IPRA South East European Conference

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IPRA South East European Conference

• Philip Sheppard

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Internet coNsumer heaven or hell?

• Why nobody runs the Internet
• Why free always has a cost
• Why consumers are both winners and losers
• Is there any hope ?

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1. Why nobody runs the Internet

• Who runs the Internet ?
• Who sets the rules?
• Why there are (almost) no rules?

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This guy runs the Internet
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These guys run the Internet

• ICANN
• Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and
  Numbers

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ICANN

• This guy runs the Internet

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ICANNs byzantine structure

• Board
• GNSO generics
• CCSO country codes
• ASO addressing
• SSAC security advisory
• ALAC citizen advisory
• GA C government advisory
• RSAC root server advisory

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ICANN
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What really matTers in ICANN

• The contracts
• ICANN to registries
• ICANN to registrars
• But they are merely permissions to run a domain
  name or sell you a domain name
• They are not protections from fraud, abuse, crime
• Indeed they specifically exclude the liability of
  the contract parties from the acts of the guys
  who put content on a web site !

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Internet

• So ICANN sets the rules
• Thats why there are (almost) no rules that matter

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2. Why free always has a cost

• Whats free?
• E-mail
• Blogs
• Web sites
• Forums and wikis
• Auction sites

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Whats the cost ?

• E-mail spam most e-mail is unwanted
• Blogs every idiot has a platform
• Web sites id theft, phishing, fraud, child
  pornography, defensive registrations
• Forums and wikis pseudo authority
• Auction sites selling illegal goods, fake
  medicines,

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3. Why consumers are both winners and losers

• Winners -all the free stuff
• e-mail
• Internet shopping
• web research
• birds of a feather sites
• social networking sites, old friends, new friends
• music and film downloads

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Winners and Losers

• Losers all the other stuff
• Internet is the greatest opportunity the world
  has ever created for criminals.
• The mugger is no longer lurking on the street
  corner, hes on your laptop
• Credit cards are no longer physically stolen,
  Internet means you to tell the criminal how to
  steal your money

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LOSERS

• Remember
• ICANNs contracts dont cover any of that
• National law means (almost) nothing
• EU law means (almost) nothing
• The only law is the law of the jungle

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4. Is there any hope ?

• Feeling depressed ?
• Want to give up now ?
• Throw away your laptop?
• Revert to doing PR via press releases in the
  print media ?
• Take away your kids computer and give them a
  train set instead ?

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A new dawn
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What needs to be done

• Governments need to wake up and tell ICANN to
  change its mission to put consumers first and the
  guys who make millions from the ICANN contracts
  second
• We users need to tell our governments to do that
• We users need to tell ICANN it needs a new
  mission. New dawn, new hope, new Obama.. A good
  time to try !
• www.icann.org

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Thank you

• Philip Sheppard
• Council member ICANN
• IPRA President 2007
• The guy who doesnt run the Internet but perhaps
  would like to!