best lindy hop troupe, the Harlem Hotshots, performing at the largest swing dance camp in the world, the Herrang Dance Camp. Sadly, I missed this performance by a week or so when I was there. Still this is some ridiculously badass dancing.
The year 2011 was a fun year for swing and lindy hop. Here are some of my favorite video clips from the past twelve months I wanted to share with you.
Best Classic Routine: Thomas Blacharz and Alice Mei at ILHCMy friend Letta Mercurial turned me on this clip of Thomas and Alice of France dancing the classic division at ILHC. Lots to notice about the video: the overall grace and style of their movement (particularly Alice), the wonderful choreography that hits lots of great moments in the song, the brilliant "shim sham" section, and the false ending. Really great stuff. How did they just get third place?
Favorite Comp Footage: Solo Charleston Competition at ILHC
I love how joyful and spontaneous everyone's movements are in this solo charleston competition at ILHC. Solo Charleston is one of the best things to happen to lindy hop in recent years, allowing individual dancers to shine, preserving and innovating on traditional jazz steps.
Most Elegant: Naomi and Peter's Classic Routine at ILHC
Naomi Uyama and Peter Strom shows how to do a romantic, elegant lindy hop routine, that still manages to be energetic and entertaining.
Best "The Swing" Video: Learn the East Coast Swing
There was a goldmine of painful, but somehow entertaining "The Swing" dancing that we watched this year. But none delighted me as much as this east coast swing instructional video. Everything about it , from the music choice, to the costumes to the cheesy choreography was a complete delight.
Best Advertising: 100 Years of Style
There were a number of ads that featured swing dance in 2011 (See Ford commercial and Simply Western biotech ad). But my favorite was this commercial for a London shopping mall featuring two very talented dancers wearing a huge range of beautiful outfits and dancing in several dance styles. Excellent editing and choice of costumes.
Most Memerific: Super Mario Lindy Routine
Yehoodi frequent contribute Captain Morgan and his partner Emily hit the high score with this awesome Super Mario Brothers homage that was a big hit on the interwebs, featured everywhere from Reddit to G4TV to CBS News.
Best Music Video: "Two Cousins"
There were some excellent music videos in 2011 that featured lindy hop, including the beautifully animated "", the dancer-produced "Black Coffee" video and the Charleston club mix. But none of them match the artistry, fantastic dancing, and cinematography of the "Two Cousins" music video, for the band Slow Club. Ryan Francois and Remy Kouame are just beautiful to watch in slo-mo, in a loving homage to Al Minns and Leon James.
Funniest Routine: Andrew and Karen's Showcase Routine at Lindy Focus
Okay, technically this was done in December 2010, but I saw it in January. Anyway, this still reigns as the funniest and best homage to late 1990s era lindy from the king and queen of swing silliness, Andrew Thigpen and Karen Turman. I laugh every damn time I watch it.
I was reading in the Canadian Lawyer Mag that businesses in Canada are now coming to grips with the Canadian Antispam law that was passed last year.
Canada's antispam law is much tougher than most jurisdictions. Aside from the penalties of the law, which are steep, what differentiates it the most from the US law is that Canada's law is an opt-in law; marketers who send commercial email must be able to demonstrate that they received consent in writing in order to market to people. It also allows for the international sharing of information and evidence to pursue spammers outside of Canada. You can view the summary here: Industry Canada summary of bill C-28.
As expected, people who are most affected by the law — marketers — are upset about the lack of wriggle room and how it could affect their business. From the Canadian lawyer mag:
"This legislation has quite a broad scope and it will capture many regular business operations by legitimate operators, so in-house counsel are starting to realize that this imposes additional requirements that they're going to need to take into account."
"The problem is since the regulations haven't been finalized, we can't put in place the final processes, training, and implementation plans."
"Unfortunately, when the draft regulations came out, frankly they didn't do anything about the concerns that industry mentioned about the scope of the legislation itself."
"Companies are put in a position where they have to go out and re-qualify their entire database."
In other words, companies thought that the antispam law went too far because they are used to sending out email without getting explicit consent from the people they email.
The fact of the matter is that it's not all that difficult to build a list by consent. Double opt-in (where you get people to click a box saying that they want to opt-in, and then send them email to click the link to confirm) is the easiest way to do it. Single opt-in is the second easiest.
The reason that some companies would complain about the broadness of scope of the law — which is intended to target spammers — is because a lot of companies buy email marketing lists from other parties. When someone says "We may use your information to sell to other partners," this is a quick-and-easy way of building a mailing list. The CASL negates this practice, which was never ethical to begin with.
Yet the most interesting quote of all is the following:
Michael Osborne, a partner at Affleck Greene McMurtry LLP, says the tumult around CASL is unlikely to end with its coming into force. He calls the legislation Canada's "biggest restraint ever on freedom of speech" and says he expects various provisions to be challenged in court. "If I want to send a flyer to your house, I can do it. That's part of the trade-off for living in a free economy, and I don't see why e-mail would be any different. I don't like getting junk at my door or in my inbox, but if I want to live in a free economy, I think I have to accept that," Osborne says.
The comments above are puzzling because I don't think anyone actually thinks legislation against spam infringes on freedom of speech, they have a weird view of it. Freedom of speech guarantees that you can communicate your message but it does not mean that others have to listen to it. People in the US have challenged antispam laws, claiming it violates their freedom of speech but courts have never supported this argument.
But the real puzzling part is the bolded text above. It's true, if you want to send me a flyer, you can. But this is not the same as email because if you want to send flyers, you have to pay the postage, and you have to pay for creation of the flyer. You only have limited resources and so you are careful about it. With email, the cost of it is borne by the recipient. It is almost as easy as it is for you to send 100,000 messages as it is to send 100. It is your recipient who has to deal with the cost of network storage of bandwidth.
We view our email inboxes as an extension of our homes. You can deliver a message to my mailbox but you cannot come into my home and force me to listen to it. I have a right to privacy and unsolicited email violates that. I guess this is getting into Constitutional arguments now (and I am poorly equipped to expound upon them).
The fact is that flyers and email are not the same. They are quite different. That's why computers are so great, you can do so much more with much less input.
Sometimes lawyers say the weirdest things.
Written by Terry Zink, Program Manager
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More under: Law, Policy & Regulation, Spam
ICANN will not delay the launch of its much anticipated program to create hundreds, possibly thousands, of new Internet extensions, nor run a limited ‘pilot program’, as reported today by Kieren McCarthy of .Nxt. "Steve Crocker [ICANN's chairman] admitted that the organization’s Board will be holding a special meeting in the first week of January and that the meeting’s focus will be the launch of the new gTLD program the following week." However that meeting will not consider a delay or limited rollout option.
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Top-Level Domains
It took me just 42 years, but I can finally do cartwheels. It's never too late to learn something new.
ICANN's plan to open up the domain name space to new top level domains is scheduled to begin January 12, 2012. This long overdue implementation is the result of an open process that began in 2006. It would, in fact, be more realistic to say that the decision has been in the works 15 years; i.e., since early 1997. That is when demand for new top-level domain names, and the need for other policy decisions regarding the coordination of the domain name system, made it clear that a new institutional framework had to be created. ICANN was the progressive and innovative U.S. response to that need. It was created to become a nongovernmental, independent, truly global and representative policy development authority.
The result has been far from perfect, but human institutions never are. Over the past 15 years, every stakeholder with a serious interest in the issue of top level domains has had multiple opportunities to make their voice heard and to shape the policy. The resulting new gTLD policy reflects that diversity and complexity. From our point of view, it is too regulatory, too costly, and makes too many concessions to content regulators and trademark holders. But delay is only going to make it worse. Stopping now disrupts the compromises that came out of the process which enabled movement forward after a long period of stagnation and artificial scarcity.
Now there is a cynical, illegitimate last-second push by a few corporate interests in the United States to derail that process. The arguments put forward by these interests are not new; they are the same anti-new TLD arguments that have been made since 1997, and the concerns expressed are all addressed in one way or another by the policies ICANN has developed. What is new is that U.S. corporate trademark interests are openly admitting that their participation in the ICANN process has been in bad faith all along. Despite the multiple concessions and numerous re-dos that these interests managed to extract over the past 6 years, they are now demanding that everything grind to a halt because they didn't get exactly what they demanded, as if no other interests and concerns mattered and no other stakeholders exist. What they wanted, in fact, was simply to freeze the status quo of 1996 into place forever, so that there would be no new competition, no new entrepreneurial opportunities, no linguistic diversification, nothing that would have the potential to cause them any problems.
That group's demands must be rebuffed, unambiguously and finally. ICANN must start implementing the new TLD program on January 12 as scheduled. It must keep its promise to those who participated in its processes in good faith.
To its everlasting credit, the U.S. Commerce Department, the official governmental contractor and supervisor of ICANN, has not caved in to the cynical corporate obstructionism. They realize what is at stake. Assistant Secretary of Commerce Lawrence Strickling is responsible and intelligent enough to understand what an unmitigated disaster it would be to pull the plug on 15 years of work. Strickling, unlike the more political Senator, knows that the stakes here go well beyond the merits or de-merits of new top level domains. Any move to delay or pull back on the start date of the new TLD program is an admission that ICANN does not really make the basic policy decisions regarding the global domain name system. It is an admission that ICANN itself is a failure. That throws us straight back to 1997, re-opening all the instability and turmoil that we have tried to resolve by the creation of a new global governance institution.
If ICANN blinks, if it deviates from or delays its agreed and hard-fought policy in the slightest way, the coup d'etat succeeds. Everyone in the world then concludes that a few corporate interests in the United States hold veto power over the policies of the Internet's domain name system. Imagine the centrifugal forces that are unleashed as a result. Imagine the impact in Russia, China, Brazil, India, South Africa, and even the EU, when they are told in no uncertain terms that ICANN's policy making is hostage to the whims of a few well-placed, narrowly focused U.S. business interests; that they can invest thousands of person-hours and resources to working in that framework only to see the rug pulled out from under them by a campaign by the ANA and an editorial by the New York Times. The entire institutional infrastructure we have spent 15 years trying to build will be drained of its life.
Of course no one is perfectly happy with the new TLD program. But no one should be wildly irrational enough to assume that they can have exactly what they want and that the whole process should be stopped until they get it. Any modification to the DNS involves millions of stakeholders and dozens of conflicting interest groups. Without question, we have reached the point where satisfying one group more, will satisfy other groups less. The idea that the basic conflicts of interest at the heart of this controversy will magically vanish if we delay things is worse than naïve, it shows a pathological misunderstanding of social process. To delay now is to give one, very narrow interest group exactly what it wants (no new TLDs) and everyone else nothing. That is a far worse solution than ICANN's flawed but workable program.
ICANN needs to make a statement that it is going forward on January 12. It must strongly reaffirm its ability to deliver on the promise of a nongovernmental, multistakeholder, global governance institution. It should celebrate the opening of its application period. It should throw a big party. Delaying the decision, as Senator Rockefeller requests, will not change the political conflicts at issue one bit, or make the policy any better; it will simply face the same requests for obstruction or delay months or years down the road. Bite the bullet and get it done.
Written by Milton Mueller, Professor, Syracuse University School of Information Studies
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More under: Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
Based on the total number of transactions, Zscaler reports botnets as the biggest security risk on the Internet for the enterprises. "Once a host gets infected, the botnet usually spreads quickly within an enterprise. It also generates a significant amount of traffic to the command and control server, to download additional malware or perform other actions."
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More under: Cyberattack, Malware, Security
Here's a super cute picture of my dance crew , wishing you a very funky, happy New Year!
I hope everyone had a lovely holiday, full of loved ones and yummy food. The Santos clan gathered at the home of my Auntie Gloria and Uncle Andy in Hercules, CA. It was a good crowd of about 30-some folks, each of them bringing boatloads of food and drink to the affair. That's lasagna, beef with broccoli, potato au gratin, shrimp, corn pudding, pancit palabok noodles, fried dili fish, salsa and salmon on the table. Not pictured is the roast beef, ham, sotanhon soup, and chicken curry.
Did I mention dessert? My cousin Rafael of course always does an amazing job making desserts. This year he made these delicious red velvet cake lollipops that he placed on a little Christmas tree. Almost too good to eat... but of course I ate about four of them.
We also had several cheesecakes, various cookies, rice crispy treats, pie, and desserts that I've already forgotten.
Besides eating, we had of course lots of gift giving. Each of the kids got their own stockings that everyone filled with small presents like crayons, candy, and small dolls and action figures. Here's my mom surrounded by some of the youngsters thanking her for giving them the gift that keeps on giving: CASH.
The adults did our now infamous gift exchange, which this year was around the theme of "Buying Local." There was some complaining about how hard this was, but there were several creative and fun presents on the pile, including chocolates, olive oil, bath salts and soaps, a salon gift certificate, a local restaurant gift certificate, and a wooden necklace in Philippine flag colors (which I got.)
Here's one of our guests Ruby trying hard to decide which gift to pick.
I really liked the wooden necklace I got, which will look swell displayed in my home somewhere.
Here's a few more pics from our celebration.
My sis, mom and me.
The cousins (minus Rosanne.)
My sister and I in tacky Christmas sweaters.
Good times with the fam!
For email usage, abuse reporting requires cooperation between senders and receivers. That's why RFC 5965 specified a standard format for it. However, Wikipedia lists only today. It is often said that the number of legitimate mailbox providers in the world is rather small, possibly some hundreds of thousands, but certainly more than that.
Abuse-POC, a.k.a. abuse-c or abuse-mailbox entries are the subject of ongoing developments at AfriNIC, APNIC, ARIN, LACNIC, and RIPE. It may take a while for Regional Registries to converge and complete their work. Abusix.org offers an Abuse Contact DB that can be queried via DNS, until then.
Some network providers allow clients to specify abuse-mailboxes along with other contact info, while others don't. They don't seem to be striving to act as the Internet police. They operate according to their commercial policies, albeit they try and comply with local laws. Thus, mailbox providers don't always have full control on what gets published on the number databases, independently of their behavior.
On the other hand, the DNS was conceived to avoid reliance on numbers and use names instead. The advent of IPv6 may exacerbate that principle. Techniques like DKIM and SPF allow to associate a domain name to a mail message. Such techniques are mature enough to yield results that are more reliable than those supplied by rDNS, which suffers the same limitations of control as number databases. However, there is no standard way to learn whether a domain offers a feedback loop, or what is the email address to be used for (automated) abuse reports. The only hint is abuse@domain, as specified by RFC 2142, which can be deemed heuristic at best. (Contrast that with the fact that abuse-c seems to be going to be mandatory, and that providing false contact data may lead to deregistration of IP blocks, at least at some RIRs.) Abuse.net offers a name-to-abuse-mailbox functionality, but there is no prospect similar to the number case, yet.
There is an IETF working group,
the same that standardized the ARF format, that might make some decisions about standardizing such reporting-discovery functionality. However, the working group experienced a drop of participants recently, for various causes. The likelihood that it will complete its work is getting lower and lower, unless new people will want to review its drafts and post comments on its mailing list. If this is a call for participation, you have been called!
Written by Alessandro Vesely, Tiny ISP and freelance programmer
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More under: Registry Services, Email, Spam
An interesting new paper from the Naval Postgraduate School (paper here, conference slides here) describes what appears to be an interesting new twist on spam filtering, looking at the characteristics of the TCP session through which the mail is delivered.
They observe that bots typically live on cable or DSL connections with slow congested upstreams. TCP sessions from bots turn out to be fairly easy to recognize by RTT, window, and retransmits, something that people have known at least since a paper at the 2008 CEAS conference on the topic.
This paper tries to see whether it would be practical to use that info to manage spam in real time. They have a network analyzer called SpamFlow that figures out per-connection characteristics. Then as a proof of concept they wrote a Spamassassin plugin to train on the data from SpamFlow and try and do filtering. They do some sort of hand-wavey load testing to see whether SpamFlow can keep up with a realistic mail load, and if it trains fast enough that it would provide useful data in real time. They claim that their results show that it does both.
It's not obvious how best you would use this in combination with all of the other anti-spam tools people we have, most notably blacklists like the CBL that very accurately identify IPs of botted hosts by looking at the characteristics of mail received at large spamtraps. One thing that occurs to me is this sort of thing might be useful if mail moves to IPv6, since building v6 blacklists will be hard due to the size of the address space, while this lets you estimate the bottiness of each connection directly. Also, rather than accepting or rejecting mail, you might slow down mail reception from hosts that seem to be bots, both to give preference to non-bot senders, and because bots tend to be impatient so if you slow down a dubious connection and it gives up, it was probably a bot. The Turntide appliance did something similar five years ago, although it used different heuristics for deciding what to slow down.
This technique looks only at the characteristics of the TCP session, and not at the contents of the session, which means it also doesn't look at the contents of the messages. It might be useful in contexts where for legal or political reasons the spam filter isn't allowed to look at the messages, but users want spam filtering anyway. The authors point out that it is in principle applicable to any TCP transaction, so it might be useful against web queries from bots, too.
It's hardly a FUSSP, but it's an interesting paper.
Written by John Levine, Author, Consultant & Speaker
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More under: Internet Protocol, IPv6, Spam
I probably should have done this a long time ago, but on December 29 I'm moving my web domains from the domain name registrar Godaddy.com to another service.
I probably should have done it awhile ago. Godaddy has tacky, sexist advertising. The CEO enjoys killing elephant for sport. And finally earlier this month, they announced their support for the SOPA legislation that threatens the underlying structure of the internet. WTF?
Reddit user "selfprodigy" started by ball rolling on December 23 by pledging to move 51 of his domains from Godaddy until they express their opposition to SOPA. He also suggested that others do the same on December 29, i.e. "Move Your Domain Day." The opposition has grown and grown, with even Wikipedia moving their domains.
So I'm going to do my little bit as well. If you'd like to do the same, here's some info on how to move your domain and where you can go to publicly pledge your opposition to Godaddy's support of SOPA.
Realizing the Dream of a Knowledge Economy
2011 has been a significant year for the technology sector globally. Information technology is touching more people in more ways than ever before.
Developed markets will be considering a 2012 in which business innovation, competitiveness, and service differentiation are built on ubiquitous broadband, cloud computing, smarter mobile computing, and an increasing plethora of Internet-connected devices. By contrast, securing the technology future for developing markets demands that attention be placed on more fundamental issues.
Here are five key tech issues for the emerging markets in 2012.
Internet Infrastructure
The build-out of critical Internet infrastructure is critical to economic diversification and sustainable development. Initiatives to improve routing of domestic Internet traffic and provide new, more optimal routes for regional Internet traffic must be accelerated through the build-out of Internet exchange points (IXPs). One top of the exchange points must come expanded terrestrial and mobile broadband networks.
Implications: Internet service providers (ISPs), governments, and businesses must work together for a faster roll-out of national and regional infrastructure. This is the key to unleashing ICT-based innovations and spurring the market for digital content and mobile service delivery.
Incentive Regulation
The agenda for infrastructure development must be guided by informed government policy. This is particularly crucial in smaller economies where market size does not present sufficient incentive for private sector investment. Incentive regulation to improve the current weak frameworks for stimulating growth and protecting consumer interest in the ICT sector will be demanded by the private sector. At the same time, governments will increasingly recognize that national benefits of ICT-enabled growth are too important to leave to the private sector to set the implementation agenda. More stakeholders will call for ICT adoption to be set within a wider context of national development.
Implications: Regulators have to adapt more quickly to technology changes. They must take the lead in ensuring that market forces align to social development objectives. Done well, this can translate to increased business innovation, improved delivery of government services, and greater consumer choice.
Cybersecurity
Cybercrime will increasingly challenge resource-constrained businesses and governments. Businesses, especially those with large, high-value networks, like financial services providers and energy companies, will require greater support cover not just nationally but regionally. A coordinated approach is critical to guiding national action and ensuring consistency and compatibility of action among nations. If regional governments are to secure their information and communications systems, identifying and investing in a central point of coordination for cybersecurity must be a top priority.
Implications: Governments must put aside petty internal and intra-regional differences and cooperate fully to ensure that cybercrime does not disrupt already fragile local economies and markets.
Mobile Phones, Mobile Apps, Mobile Services
Growth in mobile computing uptake and the availability of mobile apps that address local needs will continue. It will be driven by consumer-focused apps, but eventually business apps will catch on. As smartphones proliferate and mobile providers upgrade their networks to provide customers with faster mobile broadband access, software developers will have greater incentive to build apps. The improved user experience resulting from faster mobile data plans means that consumers will also have greater interest and incentive to use mobile apps and services.
Implications: The education sector must evolve to supply the human resources needed to support, not only the creation of digital content, but the development of new, digitally driven innovation and enterprises. This will create opportunity in the private and NGO sectors for training and capacity building beyond the traditional approaches.
Open Data
As governments increasingly recognize the potential of open data, they will move to make their datasets publicly accessible. Progressive administrations will seize the opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to transparency and accountability. Of course, they will also benefit by shortening the timeframe of new service roll-out and shifting the burden to innovators and entrepreneurs.
Implications: A huge opportunity has opened for entrepreneurs, researchers, and society. More public awareness is needed to stimulate innovation, collaboration and, most important, more efficient, personalized services for citizens.
Onward to 2012
There is wide recognition of the value of building knowledge-based economies and of investing in technology-driven systems. These are fundamental to economic and national development. There is also no denying that the technology revolution is exposing antiquated infrastructure and institutional processes; testing the philosophy and approach to education; highlighting the imperative for new approaches to human resource development; and creating new, strategic challenges for business, education, and political leaders alike.
Advances in technology have exacerbated the vulnerability of states to externally developed and controlled intellectual capital. The central role of information and communications technology in modern society amplifies the debate on priority and significance of deliberately cultivating and securing indigenous intellectual capital.
From all indications, 2012 will be a continuation of the positive trends and innovations that gained momentum in 2011. The most forward-thinking, innovative organizations will continue to adopt and deploy technologies to improve efficiencies and better engage customers and citizens.
In 2012, these developments in emerging markets will require strong, ethical leadership to ensure that investment in technology is matched by commitment to equitable social development.
Written by Bevil Wooding, Internet Strategist, Packet Clearing House
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More under: Access Providers, Broadband, Cloud Computing, Cybercrime, Internet Governance, Mobile, Policy & Regulation, Security, Telecom, Web, Wireless
Just under the wire, here is my 2011 Year End Holiday Greeting, for all of my friends and family who made this year so awesome. I hope you enjoy it. Happy Holidays!
My friend Swifty sent me the exciting news that the "grey lady" of journalism, the New York Times, has done a great writeup of the local swing scene in New York, with prominent mentions of Yehoodi.com and our Frim Fram Jam Thursday night dance! This is definitely one of the most prominent media mentions of Yehoodi ever in our history!
I love this description of Fram and quote from Swifty:
At the intergenerational Frim Fram Jam in early December, energy surged through the room when Gordon Walker’s cover of the Andrews Sisters’ hit “Bei Mir Bist Du Schön” went on the turntable at 10:25 p.m., by which time people had been dancing strenuously for more than two hours. From his booth, the D.J. and Yehoodi music organizer Ryan Swift noted the fresh excitement. “Man, I feel old,” said Mr. Swift, who is 34. “There are plenty of kids here, but look at some of these old folks dance.”
Head here to read the whole story, from the December 23, 2011 Edition of the Times, in the Dance section!
Before anyone claims victory for the consumer in AT&T's abandonment of its "swinging for the fence" gambit to buy T-Mobile's market share and spectrum, consider what did not make many headlines this week. Both AT&T and Verizon substantially shored up their spectrum stocks with major deals with Qualcomm and several cable companies respectively.
Solid hits for both carriers: not homeruns, but very strategic singles and doubles.
What results from these deals? Well on the positive side the two major carriers have more spectrum to satisfy consumer demand. On the negative side this spectrum initially was acquired by companies that offered the prospect for more competition. The competition will not occur, so the incumbents have even less downward rate pressure and the incentive to innovate.
No one has convinced me that the wireless marketplace in the United States has too many carriers and too much competition. Quite the contrary. But no carrier wants to compete with two "too big to fail" giants who have the customer base and spectrum to make quite costly competitive market entry, or even competition by existing carriers. These barriers to entry solidify incumbent market dominance, something the FCC could have prevented if it had reserved spectrum for new carriers and nondominant existing carriers.
This would not "promote competition for competition's sake." Instead it would enable sustainable competition to flourish in much the same way that airport authorities do not allow one or two airlines to capture all the landing slots. Airport authorities have learned the hard way that allowing one carrier to dominate results in higher prices. While price sensitive customers can vote with their dollars and take alternative transport, or drive to another airport, wireless subscribers have limited options.
Might a further consolidation of spectrum — the functional equivalent of landing slots — result in higher prices in the "robustly competitive" U.S. wireless marketplace?
Written by Rob Frieden, Pioneers Chair and Professor of Telecommunications and Law
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Nearly five million domain names were added to the Internet in the third quarter of 2011, bringing the total number of registered domain names to nearly 220 million worldwide across all domains, according to the latest Domain Name Industry Brief, published by VeriSign, Inc.
According to the report, the increase of 4.9 million domain names results in a 2.3 percent growth rate over the second quarter of 2011, and marks the third straight quarter with greater than 2 percent growth. The overall growth so far for 2011 has been 4.5 million domain names in the first quarter (a 2.2 percent increase) and 5.2 million domain names in the second quarter (a 2.5 percent increase).
The report also focuses on ICANN's plan for the introduction of new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) and the understanding of various categories, as well as their possible impact. These gTLD categories are recognized as: .Brand, .Community, .Geo, .IDN, .Industry, .Travel, .Interest, and .Service.
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, Top-Level Domains
As you read this, please keep in mind that I say it all with a track record nearly 14 years of being proactive and having a zero-tolerance policy toward criminal activity and network abuse on our system. We have great relationships with Law Enforcement Agencies both here in Canada and abroad. We are always helpful and (usually) happy to answer questions, and help LEA understand the complexities and nuances of the internet. We've had the good fortune to meet some really intelligent and clued in cybercrime units. We participate in numerous communities in combating net.abuse and cybercrime.
I finally got around to reading the text of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) today. While the ostensible intentions are to combat online piracy and the sale of counterfeit goods, the bad news is that the legislation contains elements which basically puts every single domain registered under generic TLDs under the authority of the United States Attorney General.
We have already seen in cases if the ICE domain seizures, improper takedowns and overreach resulting in the takedown of tens of thousands of websites when a single one was the target.
How does this affect you?
Our objections to SOPA are very similar to our objections to Verisign's recent proposal which contained overly broad takedown powers and could be used to assert US law (and "requests") on all domain holders internationally.
We consider SOPA far more pernicious because it is possibly to become US law, rather than a policy implemented by a private company (albeit one that holds a monopoly on large tracts of internet namespace).
SOPA differentiates between "domestic" and "foreign" domain names, but the definition of "domestic" basically includes all domains registered under any of the gTLDs (generic Top Level Domains), because their respective Registry operators are US-based entities:
(3) DOMESTIC DOMAIN NAME- The term `domestic domain name' means a domain name that is registered or assigned by a domain name registrar, domain name registry, or other domain name registration authority, that is located within a judicial district of the United States.
All domains under .com, .net, .org, and .biz are "assigned by" a domain name registry in the United States. Verisign, Public Interest Registry and Neustar respectively. Afilias is incorporated in Ireland, however they are operationally in the US. And at the end of the day, all domain names exist in namespaces assigned by ICANN, which is a California corporation.
So basically this means everything. Any domain, any TLD, anywhere, can be cutoff at the knees by the US Attorney General issuing a court order against a service provider, registrar or registry. (Although they may find it more difficult to assert beyond the generic TLDs. ICANN cannot for example, operationally takedown a domain inside some given ccTLD, the way Verisign or some other gTLD registry could simply yank any domain's nameserver records out of the rootzones.)
Perhaps for the scope of this discussion, only gTLDs are at risk. This means you can probably ignore all of this unless your domain is under com/net/org/biz/info, or you use a US-based registrar, service provider or your website is ever visited by anybody from the United States.
Where This Is Going.
If this becomes law, it's a short stretch from SOPA to NODA (No Online Dissent Anywhere) and if you think I'm a nutcase for saying so, I'd like to remind everybody what happened just over a year ago, when US politicians were tripping over themselves to shut down wikileaks (a royal fiasco in which this company was embroiled) and to this day, they have not been charged with a crime anywhere.
Many of the "dirty tricks" employed against Wikileaks would be enshrined on law under SOPA (and someday, NODA):
And they added an extra provision that it will be an offense to knowingly create a service or system to provide a workaround to a banned domain or host. So for example, they would no longer have to hassle Mozilla to remove that firefox plugin that let's you reach ICE blocked websites, it would be illegal to make it or distribute it.
While this is an Online Piracy law, it already contains additional "enhancements" under Title 2: Additional Enhancements to Combat Intellectual Property Theft:, namely:
Where All This Ends
Even if ICANN is officially against SOPA (Former chairman Vint Cerf wrote a good letter opposing it), failure on ICANN's part to oppose SOPA would mean catastrophic failure in their mission of overseeing the namespace to the benefit of all stakeholders.
If this happens, there needs to be a serious conversation around a topic so incendiary, so heretical that I will probably become persona non-grata within domain policy circles for saying it, but I'm going to say it:
The Internet RootZone would have to be administered by a non-US Entity instead of ICANN.
The reason why is because the internet root is held together largely through two things:
As all of the world's peoples, businesses and websites come increasingly under the jurisdiction and law of a single country, consensus will fragment. The internet root will have to be under the stewardship of an honest broker who can respect the rights of all sovereign interests as they relate to the internet.
Otherwise, it ends with a split internet root, if we're lucky. If not, it ends with a completely Balkanized one, because while it may not be the case now, as this escalates (and I suspect it will), it will pose intolerable risk to non-US entities of all stripes.
Already we get business from companies whose stated corporate IT policy is to not use US based servers to hold email or route web traffic. I'm not talking about torrent hosts, whistleblowers and fake Rolex vendors. We're talking large enterprise entities whose legal departments find even the theoretical legal ability for Homeland Security to monitor their corporate communications simply intolerable.
While I'm not complaining about the extra business, I still smell trouble on the horizon.
Written by Mark Jeftovic, Co-Founder, easyDNS Technlogies Inc.
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More under: Censorship, ICANN, Internet Governance, Law, Policy & Regulation
ICANN just published its annual report for 2011 and god bless, in the worst economy of our lifetimes they managed to get up to just short of $100 Million in assets; cash, investments and accounts receivable for the year ending June 30, 2011.
According to the report as of June 30, 2011, ICANN has over $29 Million in Cash, $51 Million in investments and over $15 Million in accounts receivable, and with some other assets all totalled, just short of $100 Million dollars.
Of course like the rest of us and to be fair, ICANN has some bills and obligations, but it's showing as "Unrestricted Net Assets" over $80 Million while it wound up last year, June 2010 with only $64 Million.
Not horrible for a non-profit that seems to be quite profitable.
On the income side ICANN seems to have brought in $70 Million in revenue plus made some $6 Million on its investments in the year ending June 2011.
On the expense side ICANN incurred "Personnel Expenses of over $26 Million, over $12 million in Travel, over $12 million in Professional expenses and finally an administrative cost of over $8 Million.
Other than the raw numbers here is what ICANN says are the achievements for the year:
"Fiscal year 2011 may be remembered most for what happened at the end, when ICANN's Board of Directors approved a plan to allow an increase in the number of Internet domain name extensions, generic top-level domains, such as .com, .org and .net."
"Major changes do not happen easily or quietly, nor should they when the global public interest is at stake."
"The Board's decision to usher in this historic change to the Internet domain name system was the culmination of six years of debate and deliberation within ICANN's multistakeholder community, and brought many to the table that had never before engaged with ICANN." "The Board of Directors approved a plan to allow an increase in the number of generic Internet domain name extensions (called generic top- level domains) beyond the current 21, which include such familiar domains as .com, .org and .net."
"Between 20 June and the writing of this report, 4,943 news stories about new gTLDs had been posted, printed or broadcast around the world."
I think that works out to something like $2,000 a story when compared to assets.
Which we at our TheDomains.com could claim the same.
2012 brings the new gTLD's which at $185,000 per application fee is said by ICANN to be revenue neutral or a cost recovery.
Of course the budget ICANN put together for the new gTLD revenue doesn't have even $1 allocated as coming from auctions of strings in contention, otherwise known to domainers as auctions.
All that auction proceeds money will flow apparently flow directly to the bottom line.
So 2012 report should be much better.
Actually ICANN could under the right circumstances be a non-profit with over $250 Million in "Unrestricted Net Assets" within 2 years.
Lets call it our 1st prediction for 2013.
June 2013.
Mark it.
Written by Michael Berkens, President of Worldwide Media, Inc.
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More under: ICANN
An observation…
I am a big fan of DDI (DNS, DHCP and IPAM) as magical trio to manage all transactions on network infrastructures… Or to say the least: make it possible.
Basically it makes these "Core Network Services" concise, manageable and integrated. It basically makes the network infrastructures of today and the future possible.
There is however one thing that continuously seems to irritate when talking about integrating these services on networks.
Let's have a look at the Microsoft DNS and DHCP, it's the most used, and has by far the largest footprint of them all. But is it "Integrated"? Seems to be with "Active Directory", but not so with IPAM as there is no real administration of "content" on Microsoft DNS/DHCP (just config and "records"). And Excel really doesn't count! :-).
If we look at Non-Microsoft DNS and DHCP, it seems to be more network/unix territory, and administering and configuring IP-Addresses seems to be more embedded due to historical reasons (maybe). IPAM is more of a common cause here.
So it would be logical, if one wants to apply the magical trio, to replace Microsoft DNS/DHCP, de-integrated it from Active Directory and put it closer to the network, right? (well, I would say yes, but lots of peoples are not convinced).
Actually there are a couple of scenario's that seems to appeal, but get little to no attention, let alone implemented.
Scenario 1: Let's replace the lot
Disable Microsoft DNS/DHCP and let Active Directory use the company wide DDI solution. This is actually no problem at all, and give lots of benefits. In most cases it actually gives Active Directory a boost in performance and all kinds of extra logging and statistical information. And of course integrated IPAM, which is key for any IP based network infrastructure and it's services nowadays.
Scenario 2: Delegate a Domain
Have a company wide DDI solution, but just delegate a domain to the Active Directory domain which will run on Microsoft DNS/DHCP services. So the "connection" is just DNS. You will loose some oversight (feedback) from the services. As long as there are procedures from the DDI team on handing out IP's and Names, it is a workable situation. Not perfect in my opinion.
Scenario 3: Integrate with the MS Services
Have a company wide DDI solution, have an Active Directory with their own Microsoft DNS/DHCP services, but manage both with the same DDI solution. This is very flexible and best of both worlds. It will have an added bonus: IPAM.
Scenario 4: No integration
Let everyone have their own island. Prone to lots of political and technical discussions. The biggest question here will be "Reverse Zones", who will own them… Good luck!
And there are many more, but I keep it by these 4 which seems to be most common.
There seems to be two camps revolving around this:
Camp 1: The Network / System Guys
They want an integral DDI solution, providing DHCP and DNS to the whole world, including Active Directory. Strong users of IPAM want all kind of neat features for failover, redundancy and disaster-recover. DNS and DHCP is a "Network Component".
Camp 2: The Microsoft Guys
They just want to do their own DNS and DHCP for Active Directory and really don't want to do anything else. Redundancy is fine (multiple servers, multi-master, etc). DNS and DHCP is an "Application".
There seems to be a lot at stake for both camps. Both will touch the core of networks. One from the bottom-up and the other top-down and can "boss around" when needed. It's a responsibility with power!
Both camps are also guilty (mostly because of knowledge shortage) by not understanding each other requirements and forgetting about the complete picture, trying to cover their own requirements. Making no decision seems to be more common in these cases. "Let it be" is mostly the outcome.
I think either scenario works, at least if integrated IPAM is part of it. IPAM is in most cases a missing part, out-of-date and disciplinary. Integrating all three components (DNS, DHCP and IPAM), respecting the infrastructure and requirements is the way forward and the way to build future proof networks.
And I have not even thrown in IPv6 and DNSSEC for added complexity! :-)
As said… An observation…
Written by Chris Buijs, Senior Product Manager
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, Internet Protocol, IP Addressing
The curtain rises on January 12th 2012 but key players are still singing different tunes. Let's peek into their performance as they start taking center stage.
FTC, the Federal Trade Commission, has sent a letter to ICANN on December 16th 2011.
Re: Consumer Protection Concerns Regarding New gTLDs. They write;
"We write now to highlight again the potential for significant consumer harm resulting from the unprecedented increase in new gTLDs."
The following paragraph clearly highlights the lack of information about the ICANN gTLD platform.
"A rapid, exponential expansion of gTLDs has the potential to magnify both the abuse of the domain name system and the corresponding challenges we encounter in tracking down Internet fraudsters. In particular, the proliferation of existing scams, such as phishing, is likely to become a serious challenge given the infinite opportunities that scam artists will now have at their fingertips. Fraudsters will be able to register misspellings of businesses, including financial institutions, in each of the new gTLDs, create copycat websites, and obtain sensitive consumer data with relative ease before shutting down the site and launching a new one."
It's about time to smell some coffee, as this mantra of 'fraudsters and cyber squatting' has become the theme song of the dancing opposition troupe. A quick lyrical analysis will turn this fake opera into a lost and off base noise. The questions are why is this topic is being regurgitated by the so many otherwise very smart teams. Either they really have no idea what a GTLD is or they are simply being fed, a biscuit. They continue and sing unison, "Fraudsters will be able to register misspellings of businesses, including financial institutions," the naive audience confusing applauds.
Let's analyze, in the first place, where are those not so intelligent fraudsters, so badly needed for the TV reality shows, who will invest a minimum of USD $185K, toil over months, disclose to their IQ, file a ream thick application, subject to dozens of scrutiny and audits, but still aggressively pursue some half-wittedly proposed 'misspelled' names to create fraudulent domain names for example 'citybank' or 'citybanq' 'cityloans' 'citycard' or 'cityinvest'. Yes, yes yes, the opposition screams.
Two questions emerge. Would someone really enjoy a successful return on this? Not really, such dumb ideas would die even before they happen, the general public is getting more mature by the day and the trademark laws will clearly identify and stop such blatant 'passing off' of established banking name brand. Would ICANN allow such a name approval? Not really, the application process will simply kill such ideas in the diligent process.
Then still where all this out of tune noise is coming from? Basically, the major brand holders and their advertising agencies from all over the world spending hundreds of billions promoting their cherished names while another and bit lesser amount is being spent by trademark lawyers to protect such names is causing all this fuss? But doesn't trademark protection mean some layer of protection? This fear mongering that ICANN GTLD's expensive and time consuming processes will freely allow 'misspelled name' while such 'misspelled names' are already available on dot com. Today, for example, the following domains are available instantly at $10 each,'citiinvestplus.com' 'citiinvestplanner.com' 'citiinvestplan.com' or 'citybanq'. Guess what, should we now shut down the entire domain name system?
To hit a real high note here, cyber-squatting fear mongering is nothing but smoke screens. If we accept the fact that domain name variations of choices are freely available all over the world then obviously there would be some cyber-squatting and for those well protected trademark holders, which is just another routine trademark defense exercise.
Change the backdrop of this noisy theatre, if there are millions of registered logos all over the world then there are billions of unregistered highly identical logos also. However, well protected and unique logos are always protected under the trademark laws and violators are routinely fined. So what do we do now, stop the usage of art work supplies, graphic design software, and snatch away colored pencils. The world has already come to the realization that when you have something very unique and worthy of protection only than a well defined protection plan would work.
They further boldly lay out a real life example. "The potential for consumer confusion in other variations of these types of scams is significant. As an example,"ABC bank" could be registered in .com, but another entity could register "ABC" in a new .bank gTLD, and a different entity could register "ABC" in a new .finance gTLD. Scam artists could easily take advantage of this potential for confusion to defraud consumers."
Now, the supposed "ABC bank" could be registered as a dot com. Why not? Now this name identity applies to the holders of .bank. Dot bank is a consortium under American Bankers Association, which intends to file on behalf of the banks, where smaller banks would wish to use .bank as a suffix. Did the NTC committee and all the other related parties miss the most important reason why ABA pursuing .bank; it is to create a 'closed and restricted .bank registry only for the qualifying banks'.
This program alone proves the fact that restricted and closed use of a suffix will protect consumer and create 'certified domain name' which until now was never available on the traditional hit-and-run, free for all, no question asked, buy one get 2 free domain name system. Behold the liberated registration, that created thousands of cases of cyber squatting and in reality responsible for creating a vibrant cyber-squatting defense registration industry.
A new book has been announced to deal with the global naming complexities and the thick fog of confusion created by mythical fear mongering, that have tried to disrupt the domain name expansion. In order to move beyond all this and to explore various models of market domination via name identity, the new book "Domination: The GTLD Name Game” is being released worldwide on February 12th 2012. The book is written in simple language for the boardroom where issues of global market domination are top of the agendas.
Most so called famous brand names have already reached their peak and are not worthy of the global 'one internet one world' platform, where to dominate that space a 'one name one owner' capability is most desirous. Unfortunately, the largest group falls into 'one name and thousand owners' category. Hence the fake opera and now the music begs for a crescendo.
Written by Naseem Javed, Corporate Image & Global Naming Expert
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More under: Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Law, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
Surprisingly, and adding to the rapidly growing field of objections to ICANN's proposed expansion of the domain naming system, the group that represents individual Internet users in the ICANN community, the ICANN At-Large Advisory Committee, posted their advice on new Generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs). The post emphasized their support for the concept while decrying the implementation of the current program.
In their letter of advice, they state that the program's current "implementation would be harmful to the public interest and specifically that of Internet end-users." They advise that the program should be halted until changes are put in place to address their concerns, which were originally stated in Mexico City at the ICANN meeting in March of 2009.
Written by Frederick Felman, Chief Marketing Officer at MarkMonitor
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Top-Level Domains
As DDoS attacks become larger, more frequent and complex, being able to stop them is a must. While doing this is part science, a matter of deploying technology, there is also an art to repelling sophisticated attacks.
Arbor Networks, Citrix and others make great gear, but there's no magic box that will solve all your problems for you. Human expertise will always be a crucial ingredient.
The Science
Certain attacks can be mitigated purely through automation. For example, you can set up proper access control lists on your routers, which can block connections to ports through which you have no services. (That is, you can define a list of services authorized to receive traffic, while at the same time dropping all other traffic.) Some attackers randomly try certain attack vectors, hoping to get lucky and flood your infrastructure — without investigating which type of attack might actually work best. When properly configured, your routers and firewalls will automatically drop such traffic, without it even reaching your servers. This is can be very effective and should be part of any mitigation strategy.
Equally effective are advanced AI algorithms, which are often built into routers and DDoS mitigation hardware. These algorithms can give you a picture of an attack in progress. You can also tune their settings to drop traffic when certain thresholds are met. AI algorithms do very well at handling simple attacks (SYN floods, UDP floods, etc.). The catch: Without careful tuning, they can automatically drop good traffic, defeating your goal of continuing business as usual. If your business is profiled on CNN, resulting in surging traffic, your gear may very well kick in and legitimate traffic could be blocked.
The Art
To avoid that sort of situation, you need to spend considerable time tuning your mitigation hardware, so it can tell good traffic from bad. Even this will not always be enough. These days, anyone with decent software development skills can craft attacks that zero in on key infrastructure. He or she will make educated guesses about your website: which parts feature dynamic content, possibly back-ended by a database, and even which parts might be making high-CPU/memory database calls. An attack can be easily masked to look like legitimate traffic. In fact, 10 properly designed simultaneous connections might be enough to take down a cluster! Such attacks take time and creativity to block, no matter if you have the latest mitigation hardware.
The same thing is true when a large, distributed botnet generates thousands of legitimate-looking requests. Automation alone will help you only so much. With the right expertise and hands-on experience, you can set up filters to drop bad traffic.
A Balanced Approach to Stopping Attacks
Before you lose millions in downtime, revenue and brand equity, make sure your mitigation includes both art and science. Remember, even the best technology won't excel without the right guidance. When comes to fighting DDoS attacks, you need both man and machine.
If you don't have the expertise in house, consider a third-party solution like Neustar SiteProtect, a cloud-based service which not only fuses technology from leading vendors (Arbor, Citrix and Juniper, along with several others) but backs it with the experts in our Security Operations Center.
Written by Miguel Ramos, Sr. Product Manager, Neustar Enterprise Services
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More under: Cyberattack, DNS, Security
Get More: Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings, He Said I Can, Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings Music Videos, Live Performances
Check out Ms. Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings throwing it down on the VH-1 as part of "VH-1 Divas Celebate Soul"! So amazing.
And if you like that song, her new album Time" is just $3.99 on the Amazon MP3 store right now!
About.me is a web-service that allows you to display on one page all of your various social media links.
Here's mine: [about.me] .
It is not a secret that I have been (and I continue to be) against the requests made to ICANN by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the Red Cross for special protection of their names and their variations. I am mainly against it because of the problems associated with these types of protection, the potential implications they may have and the fact that any attempt to reserve any names in the Domain Name Space will set a very bad precedent that will be detrimental to the whole new gTLDs experience. Well, the effect of this precedent is right upon us and, once again, ICANN is faced with a big challenge to find ways to accommodate the similar demands of intergovernmental organizations in the new gTLDs space. But, let's take things from the beginning.
For quite some time now, ICANN has been subjected to a huge amount of pressure by IOC and the Red Cross to protect their names in the new gTLD program. This request, which was also vehemently supported by ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC), was meant to ensure that all the names associated with these two organizations (OLYMPIC, OLYMPIAD, RED CROSS, RED CRESCENT, etc.) are reserved under both the top level and second level domain names. As it normally goes, the justification is that these organizations constitute targets of cybersquatting activities, their non-profit nature (a point which is questionable given their involvement in multi-billion dollar licensing deals) does not allow them to spend money defending their brands as other purely commercial entities do and, in any case, such organizations should receive special treatment especially since Treaties and international commitments provide them with presumed privileges that could justify such levels of protection. Seeking a solution to this issue and given the pressure inflicted upon it, the ICANN Board agreed to initiate a process between the GNSO and the GAC on finding ways to address this issue; in the meantime, IOC's and the Red Cross's requests were accommodated — at least partially, as ICANN has committed to reserve their names in the new gTLD space but only for the top level domain names, stating, "the extraordinary step of blocking the requested names at the second level should not be taken as it would deny those with a legitimate interest or rights in registering those names at the second level, e.g., olympic.taxis and redcross.salt."
I still think that this compromise is problematic and it is not because I don't believe in the mission of these organizations or what they stand for. My problem is that these organizations are misusing trademark law and international Treaties to receive unprecedented levels of protection, especially when their names (in the case of 'Olympic' at least) conflict with other recognized rights, associated with traditional knowledge as well as cultural and geographical identifications. But, ultimately, it is the very dangerous precedent that such policy compensations set.
A recent letter [PDF] from a number of Intergovernmental Organizations "on the Expansion of Generic Top Level Domains" to ICANN is a case in point. Based on the justifications used by the Red Cross and the IOC, several intergovernmental organizations are requesting ICANN to afford them the same privileges as these two organizations. So, if with IOC and the Red Cross we were stuck between a rock and a hard place, now we are in real trouble. The problem is simple — the argument that all these organizations should be afforded special protection, despite the very valuable work they are doing, is weak and flawed. In the letter, the organizations state that measures to protect their names can "find support in international legal norms", citing Article 6ter of the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, Article 16 of the Trademark Law Treaty and Article 2 of the WTO Agreement on Trademark Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights.
It is indeed the case that all these statutes mainly reflect the need for the protection of these organizations; but they are equally being referenced quite widely. In particular, Article 6ter, para. 1(a) states: (a) The countries of the Union agree to refuse or to invalidate the registration, and to prohibit by appropriate measures the use, without authorization by the competent authorities, either as trademarks or as elements of trademarks [emphasis added], of armorial bearings, flags, and other State emblems, of the countries of the Union, official signs and hallmarks indicating control and warranty adopted by them, and any imitation from a heraldic point of view. And, para. 1(c) states: "The countries of the Union shall not be required to apply the said provisions when the use or registration referred to in subparagraph (a), above, is not of such a nature as to suggest to the public that a connection exists between the organization concerned and the armorial bearings, flags, emblems, abbreviations, and names, or if such use or registration is probably not of such a nature as to mislead the public as to the existence of a connection between the user and the organization [emphasis added]." So, here we have provisions that commit to protect the names, abbreviations, flags, etc. of such organizations, but only in relation to trademarks. Neither of these statutes seeks to create or is willing to acknowledge special privileges like the ones being requested from ICANN.
But, the bigger picture here is the position that such pressures place ICANN. ICANN is not a trademark entity and was not created to confirm, amend or re-write trademark law. And, this is essentially what is being asked from ICANN — to interpret old Treaties into the realm of the Internet and, to do so, in a fashion that is not compatible with its governance structure. This is problematic.
It really took ICANN a lot of time to become a body that was not purely seen as a front for trademarks and their protection. The history of the organization is replete with examples of how the trademark lobby has used ICANN as the platform for many expansive policies. But, lately things have changed. For instance, the fact that ICANN resisted the adoption of the Globally Protected Marks List (GPML) is a credit to the organization, since its adoption would place ICANN as the new legislator of trademark law. The fact that such listed never existed and was requested by ICANN to do so is a clear indication of why ICANN should resist meddling with trademarks.
The current requests by all these organizations are not that far away from the GPML idea; they may not be asking ICANN to create something new or novel, but they are asking ICANN to interpret international law instruments and translate them into DNS language. This is not ICANN's job and ICANN should refrain from engaging in such dialectic. Imagine, for instance, if the World Health Organization were to reserve its abbreviation 'WHO'. With many existing entities making legitimate use of the word 'WHO', it would be contrary to existing trademark law for only one entity to use it. (Examples include the music band 'The WHO', 'Doctor Who', the biographical encyclopaedia 'Who's Who', etc.). If ICANN complies with this request and continues to grant these privileges, it exposes itself to all sorts of problems. It is time we reconsider the way trademarks fit within the domain name space.
Written by Konstantinos Komaitis, Senior Lecturer
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More under: Cybersquatting, Domain Names, ICANN, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
Since the RIPE NCC launched its Resource Certification service, there is a steady increase in the number of prefixes covered by certificates.
The Resource Certification (RPKI) service was launched at the beginning of 2011. The system enables network operators to perform Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) origin validation, which means that they can securely verify if a BGP route announcement has been authorised by the legitimate holder of the address block.
Using their resource certificate, network operators can create cryptographically validatable statements about the route announcements they authorise to be made with the prefixes they hold. These statements are called Route Origin Authorisations (ROAs). A ROA states which Autonomous System (AS) is authorised to originate a certain IP address prefix.
So far, 10% of the RIPE NCC membership has opted into requesting a Resource Certificate. In the graph below, you can see the number of IPv4 prefixes (blue) and IPv6 prefixes (red) that have been certified by RIPE NCC members using their certificate. More than 900 IPv4 prefixes are certified. That means that more than 10% of the IPv4 address space the RIPE NCC is maintaining is covered by certificates. For IPv6, around 250 prefixes are certified. This is a relatively high number compared to the total number of IPv6 prefixes in the routing system.
Number of IPv4 and IPv6 Prefixes covered by Certificates in the RIPE NCC service region (Click to Enlarge)
More information:
• Find out more information about certification.
• See more RPKI related statistics.
• See RIPE Labs for other related information about IP address space.
Written by Mirjam Kuehne
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More under: IP Addressing, IPv6, Security
In a move to be celebrated by many of us with a VoIP background, the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced today the appointment of Henning Schulzrinne as Chief Technology Officer (CTO). As the release indicates, Henning's role as CTO will be to:
… guide the FCC's work on technology and engineering issues, together with the FCC's Office of Engineering and Technology. He will advise on matters across the agency to ensure that FCC policies are driving technological innovation, including serving as a resource to FCC Commissioners. He will also help the FCC engage with technology experts outside the agency and promote technical excellence among agency staff. He will be based in the FCC's Office of Strategic Planning and Policy Analysis.
Henning brings an excellent background to this role, having been one of the co-authors of the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP - RFC 3261) and the Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP - RFC 3550 and 1889), the two main standards used in most Voice over IP (VoIP) systems today. Henning is also the author/co-author of over 70 other RFCs and countless Internet-Drafts and has been active with the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) since the 1990's. He also served on the Internet Architecture Board (IAB).
Given the recent FCC workshops on the transition of the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) to new technologies, it's great to have someone with Henning's background and knowledge in a prominent role at the FCC. Henning himself noted this in an email to the IETF DISPATCH working group mailing list, where he noted that the FCC is definitely seeking input from technical folks.
Obviously in this new role he'll be working not only with real-time communications but also with the wide range of other areas that the FCC covers. Regardless, it's excellent to have someone with Henning's background providing this level of advice and input to FCC activities.
Prior to joining the FCC, Henning has been a professor and chair of the Computer Science department at Columbia University. In my experience he's also just an all-around decent person and I'm very much looking forward to seeing what he'll do at the FCC.
Written by Dan York, Author and Speaker on Internet technologies for over 20 years
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More under: Access Providers, Broadband, Internet Governance, Internet Protocol, Net Neutrality, Policy & Regulation, Telecom, VoIP, Wireless
In a recent op-ed piece in TheHill.COM, some friends and I described the futility of mandated DNS blocking as contemplated by the SOPA (H.R. 3261) and PIPA (S. 968) bills now working their way through the U.S. Congress:
No Internet user is required to use the Domain Name servers provided by their ISP. And if millions of American citizens who for whatever reason want to engage in online piracy can no longer do so because Congress has passed this law and their ISP is now filtering the citizen's DNS lookups, well, those citizens will have dozens if not thousands of off-shore Domain Name servers they can switch to with the click of a mouse.
This is an important point since if federal law is changed to mandate that hundreds of millions of dollars be spent by ISP's blocking the estimated hundred or so domain names used by the worst off-shore offenders of U. S. copyright and trademark law, then we'd all like to have some assurance that American consumers will respect this blockade. We would call those consumers "unintended infringers" because they are infringing U. S. copyrights and trademarks now, but are doing so in ignorance, and if they knew they were stealing, they wouldn't do it. We know that no "intended infringers" — who already know they are stealing when they buy pirated or infringing goods online — will be stopped by any federal law, since the Internet just doesn't work that way. From the same article:
The Great Firewall of China is built to a massive scale and could easily cope with this sort of problem. Since we in America would never monitor and restrict Internet traffic at that scale, the best Congress could hope for would be a symbolic gesture that merely indicates our country's displeasure with online piracy and infringement — without stopping such activities or even slowing them down by much.
Today I happened across a recent report from Cisco Systems entitled "Beg, Borrow or Steal? Young Professionals, College Students Admit They'll Go to Extreme Measures for Internet Access Despite IT Policies, Identity Theft Risks", which studies the infringement motives of a statistically meaningful population. Here's an excerpt:
"Of those who were aware of IT policies, seven of every 10 (70%) employees worldwide admitted to breaking policy with varying regularity. Among many reasons, the most common was the belief that employees were not doing anything wrong (33%). One in five (22%) cited the need to access unauthorized programs and applications to get their job done, while 19% admitted the policies are not enforced. Some (18%) said they do not have time to think about policies when they are working, and others either said adhering to the policies is not convenient (16%), they forget to do so (15%), or their bosses aren't watching them (14%)."
What this means from a high level policy perspective is that we really can put "unintended infringer" into the "myth" category.
Written by Paul Vixie, Chairman and Chief Scientist, Internet Systems Consortium
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More under: Access Providers, Censorship, DNS, Law, Policy & Regulation
Yesterday I went to the amazing Renegade Craft Fair in Soma , San Francisco, along with my cousin Mel and his girlfriend Cynthia. It was perhaps the best craft fair I've ever been to, with 250 stalls selling metric tons of amazing, handmade crafts and arts.
It was really inspiring seeing all of the creative work in the hangar-like Concourse Exhibition space. The vendors were a combination of local artisans and people traveling here from across the United States for this moving celebration of handicrafts.
Despite the shopping season, I found the crowds to fairly managable even at its busiest. And folks seemed quite upbeat and friendly, bopping their heads to the DJed music, chatting amiably with each other and the vendors, drinking beer and snacking on baked goods sold nearby. Definitely a fun ambiance for perusing and shopping.
Of course, with all of the handmade goods, and many of the shoppers clearly being of the DIY-mindset, many of us were thinking "I could do that!" when we saw a handmade ornament or broach. Knowing this, the organizers had put several maker booths around the hall where you could create your own terrarium, ornament or necklace. I kind of regret I didn't make my own terrarium bauble!
I wish I had more disposable income right now to shop and help out more local artisans and small businesses. I was only able to make a few purchases, which I'm very happy about, and got the business cards of other vendors that I hope to shop from later.
One of my favorite finds was "Yes & Yes Designs" a one-woman operation run by Laura Bruland from Oakland. Laura makes these lovely handmade pins and magnets using lasercut recycled materials, typically old wood, chalkboards, and book covers. Lasercut wood and paper was clearly a theme this year, made popular by the increasing accessibility of lasercutters from such places as Techshop. Every other booth seemed to have some sort of lasercut doo-dad.
I liked Laura's use of materials, textures, and colors on her lasercut work. And I'm a sucker for anything vintage scifi. So I had to have the robot and the raygun, with the chalkboard word bubble for good measure. You can write any message you want on the word bubble, which was a clever touch.
Other great recycled materials I saw were old maps made into broaches, filmstock made into ribbons, cymbals turned into jewelry and typewriter keys made into cufflinks. Maybe almost anything can be transformed into art with a little creativity and effort. Maybe anyone can create art and share it. Maybe even me.
In response to the Washington Post's December 11 article title "What's the .rush?", directed at the expansion of new TLDs, Rod Beckstrom, ICANN's President and CEO has replied in a letter to the Washington Post stating:
"The program of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to open the Internet to new top-level domain names (TLDs) has been anything but rushed. It took more than six years of thoughtful discussion, debate and study involving governments and intellectual property experts from around the globe. About 60 technical papers and independent reports, plus analysis of 2,400 comments, informed seven versions of carefully crafted rules that will govern the award of a new TLD."
The letter full can be read here.
Other sources: (UPDATED Dec 20, 2011 11:24 AM PST)
Did Beckstrom even read the Washington Post editorial? .Nxt, Dec.20.2011
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More under: Cybersquatting, DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Top-Level Domains
"Breaking the Internet" is really hard to do. The network of networks is decentralized, resilient and has no Single Point Of Failure. That was the paradigm of the first few decades of Internet history, and most people involved in Internet Governance still carry that model around in their heads.
Unfortunately, that is changing and changing rapidly due to misguided government intervention. Ever since 2000, when we witnessed the LICRA v. Yahoo! conflict, we have had governments taking actions that move us away from the utopian vision of early netizens towards a dystopic, unrecognizable Internet.
This past month has been incredibly busy in terms of misguided governmental interference. Here is a short list of recent governmental bloopers and why they are deeply flawed;
1. Put out a RFP to run the core names and numbers entity (the IANA) but limit it to US organisations. For over a decade, other governments have complained bitterly that the US "controls the Internet". This move further entrenches that flawed perception but serves no actual purpose since it is nearly inconceivable that any entity other than ICANN (based in California) will get this no fee contract from the Department of Commerce. Serving turkey at Thanksgiving is an American tradition, but this move elevates the term "giving the bird" to new heights. Governments unhappy with this decision have another reason to try to "split the root" or build their own set of nameservers that they can control.
2. Propose a UN Committee for Internet-related policies (CIRP). India has done this in the UN General Assembly. Earlier this year, India, along with Brazil, and South Africa floated their "IBSA Proposal" [PDF] to near universal criticism. Despite this, the Indian delegate at the UN still said that CIRP would, inter alia,
"coordinate and oversee the bodies responsible for technical and operational functioning of the Internet, including global standards setting."
Since this is completely unlike the current situation in which the technical and standards bodies operate independently, developing standards and policies in open to all, bottom-up, transparent and consensus based processes this proposal seems aimed at breaking the "Internet Model" [PDF]. This model, sometimes called the Internet eco-system [PDF] has given us the Goose that lays the Golden Eggs. An excellent description of this is well worth reading, and as one commenter suggested "The model is so important that a threat to the model is a threat to the Internet itself." Because some governments are so angry about US unilateral control over Critical Internet Resources (see #1 above), they are willing to kill the Goose, thus ensuring no one gets the Golden Eggs.
3. Start a new Thanksgiving tradition of censoring websites without due process. Last year the rojadirecta case caused quite a stir in Internet governance circles. It seems that ICE will continue to do this until your lolcatz are replaced with this, only then will we see the public at large up in arms.
The rojadirecta case was striking in that ICE not only asserted authority over content (found to be legal in Spain, where rojadirecta is located) stored on a webserver outside the USA, it censored the website that only carried (allegedly) infringing links, as rojadirecta does not have the actual content that were thought to be infringing. Again, the US government angers the rest of the world. It may also be useful to point out that seizing the domain did not stop rojadirecta, they just moved their website to multiple other domains.
4. Be hypocritical. Proclaim your support of Internet Freedom abroad and actually fund projects that are doing excellent work to protect freedom of speech online with one hand while using the other to restrict those freedoms (see #3 above) not just for your citizens, but for billions of Internet users worldwide.
5. Make pressing a facebook "like" button a criminal act. Well done, Thailand for giving us a humorous interlude in this long, boring post!
6. Issue a court order instructing non-profit public interest organisations outside the USA (and one in Virginia) to take specific actions in the databases they manage. In some cases, these actions may violate contracts the organisations have signed with their members. Once again, a unilateral action by a government actor throws sand in the gears of a well-oiled Internet policy system that has taken decades to evolve.
7. Propose legislation that not only censors Internet content on allegations alone, but that requires ISPs and ANYONE who runs a caching DNS server, a search engine, advertising or payment network to police content. In the USA, there is an intense battle over this SOPA/PROTECT-IP legislation that actually reaches in to DNS servers and mandates filtering by server operators.
As the CDT and many others (including myself as a signatory) have argued, the DNS is not the appropriate place to do this.
DNS name queries should be and accurately translated into DNS name responses regardless of query source or query subject. That's the design of the DNS and it does its job billions of times per day. This legislation would mandate that your DNS server send you a lie when you made specific queries. Internet broken, plain and simple. In addition, our new DNS Security extensions are incompatible with a lying DNS server. The DNS is the wrong focal point to attack this problem.
Besides the breakage, the measure, as originally proposed (and as amended) just wouldn't work to Stop Online Piracy (House bill) or PROTECT-IP (Senate). It's trivial to register a new domain name, or find a new DNS service provider and let's not forget the content "lives" on webserver somewhere that has an IP address, so filtering DNS replies does not remove the content. Of course, one domain name can have many sub-domains, so taking down one domain can affect hundreds of perfectly innocent websites (as happened in last years Thanskgiving ICE takedown).
8. Hold hearings to put pressure on the organisation that manages Internet name and number resources to delay a program that is a result of more than 7 years of bottom-up policy making processes. Two separate House committees put ICANN on the hot seat this week because Congress clearly doesn't understand that they don't get to make these policies, they are just one stakeholder among many. I applaud ICANN for sticking to their agreed upon schedule for adding more gTLDs to the root;
"This process has not been rushed," said Kurt Pritz, SVP of ICANN. "Every issue has been discussed. No new issues have been raised. The people at this table participated in this debate."
Even though I have never been a proponent of new gTLDs, I understand that the Policy Development Process has finished and I accept the result. Whinging to Congress is just bad politics for the ANA and others who testified at the hearings if they ever want to be taken seriously in ICANN policy making going forward.
On the face of it, all of these disjointed legislative, judicial and executive actions would seem to argue for a global set of rules that all governments would abide by. We saw during WSIS however that the US is not about to give up the one lever of control they have over Internet names and numbers, nor are other governments willing to give up sovereignty over what happens in their territories.
If, by some miracle, a deal was reached on a treaty, this would be even more disastrous than individual governments making bad policy decisions. Having nearly 200 UN Member States making Internet policy in a top-down governments only setting would only multiply the badness of the bad ideas listed above. Do we really want China, Burma and Iran (just to mention a few) making decisions on what content we can consume or create?
Governments and Intergovernmental bodies are supposed to serve the public interest. Unfortuantely, they don't grok the Internet and their knee-jerk efforts are a threat to the Internet as we know it. They can best promote the public interest by NOT regulating the Internet.
Written by McTim, Co-Chair of the African Network Information Center Policy Development WG
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More under: Censorship, Cybercrime, DNS, DNSSEC, Domain Names, Registry Services, ICANN, Internet Governance, IP Addressing, Top-Level Domains
Here is the provisional list of the main Internet governance developments in 2011 and we need your help to compile a final list. Please let us know your views by:
Making comments and adding any other development you think should be on this list.
Joining us for the webinar discussion on 20 December 2012 at 15.00 (CET).
1. The Internet gets highly political
2011 started with the continuance of the Arab Spring. Although there are very different views on the impact of the Internet on the Arab Spring phenomenon (ranging from minimal to key), one outcome is certain: social media is now perceived as a decisive tool in modern political life. In various ways, the Internet — and its governance — popped up on political radars worldwide this year.
2. Internet governance moves to the premier league of global politics
Internet governance is an increasingly important global issue: its policy relevance is now comparable to topics such as climate change, migration, and food security. This is illustrated by — among other developments — the numerous high-level events on Internet governance this year: the e-G8 Forum, the London Cyberspace Conference, the Vienna Conference on Human Rights and the Internet, and the Hague Conference on Internet and Freedom. In parallel, Internet governance emerged in the mainstream of the UN General Assembly. The main global media (The Economist, IHT, Al Jazeera, BBC) are now following Internet governance developments more closely than ever before.
3. Clearer positioning of the main players
Previous vague national Internet governance approaches have started to crystallise. The USA re-affirmed its support for ICANN. The EU's Digital Agenda is taking clearer international shape (EU's Digital Diplomacy). After an attempt to form a joint approach, IBSA (India, Brazil, South Africa) moved on separately. In October, India submitted a proposal to the UN General Assembly regarding the formation of a UN Committee for Internet-Related Policies. In addition, Russia, China, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan proposed an International Code of Conduct for Information Security to the UN GA.
4. A shift in Internet governance direction, from technology (IT, telecom) to political ministries (diplomacy, prime ministerial cabinets)
Another consequence of the growing political relevance of the Internet is the reconfiguration of national handling of Internet governance. Diplomatic services and the highest political authorities are more involved. Given the complexity of Internet governance issues, the main challenge will be to achieve policy coherence and informed decision-making.
5. Cybersecurity takes centre stage
An increasing number of security incidents and the fear of cyberwar put cybersecurity high on diplomatic agendas. Cross-border cooperation remains one of the main challenges in global cybersecurity cooperation. Some analysts argue that cybersecurity will become the first area where governments will support a global Internet treaty.
6. Online human rights come into focus
Increasing interest in online human rights was triggered by two major developments: the Arab Spring, and concern that the focus on cybersecurity may endanger human rights (e.g. protection of privacy, freedom of expression). This strong interest has been particularly clear in the last few months with the Vienna and Hague conferences focusing exclusively on online human rights. Moreover, following the Swedish proposal, the UN Council on Human Rights will discuss freedom of expression on the Internet in its 2012 meeting.
7. ICANN's soul-searching
Three main developments characterised ICANN in 2011: (1) implementation of management reform; (2) introduction of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs); (3) the resignation of its CEO and the search for a new CEO. Policy discussions in ICANN in 2011 reflected different views and approaches to the way in which the Internet should be governed in the future.
8. Internet blackout in Egypt
On 27 January, Egyptian authorities cut the Internet in a vain hope to stop political protests. This was the first example of a complete country Internet blackout ordered by the government. Previously, even in the case of military conflicts (former Yugoslavia, Iraq) Internet communication was never completely severed.
9. Avalanche of Internet principles
Internet principles were proposed by the OECD, the Council of Europe, the EU, and other players. There are many convergences among these principles which may constitute a future preamble of a global Internet declaration or similar document.
10. SOPA (Stop Online Privacy Act)
US internet governance decisions tend to have global impact. If adopted, SOPA could introduce liability for intermediaries in the control of Internet content. The anti-piracy measures would shift from the final users to Internet service providers (ISPs), search engines, and financial institutions, among others. SOPA could be described as a battle between Hollywood (the entertainment industry) and Silicon Valley (the Internet industry: Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc.).
Originally posted at Diplo's website.
Written by Jovan Kurbalija, Founder & Director of DiploFoundation
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More under: Cyberattack, Cybercrime, ICANN, Internet Governance, Security
"At every crossroad on the road that leads to the future, tradition has placed against us ten thousand men to guard the past". These were the words of Stanley Prusiner in 1992 describing the opposition to his radical discovery of what he called prions, the causative agents of a clutch of baffling brain diseases. These include kuru, affecting New Guinea cannibals, Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease (CJD), and BSE or mad cow disease.
And today these guardians of the past are in place again at the crossroad that leads to a future of thousands of top-level Internet domain names.
The guardians were last heard of in Washington using the blunt weapon of a press release to garner support. They were then seen giving testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation in early December. Among the guardians of the past was oddly the YMCA, being not the voice of youth with a future but the voice of non-coms with a past.
The battle cry these guardians were making was a complaint about the cost of protecting the intellectual property of their names. Given the lengthy process leading to a slew of rights protections mechanisms embedded in ICANN's new TLD programme, their complaint seems odd and out of touch with the realities of the process.
Every trademark owner has the right to object to a possibly infringing application for a new top-level domain name, in much the same way these rights owners object every day to potentially infringing trademark applications made to trademark registries the world over.
Moreover, the guardians fail to realise that rights protection is not an objective itself but a strategy toward an objective: that of maintaining trust in the brand. And trust in the brand may arguably be best maintained by applying for a new TLD rather than complaining about it.
Trademark managers have had a rotten time in the past decade of domain name growth. They have identified horrors and been tripped up on the way to identify the perpetrators of those horrors as WHOIS records proved meaningless, proxy services protected the criminal, and national laws demonstrated their geographical and jurisdictional limitations. Meanwhile, technology marched on allowing bad actors to, in many cases, get away with their actions without sanction.
The root cause of this rotten time for trademark managers was a lack of control. They were forced to set-up as tenants renting a spot called a web-site in the company of dodgy .com neighbours. There was also trouble lurking in the lift — or dangers on the way to the web-site — in the form of the typo-squatting muggers. And to this dark place, to this web-site, were invited their loyal customers.
Lift up your heads oh downtrodden ones. Be of good cheer ye guardians of the past. For a rational rights protection strategy can be part and parcel of an expansionist new TLD strategy as you take back control. In your own TLD you do not sell counterfeits, credit card payments are safe, supply-chain data is secure, trust is restored. Here you start to not only feel safe, but look safe as well.
Back at the crossroads perhaps the ten thousand will change their minds and let us pass. Not just for the .brand, but for the satirical magazine, and the dairy lover too. .mad .cow anyone ?
Written by Philip Sheppard, Director of Policy, Governance and Public Affairs, Sedari
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, Top-Level Domains
For many people the comments made by Michael Hayden, Former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, at this week's Black Hat Technical Security Conference in Abu Dhabi may have been unsettling as he commented upon the state of Chinese cyber espionage.
I appreciate the candor of his observations and the distinction he made between state-level motivations. In particular, his comment "We steal secrets, you bet. But we steal secrets that are essential for American security and safety. We don't steal secrets for American commerce, for American profit. There are many other countries in the world that do not so self limit."
Perhaps I grew up reading too many spy stories or watched one-too-many James Bond movies, but I've always considered one of the functions of government is to run clandestine operations and uncover threats to their citizens and their economic wellbeing. The fact that Cyber is a significant and fruitful espionage vector shouldn't really be surprising. Granted, it's not as visual as digging a 1476 foot long tunnel under Soviet Berlin during the Cold War (see The Berlin Tunnel Operation GOLD (U.S.) Operation STOPWATCH (U.K.)) or as explosive as the French infiltration and eventual destruction of the Greenpeace Rainbow Warrior in New Zealand, but in today's electronic society cyber espionage is a necessary tool.
Personally, I think you'd struggle to find a country or government anywhere around the world that hasn't invested resources in building out their cyber espionage capabilities in recent years. It's a tool of modern statecraft and policing.
While the media tends to focus upon the term "cyber warfare" and its many faceted security and safety ramifications, I think that we often fail to divorce a governments need (or even expectation) to conduct espionage and what would logically be covered by the articles (and declaration) of war. Granted it all gets a bit fuzzy — just look at the history of the "Cold War". Perhaps a more appropriate name for the current situation and tensions would be "Cyber Realpolitik”.
China is often depicted as the bogeyman — rightly or wrongly — when it comes to cyber espionage. We increasingly find ourselves drawn into a debate of whether attacks which are instigated or traced back to the country are state-sponsored, state-endorsed, socially acceptable, or merely the patriotic duty of appropriately skilled citizens. The fact of the matter though is that there's a disproportionate volume of cyber-attacks and infiltration attempts coming from China, targeting North American and European commercial institutions. You may argue that this is an artifact of China's population but, if that was the case, wouldn't India feature more highly then? India is more populous and arguably has a better developed education system in the field of information technology and software development — and yet they are rarely seen on the totem pole of threat instigators.
Michael Hayden alludes that China (and other countries) is not opposed to using cyber espionage for commercial advancement and profit, and based upon past observations, I would tend to agree with that conclusion. That said though, I don't think that any country is immune to the temptation. Given the hoopla of the recent U.S. congressional insider trading fiasco and French presidential corruption, I'm not sure that "self limit" approaches work in all cases.
Cyber Realpolitik is the world we find ourselves living in and cyber espionage is arguably the latest tool in a government's clandestine toolkit. We could consume a lot of time debating the ethics and outcomes of modern espionage campaigns but, at the end of the day, it's a facet of international politics and governmental needs that have existed for millennium. For those commercial entities being subjected to the cyber campaigns directed at them by foreign governments, I don't believe this threat will be going away anytime in the foreseeable future. Perhaps the noise surrounding the attacks may disappear, but that may just reflect an increase in stealthiness.
Written by Gunter Ollmann, VP of Research at Damballa
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More under: Cyberattack, Cybercrime, Security
Yesterday evening, the ICANN's Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) held its last teleconference of the year. We had invited ICANN's new gTLD supremo Kurt Pritz to give an update on the recent US Congress hearings (Dec 8 & Dec 14).
Kurt was ICANN's spokesperson in both hearings, and felt that the first was more favourable to ICANN than the second. When I asked him if he thought the launch of the new gTLD program might be delayed as a result of these hearings, his response was a cryptic: "the risk is greater than zero”.
Although there are calls for a delay to the program, it was fiercely defended by both Pritz and some American politicians who want to see ICANN's unique model of non state-centric governance succeed. "The New gTD Program demonstrates the strength of the bottom-up, multi-stakeholder process,” Pritz said in his testimony to the US House of Representatives' Subcommittee on Communications and Technology. "The New gTLD Program under discussion today is the implementation of an ICANN-community policy recommendation to achieve one of ICANN's foundational mandates.”
The prevalent feeling is that any serious blow to the new gTLD program now be a direct attack on a governance model that tries to be as inclusive as possible. Several nations, including the US, don't want that. Because they don't want to see the Internet absorbed into United Nations control and hence be put at the mercy of countries where individual and collective freedoms are not the priority.
So if the recent hearings don't seem to have capsized the new gTLD ship just yet, the seas remain choppy. That fact is made all the more obvious by a letter co-signed by 28 major international organisations, including the UN, NATO, WIPO and the WTO, asking to be given the same level of protection under the new gTLD program as was recently granted to the Olympic Committee (IOC) and the Red Cross (RC).
You can almost hear the "I told you so"s from ICANN community members like the GNSO's Non Commercial Users Constituency (the NCUC), who have been saying all along that giving the IOC and the RC what they want was a triumph of big trademarks of individual users.
Those arguments were ignored, but doing the same with this letter, sent to ICANN CEO Rod Beckstrom, ICANN Chair Steve Crocker and Kurt Pritz, is going to be difficult. The GNSO is already working hard to refine the new gTLD policy to allow the IOC and RC requests to be implemented. With the new gTLD launch window set to open in just a few days (January 12, 2012), there is simply no time to include other organisations in this work. Let alone 28 of the world's most convoluted (in terms of the rights they would like to see protected) such groups.
For now, the goal post for the new gTLDs remains firmly set at the January 12 launch date. But there are some pretty stiff ill winds blowing around it…
Written by Stéphane Van Gelder, General manager of INDOM
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More under: Cybersquatting, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
We’re looking back at 2011, a year filled with events and developments that have had a significant impact on Internet governance. Dr Jovan Kurbalija will go through the ten most significant ones during a special end-of-year webinar next week.
A provisional list of the ten most significant events and developments can be found here. Yet, the list is a ‘draft’. Tuesday’s webinar, hosted by Dr Kurbalija, will give participants the opportunity to discuss them, add other events, and finalise the ‘top 10′ list of events which have helped shape the Internet governance debate during 2011.
The webinar will take place on Tuesday 20th December at 15:00 CET. To participate, simply fill in the registration form below (free of charge). The webinar link will be sent by e-mail. For comments or questions, e-mail us at []
Fill the the registration form below to register for our webinar on ‘The ten main Internet governance developments in 2011′, which is taking place on Tuesday 20th December at 15:00 CET.
Registrations are now closed.
The ICANN Board made a couple of important decisions regarding accountability and transparency at its 8 December meeting. Specifically, it approved compensating Directors and also enhanced ICANN's conflicts of interest rules. These are positive developments for the organization, and come at a critical juncture as the Internet governance debate heats up in 2012.
The issue of Board compensation has been debated for years. Several independent assessments, including the final report of the Accountability and Transparency Review Team (ATRT), recommended compensating Directors for their service on the Board. We concur, and believe that this is an important step in the maturation of ICANN as an organization. It has long been recognized that ICANN Directors spend a significant amount of time on their work as compared to other similarly situated Directors. Compensation of Directors for their time and commitment can improve retention and can have an overall positive impact on governance of the organization.
Significantly, the Board also approved an enhanced conflicts of interest standard with respect to new TLDs. For example, Directors will now be precluded from having a contractual or employment connection with a new TLD applicant within 12 months after voting on the application. This logical rule addresses a pressing community demand, and helps bring ICANN in line with many government and multi-lateral institution standards. The Board also made it clear that its conflicts of interest and ethics practices are undergoing multiple reviews and additional modifications may be forthcoming. We look forward to those developments.
These positive steps come at an important time for ICANN and the private sector-led, multi-stakeholder, bottom-up consensus-based model. ICANN the organization needs to continue to demonstrate its maturity and self-sufficiency. Professionalizing the Board and enhancing the conflicts of interest policy are critical steps toward that goal. These steps will demonstrate further the efficacy of the consensus-based bottom up ICANN model. As we head into 2012 and the year-end World Conference on International Communications, ICANN and its community need to continue addressing accountability and transparency concerns — or risk having "solutions" imposed upon it.
Written by Paul Diaz, Director of Policy at Public Interest Registry (PIR)
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A recent study took an in-depth look at the scale and the risk of domain name typosquatting — the practice of registering mis-spellings of popular domain names in an attempt to profit from typing mistakes. "Applying every possible one-character typo to the domain names of Facebook, Google, Twitter, Microsoft, Apple and Sophos," Paul Ducklin, Sophos' Asia Pacific head of technology collected HTTP data and browser screenshots from 1502 web sites and 14,495 URLs.
Ducklin wrote: "We recently surveyed a batch of lost USB keys bought from a transit authority's Lost Property auction; we hoped that the infection rate would be about 10%, but found that 66% of the keys in our study were infected. So we naively assumed that typosquat sites would be similarly incautious (either by accident or design) about malware. But out of 14,495 URLs downloaded in browsing to the 1502 sites on our list, only one contained malware. That's just 0.01% by URL, and 0.07% by fully-qualified domain name."
In his report, Ducklin analyses the data revealing unexpected results and harmful aspects of the typosquatting ecosystem.
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More under: Cybersquatting, Domain Names, Malware, Security
A group of 83 Internet inventors and prominent engineers sent an open letter today to the members of the United States Congress, stating their opposition to the SOPA and PIPA Internet blacklist bills that are under consideration in the House and Senate respectively.
* * *
We, the undersigned, have played various parts in building a network called the Internet. We wrote and debugged the software; we defined the standards and protocols that talk over that network. Many of us invented parts of it. We're just a little proud of the social and economic benefits that our project, the Internet, has brought with it.
Last year, many of us wrote to you and your colleagues to warn about the proposed "COICA" copyright and censorship legislation. Today, we are writing again to reiterate our concerns about the SOPA and PIPA derivatives of last year's bill, that are under consideration in the House and Senate. In many respects, these proposals are worse than the one we were alarmed to read last year.
If enacted, either of these bills will create an environment of tremendous fear and uncertainty for technological innovation, and seriously harm the credibility of the United States in its role as a steward of key Internet infrastructure. Regardless of recent amendments to SOPA, both bills will risk fragmenting the Internet's global domain name system (DNS) and have other capricious technical consequences. In exchange for this, such legislation would engender censorship that will simultaneously be circumvented by deliberate infringers while hampering innocent parties' right and ability to communicate and express themselves online.
All censorship schemes impact speech beyond the category they were intended to restrict, but these bills are particularly egregious in that regard because they cause entire domains to vanish from the Web, not just infringing pages or files. Worse, an incredible range of useful, law-abiding sites can be blacklisted under these proposals. In fact, it seems that this has already begun to happen under the nascent DHS/ICE seizures program.
Censorship of Internet infrastructure will inevitably cause network errors and security problems. This is true in China, Iran and other countries that censor the network today; it will be just as true of American censorship. It is also true regardless of whether censorship is implemented via the DNS, proxies, firewalls, or any other method. Types of network errors and insecurity that we wrestle with today will become more widespread, and will affect sites other than those blacklisted by the American government.
The current bills — SOPA explicitly and PIPA implicitly — also threaten engineers who build Internet systems or offer services that are not readily and automatically compliant with censorship actions by the U.S. government. When we designed the Internet the first time, our priorities were reliability, robustness and minimizing central points of failure or control. We are alarmed that Congress is so close to mandating censorship-compliance as a design requirement for new Internet innovations. This can only damage the security of the network, and give authoritarian governments more power over what their citizens can read and publish.
The US government has regularly claimed that it supports a free and open Internet, both domestically and abroad. We cannot have a free and open Internet unless its naming and routing systems sit above the political concerns and objectives of any one government or industry. To date, the leading role the US has played in this infrastructure has been fairly uncontroversial because America is seen as a trustworthy arbiter and a neutral bastion of free expression. If the US begins to use its central position in the network for censorship that advances its political and economic agenda, the consequences will be far-reaching and destructive.
Senators, Congressmen, we believe the Internet is too important and too valuable to be endangered in this way, and implore you to put these bills aside.
* * *
Signed,
Vint Cerf, co-designer of TCP/IP, one of the "fathers of the Internet", signing as private citizen
Paul Vixie, author of BIND, the most widely-used DNS server software, and President of the Internet Systems Consortium
Tony Li, co-author of BGP (the protocol used to arrange Internet routing); chair of the IRTF's Routing Research Group; a Cisco Fellow; and architect for many of the systems that have actually been used to build the Internet
Steven Bellovin, invented the DNS cache contamination attack; co-authored the first book on Internet security; recipient of the 2007 NIST/NSA National Computer Systems Security Award and member of the DHS Science and Technology Advisory Committee
Jim Gettys, editor of the [HTTP] protocol standards, which we use to do everything on the Web
Dave Kristol, co-author, RFCs 2109, 2965 (Web cookies); contributor, RFC 2616 [HTTP]
Steve Deering, Ph.D., invented the IP multicast feature of the Internet; lead designer of IPv6 (version 6 of the Internet Protocol)
David Ulevitch, David Ulevitch, CEO of OpenDNS, which offers alternative DNS services for enhanced security.
Elizabeth Feinler, director of the Network Information Center (NIC) at SRI International, administered the Internet Name Space from 1970 until 1989 and developed the naming conventions for the internet top level domains (TLDs) of .mil, .gov, .com, .org, etc. under contracts to DoD
Robert W. Taylor, founded and funded the beginning of the ARPAnet; founded and managed the Xerox PARC Computer Science Lab which designed and built the first networked personal computer (Alto), the Ethernet, the first internet protocol and internet, and desktop publishing
Fred Baker, former IETF chair, has written about 50 RFCs and contributed to about 150 more, regarding widely used Internet technology
Dan Kaminsky, Chief Scientist, DKH
Esther Dyson, EDventure; founding chairman, ICANN; former chairman, EFF; active investor in many start-ups that support commerce, news and advertising on the Internet; director, Sunlight Foundation
Walt Daniels, IBM’s contributor to MIME, the mechanism used to add attachments to emails
Nathaniel Borenstein, Chief Scientist, Mimecast; one of the two authors of the MIME protocol, and has worked on many other software systems and protocols, mostly related to e-mail and payments
Simon Higgs, designed the role of the stealth DNS server that protects a.root-servers.net; worked on all versions of Draft Postel for creating new TLDs and addressed trademark issues with a complimentary Internet Draft; ran the shared-TLD mailing list back in 1995 which defined the domain name registry/registrar relationship; was a root server operator for the Open Root Server Consortium; founded coupons.com in 1994
John Bartas, was the technical lead on the first commercial IP/TCP software for IBM PCs in 1985-1987 at The Wollongong Group. As part of that work, developed the first tunneling RFC, rfc-1088
Nathan Eisenberg, Atlas Networks Senior System Administrator; manager of 25K sq. ft. of data centers which provide services to Starbucks, Oracle, and local state
Dave Crocker, author of Internet standards including email, DKIM anti-abuse, electronic data interchange and facsimile, developer of CSNet and MCI national email services, former IETF Area Director for network management, DNS and standards, recipient of IEEE Internet Award for contributions to email, and serial entrepreneur
Craig Partridge, architect of how email is routed through the Internet; designed the world's fastest router in the mid 1990s
Doug Moeller, Chief Technology Officer at Autonet Mobile
John Todd, Lead Designer/Maintainer - Freenum Project (DNS-based, free telephony/chat pointer system), [freenum.org]
Alia Atlas, designed software in a core router (Avici) and has various RFCs around resiliency, MPLS, and ICMP
Kelly Kane, shared web hosting network operator
Robert Rodgers, distinguished engineer, Juniper Networks
Anthony Lauck, helped design and standardize routing protocols and local area network protocols and served on the Internet Architecture Board
Ramaswamy Aditya, built various networks and web/mail content and application hosting providers including AS10368 (DNAI) which is now part of AS6079 (RCN); did network engineering and peering for that provider; did network engineering for AS25 (UC Berkeley); currently does network engineering for AS177-179 and others (UMich)
Blake Pfankuch, Connecting Point of Greeley, Network Engineer
Jon Loeliger, has implemented OSPF, one of the main routing protocols used to determine IP packet delivery; at other companies, has helped design and build the actual computers used to implement core routers or storage delivery systems; at another company, installed network services (T-1 lines and ISP service) into Hotels and Airports across the country
Jim Deleskie, internetMCI Sr. Network Engineer, Teleglobe Principal Network Architect
David Barrett, Founder and CEO, Expensify
Mikki Barry, VP Engineering of InterCon Systems Corp., creators of the first commercial applications software for the Macintosh platform and the first commercial Internet Service Provider in Japan
Peter Rubenstein,helped to design and build the AOL backbone network, ATDN.
David Farber, distinguished Professor CMU; Principal in development of CSNET, NSFNET, NREN, GIGABIT TESTBED, and the first operational distributed computer system; EFF board member
Bradford Chatterjee, Network Engineer, helped design and operate the backbone network for a nationwide ISP serving about 450,000 users
Gary E. Miller Network Engineer specializing in eCommerce
Jon Callas, worked on a number of Internet security standards including OpenPGP, ZRTP, DKIM, Signed Syslog, SPKI, and others; also participated in other standards for applications and network routing
John Kemp, Principal Software Architect, Nokia; helped build the distributed authorization protocol OAuth and its predecessors; former member of the W3C Technical Architecture Group
Christian Huitema, worked on building the Internet in France and Europe in the 80’s, and authored many Internet standards related to IPv6, RTP, and SIP; a former member of the Internet Architecture Board
Steve Goldstein, Program Officer for International Networking Coordination at the National Science Foundation 1989-2003, initiated several projects that spread Internet and advanced Internet capabilities globally
David Newman, 20 years' experience in performance testing of Internet
infrastructure; author of three RFCs on measurement techniques (two on firewall performance, one on test traffic contents)
Justin Krejci, helped build and run the two biggest and most successful municipal wifi networks located in Minneapolis, MN and Riverside, CA; building and running a new FTTH network in Minneapolis
Christopher Liljenstolpe, was the chief architect for AS3561 (at the time about 30% of the Internet backbone by traffic), and AS1221 (Australia's main Internet infrastructure)
Joe Hamelin, co-founder of Seattle Internet Exchange [www.seattleix.net)] in 1997, and former peering engineer for Amazon in 2001
John Adams, operations engineer at Twitter, signing as a private citizen
David M. Miller, CTO / Exec VP for DNS Made Easy (IP Anycast Managed Enterprise DNS provider)
Seth Breidbart, helped build the Pluribus IMP/TIP for the ARPANET
Timothy McGinnis, co-chair of the African Network Information Center Policy Development Working Group, and active in various IETF Working Groups
Richard Kulawiec, 30 years designing/operating academic/commercial/ISP systems and networks
Larry Stewart, built the Etherphone at Xerox, the first telephone system working over a local area network; designed early e-commerce systems for the Internet at Open Market
John Pettitt, Internet commerce pioneer, online since 1983, CEO Free Range Content Inc.; founder/CTO CyberSource & Beyond.com; created online fraud protection software that processes over 2 billion transaction a year
Brandon Ross, Chief Network Architect and CEO of Network Utility Force LLC
Chris Boyd, runs a green hosting company and supports EFF-Austin as a board member
Dr. Richard Clayton, designer of Turnpike, widely used Windows-based Internet access suite; prominent Computer Security researcher at Cambridge University
Robert Bonomi, designed, built, and implemented, the Internet presence for a number of large corporations
Owen DeLong, member of the ARIN Advisory Council who has spent more than a decade developing better IP addressing policies for the internet in North America and around the world
Baudouin Schombe, blog design and content trainer
Lyndon Nerenberg, Creator of IMAP Binary extension (RFC 3516)
John Gilmore, co-designed BOOTP (RFC 951), which became DHCP, the way you get an IP address when you plug into an Ethernet or get on a WiFi access point; current EFF board member
John Bond, Systems Engineer at RIPE NCC maintaining AS25152 (k.root-servers.net.) and AS197000 (f.in-addr-servers.arpa. ,f.ip6-servers.arpa.); signing as a private citizen
Stephen Farrell, co-author on about 15 RFCs
Samuel Moats, senior systems engineer for the Department of Defense; helps build and defend the networks that deliver data to Defense Department users
John Vittal, created the first full email client and the email standards still in use today
Ryan Rawdon, built out and maintains the network infrastructure for a rapidly growing company in our country's bustling advertising industry; was on the technical operations team for one of our country's largest residential ISPs
Brian Haberman, has been involved in the design of IPv6, IGMP/MLD, and NTP within the IETF for nearly 15 years
Eric Tykwinski, Network Engineer working for a small ISP based in the Philadelphia region; currently maintains the network as well as the DNS and server infrastructure
Noel Chiappa, has been working on the lowest level stuff (the IP protocol level) since 1977; name on the 'Birth of the Internet' plaque at Stanford); actively helping to develop new 'plumbing' at that level
Robert M. Hinden, worked on the gateways in the early Internet, author of many of the core IPv6 specifications, active in the IETF since the first IETF meeting, author of 37 RFCs, and current Internet Society Board of Trustee member
Alexander McKenzie, former member of the Network Working Group and participated in the design of the first ARPAnet Host protocols; was the manager of the ARPAnet Network Operation Center that kept the network running in the early 1970s; was a charter member of the International Network Working Group that developed the ideas used in TCP and IP
Keith Moore, was on the Internet Engineering Steering Group from 1996-2000, as one of two Area Directors for applications; wrote or co-wrote technical specification RFCs associated with email, WWW, and IPv6 transition
Guy Almes, led the connection of universities in Texas to the NSFnet during the late 1980s; served as Chief Engineer of Internet2 in the late 1990s
David Mercer, formerly of The River Internet, provided service to more of Arizona than any local or national ISP
Paul Timmins, designed and runs the multi-state network of a medium sized telephone and internet company in the Midwest
Stephen L. Casner, led the working group that designed the Real-time Transport Protocol that carries the voice signals in VoIP systems
Tim Rutherford, DNS and network administrator at C4
Mike Alexander, helped implement (on the Michigan Terminal System at the University of Michigan) one of the first EMail systems to be connected to the Internet (and to its predecessors such as Bitnet, Mailnet, and UUCP); helped with the basic work to connect MTS to the Internet; implemented various IP related drivers on early Macintosh systems: one allowed TCP/IP connections over ISDN lines and another made a TCP connection look like a serial port
John Klensin, Ph.D., early and ongoing role in the design of Internet applications and coordination and administrative policies
L. Jean Camp, former Senior Member of the Technical Staff at Sandia National Laboratories, focusing on computer security; eight years at Harvard's Kennedy School; tenured Professor at Indiana Unviersity's School of Informatics with research addressing security in society.
Louis Pouzin, designed and implemented the first computer network using datagrams (CYCLADES), from which TCP/IP was derived
Carl Page, helped found eGroups, the biggest social network
of its day, 14 million users at the point of sale to Yahoo for around $430,000,000, at which point it became Yahoo Groups
Phil Lapsley, co-author of the Internet Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP), RFC 977, and developer of the NNTP reference implementation
Jack Haverty (MSEE, BSEE MIT 1970), Principal Investigator for several DARPA projects including the first Internet development and operation; Corporate Network Architect for BBN; Founding member of the IAB/ICCB; Internet Architect and Corporate Founding Member of W3C for Oracle Corporation
Glenn Ricart, Managed the original (FIX) Internet interconnection point
Other sources: (UPDATED Dec 15, 2011 1:42 PM PST)
Dec.15.2011
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More under: Censorship, DNS, Internet Governance
The House's Stop Online Piracy Act is in Judiciary Committee Markup today. As numerous protests, open letters, and advocacy campaigns across the Web, this is a seriously flawed bill. Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Darrell Issa's proposed OPEN Act points out, by contrast, some of the procedural problems.
Here, I analyze just one of the problematic provisions of SOPA: a new "anticircumvention" provision (different from the still-problematic anti-circumvention of section1201). SOPA's anticircumvention authorizes injunctions against the provision of tools to bypass the court-ordered blocking of domains. Although it is apparently aimed at MAFIAAfire, the Firefox add-on that offered redirection for seized domains in the wake of ICE seizures,[1] the provision as drafted sweeps much more broadly. Ordinary security and connectivity tools could fall within its scope. If enacted, it would weaken Internet security and reduce the robustness and resilience of Internet connections.
The anticircumvention section, which is not present in the Senate's companion PROTECT-IP measure, provides for injunctions, on the action of the Attorney General:
(ii)against any entity that knowingly and willfully provides or offers to provide a product or service designed or marketed by such entity or by another in concert with such entity for the circumvention or bypassing of measures described in paragraph (2) [blocking DNS responses, search query results, payments, or ads] and taken in response to a court order issued under this subsection, to enjoin such entity from interfering with the order by continuing to provide or offer to provide such product or service. § 102(c)(3)(A)(ii)
As an initial problem, the section is unclear. Could it cover someone who designs a tool for "the circumvention or bypassing of" DNS blockages in general — even if such a person did not specifically intend or market the tool to be used to frustrate court orders issued under SOPA? Resilience in the face of technological failure is a fundamental software design goal. As DNS experts Steve Crocker, et al. say in their Dec. 9 letter to the House and Senate Judiciary Chairs, "a secure application expecting a secure DNS answer will not give up after a timeout. It might retry the lookup, it might try a backup DNS server, it might even restart the lookup through a proxy service." Would the providers of software that looked to a proxy for answers — products "designed" to be resilient to transient DNS lookup failures — be subject to injunction? Where the answer is unclear, developers might choose not to offer such lawful features rather than risking legal attack. Indeed, the statute as drafted might chill the development of anti-censorship tools funded by our State Department.
Some such tools are explicitly designed to circumvent censorship in repressive regimes whose authorities engage in DNS manipulation to prevent citizens from accessing sites with dissident messages, alternate sources of news, or human rights reporting. (See Rebecca MacKinnon's NYT Op-Ed, Stop the Great Firewall of America. Censorship-circumvention tools include Psiphon, which describes itself as an "Open source web proxy designed to help Internet users affected by Internet censorship securely bypass content-filtering systems," and The Tor Project.) These tools cannot distinguish between Chinese censorship of Tiananmen Square mentions and U.S. copyright protection where their impacts — blocking access to Web content — and their methods — local blocking of domain resolution — are the same.
Finally, the paragraph may encompass mere knowledge-transfer. Does telling someone about alternate DNS resolvers, or noting that a blocked domain can still be found at its IP address — a matter of historical record and necessary to third-party evaluation of the claims against that site — constitute willfully "providing a service designed ... [for] bypassing" DNS-blocking? Archives of historic DNS information are often important information to legal or technical network investigations, but might become scarce if providers had to ascertain the reasons their information was being sought.
For these reasons among many others, SOPA should be stopped.
Written by Wendy Seltzer, Law professor
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More under: Censorship, DNS, Law
Some domains are too big to fail. Quite apart from the obvious ones like google.com and facebook.com, upon whose availability our everyday lives depends, there are many others upon which the infrastructure of the Internet (and much of the modern world itself) depends.
These are domains like w3.org and ietf.org, which host the technical specifications which describe the World Wide Web and the Internet themselves. iana.org hosts a number of critical protocol registries and databases. These domain names appear in XML namespaces and other protocol specifications, and their ongoing resolvability is key to these systems functioning as expected.
There are other examples. At the Domain Names and Persistence Workshop, which took place at the 7th International Digital Curation Conference in Bristol last week, I heard from representatives of organisations such as CNRI (which operates the Handle.net system) and the International DOI Foundation (which runs doi.org). These systems underpin much of the infrastructure of our modern interconnected life: the DOI system, for example, through CrossRef, is the standardised method by which scientists refer to the work of their peers in their papers. These references need to be persistent over the long-term (digital archivists like to think on the scale of centuries) in order for the work of modern academia to continue, and for future generations to access and understand the development of scientific knowledge.
These organisations are worried that their dependence on plain old domain names under traditional gTLDs and ccTLDs presents a threat to the stable operation of these systems: despite doing everything possible to ensure the ongoing function of these domains, they remain at risk from everything from failing to pay renewal fees, domain hijacking, to having their parent TLD shut down. One of the key questions the workshop tried to ask was: how can we make these domains truly persistent over the long term?
Several options were discussed as possible solutions. The first and most obvious solution is to ask ICANN to "gold plate" these domains, to make sure that they're never accidentally deleted, transferred or otherwise interfered with. Anyone who reads CircleID will probably have a good idea exactly how difficult, time-consuming and unlikely to succeed this approach would be.
Furthermore, it would be rightly argued that creating "gold-plated" (or perhaps "armour-plated") domains would be the thin end of the wedge: while it may be reasonable to protect w3.org on the grounds of protecting the infrastructure of the Web, wouldn't it also be legitimate to offer similar protection for google.com? it may be just as critical (if not even more so), and if that is the case, why not also microsoft.com, ibm.com and any of thousands of other corporate domains?
Another solution would be the establishment of a TLD specifically for domains that are "too big to fail". While some of the attendees discussed submitting an application for a generic TLD in the upcoming application round, it was pointed out that such an "infrastructure TLD" already exists: the Address Routing and Parameter Area, .ARPA.
.ARPA was the first ever top-level domain, used to migrate Arpanet hosts onto the modern Internet. After this had been accomplished it was repurposed as the root of the Reverse DNS (i.e. numbers to names) system. It is now also used by the eNUM system and the little-used Whois replacement protocol, IRIS.
Management of .ARPA is governed by RFC 3172, which states:
This domain is termed an "infrastructure domain", as its role is to support the operating infrastructure of the Internet. In particular, the "arpa" domain is not to be used in the same manner (e.g., for naming hosts) as other generic Top Level Domains are commonly used. The operational administration of this domain, in accordance with the provisions described in this document, shall be performed by the IANA under the terms of the MoU between the IAB and ICANN concerning the IANA.
Delegations under .ARPA can only be requested by the publication of a "Standards Track" RFC - a very high barrier to entry. Nevertheless, many of the systems (such as handle.net) which are under consideration are already specified in RFC documents, which could be amended to include an "IANA Considerations" section. In fact, RFC 3172 states that
Any infrastructure domains that are located elsewhere in the DNS tree than as sub-domains of "arpa", for historical or other reasons, should adhere to all of the requirements established in this document for sub-domains of "arpa", and consideration should be given to migrating them into "arpa" as and when appropriate.
Which strongly implies that domains that are critical to the operation of the Internet's infrastructure are expected to migrate to .ARPA.
Enhancing the security and stability of critical elements of the Internet's infrastructure is precisely what .ARPA is intended to do. At the conclusion of the workshop there seemed to be a consensus that such an approach offered the best chance of a workable solution to the issue of domain name persistence.
Written by Gavin Brown, Chief Technology Officer for CentralNic
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Internet Protocol, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
My cat Mole Negro has no problem with wearing silly collars like this one. He just looks as stunned as he always does.
While exploring the UNESCO's interactive atlas of the world's languages in danger, I am happy to see that new generic Top-Level Domains could help save some of these languages.
.CAT for Catalan language already exist;
.BZH will probably have the "Breton" language to help survive;
"Basque" is vulnerable but there is a .EUS initiative;
.CORSICA will certainly help the "Corsican" language to develop;
.BOURGOGNE will possibly help the Burgundian;
.CHAMPAGNE would definitely help the "Champenois" but note I am not sure it is the language it would help first ;-)
.CYM, .GAL and .SCOT also exist in other countries.
UNESCO Interactive Atlas – displaying world’s languages in danger
Written by Jean Guillon, Top-Level Domains specialist
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More under: Multilinguism, Top-Level Domains
ICANN's expansion of top-level domain program faced a second hearing today (see last week's Senate Committee hearing here), this time by the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. During the hearing critics once again warned that ICANN's January roll-out of the program is not adequately developed and it should be delayed. "I don't think this is ready for prime time," said Representative Anna Eshoo, D-Calif.
Kurt Pritz, ICANN's senior VP, a witness at today's hearing, showed no indication of ICANN's willingness to delay the launch and recently wrote this in a blog post: "A long and careful deliberative process produced this program. World-class experts on intellectual property, economics and Internet security developed solutions and those solutions were reviewed by the Internet community and vetted by governments."
Information about today's hearing can be found here.
Other sources: (UPDATED Dec 20, 2011 12:43 PM PST)
ICANN Defiant Despite Calls to Delay Domain-Name Program NationalJournal, Dec.15.2011
ANA Applauds Strong Letter from FTC to ICANN Citing Major Concerns About Top-level Domain Expansion Program ANA, Dec.19.2011
FTC tells global Internet body to cut back domain name plan Nextgov, Dec.19.2011
Critics stage last-ditch effort to derail domain name expansion plan Computerworld, Dec.20.2011
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Today, December 14, 2011, the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is holding the second of two workshops on the transition of the PSTN to new technologies (described previously). The workshop started streaming live this morning at 9:30am US Eastern at:
The FCC's note about the workshops mentions that people watching the live stream can send in questions to panelists using either of two methods:
Given that a video recording was provided for the first workshop, hopefully a video recording of this second session will also be made available.
Today's sessions look to be quite interesting and contain quite a range of participants. The full schedule and list of participants is available on the FCC's web site (click on "Expand" in the lower right corner of the page), but here is the brief list:
* * *
9:30 a.m. — 9:40 a.m. - Welcome Remarks by Zachary Katz, Chief Counsel and Senior Legal Advisor, Office of the Chairman, FCC
9:40 a.m. — 10:45 a.m. - Impact of the Transition on the Technology and Economics of the PSTN
Participants include: University of Colorado, Carnegie Mellon, George Washington University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Gillan Associates, SIP Forum
10:45 a.m. — 11:45 p.m. - Policies of the PSTN (e.g., accessibility, reliability, affordability, and public safety)
Participants include: Tufts University, Consumer Federation of America, University of Wisconsin, Neustar
1:00 p.m. — 2:10 p.m. - Implementing the Transition to New Networks
Participants include: Verizon, Comcast, Carnegie Mellon, National Telecommunications and Information Association (NTIA), XO Communications
2:10 p.m. — 3:20 p.m. - Syncing Expectations, Emerging Technologies and the Public Good
Participants include: Georgetown University, University of Michigan, University of Pennsylvania — Wharton, Acme Packet, Panasonic Systems Networks
3:20 p.m. — 4:30 p.m. - Economic Rationales for PSTN Transition
Participants include: Queens College, Indiana University, Syracuse University, Sanford Bernstein, University of Auckland, NZ
Written by Dan York, Author and Speaker on Internet technologies for over 20 years
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More under: Broadband, Internet Protocol, Policy & Regulation, Telecom, VoIP
As the weeks remaining in 2011 dwindle and 2012 peaks out from behind the last page of the calendar, it must once again be that time of year for purposeful reflection and prediction. Or is that navel gazing and star gazing?
The year still has a couple of weeks to rock on before we can comprehensively summarize the events and trends of 2011. I'm sure there will be a bunch of annual threat reports preempting the end of year — extrapolating trends etc. in order to get the jump on reports that use real data. At the highest level of navel gazing you could probably sum up 2011 with one word — "More". The bad guys got richer, more successful, invented a few new attack vectors, and generally grew in numbers; meanwhile the good guys got more efficient at causing the bad guys pain, but continued to be outspent by the bad guys.
But let's put that aside for now. What does 2012 hold in stall for us?
It's easy enough to predict the future when you're merely commenting upon the trends of past years and projecting "more" of the same. While I can offer no shortage of meaningful predictions for 2012 across a broad range of threat and security categories, I thought it would be fun to pick three topics that stole much of the limelight of 2011 — Advanced Persistent Threats (APT's), mobile malware and botnet takedowns.
So, without further ado, here are a handful of predictions for 2012.
APT Bonanza
The volume of persistent attacks directed at large corporations will continue to increase and the victims will continue to feel as though they have been specifically targeted. There will thus be a presumption of sophistication to successful penetrations, which will lead to more organizations concluding that they have been the victim of an APT — which, after more detailed analysis and external input, will increasingly be revealed as false claims.
Mobile Malware threats will continue to be misunderstood
Mobile malware will divide into two streams — Smartphone malware and tablet crimeware. Both mobile malware streams will be similarly unimpressive from a threat sophistication perspective, however their criminal intent will direct their evolutionary changes. Tablet crimeware will develop at a faster pace than Smartphone malware in 2012 as the opportunities to defraud potential victims on tablet systems grow quicker.
Botnet takedowns will be ineffective
Despite a number of public and media-hyped botnet takedowns in 2011, and the prospect of increased takedowns in 2012, the overall impact on cyber-criminal operations will decrease. In response to the 2011 takedowns, cybercriminals will change some of their management tactics, further distribute their command-and-control (C&C) infrastructure, and invest in improved and more diverse infection vector operations.
I wonder how many of these predictions will come to fruition? I guess we'll find out in 380 days.
Written by Gunter Ollmann, VP of Research at Damballa
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More under: Cyberattack, Cybercrime, Malware, Mobile, Security
Yesterday I finally got to try out the handmade virtual pinball machine created by my buddy Spuds that he calls "iPin3K". It's ridiculously cool.
From afar it looks like your standard (if a bit wide) pinball machine, complete with flippers, a ball shooter, and flashing lights. Which is already so cool to have in your home. Only on closer inspection do you realize that the entire game is simulated, created with three different different computer monitors and a homebrew Windows PC running pinball emulation software.
Despite this, the games felt totally real and convincing, from the "clack clack" of the flippers to blur of the ball whizzing around the board to the cheesy voice-overs from Arnold Swartzanegger and Patrick Stewart.
Spuds spent the past four months building the cabinet, assembling the computer components, installing the 3 monitors, connecting the buttons, flippers and ball shooter, and troubleshooting the software. It's already really impressive and Spuds tells me he's about "halfway there." Apparently he still needs to add lights, physical feedback for the bumpers, and other physical electronics.
The video above shows me blowing away Spuds' high score on the classic game Abra Ca Dabra. Which just means he hasn't played it very much. After all, he's got 50+ other pinball games loaded up on his virtual machine!
I'm totally blown away... and can't wait to come back and play some more!
Last year the municipality of Gavle asked my company if we could help them load share the streaming pictures of the famous Christmas goat in Gävle.
I accepted the invitation and set up a separate domain. My own interest in this was of course to track the usage of IPv6 and validation of DNSSEC from the visitors of the site. You can see the results from last year's test here on CircleID.
Also for this year my company Interlan was involved in terms of load sharing. My special interest also stayed the same and the test this year was done in the exact same way, except for the fact that only one camera was used this year.
How did we do this? Below is a brief description:
At the time of the premier of the 2011 Christmas Goat, November 27, 2010, the following was set up: [www.julbockmedipv6ochdnssec.se] (no longer active)
In order to:
• Track native IPv6 with a RR with A and AAAA.
• Track those who can run IPv6 native or tunneled.
• Track validating DNS-resolvers with a domain that has a faulty DNSSEC.
From the above we were able find out that both usage of native IPv6 and DNSSEC validation have increased quite a lot this year. The native IPv6 users increased from 0.1% to 0.5% and the DNSSEC validation from 44% to 72%.
52% of all visitors were able to reach the http://[2001:b48:10:3::215]/ipv6.jpg where 74% running Teredo, 25% 6to4 and 1% native IPv6.
Unfortunately the Christmas Goat did not have the same luck as the one in 2010. By the morning of Friday, the 2nd of December, it was burned down.
The total time of the test this year was hereby limited to a short period. But with the experience from the test last year, and this year, I only need few days to get quite an accurate percentage of the use of IPv6 and DNSSEC from the visitors. This year I did a check after two days, last year I checked several times and the result was surprisingly correct after only a few days.
The operating systems used by visitors were also as expected: Windows 7, Mac OS X and different smartphones were up and Windows XP and Vista down.
Hopefully I will be back in 2012 with another update on the IPv6 — DNSSEC usage via the Christmas Goat in Gavle!
For now, a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all!
Written by Torbjörn Eklöv, CTO, Senior Network Architect, DNSSEC/IPv6
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In a letter released on Monday, the Internet Society Board of Trustees has expressed concern with a number of U.S. legislative proposals that would mandate DNS blocking and filtering by ISPs to protect the interests of copyright holders. "Policies mandating DNS filtering undermine the open architecture of the Internet and raise human rights and freedom of expression concerns," says Internet Society (ISOC). More from the letter:
"While the Internet Society agrees that combating illicit online activity is an important public policy objective, these critical issues must be addressed in ways that do not undermine the viability of the Internet as a platform for innovation across all industries by compromising its global architecture. The Internet Society Board of Trustees does not believe that the Protect-IP Act (PIPA) and Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) are consistent with these basic principles."
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More under: Access Providers, Censorship, DNS, Internet Governance, Law, Policy & Regulation
Red Bull has finally gotten around to posting all of the battle footage from the 2011 Red Bull BC-One b-boy competitions in Moscow Russia that took place on November 26. Here's the final round between Roxrite of the US and Lil G of Venezuela, and it's fantastic.
I enjoy the BC-One series, which pits the best-of-the-best from around the world against each other in a series of one-on-one battles. That said, I have found them to be very power-centric, with gymnastics and flips winning out over style and dance ability. Watch for example this ridiculous battle between b-boys Neguin and Vero.
I don't know if the judging criteria has changed or people are just getting tired of endless flares, but B-boy Roxrite just mowed through the competition this year with a series of solid, smooth, style-centric rounds that demonstrated strong fundamentals, footwork, rocking the beat, on point freezes, plus some power moves thrown in. Really, Roxrite showed some classic b-boy vocabulary and flavor that is scarcely seen on the Red Bull BC-One floor.
Not to diss all of the other incredible talents on display in Moscow. Neguin is one of my favorite b-boys to watch, with his explosive opening flips, swagger, and confidence in his power moves. Lil G is just inhuman with his flares and 2000s and headspins and everything else he does in the air. Morris is just a powerhouse and a confident warrior who has a bunch of great tricks.
The weakest by far were last year's finalist b-boy Niek from Holland and b-boy Yan from Russia. Yan has some nice comedic touches and a smooth style, but he doesn't bring the energy or power to last long on the BC-One stage. Niek always looks ungainly and unclear whenever I see him dance.
Back to the final battle shown above between b-boys Lil G of Venzuela and Roxrite of the US. I think a lot of uninformed viewers will think that Lil G is the dominant competitor, just because he is so incredibly powerful, clean and explosive. While all that is true, Lil G's footwork was uninspiring and his musicality was almost nowhere to be seen. There just wasn't much dancing. That said, the kid is ridiculous and will only get better.
Roxrite's final rounds are all solid, with clean toprocking that was rocking the beat, smooth entrances, solid footwork, freezes on the break, and solid powermoves. He's like a rock and everyone else is just flying around him. That said, I found his rounds fairly uninspiring and his character a bit too introspective. Neguin plays to the crowd, laughs and smiles. Morris has swagger and aggression. Cloud is focused and intense. Roxrite just gives you the poker face and then launches into his top rock.
So I'm on the one hand happy that b-boy Roxrite won -- he's the complete package and he brings the crown back to the US, after years and years of hard-fought battles. But I'm probably not going to be replaying his rounds over and over again the way that I watch b-boys Neguin, Cloud, Lilou or Taisuke.
You can watch all of the incredible rounds on the . And definitely read b-boy on his blog.
If you missed attending or listening to the live stream of the US Federal Communication Commission's (FCC) workshop on the transition of the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) to new technologies that was held last week on December 6th, the FCC has very nicely made a video recording available from their website for viewing:
Given that the workshop was 4 hours long, you may or may not want to watch the entire session. The workshop was divided into four hour-long panels that consisted of brief presentations by the various panelists followed by questions to each panel from the moderator and attendees. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski also appeared briefly to provide a few comments.
The order of the workshop panels is as follows (and differs from the planned agenda only in that FCC Chairman Genachowski's comments came between the first two panels):
In his comments, FCC Chairman Genachowski discussed how the world is changing and moving to an IP network. He highlighted that 19% of the nation's telephone connections are already interconnected VoIP and 30% of Americans have cut the cord and moved to wireless. He spoke of the role of IP networks in unleashing innovation, contributing to job creation, education, etc. and indicated he and the commission are seeking answers to questions such as these:
He emphasized that the current PSTN is reliable and accessible and we don't want to lose benefits of old system. He indicated that he wants to enable the private sector to take the best benefits of PSTN and bring those into the future while taking advantage of new technologies.
The panelists in each section all saw the transition as inevitable, indicated it was already well underway and raised legitimate concerns to be considered with regard to their topic area. For instance, the sheer number of installed devices connected to the PSTN will take quite some time to change over to devices that can work with IP networks. An example was given that a standard for alarm systems over IP was only standardized within the TIA in 2007 and a similar standard for smoke alarms over IP was only standardized in 2010. It will take quite some time for devices with those standards to propagate out into commercial availability and transition options may need to be evaluated. Similarly, while the use of traditional TTY devices continues to decline, there is still a huge installed base. These TTY devices are designed to work over the PSTN and the traditional protocol used does not work well over IP. These devices will need to either be replaced or have a transition device such as a terminal adapter installed to work over IP networks.
All in all it was quite an interesting session and hopefully did provide the FCC with the type of feedback they were seeking. The second FCC workshop on the PSTN transition takes place tomorrow, December 14, 2011.
Written by Dan York, Author and Speaker on Internet technologies for over 20 years
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More under: Access Providers, Broadband, Internet Protocol, Policy & Regulation, Telecom, VoIP, Wireless
You should not worry too much if some of the new generic Top-Level Domain names (gTLDs) become monopolies. ICANN and the registries won't charge monopoly prices as long as they have to worry about the government stepping in.
Monopolies normally present two problems for consumers: restricted output and higher prices. In the case of the new gTLDs, restricted output is caused only by ICANN's monopoly over approving gTLD applications. By contrast, registries have an incentive not to restrict registration volumes other than for quality purposes. That leaves the problem of high prices. Will monopolistic registries charge exorbitant registration renewal fees?
It should be noted that even if initially there are competitors for an approved gTLD signal (say, .nyc for New York City), over time network effects can lead to market-driven monopolies. Consider the case of .com. More companies want to have a .com address as opposed to .net, .info, or .biz, and the reason is simply that more people search for .com Web sites. Once a preference, .com has quickly become a necessity.
ICANN faces an incentive and a disincentive. Let registries charge high prices and ICANN can collect higher dues because registries have to pay ICANN a fixed fee for every domain registration. But there's the chance that the antitrust division of the Justice Department will swing into action with an antitrust suit (whether against the registries or ICANN) and/or imposition of stricter regulations on the domain name industry. Those steps would spell goodbye to any profits that ICANN hopes to pick up from hogwild registry pricing.
In fact, it would be best if the Justice Department spoke up now and warned ICANN against allowing such practices. But the threat is already clear to anyone who knows the industry and its regulatory environment, and that includes the people at ICANN and the registries. That threat is enough to spur them to self-regulate and thereby escape regulatory scrutiny.
Written by Alex Tajirian, CEO at DomainMart
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More under: Domain Names, Registry Services, ICANN, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
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It's ironic and amusing that while a few well-connected opponents of the new gTLD program were testifying before the U.S. Senate committee, I was asked to help educate top executives of one of the largest global ad agencies and their major clients on the brand marketing and advertising implications of the program.
It was clear from the start that virtually all these high-powered executives knew about the program they had learned from the eleventh hour negative campaign. Many thought the program had little or no value for brands and businesses and feared having to apply defensively for their names.
There is confusion on the most basic facts. The arguments of the opponents of the new gTLD program are founded on the inaccurate presumption that gTLDs and second level domains are interchangeable and hence, to be evaluated in much the same way. This has led many senior marketing and brand executives, to conflate gTLDs and second-level domain names. One senior vice president of a large multi-national consumer package goods company said, "We have hundreds of brands. The cost for us to apply for each of these as a TLD to defend them would be huge."
Why would she believe she had to apply for every brand as a gTLD?
If you listen to the testimony from the ANA's Dan Jaffe, he estimates the cost to brands as "multi-billions of dollars," and then justifies how the ANA has arrived at this figure. He says, "Some have estimated that for a typical company the cost of acquiring a single new gTLD and managing it could easily exceed 2 million dollars. Companies that are forced into an auction with another potential applicant could face far higher costs. As companies have hundreds and even thousands of brands to defend, it's easy to see how these costs can spiral upward." Is he talking about gTLDs or second level domain names?
By the end of the seminar with major brands and their ad agency — and after correcting misrepresentations and discussing innovative marketing opportunities possible for some brands with new gTLDs — reactions were much different. Many found that they needed to see gTLDs as a competitive and strategic opportunity, not simply a defensive and tactical maneuver. We talked about involving other functions within their organizations to make a proper decision. For some, it was clear that they need not apply for gTLDs. Others began considering a generic term describing their vertical industry or market.
My morning in New York reaffirmed the notion that our entire DNS industry is faced with a massive communication problem that we must do a better job of addressing.
While it is fair to discuss the potential benefits of new gTLDs, we need to first address the misinformation and criticisms.
First, there are the trademark infringement concerns. There are comprehensive and collectively unprecedented protections afforded legitimate trademark holders in the new gTLD program. For example, once the applicants are announced and before ICANN even evaluates applications, there are opportunities for trademark holders to object. Specifically, trademark holders can use the Legal Rights Objection, using the WIPO Rules that are part of a larger dispute process laid out in module 3 of the Application Guidebook. Companies and associations can raise objections for both registered and unregistered trademarks upon which they believe the new gTLD application may infringe. So, for example, if an entity other than eBay applies for .eBay, it would likely be a costly exercise in futility.
As for generic strings, they are just that, generic, so no entity has trademark rights. If a company or brand chooses to apply for a generic string, it may be to defend their competitive business interests, but it is not to defend their trademark interests.
If on the other hand, the company or brand decides against applying for a generic string and finds later that another entity has applied, been evaluated and been awarded the same string, they still have options. They can choose whether to register second level domains, should be it applicable to their business. In that case, they are afforded protections such as mandatory sunrise provisions giving trademark and brand holders the first rights to apply for a domain name under a new gTLD. Should they choose not to register their second level names, additional and new mechanisms, such as the Centralized Trademark Clearinghouse, makes the task of guarding against potential violations much easier. The Centralized Trademark Clearinghouse provides them a mechanism to register their trademarks only once in a centralized database for all registries to reference as a source for validating applications. Should an potential infringement occur, they have quick and efficient recourse through the Uniform Rapid Suspension System and the Trademark Post Delegation Dispute Procedure. Bottom-line: It will be more difficult and costly than ever before for cybersquatters to attempt to register legitimate trademarks. That said, ICANN would need to ensure that this fear among trademark owners is unfounded.
A related issue is the cost of defensive domain name registrations to protect against cybersquatting. Unless the program is launched and the impact on defensive registrations studied, we will not know the exact cost. But if prior behavior is an indication, companies do not make a habit of registering their names in every conceivable TLD. A 2009 study showed that among the seven most common current gTLDs, less than 200,000 names were registered across all the TLDs — but only three percent were registered by the same entity, or about 6,000. Again these numbers are based on the current state and current gTLDs, many of which were launched without the comprehensive protections now afforded trademark and brands in the new gTLD program. Also, in extreme cases, the new ICANN rules facilitate trademark holders going directly after registries that sell names that infringe or have the potential to create confusion.
Last but not least, let's examine the claim of user confusion resulting from an "unlimited" number of new gTLDs deluging the market. This assertion is based on two assumptions: one, that unlimited number of gTLDs would be awarded, delegated and launched at the same time; and two, that many would be confusingly similar to one another. As for the first, ICANN has made a commitment to the root servers, operators and others in the security and stability community that the maximum number of gTLDs delegated in a year would be no more than 1,000. ICANN's new gTLD Application Guidebook has clear provisions for string confusion and string contention. So ICANN could not and would not award .shop and .shops.
Ironically, by their own misunderstanding, the opponents are spreading the confusion wider instead of curbing it.
It is our job as an industry to clear the smog of misinformation for the benefit of businesses, brands and consumers.
Written by Alexa Raad, CEO of Architelos
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More under: Cybersquatting, DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Top-Level Domains
The US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation Hearing on ICANN's Expansion of Top Level Domain Names on December 8, 2001 was all about strategy. The strategy was simple: while the world has its attention turned to the debate on the copyright legislative proposals of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act, let's have another ICANN hearing and try to re-open trademark protection for new gTLDs. And this time, let's have a different crowd submitting the testimonies: Mr. Dan Jaffe of the Association of National Advertisers (ANA); Ms. Angela Williams, of the Young Men's Christian Association of the United States of America (YMCA); and, Ms. Esther Dyson, first ICANN's chairwoman.
What was heard at the Hearing was not something inspiringly new: brands will suffer and consumers will be confused. A lot was said about defensive registrations, how the Internet is a scary place for trademark and brand owners, how there is a possibility that child porn will proliferate, how cybersquatters can 'blow us up', how law enforcement will not be able to do their jobs and how US senators may not be able to register their names. Innovation was questioned in a much unconvincing way and much was argued about the presumed lack of consensus for the new gTLD program.
The new twist in this Hearing was the participation of non-profits, through the YMCA, which was used by the trademark community as the new vehicle to air trademark concerns and as a further attempt to demonstrate that if these organizations' brands are suffering, then this should be enough to put the new gTLD program on hold. This might have impressed the Senators at the Hearing but it, ultimately, is a really weak argument. Non-profits are not trademark maximalists, especially in the way trademark interests are represented at the ICANN level. Non-profits are entities that protect their marks (not brands), but following the underpinning principles of goodwill, consumer protection, competition, etc. associated with the mark and the services they provide. So, I am not sure whether the YMCA's testimony represents an understanding for NGOs and non-profits outside the US; in fact I am pretty sure it doesn't represent the views of many NGOs and non-profits in Europe and, especially, in the developing world.
On the other hand, ANA's message was simple: the new program is a threat to companies and consumers and it should be stopped. ANA has been particularly involved in this process after the Special Trademark Issues (STI) team recommendations were released, which were based on a consensus that the trademark community did not agree with. This consensus was highly challenged by ANA, on the basis that, since it didn't reflect the views of the trademark industry and some non-profits, it was illegitimate. No matter what one thinks about ICANN's consensus policies, these have been in place for many years, a lot of work to more accurately define it has been done and continues at the level of the the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO), they are part of ICANN's ecosystem of procedures and, in many cases, have been instrumental in the trademark community winning many policy battles. So, the idea that this consensus is not working is mistaken: it just didn't work out this time for the trademark crowd.
I was quite puzzled with Esther Dyson's testimony, especially the part where she argued that "the process of consulting with the public hasn't really worked" and that she was representing Internet users, who will be confused through this expansion. There are two mistakes Ms. Dyson made: through NCUC for example, users have participated in the process and, for instance, concerns of free speech and freedom of [removed]that no one at the meeting even dared to mention) have been addressed to the fullest extent possible within a multistakeholder model. (The difference is that, contrary to other groups, these groups have accepted the results of such multistakeholder recommendations.) And, as for the argument that users will be confused through this process is really not working any more. Users have become more savvy than any other time; by now the majority knows how to use the Internet, what to suspect and what to avoid. The idea that we need stronger intellectual property protection for the users reflects a time when our parents and grandparents were not logging on to Facebook and they thought computers were aliens.
So, what one should take from this Hearing is that the people who actually have been involved in this process, Ms. Fiona Alexander from INTA and Mr. Kurt Pritz from ICANN, both celebrated and gave their vote of confidence to multistakeholder participation. They both correctly insisted on the fact that the new gTLD program was a consensus policy and that its language is an attempt to represent the multistakeholder environment of ICANN. They addressed how all stakeholders participated in the various policy groups and that, although work needs to be done, a lot has happened towards ensuring that ICANN's work on the new gTLD program reflects its multistakeholder community in a transparent and accountable way. This is a very crucial point and Hearings like this one demonstrate how foreign multistakeholderism is for many US politicians. So, here's a suggestion: if we wish to have Hearings like this one, let's do so, at least with an understanding of how ICANN works, where we were and where we are now. Because it turns out that Hearings like the one of December 8, are not constructive at all; they are highly disruptive, in a time when ICANN should be focusing on finalizing and cross-checking everything in order to make sure that the January 2012 launch goes as smoothly as possible.
Written by Konstantinos Komaitis, Senior Lecturer
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More under: Cybersquatting, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Top-Level Domains
About two months ago, I got together with some fellow DNS engineers and sent a letter to the U. S. Senate explaining once again why the mandated DNS filtering requirements of S. 968 ("PIPA") were technically unworkable. This letter was an updated reminder of the issues we had previously covered in our earlier white paper on the same subject.
In the time since then, the U. S. House of Representatives has issued their companion bill, H. R. 3261 ("SOPA") and all indications are that they will begin "markup" on this bill some time next week. SOPA contains a DNS filtering mandate similar to PIPA's, and our arguments about the technical unworkability of PIPA are entirely accurate about the technical flaws in SOPA. We've also heard rumours of a possible "compromise" whereby Congress may be willing to water down these bills and require that DNS lookups for infringing web sites are simply not answered, as if that would be somehow better than answering with a pointer to a government warning page.
This is not a compromise, and would not work anyway. Today we're sending a letter to the chairmen, members, and staffs of the committees in the House and Senate who are trying to figure out how to re-engineer the DNS to protect brands and intellectual property from online infringement. The simple fact is, DNS doesn't work the way Congress needs it to work, and mandated interception in any form will not make it so.
In other news, I participated in a panel at Stanford University's law school the other night, topic: "What's Wrong With SOPA?". While we had no SOPA proponents on the panel itself, we had plenty in the audience, as the Q&A will show. The video is . And if you missed the webinar last month where we discussed the dangers of PIPA (and SOPA) with some ISP's, the audio is here.
Written by Paul Vixie, Chairman and Chief Scientist, Internet Systems Consortium
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More under: Censorship, DNS, DNSSEC, Domain Names, Law
Several months ago McKinsey did a very interesting study on the economic value of the Internet. They pointed out that Internet in the G8 countries as well as Brazil, China, India, South Korea, and Sweden is now bigger than agriculture or energy. The Internet represents 3.4% of GDP and accounted for 21 percent of GDP growth over the last five years among these developed countries and as Vint Cerf pointed out in his blog created 2.6 jobs for every one lost.
It is interesting to note that many governments have a variety of research and financial support programs for agriculture, energy and other sectors, but they hardly spend any R&D money on the greatest job engine in the economy — the Internet. There are some funding programs and research initiatives in telecoms, computation and related fields. But R&D support for future Internet specifically is very small in comparison. Given the importance of the Internet to our future economy and job creation one would think governments should make more than a token investment in this field.
The future Internet spans a number of activities including pure research initiatives such as GENI and FIRE, to production facilities which involve deployment of working networks. The deployment of real working, next generation Internet networks with an early adopter community to my mind is probably the most important of all these activities. This is where National Research and Education Networks (NRENs) play a critical role.
This is how the early Internet started. In a landmark study undertaken by University of Toronto researchers showed that the adoption and growth of the commercial Internet was driven in early stages by recently graduated students who had been exposed to the benefits of the Internet at their respective universities and community colleges. (see: "The (Teaching) Role of Universities in the Diffusion of the Internet”)
There are many viewpoints on what is the role and purpose of R&E networks. Some feel that they should be simple aggregators of traffic and deliver the lowest cost possible Internet service to the research and education community. Others believe that NRENS should focus on supporting eScience and the demands of big data flows from instruments and high performance computing. While others advocate that NRENs should be the backbone of all public sector service delivery such as education, healthcare and government services. While all these are very important roles for NRENs it is my belief that none of these roles should be considered an end objective in their own right. In my opinion, the most important role for NRENs is to lay down the foundation for development of the most important sector of the economy — the future Internet — by deploying advanced networks and services for the most demanding and largest early adopter community in the world — the research and education sector. Exposing researchers and most importantly, students to innovative applications, unconstrained bandwidth, new wireless services, open data, digital collections, federated identity, clouds, green IT, etc. will give them the insight to take this experience to the outside world when they graduate.
The biggest transfer of knowledge between academia and society is not through science journals. Nor is it through patents or commercializing of academic research. The biggest transfer of knowledge between academia and industry and society occurs once a year at graduation. The future economy is increasingly going to be based on Internet services applications in all sectors whether it is the resource, manufacturing or the service industries. Countries that expose students to the latest Internet innovation and who are comfortable in the collaborating and working in a future virtual world of the Internet will reap the rewards of a stronger economy and greater job growth.
Written by Bill St. Arnaud , Green IT Networking Consultant
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More under: Broadband
Larry Strickling, who runs the NTIA (the part of the U.S. Department of Commerce that handles ICANN), yesterday gave an important and remarkable speech to the Practicing Law Institute about Internet governance. His speech, timed to coincide with an orchestrated ICANN-bashing across town in the Senate, was a striking defense of the ICANN model and a repudiation of special pleading outside the process.
Meanwhile, across town, the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), who a few months ago decided to become the public face of opposition to new gTLDs after years of only desultory interest, had managed to convince the Senate Commerce Committee to hold a hearing on the matter. It was supposed to be a great party, but nobody came. The most powerful group of public-opinion changers in the United States barely got a quorum at their public event on how awful new gTLDs would be for the 1%.
Space in People's Heads
The Senators that did appear were somewhat cool to the New Luddite message being peddled by the ANA and Esther Dyson, ANA's star performer. Esther, fully inhabiting her new role of grumpy ex-Chair of ICANN, said:
"The rationale is that there's a shortage of domain names… but actually, there's a shortage of space in people's heads… So was that Marriott.com or Marriott.hotel, or dyson.com or dyson.hotel if I decide to rent out my apartment?"
Of course Esther doesn't own dyson.com, that's owned by a vacuum cleaner company in the UK. And ".com" doesn't indicate whether the site is about renting your apartment or sucking up loose dirt — but never mind....
Apparently there was enough space in the head of Senator Rockefeller, Chair of the Commerce Committee. He said,
I think we have to get used to .hotel.... I think we have to get used to .auto… I start from that position, but I listen.... I think a surge of new names and addresses can create opportunities: whether they will or not, I do not yet know...
A Principled Defense
Larry Strickling's speech was the opposite of the low comedy in the Senate. His principled and passionate defense of ICANN's model of Internet governance is worth quoting at some length (emphases mine):
This year has been a very active one for NTIA in the area of Internet governance as well as in privacy policy. In fact, the Senate Commerce Committee had a hearing this morning on the new top level domain program that Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) will be starting in January. Our work at NTIA in this area has focused on how we can preserve and expand the marvelous economic and job creation engine that the Internet has become. As we address these issues, we are guided by two principles.
First is trust. It is imperative for the sustainability and continued growth of the Internet that we preserve the trust of all actors on the Internet. For example, if users do not trust that their personal information is safe on the Internet, they may not use it to its full potential. If content providers do not trust that their content will be protected, they may be reluctant to put it online.
Second, as we find ways to address Internet policy challenges, we want to preserve the flexibility companies need to innovate. Our view at NTIA is that multistakeholder processes are best suited for striking this balance. By engaging all interested parties, multistakeholder processes encourage broader and more creative problem solving, which is essential when markets and technology are changing as rapidly as they are. They promote speedier, more flexible decision making than is common under traditional, top-down regulatory models which can too easily fall prey to rigid procedures, bureaucracy, and stalemate.
The United States strongly supports the use of a multistakeholder process as the preferred means of addressing Internet policy issues. We have been active in promoting the multistakeholder model in the international arena through our work at ICANN and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
...we are now seeing parties that did not like the outcome of that multistakeholder process trying to collaterally attack the outcome and seek unilateral action by the U.S. government to overturn or delay the product of a six-year multistakeholder process that engaged folks from all over the world. The multistakeholder process does not guarantee that everyone will be satisfied with the outcome. But it is critical to preserving the model of Internet governance that has been so successful to date that all parties respect and work through the process and accept the outcome once a decision is reached. When parties ask us to overturn the outcomes of these processes, no matter how well-intentioned the request, they are providing "ammunition" to other countries who attempt to justify their unilateral actions to deny their citizens the free flow of information on the Internet. This we will not do. There is too much at stake here.
We all know the Internet for its technological achievements. What is less understood, but possibly just as important, is that it has pioneered a global decision-making model that involves the people who are interested in and affected by the decisions, irrespective of status or geography, and de-emphasizes the power of moneyed interests. Going forward, if the ANA or some other group cares about an issue, they may have to rub shoulders with the hoi polloi, listen to other viewpoints, and reach a compromise that can attract wide acceptance.
With the speech by Larry Strickling (and, in a different context, similar remarks by Hillary Clinton), the U.S. government has now stated unequivocally that it won't open a new door to censorship in order to placate the ANA, and for this defense of the right of free speech they should be applauded. With rights come responsibilities: now it's up to the operators of top-level domains, and ICANN, to vindicate this faith in consensus decision-making.
Written by Antony Van Couvering, CEO of Minds + Machines
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Top-Level Domains
Yesterday, the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation held hearings on ICANN's expansion of top level domains. Next week the House Energy and Commerce committee will also conduct their hearings on this same topic.
While there were some harsh criticisms expressed, and interesting questions posed at the hearings, it became even more clear (if it hadn't been already) that ICANN feels very confident that as a result of their approach that the new gTLD program has been designed with the guidance of the entire community.
At this late stage, a delay in the launch of new generic top level domains seems highly unlikely. However, that is not to say that we won't still see some very important enhancements incorporated into the program. Some of these potential enhancements could include increasing the length of mandatory Sunrise Periods, removing the 60-day limit on Trademark Claims notifications, and establishing defined guidelines for the batching of applications for processing, just to name a few.
I do not expect a delay, but I do expect that we will continue to see some refinements incorporated into the gTLD program.
Written by Elisa Cooper, Director of Product Marketing at MarkMonitor
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Top-Level Domains
Some folks have been asking what I was doing in Washington DC last week. What I can say at the moment is that I was participating in a project with the National Endowment for the Arts. I'm not at liberty to say what the nature of the project was yet, but all will be revealled in the Spring.
Suffice to say, it was a great honor and a pleasure to serve this important federal agency. It's great to see the government doing something that I wholeheartedly endorse and support, namely supporting the arts for the public good.
In my last post I blogged about greylisting, a well-known anti-spam technique for rejecting spam sent by botnets. When a mail server receives a an attempt to deliver mail from an IP address that's never sent mail before, it rejects the message with a "soft fail" error which tells the sender to try again later. Real mail senders always retry, badly written spamware often doesn't. I found that even though everyone knows about greylisting, about 2/3 of IPs don't successfully retry.
Another theory about greylisting is that if you defer mail from a new IP, by the time the sender retries, if it's sending spam it'll have hit spamtraps and been added to blacklists. I recently realized that I have enough log data to check that theory, so I collected some statistics for the past week, which is as long as I keep logs about mail connections from blacklisted hosts. The IPs I greylisted broke down like this:
| Count | Percent | |
| No retry | 3,803 | 35.8% |
| Retry too soon | 3,345 | 31.5% |
| One retry | 1,183 | 11.1% |
| More than one message | 1,635 | 15.4% |
| Blacklisted | 561 | 5.3% |
| Retried, blacklisted later | 89 | 0.8% |
| Total | 10,616 | 100.0% |
No retry and Retry too soon are senders that greylisting kept from sending anything, again, about 2/3 of mail. (My greylister requires that the sender wait at least a minute, since some spamware sends several messages a few seconds apart.)
The next two are senders that retried successfully and sent one message, or more than one message. (If a sender retries too soon, then retries again after more than a minute, it's counted in one of those two categories.) Blacklisted means that when the IP retried, the IP was on one of the a blacklists I use, in nearly all cases Spamhaus Zen. The last line is IPs that retried successfully, but were blacklisted when they tried to send other messages later.
The 5.3% for Blacklisted probably overstates how much mail was caught by waiting to see if an IP was blacklisted. My logs don't say whether the delivery attempt that was blacklisted was trying to deliver a message with the same To and From addresses, in which case it would have been delivered, or a different message, in which case it would just have been greylisted again. Spot checking shows IPs that were greylisted repeatedly, before appearing in a blacklist, which suggests that they were sending different messages.
Also, for the few IPs that were blacklisted later, they were generally blacklisted much later, hours or days later, far longer than any reasonable greylisting strategy would force mail to wait.
So greylisting still works, but it's almost entirely because spamware doesn't retry, not because it gets blacklisted.
Written by John Levine, Author, Consultant & Speaker
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Greylisting is a hoary technique for rejecting spam sent by botnets and other poorly written spamware. When a mail server receives an attempt to deliver mail from a hitherto unseen sending host IP address, it rejects the message with a "soft fail" error which tells the sender to try again later. Real mail software does try again, at which point you note that the host knows how to retry and you don't greylist mail from that IP again. The theory is that spamware doesn't retry, so you won't get that spam. I wrote a paper on it for the 2005 CEAS conference, and concluded that conservative greylisters worked well.
We've now been using greylisting for close to a decade, and some people have argued that it's no longer useful, since the bad guys could easily fix their spamware to retry, or since bots are so cheap, they could just send everything twice. So does it still work?
I recently went through my greylister's logs and collected some statistics for both a recent week, and the past year, about hosts that I greylisted:
| Week | Year | |
| No retry | 12121 | 294812 |
| One retry | 7456 | 62402 |
| Many messages | 4956 | 74590 |
The first row is the number of hosts that got a soft fail and never came back. The second row is the number that retried the message that failed, but never sent anything again, and the third row is the number that retried and sent more messages after that.
As you can see, for the week, about half of the greylisted hosts didn't retry, and over a year, about 2/3 didn't. That's still a lot of mail my mail server didn't have to filter. I attribute the different ratios to the shutdown of several botnets over the past year, evidently botnets that didn't retry.
So it's certainly not a magic bullet (what is?) but greylisting still is an effective way to deter a lot of spam cheaply.
Next, Greylisting Still Works - Part II
Written by John Levine, Author, Consultant & Speaker
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South Korea's ruling party chairman has offered to resign over a cyberattack reported to have been orchestrated by an aide to one of the conservative party's lawmakers. The move comes after police concluded the distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on the election watchdog's website on the day of by-elections in October was masterminded solely by a 27-year-old aide to the ruling Grand National Party. The aide has also admitted to orchestrating a similar cyberattack on the website of Park Won-soon, who was elected Seoul mayor in the Oct. 26 elections.
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More under: Cyberattack
Kevin Murphy reporting in DomainIncite: "NTIA boss Larry Strickling has come out in support of ICANN and its new top-level domains program, warning that its opponents 'provide ammunition' to authoritarian regimes. Speaking in Washington DC yesterday, Strickling warned that organizations fighting to put a stop to the new gTLD program risk provoking a UN takeover of the internet."
Related Links:
US says it will not block the new gTLD program DomainIncite, Dec.9.2011
Remarks by Lawrence E. Strickling NTIA, Dec.9.2011
US government saves ICANN's bacon by Kieren McCarthy, .NXT, Dec.9.2011
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Top-Level Domains
U.S. Office of Management and Budget released a memo today establishing a program to reduce "duplicative efforts, inconsistencies and cost inefficiencies when assessing and authorizing cloud systems." The initiative called, Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP), is aimed to develop a standardized approach to security assessment, authorization, and continuous monitoring for cloud products and services through standardized security requirements and controls.
"FedRAMP is a government-wide effort, and represents the efforts of the Department of Defense (DoD), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the General Services Administration (GSA), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), amongst many others."
Some key FedRAMP benefits include:
The full policy meme is located here on CIO.gov website.
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More under: Cloud Computing, Data Center, Policy & Regulation, Security
As previously noted, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation today held a full committee hearing on ICANN's expansion of top level domains (TLDs). The hearing was held to examine the merits and implications of the program and ICANN's efforts to address concerns raised. ICANN will begin accepting applications for new TLDs on January 12, 2012.
In his remarks, Chairman John D. Rockefeller, U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, said:
"Starting in January, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, commonly referred to as ICANN, is planning to allow organizations and companies to apply for any generic or brand-specific top level domain name they wish. This means that hundreds — if not thousands — of new names are going to join the familiar world of "dot com," "dot net," and "dot org." Get used to "dot hotels" or "dot auto" or "dot movie," a surge of new names and addresses that create opportunities but could also create a lot of confusion. If ICANN is determined to move forward, it should do so slowly and cautiously."
Below are quotations from witness panel testimonies:
"The ICANN community has worked tirelessly to create a New gTLD Program that will introduce competition and innovation at the top level of the DNS. Thousands of pages have been carefully written, balancing expert analyses, independent study, and thousands of comments. Governments have provided advice; professionals have weighed in. The new gTLD implementation program represents opportunities for innovation and enhanced competition, with a future of stronger rights protections, stronger consumer protections, and measured paths forward to future rounds."
— Mr. Kurt Pritz, Senior Vice President of ICANN
* * *
"NTIA is dedicated to maintaining an open, global Internet that remains a valuable tool for economic grown, innovation, and the free flow of information, goods, and services online. We believe the best way to achieve this goal is to continue to actively support and participate in multi-stakeholder Internet governance processes such as ICANN. This is in stark contrast to some countries that are actively seeking to move Internet policy to the United Nations. If we are to combat the proposals put forward by others we need to ensure that our multi-stakeholder institutions have provided a meaningful role for governments as stakeholders. NTIA believes that the strength of the multi-stakeholder approach to Internet policy-making is that it allows for speed, flexibility, and decentralized problem-solving and stands in stark contrast to a more traditional, top-down regulatory model characterized by rigid processes, political capture by incumbents, and in so many cases, impasse or stalemate."
— Ms. Fiona Alexander, Associate Administrator, Office of International Affairs, National Telecommunications and Information Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce
* * *
"We reject the argument of those who say that it is too late for ICANN to step back and reevaluate or for NTIA, the Governmental Advisory Committee and other key Internet participants to try to make one last major effort to forestall this potentially severely damaging initiative. There is absolutely nothing sacred about the January 2012 implementation date. Given the serious concerns expressed by a broad and growing cross-section of the entire American and global business community, the companies which provide the economic foundation of the Internet, and the potential dangers to consumers, we believe it would be irresponsible for ICANN to proceed full-speed ahead with the roll-out next month."
— Mr. Dan Jaffe, Executive Vice President, Government Relations, Association of National Advertisers, Coalition for Responsible Internet Domain Oversight
* * *
"The current domain name system in some ways is an accident of history. ICANN was created to regulate it, independently of any government and on behalf of the Internet — and world-community as a whole. Just as with fishing rights, communications spectra, taxi medallions and other «commons,» there's a delicate balance between too few and too many domain names, which this new initiative may well upset if it goes forward without more serious study. As the old saying goes: If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"
— Ms. Esther Dyson, Founding chairman of ICANN, 1998-2000; currently an independent angel investor
* * *
"I know that in Health Care Reform you heard the concerns of small not-for-profits and provided the same "claw back" for health insurance premiums for small not-for-profits as you have for small business. Time and again this committee has shown interest and common sense in protecting our precious not-for-profit sector from tremendous financial burden that will inhibit our ability to achieve our missions. I ask each of you to think about all the small and large not-for-profits that make our country and our world a better place to call home; our work alongside government; our work on most, if not all, of our nation's greatest problems. I ask you to look at this issue through the lens of the not-for-profit organizations in this country who are using limited resources to do much good."
— Ms. Angela F. Williams, Senior Vice President and General Counsel, Young Men's Christian Association of the United States of America
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More under: Cybersquatting, DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Top-Level Domains
Proposals to enhance online property protection have received a lot of attention lately. Brand managers, goods manufacturers, and content distributors strenuously argue that current law enforcement mechanisms are inadequate to meet the challenges of today's fast-paced marketplace. They specifically note that foreign-based "rogue websites" continue to distribute unlicensed products and content despite existing rules; they maintain that new legislation is needed to empower intellectual rights holders to counter such cyber-criminals more effectively.
Several proposals for such new legislation currently before the U.S. Congress have generated quite a bit of controversy. Significant concerns have been raised, including the risks of technological collateral damage; expansion of certain parties' legal rights at the expense of due process and other social norms; and a negative impact of these measures on international relations. As the rhetoric becomes more polarized, a satisfactory public policy outcome appears that much harder to achieve.
Public Interest Registry acknowledges that online infringement and piracy are real issues and concerns for a variety of U.S. and international interests. We also understand the calls for additional efforts to confront these challenges, and we accept that new legislation may be necessary. Nevertheless, we share the concerns of many of the current proposals' critics. We believe that any legislative options should be narrowly focused to avoid unintended consequences that could seriously degrade the functioning of the domain name system (the "DNS").
Some proposals would require Internet service providers (ISPs) to filter attempts to view content under certain domain names so that Internet users would not be able to see the web sites represented by these domains. Filtering also is used by some nations to censor content that offends the government.
Public Interest Registry is already on record regarding our serious concerns about mandated DNS filtering and the collateral damage that this approach can cause. Such filters have potential consequences for a critical Internet security mechanism. Domain Name System Security Extensions, or DNSSEC, is a set of Internet security protocols that have been under development for approximately 20 years. The U.S. government has been publicly committed to use of DNSSEC since the publication of the President's National Strategy to Secure Cyberspace in 2003.
These protocols can ensure that an Internet user is being routed to a location that he or she intends to visit; they have the promise to be a critical tool in fighting phishing, DNS hacks, and other abusive behavior on the Internet. DNSSEC has only recently been implemented by generic top-level domains (gTLDs) such as .ORG, which was the first open gTLD to do so. Their adoption is critical in the battle against fraudulent and malicious practices on the Internet, and any action that might undermine public confidence in their effectiveness will damage their increasing adoption.
It also is difficult to assert a public interest in a broad expansion of certain parties' legal rights at the expense of the broader Internet-using community's rights. In particular, the current legislative proposals raise significant due process concerns. Provisions of pending legislation would eliminate or seriously limit advance notice to alleged offending sites and meaningful opportunities to respond to charges. These initiatives could threaten the universally recognized right of freedom of expression.
Speech, be it personal or commercial, deserves protection; removal of content from the Internet without due process is a threat to that protection. The history of law enforcement actions has shown that DNS filtering and other DNS-related solutions to online problems have the potential to remove innocent content from the Internet. It continues to be our strong belief that limits to the exercise of fundamental human rights must meet a rigorous standard; such limits should be the exception and not the rule. There must be respect for due process and the provisions enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and related international law.
In addition, it is hard to reconcile a specific domestic initiative that appears to be at cross-purposes with long-standing international law enforcement principles, including the encouragement of multilateral cooperation. European jurists and parliamentarians recently have confirmed their commitment to preserve existing law concerning service provider liabilities and monitoring responsibilities for alleged online infringement. A unilateral U.S. mandate could undermine the spirit and practice of cooperation among international law enforcement bodies. A uniquely American approach might also have the unintended consequence of retaliation by other governments, including those that are more interested in censorship of content.
In sum, it seems clear that the proposed online property protection initiatives should not advance in their current form. These attempts at legislative solutions need to be reworked to reconcile the technical, jurisdictional, and international shortcomings that many have identified. To be sure, balancing the growing demand for more effective online property protections with the public interest of ensuring respect for fundamental human rights will remain a significant challenge for legislators, law enforcers, and policy analysts around the world. In our view, it would be unfortunate — even irresponsible — to see a set of special interest proposals undermine the open, decentralized, and global nature of the Internet that we enjoy today.
Written by Paul Diaz, Director of Policy at Public Interest Registry (PIR)
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More under: Cybersquatting, DNS, Domain Names, Registry Services, Internet Governance, Law, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
In an article on CSO.com.au a report from Sophos Australia is reported on. The anti-virus software company had bought 50 usb drives for analyses at a public transport auction of devices left on the Sydney trains. When they wrote that 66% was infected with malware, I presumed that they were left behind consciously, but were they?
Loss of privacy sensitive data
No, apparently not. The article was mainly on privacy issues, that people are unaware of the risks they run when not securing their devices. The article gives a summary of content lost this way. Yes, this is a very important issue. We have heard about great loss of privacy sensitive data or military secrets lost on devices (and discs) in the recent past. Cyber awareness and the sense that privacy is a serious issue in cyber space is still at a low ebb with a lot of people.
But what if?
The article gave rise to some reflection on my part.
1. The amount of malware on the usb drives
a. Was this in place when bought or
b. Is this a clear sign of the amount of pcs/laptops infected?
2. Spreading usb drives as source of infections
With the price of usb drives as low as it is, this is a way to infect other devices quickly. Whether through infection from the manufacturer or through distributing some devices on trains and other public places.
Mandatory pre-checks. A solution?
What about issuing, by law, information on how usb devices (external hard disks, etc.) can be checked before use in combination with them not working before the mandatory check? Is this feasible or technically possible? It's worth considering if society wants to be more secure.
Written by Wout de Natris, Consultant international cooperation cyber crime + trainer spam enforcement
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More under: Cybercrime, Law, Malware, Policy & Regulation, Security
A few days ago, I sat in a meeting here in Ottawa with our IT Director and Director of Marketing and Communications. These are two highly intelligent people working on the same team, for the same company, talking about a common subject. And yet, something was amiss in achieving mutual understanding. Each was seeing things from his own distinct perspective and as such, speaking his own language. As I reflected on my team's internal dynamic, I began to see parallels in areas that have an even more direct impact on the Internet ecosystem.
Recently in Dakar at the meeting of the ICANN Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) and the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO), different languages (and I mean that figuratively) were clearly being spoken and mutual understanding was not achieved. Phrases like 'very, very disappointed' were used, voices were raised, and the tension in the room was palpable.
While fireworks often happen at ICANN meetings, there was a new sense of urgency displayed.
A lot happened behind the scenes, and it was, in my opinion, symptomatic of a few challenges facing a maturing organization.
ICANN is made up of many — sometimes — disparate voices. That's the beauty of the multi-stakeholder model — those who should have a voice do have a voice. However, disparate voices can also lead to some severe, albeit unintentional miscommunications.
I live in Ottawa, and as anybody who has lived or worked here knows, government folks have their own language. It goes beyond a vocabulary rife with acronyms; every message, every sentence (to us outsiders, anyway) is nuanced and massaged. Contrast this to the direct nature of private sector players, Registrar and others, in the Internet world. These are "chronic entrepreneurs," folks who look for the most efficient, pragmatic solution, often bred in the wide open early days of the Internet. When these two groups get together, the potential for miscommunication is enormous. Each speaks the same language, but the "dialects" of their cultural groupings can be quite different.
The law enforcement community has been calling on Registrars for a long time to curb criminal use of the domain name system. This issue has finally come to a head with the blowout at the meeting of the GAC and the GNSO, who represent the interests of the Registrar community at ICANN, and subsequent meetings between the GNSO and other groups.
Law enforcement first introduced a set of recommendations in a document called, appropriately, ICANN Law Enforcement Due Diligence Recommendations, to curb illegal activity on the Internet in 2009, and these recommendations were endorsed by the GAC in 2010.
The Registrar Stakeholder Group, a sub-group of the GNSO, had a discussion at the ICANN meeting in Singapore in June 2011 about implementing the law enforcement recommendations. There was a clear miscommunication at that time, because in Dakar the GAC were convinced that the Registrars would be returning in Dakar to report on progress toward implementing in short order nine of the 12 recommendations.
When the Registrars came back with an update on implementing just three of the recommendations (and at that, they were the three most minor of the bunch), the GAC was understandably upset.
In the government's world, the appearance of making progress can be just as important as progress in and of itself. There's no point in doing something if you can't show that you've done so.
The Registrar Stakeholder Group, I'm sure, believed they were reporting a major success. They have a point. The fact is, even if they adopt all 12 of the recommendations and shut down nefarious activity originating in their respective countries, a Registrar somewhere else in the world will likely just fill that void. Why make investments, time and money, if it's likely not going to make a difference?
In the minds of the Registrars, they think they've made real progress. If you can't get 100 per cent, there's no point in wasting time and energy trying. Most of the good guys are already taking appropriate steps anyway. The GAC is going to have to go back to their respective countries, where some of them are facing a good deal of pressure to have Registrars implement the Law Enforcement recommendations, and let their leaders know Registrars won't voluntarily adopt them and self-regulate.
Fine, you can't get 100 per cent, but you have to give us something, the GAC seems to be saying.
This was seen by both the GAC in particular, and as a result the ICANN board, as having some pretty severe consequences, and they let the Registrars know their disapproval.
But what's the GAC really saying here? It's a metaphorical scream for help. It's a, "Guys, help us so we can help you!"
Why?
Because governments want — need — to curb criminal activity on the Internet. If the current structure that oversees the Internet is ineffective in helping them do so, another model for governing the Internet will start looking more attractive to them.
Bodies like the GAC, who have been, for the most part, supporters of the multi-stakeholder model, are trying their best to protect that model from external pressures, often coming from governments. Fact is, governments are flexing their muscles, and all of the players in the Internet governance ecosystem better listen. There are expectations placed on GAC members by their home governments, and when they need to deliver, they need to deliver.
And there are a few options that are gaining awareness around the world, such as in moves by the International Telecommunication Union to exert their control over the Internet, and more recently we've seen it in the form of a proposal commonly referred to as the IBSA proposal.
The IBSA is a proposal developed by India, Brazil and South Africa (thus, the acronym), calling for the development of a new global body, within the current United Nations system, that would oversee the technical development and operations of the Internet. In other words, it calls for the dismantling of the multi-stakeholder model for governing the Internet.
Fact is, the IBSA is the sound of the bolts being tightened around the key players. Although it's unlikely to succeed, there will be other proposals that will follow, and if something doesn't change soon (as in, start listening to each other, Registrars and GAC), eventually one of them is going to succeed.
In a way, this really puts the Registrars in a no-win situation. If they're not willing or able to materially self-regulate, regulations are going to be imposed by governments. And, it's in their best interest to self-regulate. This course of action will be the best for everyone involved because it will be the path to protecting the multi-stakeholder model.
Many of the Registrars need to better appreciate that the Internet isn't the Wild West anymore. It's a maturing industry, and it's an industry like no other — all of the disparate stakeholders have a (more or less) equal say. And, more and more governments around the world are starting to take notice.
At some point the Registrars need to realize that they need to start really listening to what the other stakeholders are trying to say to them. This not only means listening to the words being spoken but also really hearing the meaning of what is being said. It's in their own best interest. I can promise you one thing — if the multi-stakeholder model is dismantled, whatever replaces it won't have nearly as much room for a voice from private sector actors like Registrars (or any other non-governmental agency, for that matter).
What do you think? Am I understanding the GAC and Registrars' respective points of view or am I also interpreting through my own lens?
Written by Byron Holland, President and CEO of CIRA
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More under: Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance
A political focus on subsidizing telecom infrastructure is just so easy. There are multiple photo opportunities (at the announcement, the cheque presentation and the system activation), happy mayors, happy voters. It gets to be portrayed as economic stimulus, direct job creation and consistent with progress on digital economic development.
But while it may feel satisfying politically, I question the effectiveness of continued broad government subsidies based on geography, rather than taking a more focused approach based on need.
That is what drives my view that our attention needs to turn to subsidies with more precise targeting aimed at those who can't afford a computer or the connectivity. The approach to date has been trying to level the prices charged in urban and rural markets, without regard to whether that price point is consistent with increased rates of adoption.
It is within this context that I read an OpEd by Susan Crawford in the weekend New York Times. The piece opened with a paragraph that has since been changed. Here is how the original read:
FOR the second year in a row, the Monday after Thanksgiving — so-called Cyber Monday, when online retailers offer discounts to lure holiday shoppers — was the biggest sales day of the year, totaling some $1.25 billion and overwhelming the sales figures racked up by brick-and-mortar stores three days before, on Black Friday, the former perennial record-holder.
This has since been changed, realizing that Cyber Monday wasn't the biggest shopping day of the year — just the biggest on-line shopping day:
FOR the second year in a row, the Monday after Thanksgiving — so-called Cyber Monday, when online retailers offer discounts to lure holiday shoppers — was the biggest online sales day of the year, totaling some $1.25 billion and overwhelming the sales figures racked up by brick-and-mortar stores three days before, on Black Friday, the former perennial record-holder.
Both versions continue "Such numbers may seem proof that America is, indeed, online." But the correction results in the entire opening making no sense. As mighty as the sales were on Cyber Monday, they were only about one-tenth the volumes of sales on Black Friday. In what way did this overwhelm the sales figures of brick-and-mortar stores? I just wrote about Digital corrections. Having the premise of the article destroyed by the opening inaccuracy, it is tough to read through the rest of the piece — at its core, the OpEd was a tired argument for strong government intervention in the communications marketplace.
A blog post by ITIF research fellow Richard Bennett does a great job destructing Professor Crawford's "old-school analysis."
Her vision of future applications is utterly pedestrian. She says: "Within a decade, patients at home will be able to speak with their doctors online and thus get access to lower-cost, higher-quality care" without acknowledging that doctors already use e-mail, can use video calling in many cases, and have been reachable by phone for several generations.
Similar misguided calls for "structural separation" have also been heard in Canada — ignoring a regulatory framework that already enables competitors to access facilities and services from the facilities-based carriers. A competitive services marketplace continues to ignore the challenge of connecting households that don't even have a computer.
Solutions for bridging the digital divide need to look beyond the myopic focus of infrastructure. How do we address adoption among identifiable groups — the most glaring being low income households. That should be a broadband target for the coming year.
Written by Mark Goldberg, Telecommunications Consultant
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More under: Access Providers, Broadband, Internet Governance
The Internet Commerce Association has just sent a letter to senior members of the House Judiciary Committee regarding the likely unintended but potentially devastating impact of H.R. 3261 ("SOPA") as introduced upon ICANN-accredited registrars and other participants in the broad domain name industry, as well as upon the domain registrants who use those services. Registrants, for example, might find it impossible to renew domains due to the extrajudicial termination of payments services sanctioned by the proposal, or to complete domain sales or transfers. Further, many of the domain name industry companies subject to potential payment and advertising service termination under the bill might lack the income to pursue their legal rights, and could well be forced into bankruptcy.
This potential impact arises because, while domain names are subject to trademark law, the Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA) as well as ICANN's Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) place the responsibility for domain name infringement upon the domain registrant and look at a variety of factors, particularly the actual use of the associated domain, before reaching a determination as to whether infringement exists.
ICA believes that SOPA, as introduced, creates the strong possibility that trademark rights holders will seek to have payment and ad services terminated to registrars and other domain name intermediaries based upon the allegation that they are facilitating the use of domains that constitute "counterfeit marks" in and of themselves, without reference to actual use or available defenses. This potential shifting of "cybersquatting" responsibility from registrants to registrars and other domain name intermediaries, as well as the failure to incorporate the more comprehensive and nuanced analysis of the ACPA and UDRP, appears unjustified and unwise — and could lead to the shutdown of these domain name intermediaries and the associated termination of critical domain-related services to millions of registrants engaged in non-infringing uses of their websites.
A key portion of the letter states:
ICA must oppose SOPA as introduced.
While a principal and worthy intent of the legislation is to curtail the Internet sale of counterfeit hard goods to U.S. individuals and businesses, scant attention has been given to its potential effect on the hundreds of highly competitive domain registrars accredited by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), as well as upon other intermediary participants in the domain name ecosystem — including "parking" companies that arrange for the display of click-through ads on domains, domain hosting companies, and domain auction and resale websites that facilitate the operation of a thriving secondary free market in domains.
Our concerns are heightened by the fact that SOPA would facilitate the termination of payment and ad services to a website — including the website of an ICANN-accredited registrar or other domain industry intermediary — before any judge had reviewed the factual allegations brought against it much less determined whether such allegations, if true, would constitute a violation of trademark law.
Such a result would not only be devastating to the companies operating through such websites but to their customers, who might find it impossible to renew valuable domains in a timely manner — potentially resulting in the unjustified closure of their own web-based business — or to complete domain transfers or sales that were in process at the time the allegations were levied.
We therefore urge the Judiciary Committee to give careful attention to the potential impact of SOPA upon the domain name industry and to amend the legislation to clarify that the mere fact that an industry participant facilitates the de novo registration of a domain, or its renewal, transfer, or sale, or provides other domain-related services, cannot give rise to an allegation that it is involved with unlawful activities concerning goods or services bearing a "counterfeit mark".
The letter also expresses concerns that the introduced legislation needs substantial narrowing and is not required to effectively address infringement on websites subject to U.S. court jurisdiction, and will also have negative effects on cybersecurity and on the availability of venture capital for innovative Internet startups.
The full text of the letter is available at the ICA website.
Written by Philip S Corwin, Founding Principal, Virtualaw LLC; Counsel, Internet Commerce Association
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More under: Cybersquatting, Domain Names, ICANN, Law, Policy & Regulation
I just found out that Red Bull is producing a new TV series on breaking called "Break'n Reality." The six episode series will follow three of the world's best b-boys, Roxrite, Lilou and Neguin, as they pursue their art, compete and train.
Given the high production values of the Red Bull BC-One competitions and online videos, this could be a really epic series. At the very least, we are going to see some compelling dance footage from the world's finest breakers. And maybe we'll get some insights into how they got where they are.
"Break'n Reality" is set to premiere in Spring 2012.
The United States White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) has released a new report titled, Trustworthy Cyberspace: Strategic Plan for the Federal Cybersecurity Research and Development Program, specifying an agenda for "game-changing" cybersecurity R&D according to an official announcement today. The report is described as "a roadmap to ensuring long-term reliability and trustworthiness of the digital communications network that is increasingly at the heart of American economic growth and global competitiveness."
This plan has defined the following as four strategic thrusts:
1. Inducing Change – using game-changing themes to understand the root causes of existing cybersecurity deficiencies with the goal of disrupting the status quo;
2. Developing Scientific Foundations – minimizing future cybersecurity problems by developing the science of security;
3. Maximizing Research Impact – catalyzing coordination, collaboration, and integration of research activities across Federal agencies for maximum effectiveness; and
4. Accelerating Transition to Practice – expediting improvements in cyberspace from research findings through focused transition programs.
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More under: Cyberattack, Cybercrime, Internet Governance, Security
My friend Cynthia Millman passes along this exciting news about a BBC radio program on lindy hop that aired yesterday and is streaming online for the next week. Swinging At The Savoy presented by Len Goodman was broadcast on BBC Radio 2 on December 5.
You can listen live on BBC Radio 2 or on the internet at [www.bbc.co.uk] for 7 days .
Check out the amazing line up of swing all-stars interviewed on the show!
- Norma Miller – original dancer and pioneer at The Savoy Ballroom alongside Frankie Manning
- Barbara Billups – Sonny Allen’s dance partner and member of touring dance troupe Sonny Allen And The Rockets
- Sugar Sullivan - Sugar has been featured with the Harlem Blues & Jazz Band, Cab Calloway's Hi-De-Ho Orchestra, Duke Ellington Orchestra, Count Basie Orchestra, and Panama Francis and his Savoy Sultans among others
- Dawn Hampton - danced with Frankie Manning in Malcolm X. She has been a singer, dancer and cabaret artist since the age of 3 in the 1930s
- Frankie Manning - pioneer of swing dance and inventor of the aerial. Interview recorded in 2003
- Cynthia Millman – Co Authour of Frankie Manning's autobiography, Frankie Manning: Ambassador of Lindy Hop
- Paul Mercer Ellington – Grandson of Duke Ellington and current band leader of The Duke Ellington Orchestra
- John Miller – Glenn Miller's nephew and leader of the John Miller Orchestra
- Jive Aces – UK’s number one swing band, regularly play to swing fans around the world
- World War II veterans at War & Peace Show
- Joe Wilder - a great trumpet player who performed many times at the Savoy
- Chazz Young – Frankie Mannings son and a talented dancer in his own right. Chazz also worked on Malcolm X
- Ray Gelato – former member of The Chevalier Brothers, Ray gelato has performed swing at Royal Albert Hall and for The Queen
- The Puppini Sisters – modern day Andrews Sisters, well known for their close harmony versions of modern day tracks
- Herrang Dance Camp – the worlds biggest swing dance camp, it runs for 5 weeks a year, with over 1,000 dancers and attracting internationally renowned techers and original swing dancers from the Savoy era. Led the swing revival in Sweden
- Warren Heyes – member of the Jiving Lindy Hoppers, alongside Terry Monaghan, who led the UK swing revival
- Broken Hearts DJs – swing djs and host of Jazz FM’s Peppermint Candy swing show
- Swing Patrol/London Jitterbug Championship event – swing teachers and events organisers in the UK and Australia
- Jive Swing/ Vintage Tea Dance event – swing teachers and events organisers in the UK
- International swing dance teachers from US, Sweden and UK
- International swing dancers from Switzerland, US, Japan, Portugal, France, UK
Check it out while you can!
On Thursday, December 8, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation will host a full committee hearing on "ICANN's Expansion of Top-Level Domains." According to the Committee's website, the hearing will "examine the merits and implications of this new program and ICANN's continuing efforts to address concerns raised by the Internet community."
Other sources: (UPDATED Dec 06, 2011 12:39 PM PST)
Dyson confirmed for new gTLDs Senate hearing DomainIncite, Dec.6.2011
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, Registry Services, ICANN, Internet Governance, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
The www.buy.xxx website already receiving nearly one million visitors per day.ICM Registry, the official registry of the new adult top-level domain (TLD) launched today for General Availability of .XXX domain names on a first come, first served basis.
While the debate over the new domain has been fierce, the company reports today: "The introduction of .XXX has quickly become the most successful launch of any new sponsored top level domain. The positive public response has fueled global media interest normally not afforded to a new domain launch. In addition, the global advertising campaign, a first for any adult-related company, includes hundreds of nationally broadcast TV commercials, radio, newspapers and online ads. The www.buy.xxx website is already receiving nearly one million visitors per day."
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More under: Domain Names, Registry Services, Top-Level Domains
Last Saturday, I spent the good part of the day into the evening at the "Great Dickens Christmas Fair," a month long celebration of the holidays in the Cow Palace in South San Francisco. I'm still struggling to find words to describe the experience.
The Dicken's Fair is a fully realized recreation of Victorian England (or at least as fictionalized by Charles Dickens and other authors) including entire city blocks of shops, cafes, pubs and diverse entertainments, brought alive by a cast of hundreds of costumed participants.
Everything is designed to fully immerse you in the experience. A street vendor tempts you with freshly roasted chestnuts. A passing group of drunken sailors sing bawdy drinking songs. A puppet show delights children with Punch and Judy hitting each other with sticks. A pub serves hot mulled wine and other spirits to a raucous crowd of celebrants.
It's enough to make you forget where and when you are.
My girl Jeskat had multiple roles at the Fair....
She was one of the living window displays at a local corset shop.
She also sang with in the Coventry Carol group. Here they are being visited by a group of gruff sailors.
And she was a cast member in the adults-only "French Postcards" production that happens later in the evening. (No pictures, sorry.)
Here's Jeskat and me in the steampunk emporium. I did my best to look as period as I could. Jeskat of course is gorgeous.
The day passed into evening so quickly as I was absorbed in the experience, along with my sister and cousin who came along. We ate various period-specific fare like bangers and mash, spiced nuts and roast beef. We shared some hot mulled wine that was strong and well spiced. We danced a polka in Fezziwig's dance hall. In a hat shop we tried on various fascinators, newsies and bonnets. And we saw lots of carolers wandering about. Along the road, we even had to make way for a passing entourage of Queen Victoria and her children along with their attendants!
Here's some Morris dancers performing a spirited dance routine with a live band at Mad Sal's.
The evening closed with a hundred or so people singing Handel's Messiah together in Fezziwig's dance hall, which was just a perfect way to end the night.
There are hundreds of more things to see and do that I don't have time to write about now. Whether you are shopping for some special gifts and handcrafts, eager to waltz to a live band, sing bawdy songs in a tavern, dine on English specialities like fish and chips and meat pie, or just get into the Christmas spirit, I can't think of a better place to go than the Dickens Fair.
The Dicken's Fair runs every weekend until December 18. Don't miss it, if you are in the area! See more of my pics on
Image source: WikipediaWith IPv4 address exhaustion upon us, it appears that the going market rate for IPv4 addresses is now $12/address. Over at the Register, Kevin Murphy reports on a bankruptcy filing from Borders seeking to sell a /16 block of to healthcare software vendor Cerner for a total of $786,432. At $12 per IPv4 address, this sets a new public record given that the previous high was Microsoft's acquisition of a block of Nortel IPv4 addresses back in April 2011 for $11.25/address.
Over on his own Domain Incite blog, Murphy also provides a PDF of the court document relating to the actual sale. The document includes this note about the actual addresses which I found interesting in the justification for the sale:
The Internet Addresses consist of one /16 legacy block of 65,536 IPv4 Internet Protocol Numbers (the "Internet Addresses"). Computers and their devices, to connect to the internet, require unique internet addresses. The current Internet Address pool is IPv4 (which stands for version 4) which addresses consist of 32 bits — limiting the number of available Internet Addresses to 4.3 Billion. IPv4 addresses have been depleted and availability is scarce. A new version IPv6 has emerged which will make availability almost infinite. However until IPv6 is fully transitioned, there is still a need for IPv4 addresses.
The court document also includes this indication that the sale is contingent upon approval from ARIN:
Since late 1997, internet addresses in North America are distributed and administered through the American Registry of Internet Numbers ("ARIN"). The address blocks being sold were acquired by the Debtors before ARIN's appointment, which results in the classification of the block as a "legacy block." ARIN offers various services to holders of IP Addresses including publication in their WHOIS directory and many holders of legacy IP Addresses have agreed to sign agreements with ARIN to insure compliance with ARIN policies in exchange for the services. ARIN has indicated to the Debtors that they believe that the legacy Internet Addresses fall within ARIN's jurisdiction. While the Debtors believe that this Court has the authority to authorize the sale of the Internet Addresses over any such objection by ARIN, the IA Sale contains a condition of ARIN's consent and the proposed order incorporates various protections of ARIN's rights, which moots any need to consider any of these issues.
There will be a hearing on December 20th by the bankruptcy court to approve the sale, presumably based on ARIN's consent. (Should ARIN choose NOT to give consent, it will be interesting to see what the court would then do.)
What do you think? Should ARIN give its consent and allow the sale to go forward? And given this sale at $12/address, how high do you expect the next sale to go?
Written by Dan York, Author and Speaker on Internet technologies for over 20 years
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More under: IP Addressing, IPv6
There is such a huge volume of genomics (DNA related data) and bio-informatics data being produced that it cannot be transferred over commercial Internet networks, and instead organizations are using FedX and other sneaker nets to ship the data.
The same crisis in data volumes is also occurring in the climate modelling and other fields as well.
Research and Education (R&E) networks for many years have been warning about this coming data tsunami. For the most part they have the capacity and the tools to easily enable the transfer of these large data volumes. No commercial networks have this capability at this time. But the biggest problem is a lot of this data is not being generated by universities or R&E organizations but commercial facilities closely aligned with the R&E community. Numerous bioinformatics companies, like SoftGenetics, DNAStar, DNAnexus and NextBio, have sprung up to as they have found life sciences a fertile market for products that handle large amounts of information.
This poses a real dilemma for many R&E networks, especially those who receive public funding. They cannot be seen to be competing with the private sector (even though commercial networks do not yet have the capability or technology to deliver such data volumes), and in many cases their stated public policies do not allow them to connect commercial facilities. Compounding this problem is that most of the modern computational tools needed to analyse this data are only available on commercial clouds. Academic HPC facilities and university based cloud solutions generally cannot scale as quickly as commercial cloud providers in providing as many cores as required on demand to analyse this data. As well many grad students and many small innovative businesses are developing the necessary analysis tools to work only on the commercial clouds, as they are driven by the revenue opportunity of "click compute" models offered by many commercial cloud providers.
R&E networks are thus conflicted. Academic institutions and commercial organizations need access to commercial clouds to analyse this torrent of data — yet their acceptable use policy may prohibit the interconnection to commercial facilities, especially if the other end of the connection is also a commercial organization. This is where Open Lightpath Exchanges can play a critical role, much like the earlier NAPs played in the early day of the commercialization of the Internet.
Open LightPath Exchanges, by their very definition are policy free. That means anyone can cross connect to anyone else regardless of whether they are commercial organizations or academic institutions. Open LightPath Exchanges are being established all around the world and many more are expected to be deployed in the coming year. A good background paper on Open LightPath Exchanges "Open Exchanges for Open Science" can be downloaded here [PDF].
Written by Bill St. Arnaud , Green IT Networking Consultant
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More under: Broadband, Cloud Computing, Data Center
As described in New RIPE Atlas Features in the Making, each RIPE Atlas probe performs "anycast instance discovery" measurements. This means, for each DNS root name server, we determine which instance of a name server a probe uses.
We compile the data from all probes and build maps showing these results for each Atlas probe. In other words, the map shows the "gravitational radius" for root DNS server instances. This gives a unique insight into the client base for the root DNS operators. An example of such a map can be seen in Figure 1 below. The colour of the pin indicates the instance of K-root this particular probe is connecting to:
On the map shown in Figure 2, you can see the results of the seven probes located in and around Berlin, Germany:
This information can be useful for DNS root server operators as well as ISPs to determine whether there is room for improvement in terms of routing between end hosts (or rather, their DNS resolvers) and servers. This can result in reviewing of peering relations, or even deployment of new DNS root server instances.
We will make new visualisations available based on this data. We'll also make the data available to our users. More information on RIPE Atlas can be found at: http://labs/ripe/net/atlas.
Written by Daniel Karrenberg, Chief Scientist at the RIPE NCC
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More under: DNS, IP Addressing, Regional Registries
The FBI is warning that computer crooks have begun launching debilitating cyber attacks against banks and their customers as part of a smoke screen to prevent victims from noticing simultaneous high-dollar cyber heists. The bureau says the attacks coincide with corporate account takeovers perpetrated by thieves who are using a modified version of the ZeuS Trojan called 'Gameover.'"
Read full story: Krebs on Security
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More under: Cyberattack, Cybercrime, Malware, Security
The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) recently issued a public notice that it will be holding two workshops on the transition of the public switched telephone network (PSTN) to "new technologies" such as voice-over-IP (VoIP). The workshops will be held on December 6 and 14, 2011, at the FCC's office in Washington, DC. The public notice states the goal as:
Circuit-switched wireline voice technology has created a high standard for reliability, accessibility, and ubiquity. Consumers will continue to expect and demand these qualities, even as they shift from PSTN services to services provided over different networks. The transition away from the PSTN is already occurring, and is likely to accelerate. Through these workshops, the Commission will seek input on the technical, economic, and policy issues that must be addressed to minimize disruption during this transition, and to protect consumers, public safety, competition, and other important interests.
The first workshop on Tuesday, December 6, will focus on "what obstacles and opportunities the transition may create regarding public safety, accessibility, and ubiquitous service.”
The second workshop on Wednesday, December 14, will focus on "a wide array of economic, technological, and policy issues that need to be addressed as consumers choose to subscribe to, and rely on, new technologies and services.”
More details about attending can be found in the public notice. The document also indicates that the workshops will be streamed live at http://www.fcc.gov/live
Written by Dan York, Author and Speaker on Internet technologies for over 20 years
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More under: Internet Protocol, Policy & Regulation, VoIP
In an article published over two years ago, I cited a disturbing trend of third parties seeking to obtain national trademark registrations in an apparent attempt to game ICANN's new gTLD process. While many of these applications have withered and died on the vine some have sneaked through. However, it appears that the United States Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) has issued a very well-reasoned and articulate opinion rejecting the attempt by theDot Communications Network LLC to register the mark .MUSIC in several classes of goods and services.
While it is worth the time to read the entire 22 page decision, the following excerpts are particularly insightful:
Finally, the question of whether a mark is merely descriptive must be determined based on the evidence of record at the time registration is sought. In re Sun Microsystems Inc., 59 USPQ2d 1084, 1088 (TTAB 2001). See also In re Thomas Nelson Inc., 97 USPQ2d 1712, 1717 (TTAB 2011). In the applications at issue, this last principle is particularly important, as the evidence and arguments involve consideration of the question of consumer perception of domain names and internet addresses, a field which the record shows to be changing.
* * *
In view of the foregoing, we find that applicant's proposed mark .music conveys the commercial impression of a top-level domain name similar to .com, .net, etc., and not merely the word "Music" featuring nondistinctive punctuation. Moreover, consumers would understand it to be a top-level domain in the field of music. This finding is based on the current marketing environment which is different than the marketing environment when many of the third-party registrations relied upon by applicant were issued. When many of the third-party registrations were issued, ICANN was not considering expansion of the roster of domain name extensions. FN21 Nor does the record reveal active campaigns to obtain TLD status for the marks in those registrations as there is for the .music top-level domain. Therefore, the third-party registrations submitted by applicant for marks consisting of "dot ____________" or ".__________" have very limited probative value, especially if those registrations were not supported by evidence of actual use in this record. FN 22
Footnote 22: Our finding that .music engenders the commercial impression of a top-level domain name is limited to the facts in this case. For example, as indicated above, Canon, Inc. has announced that it is seeking a top-level domain for .canon which, depending on the record developed in a trademark application, may or may not engender the commercial impression of a top-level domain name.
* * *
Having determined that .music engenders the commercial impression of a top-level domain in the field of music, we now analyze whether someone who knows the goods or services listed in the applications will understand the mark to directly convey information about them.
Written by Michael D. Palage, Intellectual Property Attorney and IT Consultant
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More under: Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Law, Top-Level Domains
Global cloud computing traffic is expected to grow 12-fold from 130 exabytes to reach a total of 1.6 zettabytes annually by 2015 — a 66% compound annual growth rate — according to Cisco's Global Cloud Index. 1.6 zettabytes is approximately equivalent to 22 trillion hours of streaming music; 5 trillion hours of business Web conferencing with a webcam; 1.6 trillion hours of online high-definition (HD) video streaming.
From the report: "The vast majority of the data center traffic is not caused by end users but by the data centers and clouds themselves undertaking activities that are largely non-transparent to end users — like backup and replication. By 2015, 76 percent of data center traffic will remain within the data center itself as workloads migrate between various virtual machines and background tasks take place, 17 percent of the total traffic leaves the data center to be delivered to the end user, while an additional 7 percent of total traffic is generated between data centers through activities such as cloud-bursting, data replication and updates."
Cisco Global Cloud Index (2010 - 2015) Infographic
Cisco YouTube Animation: How Big Will Cloud Computing be in 2015?
More on Cisco's Cloud Index can be found here.
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More under: Cloud Computing, Data Center
The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) has shifted its campaign against ICANN's new gTLD program with a video from its President accusing the organization of "lying" about having reached a consensus over its plans, reports Kieren McCarthy at .Nxt.
"The video ends with a dramatic statement, clearly devised to produce stories such as this one: 'So we'd like to say to ICANN: your claim for consensus it wrong, it is false, it is a lie. Nevertheless, Liodice does make a strong point: if this many organizations — and they include many large companies and mostly American associations — are opposed to the program, how can you claim to have reached a consensus?"
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More under: DNS, Domain Names, ICANN, Internet Governance, Policy & Regulation, Top-Level Domains
While the global rollout of Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) continues at the domain name registry level — with more than 25% of top-level domains now signed — the industry continues to focus on the problem of registrar, ISP and ultimately end-user adoption. At the ICANN meeting in Dakar in late October, engineers from some of the early-adopting registries gathered for their regular face-to-face discussion about how to break the "chicken or egg" problems of secure domain name deployment.
Perhaps the most encouraging update came from CZ.NIC, the manager of Czech country-code top-level domain .cz, which has been aggressively promoting DNSSEC since 2009. According to CZ.NIC's Ondrej Filip, 17% of domains in the .cz zone are now signed. That's 145,000 domains, making .cz probably the most DNSSEC-saturated zone in both relative and absolute numbers.
This level of rapid uptake was achieved through a combination of registrar outreach, incentives, and end-user marketing, Filip said. Registrars received free training, co-marketing assistance and increased rebates from CZ.NIC for signing domains. Three .cz registrars have now signed all of their customers' domains by default and free of charge, which accounts for the big uptick earlier this year.
Larger ccTLDs and gTLDs signed their zones later and have seen lower adoption so far. Roy Arends of Nominet said that 226 domains use DNSSEC in .uk, following the signing of second-level zones such as .co.uk and .org.uk in May. However, Arends also reported seeing increasing levels of DNSSEC queries coming from resolvers, suggesting that ISPs in the UK are beginning to support the technology, bringing secure DNS one step closer to end users.
Vincent Levigneron of .fr registry Afnic said that there are only 30 signed domain names of the two million in .fr, and only 1% of its accredited registrars offer the technology, about a year after .fr was signed. VeriSign's Joe Waldron reported that .com had 4,436 signed domains in mid-October, about six months after DNSSEC went live in the 100-million-strong zone.
Waldron, along with Afilias' Jim Galvin, shared .org data and explained that DNSSEC can be complex for registrars to implement in gTLDs where inter-registrar transfers are commonplace and easy. When a domain name is transferred between two registrars that also bundle DNS with their services, the DNSSEC records must also be transferred. This becomes more complex when a registrant uses a third-party provider for their DNS needs. Mistakes could lead to validation failures and downtime — and that is unacceptable to customers.
Galvin explained that work is underway on best practices for inter-registrar transfers of DNSSEC-signed domains when a third-party operator needs to be in the loop. DNS services currently bundled with registration services will need to be functionally decoupled to make a coordinated handover more reliable, and registrants will need to be well-informed about how to transfer their DNS functionality as well as their domains.
As I've previously written, the road to universal DNSSEC deployment will be long and fraught with challenges. Open industry discussions and the sharing of experiences and best practices — the likes of which we saw once again at ICANN Dakar — can only help make the roll-out shorter and easier for all concerned. DNSSEC deployment is something the Internet is relying on us all to do, and we're getting there, one step at a time.
Written by Ram Mohan, Executive Vice President & CTO, Afilias
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More under: Access Providers, DNS, DNSSEC, Domain Names, ICANN, Security
The word gTLD has been added to the hardcore lexicon of global branding. Why is this new spin causing vertigo to some? Before you say anything else like 'what'? Just hold on. It makes no difference whether you already are an expert on gTLD or not. The fact is it's in your face and we all have to deal with it for a long time, so deal with it. On the internet today, from around the world, there are over 10,000 articles on ICANN's gTLD platform with a pro and con analysis ranging from 'marketing, branding, naming and global cyber image expansion issues' all the way to how it will 'destroy big brand management.' The sooner you can articulate the topic, the faster you will enjoy the ride.
The Dizzying Questions
• What would you do if your industry sector world became overpowered by new global gTLDs?
• What precise calibration can you apply today to determine the long term future of your name identity?
• What action plan can you activate if your name identity was unsafe to carry the marketing load?
• Why too many or too few name identities are considered necessary in your organization?
• Where are the opportunities on new global digital platforms to increase customer touch points?
Who are the real beneficiaries if there are disfunctionalities in your brand names?
To start, if these subjects are still not on the agenda, then obviously digital spinning and new platforms are going to hit the fan and eventually shake down your old trees. As an overview, the current 200 million domain names are stretched to serve 2 billion online users. Both of these numbers will double to cope with the increasingly e-commerce hungry population of 7 billion. Last century marketing and branding models all over the world will not be able to hide from these digital storms, they are being caused by huge additions to online and mobile users the world over.
A gTLD is simply a new powerful domain name platform to create limitless nets for customer touchpoints. Like any other innovation it has some limitations and may not fit each and every model. Nevertheless, guesswork on this branding lexicon and casual chatting about its role, without understanding of its functionality and global marketplace would easily become a proof of lack of education. To have bold opinions, it is important to have full orientation as half knowledge is the worst kind of knowledge. On January 12th 2012, the world's largest branding revolution will begin, as ICANN will start accepting gTLD applications. A White Paper has been issued today at AARM to provide some in-depth perspective to the marketers of the world.
In the meanwhile, to keep with the advertising tradition, the advertising associations of the world under the leadership of ANA have now finally branded their front as CRIDO; a logo-slogan based violent opposition campaign against gTLD. Their jingling opposition is based on fear mongering, lack of skills on nomenclature issues and fear of massive digital shifts towards new platforms. Their ambiguous search for the justification on the value of the gTLD program points to their own confusion about digital compression of a name identity on a global horizon. The majority of their members seriously lack the transparency in their own name brands to accommodate global expansion.
Unfortunately, gTLD platform will not work for the thousands of established big brand names as their name-structuring is too cumbersome to fit cyber name management demands. This opposition is a double edged sword, as the more opposition they raise on mythical grounds, the more visible the limitations of their name.
The gTLD is an inevitable game changer and is no different from what earlier domains did to old established sectors. Irrespective, any last century name without proper name evaluation report may never discover how to re-calibrate for the next generational digital demands. Denials to these facts will only prolong the agony and eventually sink old brand names.
The Creative Vertigos
History allows revolutionary steps of human effort to climb up much higher on the ladder of innovation. Higher advancements shouldn't be hindered with a sudden fright of vertigo. Gutenberg's 'moveable type presses' dispersed knowledge, Netscape's world's first free browser created the first internet revolution, while today's portable computer devices are shattering old models. These innovations have given well grounded and deeply rooted sectors discomfort. It's no longer important what ad agencies think, what's important is whether or not they can step up to the new heights of global naming complexities and stop dwelling in creative vertigos?
Keeping the same tempo, a consortium of heavyweights from the 'adult industry', with an antitrust lawsuit against ICANN, claim their existing adult megabrands are threatened by the expected strangulation from the newly approved XXX gTLD of ICM registry. They are right. This could happen, and this claim further endorses the hidden powers of a gTLD. It also exposes limitations of last-century-naming and how their 'print media age dependency' of the 'glossy-centerfold-era' is being challenged by upcoming free-flow digital video platforms with massive customer touchpoints via cyber name management. The books needed to discuss this subject matter in detail and outline tactical nomenclature strategies have not yet been written. However it is a sophisticated game demanding bold maneuvers and cyber savvy skills. There will be many other similar fights among various consortiums controlling major sectors of the global consumption over cyber access and market domination via name identity.
Let's say, on the other hand, what will happen if the US Department of Commerce were to order a halt to this revolutionary project? Firstly, the sudden stoppage to gTLD would crush the credibility of ICANN beyond repair and secondly, provide sought after substance to rest of the Internet stakeholders outside USA to hand over future decisions to either a UN body or simply break up the Internet. All that would be a great disaster.
While ad agencies would declare victory, brand owners, in the largest majority, would hardly have little or no idea about what just happened. Most CMOs of the world are still trying to figure out what this is all about. However, the global volume and demand of ecommerce activity for second generation types of domain name platforms will create intercontinental shockwaves. Multilingualization of domain names alone is a new frontier where hundreds of millions of non-English domain names will dwarf dominating Western name brands. Any victory declared by CRIDOS would be short lived as the future is relentlessly headed for creation of new cyber name brands for global ecommerce business names. In fairness, CRIDOS is trying to protect the USA and western brand names from an eventual onslaught of more powerful and creative names emerging from the rest of the world.
What will happen come January, when there are global ground breaking stories about the winners and losers of the gTLD race with exciting new branding models appearing on the global scene? The probability of this happening is slim. The real big event will happen when all of the expected 1000-3500 gTLD applications go online in accordance to the transparency promised by ICANN. This massive race will become open to the public and visible for competitive posturing. What would this do to all the opposing ad agencies? Will they all form a new branded front in support of gTLD? Why not? They're the gatekeepers of $400 billion dollar global advertising expenditures.
Irrespective, wherever there are cameras and spotlights, there are always stars. These big image expansion games for the highly innovative marketing teams will provide the best showcase of market domination via name identity.
The biggest question is not how much this is going to cost your organization, but rather why would you strive to achieve this gTLD status of exclusive ownership? The answers are most probably hidden in your corporate vision, your name identity's elasticity and its cyber mandates and lastly intellectual sophistication to cope with global marketing challenges. Whatever happens, a gTLD game is a sophisticated maneuver of name identity expansion and not every major name brand identity or its corporate model could pass the acid test for approval and suitability, hence, all the creative vertigos in the name of a new branding lexicon called gTLD.
Written by Naseem Javed, Corporate Image & Global Naming Expert
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More under: Domain Names, ICANN, Top-Level Domains
Today, over half the world's population now has access to a mobile phone, with 5.37 billion mobile subscriptions and over two billion internet users worldwide by the end of 2010. However, these are more than just bald statistics — today, modern ICTs are genuinely changing people's lives for the better. As information and communications technologies (ICTs), and mobile phones in particular, reach the hands of more and more people living in low-income and rural areas, a growing number of people are becoming empowered, able to access information on demand and readily contactable — often for the first time. Today, due to this large subscriber base, mobile communications are argued by many observers to offer the single biggest delivery platform for development — but does size or functionality matter more?
Poverty reduction is the first, and arguably most urgent, Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of the United Nations, but for many people in developing countries, information poverty rapidly becomes actual poverty. Lack of education, illiteracy, lack of nutrition or access to health resources, lack of aspirations — the causes of poverty are complex, persistent and difficult to overcome. Figures vary, but around 10 million people still die every year from hunger, and present trends in rising food prices and the global economic crisis may have pushed tens of millions more back into poverty, with women and girls often the most at risk, according to UN analysis. For many people, better access to information could make a real and significant life-changing difference.
Mobile applications and customized services can deliver concrete benefits promoting healthcare and education to raise awareness and help achieve public health goals. m-Health applications offer huge promise through lower costs and greater coverage to improve the quality of healthcare, as well as shifting the focus in behaviour towards preventative healthcare, rather than curative healthcare. Examples include: the treatment and management of health (e.g. by reminding, registering or transmitting readings for diabetes or blood pressure); better health data to improve decision-making; applications for treatment plans (e.g. in HIV retroviral adherence plans); or applications for awareness-raising and information dissemination throughout the community at large, following community-based approaches towards achieving improved health outcomes as a social construct.
In education, mobiles could put a teacher into the hand of every schoolchild, woman and parent. Educational apps are being devised with local language content to teach literacy, numeracy, geography or safety or hygiene awareness. Children can learn more about prospects and opportunities in certain fields. Even more valuable, they can familiarize themselves with ICTs and learn fresh skills — skills that will stand them in good stead in a field where the shortfall between labour requirements and skilled labour is projected to widen significantly over the next ten years.
More broadly, expanding access to mobiles can open up young and old minds alike to new opportunities, new sources of information and fresh perspectives. They may also create an enabling environment for innovation, experimentation and fresh thinking, even within established societies with traditional perspectives — for example, in agricultural or rural societies, which can experiment with new and innovative development initiatives.
Written by Paul Budde, Managing Director of Paul Budde Communication
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More under: Access Providers, Broadband, Mobile
Now that we're 20 years past TN 2.0, well into the 21st century, and onto the 3rd generation of the web; it is about time we move telephone numbers into the Internet age. They are still managed as if they all connect to four copper wires. We manage to the lowest common denominator rather than acknowledging the power of mobility and Internet technology. Telephone Number 3.0 needs to treat telephone numbers more like Internet resources and enable greater consumer control, while at the same time conserving numbering resources.
I'm advocating for a model more like Internet domain names. Let consumers get their own telephone numbers from an entity similar to a domain name registry. Here's how it could work: the registry maintains an inventory of telephone numbers. It provides credentials to the consumer so that he can prove he owns the telephone number. The consumer then brings the telephone number and credential to their chosen service provider to activate their service. The service provider also uses the credential to update the registry with any relevant information. If the consumer wants to change service providers he brings the credential to the new service provider.
The registry could be funded by fees to either the service providers or directly to the consumer.
There are a number of benefits to this approach. First by allowing service providers to get telephone numbers on behalf of their customer, but not to carry an inventory, it conserves telephone numbers. Second, activation of telephone numbers will be immediate through the registry. Third, the registry will make all relevant information readily available to all. And finally, rather than taking something away from service providers this process actually frees them up from something they don't need to do. Why manage a vast nationwide inventory of telephone numbers requiring a significant investment in systems, processes and people? Let the consumers do it. The telephone number is simply an attribute of their service. It's a win-win situation for all.
Another simple thing to do is to activate all 792 central office codes in each existing geographic area code. Doing so will increase the available inventory of telephone numbers from 1.4B to 2.8B and would provide more consumer choice. (There are about 350 area codes, each with about 8M telephone numbers; 350 x 8M = 2.8B.) If done right, we would never need to implement a new area code because of exhaust. (There are 300M people in the US using an average of 2.5 telephone numbers each for a total of 750M assigned telephone numbers. Double 2.5 to 5 and we're still well below 2.8B assigned telephone numbers.) However if an area code needs to be implemented the registry would manage that process.
We should also do away with rate centers. Rate centers are irrelevant to the vast majority of billing plans and should not be relevant in a post-PSTN world. People no longer look for a central office code that is close to their home, e.g., PYramid 1 and Valley Stream. There's no need to let rate centers hold unused telephone numbers hostage.
I'm not naïve, I know that there will be significant issues to work out. We need to address current inventory, legacy systems and networks — how to implement the new regime; and how to transition to it — to name just a few issues. We need to ensure that speculation and squatting don't have a negative effect on conservation and consumers' desires. How do we manage highly desirable area codes (e.g., 212, 321, 777) and telephone numbers (e.g., repeating digits)? Should there be a link between a person's geography and the telephone numbers they can register? How do we maintain the important services for law enforcement and public safety? This will have far reaching effects and will take many years to plan and implement. There is a lot of work to do.
It is 2011 and the pace of change is constantly accelerating. It was about 80 years between TN 1.0 and TN 2.0. It's been about 20 years since TN 2.0. Service providers are evolving their networks to advanced IP platforms. All communication is rapidly moving to the Internet. The time to start planning TN 3.0 is now.
Written by Tom McGarry, VP of Research at Neustar Labs
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In connection with the recent publication of the IANA RFP, there have been some commenters that have proclaimed that removing the requirement of the Contractor to document the consensus of relevant stakeholders in connection with the delegation of new gTLDs from the original draft Statement of Work as a win for ICANN. However, when reading the recently revised IANA RFP language in light of the Government Advisory Committee (GAC) Dakar Communiqué, a rather compelling legal case can be made that when the IANA contract is awarded in March 2012 the net result will be a GAC veto power over gTLD delegations and re-delegations requests which, significantly, cannot be overridden under the ICANN bylaws.
Amended Guidelines on GAC Advise
Before dissecting the IANA RFP language, one needs to begin with a side by side comparison of GAC's advice provisions contained in the Dakar Communiqué versus those provisions currently contained in the Applicant Guidebook. This comparison identifies the three classifications ("baskets") of advice the GAC is proposing to provide in connection with new gTLD applications, each of which is discussed in detail below.
For those readers with an institutional knowledge of ICANN's new gTLD program, particularly the 2000 proof-of-concept round, the use of the word "basket" is an intended pun on the ICANN Board's shopping basket reference during the 2000 selection process.
Basket One
The first basket is incredibly straightforward. When the GAC provides consensus advice that an application should not proceed, there is a strong presumption that the ICANN Board will not approve that application. If a new gTLD application falls into this basket, it is checkmate/game over for that applicant.
However, baskets two and three are where things get far more interesting as GAC advice on its face does not appear explicitly constrained to just consensus advice.
Basket Two
For this basket, the GAC has removed the text from the current Applicant Guidebook which states that this advice will not "create the presumption that the application should be denied" nor "require the Board to undertake the process for attempting to find a mutually acceptable solution with the GAC should the application be approved." Instead, the alternative language requires the ICANN Board "to enter into dialog with the GAC to understand the scope of concerns." This broader remit on its face is absent of any limitation of how such advice should be submitted by the GAC or received by the Board. The ability for this type of GAC advice to potentially block a new gTLD application becomes much clearer within the context of the IANA RFP language.
Basket Three
The third type of advice that the GAC can provide is in connection with applications that require remediation. The current guidebook appears to limit remediation to methods specified in the guidebook, and state the fact that material amendments to applications are generally prohibited, and that if no remediation method is available the application will not go forward and the applicant can re-apply in the second round. However, the proposed alternative text which the GAC has provided removes the apparent limitation on material amendments and the requirement that applicants re-apply in the second round. The proposed wording by GAC regarding this type of advice appears to leave open the option for future remediation methods to be added to Guidebook during the pendency of the application process. In fact this is exactly what happened in connection with the .ASIA and .CAT gTLD applications in the 2004 round to address GAC concerns.
Although most have feared GAC advice as serving as a higher bar to potential gTLD applications from being approved, this basket of advice on its face appears designed to allow remediation (and or material amendments) of applications that ICANN staff initially preferred to push toward the second round.
Those Who Fail to Learn From History Are Doomed to Repeat It
To properly interpret how GAC advice in connection with new gTLDs will be interpreted, it is constructive to revisit the GAC advice in connection with the ICM Registry application for the XXX domain name. Although there were some within the GAC that were seeking a consensus statement against the approval of the ICM Registry application (Basket 1), the GAC was only able to achieve consensus on the following advice:
Despite this clear advice expressing no support for the ICM Registry application, the ICANN Board decided to approve it absent any clear consensus advice from the GAC to reject it. This was a learning moment for the GAC and when coupling the Dakar communiqué with the current IANA RFP, one can see that the GAC now has the means to ensure that it its advice is never misinterpreted again.
Changes in the IANA Statement of Work (SOW)
When the USG issued the IANA Further Notice of Inquiry (FNOI) this past summer there was a proposed requirement in section C.2.2.1.3.2 pretaining to new gTLDs that would have required the contractor to document "how the proposed string has received consensus support from relevant stakeholders and is supported by the global public interest." However, the revised IANA RFP contained the following language;
the Contractor must provide documentation verifying that ICANN followed its own policy framework including specific documentation demonstrating how the process provided the opportunity for input from relevant stakeholders and was supportive of the global public interest.
While some people touted the removal of the language regarding documenting "consensus support from relevant stakeholders" as a win for ICANN, for the reasons set forth below this change in the language actually represents a coup for the USG and GAC.
Consensus is in the Eye of the Beholder
The problem with proving or disproving consensus is that it has different meanings to different communities. In the private sector consensus is broadly defined as general agreement (not unanimity) among a group of participants, which is different from consensus within an intergovernmental body. Per the GAC Dakar advice, "consensus is understood to mean the practice of adopting decisions by general agreement in the absence of any formal objection." Simply put, if a government is not happy and continues to make interventions on a issue, consensus cannot be achieved.
Public Sector Consensus versus Private Sector Consensus
Under the original IANA SOW the legal obligation was for the Contractor (ICANN) to "include documentation to demonstrate how the proposed string has received consensus support from relevant stakeholders and is supported by the global public interest." As noted above since consensus was never defined, there was a potential ambiguity in what definition of consensus should be applied. This ambiguity actually worked to ICANN's favor as it would have been able to document and provide a factual basis for its consensus finding. The burden of proof would have then fallen on the shoulders of the USG as the moving party to disprove consensus in order to reject the delegation of a new gTLD. In the ever increasing political internet governance debate, the USG did not want to have its finger prints on the smoking gun that killed a gTLD application.
In the published IANA RFP, the potential ambiguity of the consensus requirement has been removed. Instead, the legal requirement now imposed upon the Contractor (ICANN) in making "a delegation or redelegation recommendation" is to "provide documentation verifying that ICANN followed its own policy framework including specific documentation demonstrating how the process provided the opportunity for input from relevant stakeholders and was supportive of the global public interest." While some will argue that the removal of the specific text "the proposed string" from the draft SOW in the FNOI points to the Contractor only needing to document the "global public interest" with regard to the new gTLD program. However, that argument is difficult to reconcile with the actual words of the IANA RFP and current IANA practices.
The IANA RFP text requiring the Contractor to provide documentation appears in the sentence beginning with a reference to a delegation or redelegation recommendation. The current IANA practice is only to make new gTLD delegation request per each unique string; therefore it is reasonably to imply that that the documentation requirement is per each gTLD string request and not to the ICANN policy as a whole.
While this broader policy documentation requirement might have been consistent with the IANA standard operating procedures in 2000 when ICANN issued a single IANA report for both the .INFO and .BIZ gTLDs, the trend since then has been to provide increasing levels of factual detail in each new gTLD delegation request. By way of example, the .ASIA, .CAT and .XXX IANA delegation reports each document a detail list of actions taken to address GAC concerns that went above and beyond just a mere summary of the gTLD process.
Global Public Interest versus Public Policy
While the USG removed one potential ambiguity in defining consensus, the perhaps more difficult task of defining the "global public interest" remained. In fact US Senator John Rockefeller IV appears to be struggling with the same issue, as evidence by his recent correspondence to the Department of Commerce asking for clarification as to "what evaluation criteria a contractor should consider to determine whether a generic top level domain is supported by the global public interest." While there may be many potential opinions as to what is the authority body/standard to answer this question, it is respectfully submitted that within ICANN the GAC is the most authoritative body to speak on this issue. In addition to numerous citations in the ICANN bylaws regarding the role of the GAC in connection with public policy issues, the GAC provided a timely reminder to ICANN of the important role that it plays in its Dakar communiqué:
ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee was formed to consider and provide advice on the activities of ICANN as they relate to concerns of governments, particularly matters where there may be an interaction between ICANN's policies and various laws and international agreements or where they may affect public policy issues. (emphasis added)
While there will be many within the ICANN community that will vehemently reject this potential interpretation of this IANA RFP provision, the only two entities that really matter are the USG and the GAC and how they define that phase.
GAC Veto
To better understand how this new standard might be applied; consider a scenario where the GAC was to provide advice similar to the one that it provided in connection with ICM Registry application, e.g. "there is no active support within the GAC that [dot-example] is in the global public interest." It would appear on its face that it would be checkmate/game over that gTLD applicant. As it is hard to conceive how the ICANN Board would be able to document "global public interest" to supersede this GAC advice.
In connection with the ICM Registry decision, the ICANN Board was briefed of its legal obligations under the bylaws, and how it could disregard GAC advice. However, in the scenario outlined above this bylaw provision permitting the ICANN Board to disregard GAC advice does not exist, as the legal burden to document "global public policy" rests solely as a contractual obligation to the USG in the IANA contract.
Also lost on most commentators is the fact the USG and the GAC have potentially increased their scope of review in providing "global public policy." No longer is the burden imposed upon the Contractor (ICANN) solely in connection with new gTLD delegation requests, but now it also involves redelegation requests as well.
Which Came First the Chicken or the Egg
Over the course of the past year the USG had become quite adept at releasing major publications or statements in advance of major ICANN events. However, it was initially somewhat of a surprise that the only announcement released prior to the Dakar meeting was a Presolicitation Notice that the IANA RFP would be issued on or about 4 November 2011. However, it was not until 10 November 2011 that the IANA RFP was issued suggesting that there may have been some material changes made to the IANA RFP based upon the feedback from the ICANN Dakar meeting. In fact given the recent release of an amended IANA RFP on 17 November 2011, it appears that the USG is not done tweaking the IANA RFP to achieve its desired goal.
Bylaw Rewrite
I have previously advocated amending the ICANN bylaws to put GAC advice on equal footing as a GNSO Supermajority vote. However, the GAC Dakar communiqué and the proposed IANA RFP appear on their face to have gone above and beyond a bylaw revision and superseded the ability of the ICANN Board to disregard GAC advice on global public policy in connection with gTLD delegation and redelegation issues. While many new gTLD applicants have expressed reservation about having to waive all types of legal rights against ICANN for the privilege of apply for a new gTLD, it appears that ICANN is getting a dose of its own medicine by the USG imposing a list of requirement that are rather take or leave it if ICANN wishes to remain the Contractor of the IANA functions. It seems that turn-around is fair play.
The GAC communicated to the ICANN Board in Dakar its concerns of providing early warning advice in connection with potential a substantially large number of new gTLD applications in such a short period of time, noting that ICANN had reserved itself the ability to batch applications in groups of five hundred. If the ICANN Board would like to prevent an initial GAC Early Warning communication noting genuine global public policy concerns involving a long laundry list of gTLD applications that have not been able to be fully resolved due to a short period of time, ICANN should be working on a way to address the valid concerns of the GAC expressed in Dakar.
Some critics will undoubtedly dismiss this article as placating to the GAC, or a last gasp attempt to interfere with the roll-out of the new gTLD process. Unfortunately these individuals are missing the much bigger picture of a fundamental paradigm shift within the power base of ICANN. During a recent presentation to a group of registration authorities in June I provided a presentation that included the following text: "[t]he GAC sleeping bear has been awoken; will it go back into hibernation or will it go on a feeding frenzy to bulk up." For anyone that may have missed Dakar just ask the registrars if they believe the GAC will be going back into hibernation anytime soon.
Written by Michael D. Palage, Intellectual Property Attorney and IT Consultant
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More under: Domain Names, Registry Services, ICANN, Internet Governance, Law, Regional Registries, Top-Level Domains
Luxury brand Chanel has engaged in a fierce campaign against counterfeit websites in federal court in Nevada. It has seized approximately six hundred domain names in the last few months, reports Venkat Balasubramani. "I'm sympathetic to the "whack-a-mole" problem rights owners face, but this relief is just extraordinarily broad and is on shaky procedural grounds."
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More under: Cybersquatting, Domain Names, Law
