ICANN

The 52nd ICANN meeting was held in Singapore from 8-12 February, attracting around 1800 participants on-site, as well as numerous remote participants. The issues surrounding ICANN accountability and the transition of IANA stewardship were again at the top of the agenda, and RIPE community members and RIPE NCC staff contributed to these discussions.

The 51st ICANN meeting was held in Los Angeles, USA, from 11-16 October 2014, with questions surrounding the IANA stewardship transition and the accountability of ICANN driving much of the agenda.

The RIPE NCC has been providing DNS root name service at k.root-servers.net since 1997. As the global Internet community considers changes to the NTIA oversight of key DNS functions, the RIPE NCC wishes to assure the Internet community that our commitment to providing this service and to coordinating appropriately with ICANN and the other root server operators will not be affected by the outcome of these discussions.

More than 3,000 people gathered in London last week to participate in the largest ever ICANN meeting. Some of the key issues discussed included the evolution of IANA stewardship arrangements and ICANN's accountability to its many stakeholders.

On Friday 14 March, the United States Government announced that it intends to transition stewardship of key Internet functions (including the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, or IANA) to the global multi-stakeholder community. It has asked ICANN to facilitate, in consultation with the global multi-stakeholder community, the development of a proposal for the transition.