[WSIS CS-Plenary] "transfer Internet control into the hands of intrigue-plagued bureaucracies" - quote

[Rui Correia]

From
http://www.news.vu/en/business/Tech/051108-Vanuatu-tech-news-Beware-a-Digita
l-Munich.shtml, a news web site for Vanuatu news. 
With this to say in their "About us": news.vu is a reliable source for
Vanuatu news, sourced both locally and internationally.

I wonder if this was the only place willing to give space to this piece of
........ I suppose the caveat does say "reliable source for Vanuatu news,
not WSIS news - Rui
__________________________________________________________________________
Beware a 'Digital Munich' - Internet Under threat

By Norm Coleman - Mr. Coleman is a Republican senator from Minnesota. 
Posted Tuesday, November 8, 2005

It sounds like a Tom Clancy plot. An anonymous group of international
technocrats holds secretive meetings in Geneva. Their cover story: devising
a blueprint to help the developing world more fully participate in the
digital revolution. Their real mission: strategizing to take over management
of the Internet from the U.S. and enable the United Nations to dominate and
politicize the World Wide Web. Does it sound too bizarre to be true?
Regrettably, much of what emanates these days from the U.N. does.

The Internet faces a grave threat. We must defend it. We need to preserve
this unprecedented communications and informational medium, which fosters
freedom and enterprise. We can not allow the U.N. to control the Internet.

The threat is posed by the U.N.-sponsored World Summit on the Information
Society taking place later this month in Tunisia. At the WSIS preparatory
meeting weeks ago, it became apparent that the agenda had been transformed.
Instead of discussing how to place $100 laptops in the hands of the world's
children, the delegates schemed to transfer Internet control into the hands
of intrigue-plagued bureaucracies.

The low point of that planning session was the European Union's shameful
endorsement of a plan favored by China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Cuba that
would terminate the historic U.S. role in Internet government oversight,
relegate both private enterprise and non- governmental organizations to the
sidelines, and place a U.N.- dominated group in charge of the Internet's
operation and future. The EU's declaration was a "political coup," according
to London's Guardian newspaper, which predicted that once the world's
governments awarded themselves control of the Internet, the U.S. would be
able to do little but acquiesce.

I disagree. Such acquiescence would amount to appeasement. We cannot allow
Tunis to become a digital Munich.

There is no rational justification for politicizing Internet governance
within a U.N. framework. The chairman of the WSIS Internet Governance
Subcommittee himself recently affirmed that existing Internet governance
arrangements "have worked effectively to make the Internet the highly
robust, dynamic and geographically diverse medium it is today, with the
private sector taking the lead in day-to-day operations, and with innovation
and value creation at the edges."

Nor is there a rational basis for the anti-U.S. resentment driving the
proposal. The history of the U.S. government's Internet involvement has been
one of relinquishing control. Rooted in a Defense Department project of the
1960s, the Internet was transferred to civilian hands and then opened to
commerce by the National Science Foundation in 1995. Three years later, the
non-profit Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers assumed
governance responsibility under Department of Commerce oversight. Icann,
with its international work force and active Governmental Advisory
Committee, is scheduled to be fully privatized next year. Privatization, not
politicization, is the right Internet governance regime.

We do not stand alone in our pursuit of that goal. The majority of European
telecommunications companies have already dissented from the EU's Geneva
announcement, with one executive pronouncing it "a U-turn by the European
Union that was as unexpected as it was disturbing."

In addition to resentment of U.S. technological leadership, proponents of
politicization are driven by fear -- of access to full and accurate
information, and of the opportunity for legitimate political discourse and
organization, provided by the Internet. Nations like China, which are behind
the U.N. plan to take control, censor their citizens' Web sites, and monitor
emails and chat rooms to stifle legitimate political dissent. U.N. control
would shield this kind of activity from scrutiny and criticism.

The U.S. must do more to advance the values of an open Internet in our
broader trade and diplomatic conversations. We cannot expect U.S. high-tech
companies seeking business opportunities in growing markets to defy official
policy; yet we cannot stand idly by as some governments seek to make the
Internet an instrument of censorship and political suppression. To those
nations that seek to wall off their populations from information and
dialogue we must say, as Ronald Reagan said in Berlin, "Tear down this
wall."

Allowing Internet governance to be politicized under U.N. auspices would
raise a variety of dangers. First, it is wantonly irresponsible to tolerate
any expansion of the U.N.'s portfolio before that abysmally managed and
sometimes-corrupt institution undertakes sweeping, overdue reform. It would
be equal folly to let Icann be displaced by the U.N.'s International
Telecommunication Union, a regulatory redoubt for those state telephone
monopolies most threatened by the voice over Internet protocol revolution.

Also, as we expand the global digital economy, the stability and reliability
of the Internet becomes a matter of security. Technical minutiae have
profound implications for competition and trade, democratization, free
expression and access to information, privacy and intellectual-property
protection.

Responding to the present danger, I have initiated a Sense of the Senate
Resolution that supports the four governance principles articulated by the
administration on June 30:

• Preservation of the security and stability of the Internet domain name and
addressing system (DNS).

• Recognition of the legitimate interest of governments in managing their
own country code top-level domains.

• Support for Icann as the appropriate technical manager of the Internet
DNS.

• Participation in continuing dialogue on Internet governance, with
continued support for market-based approaches toward, and private- sector
leadership of, its further evolution.

I also intend to seek hearings in advance of the Tunis Summit to explore the
implications of multinational politicization of Internet governance. While
Tunis marks the end of the WSIS process, it is just the beginning of a long,
multinational debate on the values that the Internet will incorporate and
foster. Our responsibility is to safeguard the full potential of the new
information society that the Internet has brought into being.

Mr. Coleman is a Republican senator from Minnesota.

________________________________________________
 
 
Rui Correia
Coordinator, Southern Africa WSIS Partnership
(Media Institute of Southern Africa, SACOD, Highway Africa)
38 Finch St, 
Ontdekkers Park, Roodepoort, 
Johannesburg, South Africa
Tel/ Fax (+27-11) 766-4336
Cell (+27) (0) 83-368-1214