[ga] Re: Two more China National TLDs added to the China root and DNSSEC

["Joe Baptista" <baptista@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

This is a very significant announcement from the Chinese.  Basically they
are sending ICANN a message.  That message as far as I can tell is called
sending them the "finger".

I'm very pleased with Chinas move into the TLD arena.  As far as countries
go they are the world leaders in IDN TLD deployments in the process of
securing of their national infrastructure.  Essentially a DNS system devoid
of US control.

I would strongly advise other governments to follow the Chinese lead.and
setup their own TLDs and national infrastructure - not only in IDN TLDs but
ASCII TLDs as well.

NOW this move incidentally, to create more China National TLDs - for
Government and Organizations brings up the question.  Would China be willing
to hand over their national infrastructure to the ICANN goons and adopt
DNSSEC?

My initial guess is NO. I would not even be surprised if they have plans in
the works to ban it - just in case the US DOC goes bonkers and does not rule
against DNSSEC in the root.  I don't think China is prepared to hand over
the keys to what they have built to ICANN.

DNSSEC is not a solution - it is a patch on a legacy system long deemed
broken.  The solution is not to hand over the keys to ICANN as DNSSEC would
have us do.  The trick here is to deal with the technical problem, which is
that the UDP protocol that transports the DNS is not secure in the first
place.   We all have known that for years.

Simple solutions exist to fix the problem - from the simple minded DNS over
TCP to the more elegant solution proposed by professor Bernstein known as
DNSCurve.  A solution that provides for an added security measure not
currently deployed in the DNS - the encryption of the DNS protocol.

http://dnscurve.org/

ICANN meetings may start getting interesting again, if not maybe even worth
attending.

regards
joe baptista

2008/10/21 Joe Baptista <baptista@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

> *Congratulations to the Center from i-DNS.net International*
>
> 国际化域名系统公司恭贺中编办事业发展中心正式启动政务、公益机构域名
>
> *Singapore, 8 October 2008 *i-DNS.net International, the Singapore-based
> company that pioneered the concept and technology behind multilingual
> Internet domain names including Chinese-character domain names, collectively
> known as Internationalized Domain Names (IDN), would like to congratulate
> the Chinese people and the Government of the People's Republic of China on
> their historic official launch of Chinese-character domain names under the
> top levels "政务" and "公益" signifying "government" and "organization",
> respectively. The forward-thinking and foresight shown by both the Service
> Development Center of the State Commission Office for Public Sector Reform 
> (also
> known as Center), and the Ministry of Information Industry and Technology
> that authorized the Center, in helping the average non-English speaking
> citizen reach government web-sites under specific local-language top-level
> domains dedicated to government organizations is certainly a world-first.
>
> But the world has increasingly come to expect such world records from
> China, especially in Internet-related progress. In the past decade, China
> has gone from less than a few hundred thousand Internet users to over 200
> Million, with China now being the country with the largest number of
> Internet users and accounting for nearly 1 in 5 global Internet users. And
> there is every reason to believe that within the next decade the number of
> Chinese Internet users will exceed a billion and along the way Chinese will
> replace English as the top language for web-site content. Given that only
> about 1%, or some 15 Million people, in China are truly comfortable in
> English, the time has certainly come for  the Chinese Internet to serve the
> needs of the other 99% native Mandarin-only speakers by way of
> Chinese-character domain names so that they too can use the Web effectively.
>
>
> The most important benefit of the Internet is its educational aspect in
> disseminating information widely. A central component of such distributed
> information relates to information provided by government to all citizens,
> but particularly to the less-educated and native-language-only rural poor
> who need help in crossing the digital divide. By launching "政务" and "公益"
> Chinese-character domain names the Center has boldly taken a critical step
> in bringing such e-government to its native-language citizens.
>
> With this launch we have come a long way from early-1998 when a team of
> researchers, led by Prof. Tan Tin Wee (a Mandarin speaker and a man of
> Chinese origin) and by Prof. S. Subbiah, at the National University of
> Singapore, first demonstrated the feasibility of a non-English domain name
> (IDN) which happened to be a Simplified Chinese Character domain name. From
> one test Chinese name on a small island populated by the Chinese diaspora,
> we are now poised under the Center's oversight to reach a million domain
> names for Chinese government entities and organizations that serve the needs
> of more than a billion Chinese people in the Middle Kingdom.
>
> Long ago Confucius illustrated the strength of a nation in terms of the
> strengths of each of societies' layers and its responsibilities to other
> layers within a pyramid structure when he said " if each individual is
> strong, then the family is strong, if each family is strong then the village
> is strong, if each village is strong then the county is strong, if each
> county is strong the province is strong, if each province is strong then the
> nation (as embodied by the government) is strong". To update that in the
> more complex times of today, clearly an even stronger nation can be built if
> one completes the circle of societal responsibility and allows for the top
> government layer to communicate directly to the lowest citizen layer. Today,
> on the shoulders of the broader Internet and e-government initiatives, a
> critical small step  -  the introduction of Chinese-character domain names
> for government web-sites ?C is  being taken to complete that circle of mutual
> responsibility.
>
> Once again, congratulations Center. Congratulations China.
>
> Dr. S. Subbiah
>
> Chairman
>
> i-DNS.net International
>
> For your further reference, attached please find following selected press 
> releases :
>
> 1. China Government official 
> website:http://www.gov.cn/jrzg/2008-10/08/content_1115527.htm
>
> 2. China's national TV 
> station:http://news.cctv.com/society/20081008/110040.shtml
>
> 3. China's top business 
> website:http://news.hexun.com/2008-10-08/109614091.html
>
> 4. China's national news agency 
> (xinhuanet)http://big5.xinhuanet.com/gate/big5/news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-10/08/content_10166337.htm
>
> 5. China's top portal site 
> (SOHU):http://news.sohu.com/20081008/n259916846.shtml
>
> 6. China's top portal site 
> (SINA)http://tech.sina.com.cn/i/2008-10-08/18382496985.shtml
>
> 7. China's national news agency (PEOPLE's 
> Daily)http://paper.people.com.cn/rmrb/html/2008-10/09/content_114877.htm
>
> --
> Joe Baptista
> www.publicroot.org
> PublicRoot Consortium
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> The future of the Internet is Open, Transparent, Inclusive, Representative
> & Accountable to the Internet community @large.
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>


-- 
Joe Baptista
www.publicroot.org
PublicRoot Consortium
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