[council] US Government Announcement

[Glen de Saint Géry <Glen@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear SO/AC SG Leaders:
As you may be  aware,  the United States government announced its intention to 
transfer its stewardship of the IANA Functions to the global Internet 
multistakeholder community.NTIA release is up 
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/press-release/2014/ntia-announces-intent-transition-key-internet-domain-name-functions

In 1998, the year ICANN was formed, the U.S. government determined that, as the 
Internet continued to expand globally, stewardship of that technical role would 
one day become the responsibility of all Internet stakeholders representing, 
not just governments, but also business, non-commercial interests, technical 
and academic communities and independent Internet users around the world.



in fulfilling its contractual obligations in executing the IANA Functions since 
1998, ICANN has achieved both operational excellence and organizational 
maturity. That has prompted the United States government to designate ICANN to 
launch a process that allows the community to design a framework for the IANA 
Function transition through its bottom-up, multistakeholder model. That will 
include opportunities for global stakeholder input, including from ICANN's 
Supporting Organizations and Advisory Committees and directly-impacted parties.



If you are interested in becoming further involved with this community 
consultation process, please see the timeline below. I look forward to having 
your support as we move forward on this significant transitional process.



A Saturday , March 15 webinar is planned for the Community. An announcement 
will be made shortly.



The ICANN Release is here:



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
14 March 2014

Administrator of Domain Name System Launches Global Multistakeholder 
Accountability Process

Press Briefing Scheduled with Board Chair and CEO

Los Angeles, California...The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and 
Numbers (ICANN) today launched a process to transition the role of the United 
States Government relating to the Internet's unique identifiers system.

ICANN's announcement comes on the heels of an historic announcement today by 
the U.S. Government stating that it is ready to transfer its stewardship of the 
important Internet technical functions to the global Internet community. The 
U.S. Government's current responsibilities to be transitioned include the 
procedural role of administering changes to the Domain Name System's (DNS) to 
the authoritative root zone file - the database containing the lists of names 
and addresses of all top-level domains - as well as serving as the historic 
steward of the unique identifiers registries for Domain names, IP addresses, 
and protocol parameters.

In doing so, the U.S. recognized ICANN's maturation in becoming an effective 
multistakeholder organization and requested that ICANN convene the global 
community to develop the transition process from of the U.S. stewardship to a 
global community consensus-driven mechanism.

"We are inviting governments, the private sector, civil society, and other 
Internet organizations from the whole world to join us in developing this 
transition process," said Fadi Chehadé, ICANN's President and CEO. "All 
stakeholders deserve a voice in the management and governance of this global 
resource as equal partners."

Independent of the U.S. transition, the roles of the Internet technical 
organizations, including ICANN's role as administrator of the Internet's unique 
identifier system, remain unchanged. The Internet's Unique Identifier functions 
are not apparent to most Internet users, but they play a critical role in 
maintaining a single, global, unified and interoperable Internet.

"Even though ICANN will continue to perform these vital technical functions, 
the U.S. has long envisioned the day when stewardship over them would be 
transitioned to the global community," said Dr. Stephen D. Crocker, ICANN's 
Board Chair. "In other words, we have all long known the destination. Now it is 
up to our global stakeholder community to determine the best route to get us 
there."

"The global multistakeholder process is defined by inclusion, and it will take 
some time to make sure that we obtain all of the necessary inputs," said 
Chehadé. "By the time the current contract with the U.S. Government expires in 
September 2015, we will have a defined and clear process for global 
multistakeholder stewardship of ICANN's performance of these technical 
functions."

The first community-wide dialogue about the development of the transitional 
process will begin March 23-27 during ICANN's 49thPublic Meeting, in Singapore. 
All global stakeholders are welcome to participate in person or remotely.

##

To see more about the IANA Functions survey go here: 
http://www.icann.org/en/news/press/releases/release-15jan14-en



Press Briefing

Note: Because of the historic nature of this announcement, ICANN Board Chair 
Dr. Stephen D. Crocker and ICANN CEO Fadi Chehadé will make themselves 
available to answer journalists' questions during a 1-hour press briefing.  
Details are:

Date/Time: Friday, 14 March 2014 at 11PM UTC / 7PM U.S. EDT

Telephone Access Numbers:  International access numbers may be obtained here - 
www.adigo.com/icann<http://www.adigo.com/icann>. Once you have reached the 
conferencing center, dial 25594#.

Journalist Questions: Because there are likely to be many journalists joining 
this briefing, upon calling in, your line will be muted. If you have a 
question, please hit #3 and tell the conference operator the following:

 *   Your name.
 *   Your news organization.
 *   The city and country from which you are calling.
 *   The conference operator will notify the moderator, who will then introduce 
you.

    *   Your line will be unmuted and you may ask your question.

MEDIA CONTACTS:

Brad White
ICANN Director of Global Media Affairs
Washington, D.C.
Tel. +1 (202) 570 7118
brad.white@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:brad.white@xxxxxxxxx>

James Cole
ICANN Global Media Coordinator
Washington, D.C.
Tel. +1 (202) 570 7139
james.cole@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:james.cole@xxxxxxxxx>

Liana Teo
ICANN Head of Communications - Asia/Pacific
Singapore
Tel. +65 6808 6669
liana.teo@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:liana.teo@xxxxxxxxx>

Alexandra Dans
ICANN Communications Manager - Latin America and the Caribbean
Montevideo, Uruguay
Tel. +598 2604 2222
alexandra.dans@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:alexandra.dans@xxxxxxxxx>



About ICANN: ICANN's mission is to ensure a stable, secure and unified global 
Internet. To reach another person on the Internet you have to type an address 
into your computer - a name or a number. That address has to be unique so 
computers know where to find each other. ICANN coordinates these unique 
identifiers across the world. Without that coordination we wouldn't have one 
global Internet. ICANN was formed in 1998. It is a not-for-profit 
public-benefit corporation with participants from all over the world dedicated 
to keeping the Internet secure, stable and interoperable. It promotes 
competition and develops policy on the Internet's unique identifiers. ICANN 
doesn't control content on the Internet. It cannot stop spam and it doesn't 
deal with access to the Internet. But through its coordination role of the 
Internet's naming system, it does have an important impact on the expansion and 
evolution of the Internet. For more information please visit: 
www.icann.org<http://www.icann.org/>.

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States



Best regards,

David


--
David A. Olive
Vice President, Policy Development Support
General Manager, ICANN Regional Headquarters -Istanbul

Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)
Hakki Yeten Cad. Selenium Plaza No:10/C K:5
34349 Fulya, Besiktas, Istanbul, Turkey

Tel: +90.212.381.8727 - Fax: +90.212.381.8731 - Mobile: +1. 202.341.3611
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