[council] Input from the Australian Government on the WHOIS service

["Bruce Tonkin" <Bruce.Tonkin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello All,

The note below was sent to me four hours ago as chair of the GNSO
Council.

Regards,
Bruce Tonkin


AUSTRALIA'S CONTRIBUTION TO GNSO COUNCIL ON WHOIS 

Australia would like to reiterate to the GNSO Council the position it
conveyed during the GNSO Council - Government Advisory Committee (GAC)
Working Group meeting on 26 March 2006.

On the information available to us, Formulation 2, as identified in the
Final Task Force Report on the Purpose of Whois and of the Whois
Contacts, appears to better reflect the public policy interests of a
fully functional Whois regime from an Australian perspective.

At this point, Australia considers that Whois should:

*       satisfy the traditional and ongoing goal of ensuring the
security and stability of the Internet; 

*       provide the ability to identify and respond to those involved in
criminal activity such as child pornography, 'phishing' and identity
theft;

*       provide an appropriate level of data to any user that seeks it
including, for example, civil and criminal law enforcement officials,
online consumers, network operators, intellectual property rights
holders and registrars and registries;

*       support national laws and global agreements associated with
privacy, trade practices, consumer protection, intellectual property
rights and copyright protection; and 

*       operate in a manner that is technically feasible and cost
effective for registrars and registries, and does not rely solely on the
registrant to be implementable.
 
We appreciate that Whois is a complex issue with a range of  interests.
Given this, we consider that it is important that the GAC and GNSO
Council continue to exchange information and views.

Australia will work with other GAC members  to ensure that the GAC is
well placed to have effective dialogue with the GNSO community in
Marrakesh.



ASHLEY CROSS
GAC Representative -AUSTRALIA
April 2006