[council] GAC advice on WHOIS

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

Hello All,

The following advice in the GAC communiqué just presented in the ICANN Public 
Forum relates to WHOIS:

"The GAC welcomes the opportunity to respond to the "draft ICANN 
Procedure for Handling WHOIS Conflicts with National Privacy 
Laws".  

Due to the complexity of this issue related to the diversity of 
national policies and procedures among GAC members the GAC 
does not believe a uniform process is workable and accordingly the 
interim solution from the GAC's San Juan communiqué should be 
the basis of resolving any potential conflict: 

... specific cases should be referred to the relevant national 
government for advice on the authority of the request for 
derogation from the ICANN gTLD WHOIS policy. 


The GAC reiterates its recommendation outlined in the GAC 
WHOIS principles that a study on uses and misuses of WHOIS data 
should be undertaken by ICANN and is prepared to contribute to the 
elaboration of the terms of reference of such a study. "


Regards,
Bruce Tonkin