[council] Call for volunteers:Working Group to develop policy recommendations on issues relating to the accreditation of privacy and proxy service providers for domain name registrations.

[Glen de Saint Géry <Glen@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Councillors,

Please find the Call for volunteers for the RAA Privacy & Proxy Services 
Accreditation Issues PDP Working Group which is an action item arising from the 
GNSO Council meeting on 31 October 2013. (Item 7: MOTION - A charter for the 
Privacy & Proxy Services Accreditation PDP WG.)

A reminder that Maria Farrell volunteered as the GNSO Council liaison to the 
RAA Privacy & Proxy Services Accreditation Issues PDP Working Group (WG).
In Brief
The Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) Council seeks volunteers to 
serve on a Working Group to develop policy recommendations on issues relating 
to the accreditation of privacy and proxy service providers for domain name 
registrations.

What This Team Will Do
The Working Group (WG) is tasked to provide the GNSO Council with a set of 
recommendations regarding issues identified during the recently-concluded 
negotiations for the new 2013 Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA), 
including recommendations made by law enforcement and GNSO working groups, that 
were not addressed during the negotiations and otherwise suited for a Policy 
Development Process (PDP); specifically, issues relating to the accreditation 
of privacy & proxy services.

Specific issues to be discussed by the WG are detailed in the WG's charter:
http://gnso.icann.org/en/drafts/raa-pp-charter-22oct13-en.pdf

How This Team Will Work
ICANN Working Groups use transparent, open processes. The meetings of this WG 
will be recorded, and the recordings will be available to the public. The 
mailing list for the WG will be archived publicly. WG members are expected to 
submit Statements of Interest 
(SOI<https://community.icann.org/display/gnsosoi/New+SOIs>). The group will 
collaborate using a public workspace. The WG is expected to follow the GNSO 
Working Group 
Guidelines<http://gnso.icann.org/council/annex-1-gnso-wg-guidelines-08apr11-en.pdf>.

How to Join
The GNSO Council invites interested parties to join the WG, which will be open 
to anyone interested to join. Community members who wish to be invited to join 
the group should contact the GNSO 
secretariat<mailto:gnso.secretariat@xxxxxxxxx?subject=Application%20to%20Join%20Uniformity%20of%20Reporting%20Drafting%20Team>
 (gnso.secretariat@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:gnso.secretariat@xxxxxxxxx>).

Background
In October 2011, the ICANN Board initiated negotiations with the Registrars 
Stakeholder Group for a new form of RAA, and simultaneously requested an Issue 
Report from the GNSO on issues not covered by the negotiations and otherwise 
suited for a PDP. The Final Issue Report was published in March 2012, and 
recommended that the GNSO commence its PDP as soon as possible after receiving 
a report that the negotiations were concluded.

In June 2013, the ICANN Board formally approved the new 2013 RAA. In September 
2013, ICANN staff published a paper for the GNSO reporting on the conclusion of 
the RAA negotiations and highlighting that of all the high and medium priority 
topics for the negotiations previously identified by the GNSO and the law 
enforcement community, only two were not fully addressed in the negotiations, 
viz. clarification of certain registrar responsibilities in relation to 
proceedings under the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP), and issues 
relating to privacy and proxy services, including their accreditation and 
Relay/Reveal procedures. The UDRP questions have, however, been dealt with in a 
separate PDP that concluded with the publication of a Final Report in June 2013 
and its adoption by the GNSO Council in August 2013.

Following a number of discussions on the topic, the GNSO Council formally 
approved the charter for this RAA Privacy & Proxy Services Accreditation Issues 
WG at its meeting on 31 October 2013.

As ICANN has already committed itself to establishing an accreditation program 
for privacy and proxy service providers, the recommendations from this WG are 
expected to inform the development of such a program. In addition, there 
continues to be ongoing work on various aspects of the Whois gTLD registration 
data directory service, including the creation of an Expert Working Group (EWG) 
in December 2012 that is expected to assist ICANN in redefining the purpose and 
provision of gTLD registration data directory services. The EWG published its 
Initial Report in June 2013 and is currently working on its Final Report.

In addition, the GNSO had previously commissioned a study on Whois Privacy & 
Proxy Abuse. The results of the study, performed by the National Physical 
Laboratory in the United Kingdom, were published for public comment in 
September 2013. It is expected that the study will be relevant to the 
deliberations of this WG.

This WG is an opportunity for the GNSO and other interested community members 
to help develop specific recommendations that will assist ICANN in developing a 
privacy and proxy accreditation program in relation to gTLD registration data 
directory services.

Please let me know if you have any questions.
Thank you very much?
Kind regards,

Glen

Glen de Saint Géry
GNSO Secretariat
gnso.secretariat@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:gnso.secretariat@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
http://gnso.icann.org