U.S. Again Delays Internet Addresses Plan
By JERI CLAUSING
WASHINGTON -- The Commerce Department on Friday delayed for a third time its target date for introducing full-scale competition into the lucrative business of registering Internet domain names, which has been handled exclusively by Network Solutions Inc.
It did, however, agree to extend its test phase of competition -- which had been limited to just five companies -- to the more than 50 companies that have already been accredited by the Internet's new oversight body, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
The latest extension until September 10, comes as the Commerce Department and Network Solutions continue to wrangle over the terms under which the company will let other companies begin logging Internet addresses in the master registry of .com, .net and .org names that it administers.
“This feud has the potential to seriously damage the stability and proper functioning of the Internet.”
Letter from Senators Mike DeWine and Herbert Kohl.
Among the key sticking points in those negotiations is ownership of what is essentially the phone directory for the Internet. The Herndon, Va., company earlier this year, in anticipation of competition, had cut off access to that database listing who owns which domain names, information that had previously been considered public.
Although the company later restored access to some of the data, it has prohibited third parties from using the information to build new products, like the new Internet Yellow Pages-type product called DotComDirectory that it unveiled two weeks ago.
Commerce Department officials said on Friday that the company had agreed to remove all restrictions on the access and reuse of that data "pending resolution of all outstanding issues."
"We have been engaged in extremely productive negotiations" with Network Solutions and ICANN, Andrew J. Pincus, general counsel for the Commerce Department, said in a statement. "We have made important progress toward resolving our remaining issues."
Network Solutions, in a separate progress report that was sent to Congress on Thursday, detailed its efforts to open the domain name system to competition and said it had "no doubt that we will be able to resolve these differences with ICANN and Commerce in the near future."
The letter from Don Telage, senior vice president, said that despite the sometimes fierce debate, "I know we all share the same goal -- providing stability for the Internet" while opening domain registration to competition.
But policy questions are not the only things delaying the introduction of full-scale competition, which officials had originally hoped to complete by June. Technical glitches in opening Network Solutions' exclusive registry to competitors took longer to resolve than originally anticipated, a problem some critics and test-phase participants blamed on a lack of responsiveness by Network Solutions.
And while the Commerce Department extended the test to the other 52 companies that have also been accredited by ICANN, Network Solutions has said it only has the staff to add about five new competitors a month. To date, only four of the five initial test participants are doing live registrations, and all are still charging the same $70 fee for a two-year registration that Network Solutions charges -- although some offer more services as part of that fee.
Pincus said the extension of the test phase to more companies will "help ensure that the functions of the system have been adequately tested in a multi-registrar environment. We also expect that the expansion of the test-bed phase will provide for greater consumer choice, better services and lower prices."
The statement from Pincus comes as Congress is increasing its scrutiny of the highly contentious process the Commerce Department has undertaken for moving administration of the Internet from government contractors like Network Solutions to ICANN.
When ICANN was picked by the Commerce Department last year to take over the effort, one of its first charges was to break the government-sanctioned monopoly that Network Solutions has had since 1993. But in addition to a nearly yearlong stalemate Network Solutions has had with the Commerce Department on the details for opening its business, Network Solutions has refused to sign an agreement recognizing ICANN's authority in overseeing the process. The company insists the interim board of ICANN is overstepping its charge and is working privately to put it out of business.
This week, two senators from the Senate Judiciary Committee's antitrust subcommittee sent letters to Esther Dyson, interim chairwoman of ICANN, Commerce Secretary William Daley and Jim Rutt, chief executive of Network Solutions, questioning both the conduct of ICANN and Network Solutions.
"We have frankly been disturbed that both Network Solutions Inc. (NSI) and the Internet Commission [sic] for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) have been publicly engaged in a bitter dispute regarding the development of the new system for domain name registration," Senators Mike DeWine, an Ohio Republican who is chairman of the antitrust subcommittee, and Herbert Kohl, a Wisconsin Democrat, the committee's ranking Democrat wrote.
"This feud has the potential to seriously damage the stability and proper functioning of the Internet, and to disrupt both an enormous amount of electronic commerce and the free flow of ideas."
The senators said they were writing to "strongly encourage the parties to resolve their differences in a professional and respectful manner no later than Oct. 1, so as to avert the threat of a disastrous disruption to the functionality of the Internet."
The query follows a letter-writing campaign and two hearings by the House Commerce Committee, which resulted in ICANN's agreeing to open its board meetings to the public and to drop a controversial $1 fee on every domain name registered until elected board members are put in place. But ICANN's decision to temporarily drop the $1 fee -- which was intended to finance its $5.7 million budget -- leaves it more than $800,000 in debt. And the Clinton Administration has vowed to help the group seek more interim financing from private sources.
As part of that effort, ICANN officials have apparently been to the White House, prompting new questions from the Commerce Committee.
On Thursday, the chairman of the House Commerce Committee, Thomas Bliley, asked the White House general counsel, Charles Ruff, to explain communications cited in an e-mail message from Joe Sims, ICANN's lawyer , about a meeting he and Dyson had with Tom Kalil, the White House's senior director of science and technology issues for the National Economic Council, about helping to raise funds for ICANN.
"Esther and I met with him today, and he promised to do what he could to encourage private donations on the scale necessary to make it clear that we are message addressed to "chair." "He said it would be useful to have e-mailed to him information on the budget, work planes, etc. -- the kind of stuff that he could give people to show them that we have a real live operation here."
Bliley asked Charles Ruff, counsel to the President, for more details on Kalil's involvement. He also questioned whether such activities were in accordance with federal laws governing fundraising by executive branch employees.
Kalil on Friday declined to comment on the matter. |
