U.S. makes about-turn on Internet directories (DNS)

[Renew Deal]

U.S. government intends to indefinitely retain control over parts of the DNS

By John Blau, IDG News Service
July 01, 2005

The U.S. government, in an unexpected about-turn, intends to indefinitely retain control over parts of the Domain Name System (DNS), the system that converts human-readable Internet addresses into computer-readable numerical addresses. Such addresses are used to direct traffic to Web sites or to deliver e-mail to the correct server.

"Given the Internet's importance to the world's economy, it is essential that the underlying DNS of the Internet remain stable and secure," and for this reason the U.S. aims to "maintain its historic role in authorizing changes or modifications to the authoritative root zone file," which is part of the DNS infrastructure, according to a statement published Thursday on the Web site of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), part of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Several years ago, the U.S. government put the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in charge of managing the 13 root name servers that serve as the Internet's master directories, telling Web browsers and e-mail programs how to direct traffic. Now, following Thursday's announcement, the U.S. appears determined to retain control.

The announcement is a departure from previous U.S. strategy, which indicated that the U.S. government would someday relinquish its control over the root name servers.
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http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/07/01/HNinternetdirectories_1.html?source=NLC-TB2005-07-01

[bemildred]

1. Enforced how?

The US government has not the means to enforce it's will here.
Just making themselves look like an ass, as usual.

[salvorhardin]

2. No kidding!

Very few people seem to actually get that the internet is not a physical thing; it is an agreement. If the rest of the world decides to start using different root name servers there is nothing the US government can do about it. All that will happen in that instance is that companies will need to decided if they want to continue to do business on the internet in other countries. If so, they will simply follow the root name servers the rest of the world sets up.