[cc-humanrights] Human Rights at ICANN63

[Collin Kurre]

Dear colleagues,

First, a special welcome to our new members, from across stakeholder groups and around the world. I look forward to working with you!

I’m pleased to report that great progress was made at ICANN63 in Barcelona. Some highlights:

- WS2 recommendations have now been approved by all Supporting Organizations and Advisory Committees. It's not yet clear what the timeline for final approval by the Board is as far as I know — please chime in if you have additional information.

- Human Rights Impact Assessments were a major topic in the NCSG’s meeting with the ICANN Board – video <https://livestream.com/icannmeeting/events/8416046/videos/182340946> (starts at 33:38) We also had a constructive exchange with Ergys and Betsy from ICANN’s Public Responsibility team during our CCWP-HR session, where we confirmed that both the methodology and the unredacted results from the assessment will be made public once it has wrapped up.

- HRIAs also featured in ICANN CEO Göran Marby’s opening remarks during the ICANN63 Welcome Ceremony, a clear indication of the community’s success in putting human rights on the agenda:
“One thing I also want to mention that is dear to my heart is that – surprising to many of you — we have done something that we’ve never done before; and that’s a human rights assessment of ICANN org. It’s only ICANN org, but what we’re doing right now is trying to measure ourselves so that when we do things, we do them according to the principles of human rights. We are a technical organization, but by your instruction in the community, we were performed to do this, and I’m very proud that we’re working on it.“
video <https://livestream.com/icannmeeting/events/8415981/videos/182270817> (starts at 41:56)

However — it’s very important to reiterate that ICANN’s HRIA does not cover DNS policy, which has obvious implications for freedom of expression, privacy, and numerous other rights. (Learn more in the CCWP-HR’s latest paper <https://icannhumanrights.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/ICANN-PDPs-and-Human-Rights-CCWP-HR-Sept-2018.pdf> on human rights impacts of ongoing PDPs.) So where’s the HRIA to assess the impacts of ICANN’s policies and ensure that they live up to the Human Rights Bylaw? It’s up to us to create it! A lot of new ideas about how to do this cropped up in Barcelona — I’ll follow up on that in another email in the coming days.

On a more macro level, there are currently many conversations underway within the GNSO and the broader community about improving the efficiency and effectiveness of consensus-based community policy development processes. We touched on the subject of the GNSO’s “PDP 3.0” as it may be articulated with the Human Rights Bylaw in our September <https://community.icann.org/display/gnsononcomstake/Meeting+Notes> call, and discussed the relationship between bottom-up consensus and WS2 recommendations on diversity and transparency in Barcelona. The evolution of ICANN’s multistakeholder model, particularly as it relates to the new standards for human rights, diversity, transparency, and accountability, will be an important topic to keep track of as conversations evolve.

To wrap up, I have an announcement: we’re seeking a Co-Chair! Please get in touch if you are interested.
A big THANK YOU to Michael Karanicolas, who stepped down during our meeting in Barcelona. We, and I, appreciate the contributions you made over the past year and hope you’ll stick around. Your expertise on transparency and open data are a real asset to this community.

Greetings from London,
Collin Kurre

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