[ispcp] Fw: [council] ICANN Blog post on name collisions

[WUKnoben]

FYI

Wolf-Ulrich


Moving Forward with Delegation of Top-Level Domains

by ICANN Blog on October 9, 2013

By Jeff Moss and John L. Crain

ICANN's New gTLD Program Committee (NGPC) has approved resolutions allowing 
us to move forward in expanding the Internet's name space while mitigating 
possible issues in the expansion.

A document describing the mitigation plan can be found here [PDF, 841 KB].

It's an understatement to say that ICANN takes its obligation to preserve 
the Security, Stability and Resiliency (SSR) of the Identifier Systems 
seriously.
In fact, that part of our mission is the very first thing you read in 
ICANN's bylaws.

In recent months, concerns have been raised that there will be "collisions" 
between some of the proposed new TLD strings and those used in private name 
spaces.   The possibility that collisions can occur in the DNS is not new. 
Queries for non-existing strings are currently a common occurrence 
throughout the DNS.   They can be caused by simple typos, errors in 
configuration, and historic or recommended use of certain names for intranet 
applications.   The DNS is often queried to resolve such names and this 
"leakage" of queries from private spaces occurs at rather remarkable 
volumes.

At the Board's direction, ICANN staff commissioned a study to examine the 
extent of the name collision problem and to look at possible methods for 
mitigating the risks.

As has been noted by many community members, it is much easier to observe 
the occurrences of collisions than it is to assess the potential impact of a 
collision.

DNS data collected at the root and elsewhere reveals some interesting 
information about queries for the proposed new TLD strings.  But to assess 
the precise impact of these occurrences, there needs to be additional study 
which would allow us to learn quite a bit more about the extent of these 
occurrences and to determine which strings appear most often in queries. 
Ultimately, the additional study will allow us to develop targeted 
mitigation strategies.

The basic concept of the risk mitigation plan adopted by the NGPC is 
fourfold:

- First, to document on a per TLD basis those collisions that have been 
identified in studies of the "Day In The Life of the Internet" (DITL) data 
and to place each of the Secondary Level Domain (SLD) strings identified to 
have had collisions on a reserved or blocked list for that specific TLD. 
These strings will not be allowed to be registered or to resolve until such 
a time as the effects of the specific collision are known and appropriate 
mitigation strategies are developed and implemented.

- Second, ICANN will develop a process by which affected parties may report 
and request the blocking of a SLD that causes demonstrable harm as a 
consequence of a name collision.   This process is intended to mitigate the 
risk of harmful collision occurrences not observed in the study.

- Third, ICANN will develop a framework to identify the probability and 
severity of harm to better assess the consequences of name collisions. 
Remember that harm and risk are not the same thing.   This framework will be 
an important tool in identifying the likelihood of harm but also for helping 
to identify mitigation techniques.   Once acceptable mitigations are in 
place it may be possible to allow the release of strings from the list of 
reserved or blocked names.

-  Finally, promoting awareness and mitigation strategies through a targeted 
outreach campaign will help potentially affected parties identify and manage 
the causes of name collision occurrences arising from their own networks.

We believe the proposals outlined above afford a balanced way of moving 
forward.   The plan minimizes the risk that collisions will cause serious 
harm by implementing measures to avert the problem by mitigating the 
associated risks and continuously monitoring the situation.

We would like to thank those who have submitted research, comments, and 
feedback on real world examples of name collisions.   The community efforts 
have shown that we can put aside our self-interest, consider a complex 
problem and drive toward solutions to meet our common objective - ensuring 
that the Domain Name System continues to provide services to all users in a 
secure, stable and resilient manner while still allowing it to grow and 
innovate.