Under the terms of the renewed contract, ICANN will continue to perform its Internet Assigned Numbers Authority functions, which include IP address space allocation, protocol identifier assignment, generic top-level domain and country code top-level domain management and root server system management functions.
"In executing this contract, Commerce has confirmed that ICANN is uniquely positioned to perform this function," ICANN President Paul Twomey said. "It means that ICANN remains the organization responsible for a range of functions that are vital to the daily operation of the Domain Name System and hence the Internet.”
The new five-year contract is a series of one-year options. ICANN has had a contract with Commerce since 1998.
ICANN, which employs about 50 people and has an annual budget of about $25 million, faced complaints from critics around the world who charged that the agency lacked independence from Commerce.
For many, those complaints came to a head in May, when ICANN rejected .XXX, the proposed top-level domain for adult content.
The .XXX debacle lead many around the world to speculate that Commerce, which faced pressure from the Bush administration, had exercised inappropriate interference in the day-to-day decision making process at ICANN, creating a de facto U.S.-controlled Internet.
Many critics had hoped that the Sept. 30 deadline to renew the ICANN contract would mark the beginning of the agency’s independence and an end to Commerce oversight.
While Commerce has renewed its contract with ICANN, the two must still agree on a larger issue — the specifics of how ICANN is to operate going forward. ICANN and Commerce have a Sept. 30 deadline to negotiate a memorandum of understand, which will dictate the operational guidelines for the agency.
In 2005, the United Nations held a summit in Tunisia to address global concerns regarding the operation of the Internet. The contentious debates at the summit lead to mixed results.
Delegates conceded that ICANN had an important role in governing the Internet. However, they condemned undue U.S. influence over ICANN, urging autonomy for the agency.
The U.N. will hold a similar forum on Internet governance in Greece at the end of October.
