[address-policy-wg] New paper on RIRs by Internet Governance Project

Regional Address Registries, Governance and Internet Freedom

 

Abstract: Regional Internet Address Registries (RIRs) are private,
nonprofit and transnational governance entities that evolved organically
with the growth of the Internet to manage and coordinate Internet
Protocol addresses. The RIR's management of Internet address resources
is becoming more contentious and more central to global debates over
Internet governance. This is happening because of two transformational
problems: 1) the depletion of the IPv4 address space; and 2) the attempt
to introduce more security into the Internet routing system. We call
these problems "transformational" because they raise the stakes of the
RIR's policy decisions, make RIR processes more formal and
institutionalized, and have the potential to create new, more
centralized control mechanisms over Internet service providers and
users. A danger in this transition is that the higher stakes and
centralized control mechanisms become magnets for political contention,
just as ICANN's control of the DNS root did. In order to avoid a repeat
of the problems of ICANN, we need to think carefully about the
relationship between RIRs, governments, and Internet freedom. In
particular, we need to shield RIRs from interference by national
governments, and strengthen and institutionalize their status as neutral
technical coordinators with limited influence over other areas of
Internet governance.

 

Download: http://internetgovernance.org/pdf/RIRs-IGP-hyderabad.pdf 

 

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