<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:verdana,sans-serif"><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Twice in my professional career, I have been employed by
VeriSign (2009-2010 and 2013-2016) in senior roles with direct responsibility
for designing and coordinating execution of policy programs that supported the
company’s continuing ability to manage core Internet infrastructure, including
the .COM and .NET domain name registries.
Consequently, I’ve been helping to shape ICANN policy for over a decade
and, though my participation has been most often in the background, I’ve had a
unique opportunity to develop an informed perspective on the peculiar dynamics
at the root of the DNS.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Far too often, ICANN and its stakeholders are twisted like
pretzels by policy minutiae and process when the public interest would be
better served by a sharper focus on big-picture matters of principle. A principled approach to consideration of
this Third Amendment to the .com Registry Agreement would accurately perceive
this moment as a rare opportunity for stakeholders to evaluate both the
tangible and intangible benefits – as well as the offsetting costs – to the public
interest that accrue from VeriSign’s management of the Internet’s largest
domain name registry. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">An honest and forthright performance review by stakeholders
is critically important for many reasons, including the public interest
imperative of accountability and transparency, and it must recognize and
acknowledge that ICANN is unavoidably conflicted in matters involving its
contracted parties. The recently
announced investigation by California’s Attorney General into the proposed sale
of Public Interest Registry along with the lucrative concession rights to
operate the .ORG registry should be seen as a sign that others are becoming aware of ICANN’s conflicts. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">This proposed Amendment further fans the flames by creating
the widespread perception that ICANN has engaged in a quid pro quo by trading
approval of .COM price increases for $20 million — a stain of self-dealing that
no amount of security, stability, and resiliency (SSR) whitewashing can
remove. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">This matter, like any involving ICANN and its largest
ratepayer, is made especially grim because of an aggravated imbalance between
the two organizations. On one side there
is a corporation with unlimited economic resources, a reputation for behaving
as an entitled monopolist, and a proven track record of thin-skinned and
aggressive tendencies, including an itchy trigger finger when it comes to the
creative and anti-competitive use of legal counsel and the civil tort. On the other side is a consensus-driven
debating society for smart and talented people that is preternaturally
broke. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">We know that this lopsided state of affairs didn’t spring
forth fully formed like Athena from Zeus’ forehead — so how did this happen? </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">An admittedly non-legal theory is that the 2006 settlement
agreement for litigation between ICANN and VeriSign is the means by which
VeriSign obtained ICANN’s acquiescence for what is now called the “presumptive
right of renewal.” Infrastructure
providers in other industries often rely on presumptive renewal that enable
costly investment, but usually they are also regulated and called
“utilities.” Now featured in every
registry agreement, this presumptive renewal is an anti-competitive contractual
innovation which has had the practical effect of granting a perpetual
concession, or de facto ownership and, as the saying goes, possession is 9/10 of the law. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Maybe it wasn’t possible to predict how this would develop
over 15 years, but it is possible to look back now and see that this
effectively neutered ICANN as a credible regulator, sold the public interest
down the river, and has created the dangerous dynamic where an insecure Goliath
with unlimited financial resources and a martyr complex is alternating between
bullying and buying as it seeks to preserve and prolong its
concession. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">These issues have consequences that reverberate beyond the
billions of dollars distributed by contracts managed by ICANN and, in fact,
determine the integrity and legitimacy of private sector-led governance at the
root of the Internet. Considering the
public concern about the power of technology companies such as Google, Facebook
and others, stakeholders should ask themselves: if the Internet’s core is rotten,
then what can be expected at the edge but bitter fruit? </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><b>Distribution of Child Sex Abuse Materials in .COM</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">The distribution of child sexual abuse materials (CSAM) is reprehensible
and indefensible. The Internet Watch
Foundation, a group combatting CSAM online, reported in 2017 that 59.5% of CSAM
websites reside in the .com registry, including the top 5 sites on the
Internet. In 2018, a coalition of groups
combatting CSAM online wrote to ex-NTIA Administrator David Redl and said:</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p style="margin:0in 0in 12pt 0.5in;line-height:19.2pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><em><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(26,26,26)">Verisign is uniquely unforthcoming. We have
regularly worked and had conversations with just about every Internet company
you can think of and quite a few you are unlikely to know. Only Verisign has
been so utterly uncommunicative. This is a very poor show and runs completely
contrary to the spirit of multi-stakeholderism.</span></em><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(26,26,26)"></span></p>
<p style="margin:0in 0in 12pt;line-height:19.2pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><span style="font-size:14.5pt;color:rgb(26,26,26)"></span><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(26,26,26)">The
letter continues in strong and unmistakable language: </span><span style="font-size:14.5pt;color:rgb(26,26,26)"></span></p>
<p style="margin:0in 0in 12pt 0.5in;line-height:19.2pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><em><span style="font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(26,26,26)">To put the matter plainly, it is immoral for a
business to attempt to deflect responsibility by arguing these matters are the
sole provenance of law enforcement and courts. As the dominant Registry in the
global system, Verisign should be taking a leadership position, adopting
voluntary procedures to combat online child sexual abuse.</span></em><span style="font-size:14.5pt;color:rgb(26,26,26)"></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Now, two years later in 2020, ICANN has permitted the
definition of DNS abuse contained in Amendment 3 – and which applies to the
largest “territory” of the Internet – to exclude CSAM. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Two questions ought to be answered before proceeding:</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">ICANN will allow a “sanctuary namespace” to persist for the distribution
of materials depicting the sexual exploitation of children in exchange for four
easy installation payments of $5 million each?
</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">How does this accrue “for benefit of the public interest”?</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><b>Verifying Operational Accuracy</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Technical proficiency has often been pointed to as
demonstrating excellence in registry operations, such as statements about
twenty-plus years of operational accuracy for .com. On August 19, 2019, a hosting service
provider named InfinityFree experienced an outage that they described as being caused
by “a bug in VeriSign” and further summarized the matter on their website:</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt 0.5in;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><i>It’s not normal that domain
registrars, domain owners or hosting providers are able to cause changes to the
domain names of other people registered with other companies. So this is quite a severe issue with VeriSign. And because of that, we are not able to fix
this issue for you. </i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Statements made during VeriSign’s most recent quarterly
earnings call referred to increasing investment in security that were mentioned
with only vague explanations and an abbreviated response to a question from a
financial analyst. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">There are any number of things that could have happened
here, including the hosting provider being completely wrong. But considering that VeriSign apportions 97%
of its free cash flow to stock buybacks rather than infrastructure investment, isn’t the public interest best served
by determining if there was a technical failure of the registry before
permitting the registry operator to increase its 85% gross profit margin by giving
itself a raise?</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><b>Conclusion</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif">Evaluating the Third Amendment’s benefits to the public
interest shouldn’t be restricted to merely compliance with the handful of
technical SLAs in the registry agreement, but should seek to measure other
contributions such as the registry operator’s conduct as a corporate citizen
and how it apportions the revenues generated from operating a concession for the benefit of the public interest. Care
should be taken that the financial resources and market position enjoyed by the
registry operator of .COM don’t become an impenetrable moat between the registry
operator and the public interest it serves. </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><br></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:12pt">Lastly, it may be possible to seek a ruling from a federal
court that finds the presumptive right of renewal to be inherently anti-competitive
and incompatible with industry self-regulation of the DNS. Perhaps California’s Attorney General will expand
his inquiry and come to the same conclusion. This presumptive renewal and the resulting
sense of entitlement causes significant harm and it should be excised from the
root. </span><br></p></div><div><br></div>-- <br><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div><b style="font-family:"Trebuchet MS""><span style="font-size:12px"><font color="#000000">GREG THOMAS</font></span></b><br></div><div><p style="margin:0px;line-height:normal"><span style="font-family:"Trebuchet MS""><b><font color="#000000"><span style="font-size:12px">THE VIKING GROUP </span></font></b></span><br></p><p style="margin:0px;line-height:normal"><span style="font-family:"Trebuchet MS""><b><a href="https://vikinginsight.com/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size:10px"><font color="#0b5394">web </font></span></a><span style="color:rgb(70,70,70);font-size:10px">|</span><font color="#0b5394"><span style="font-size:10px"> </span><a href="https://twitter.com/realgregthomas" target="_blank"><b><u><span style="font-size:10px"><font color="#0b5394">twitter</font></span></u></b></a></font><span style="color:rgb(70,70,70);font-size:10px"> | </span><b><span style="font-size:10px"><a href="https://linkedin.com/in/game-changer" target="_blank"><font color="#0b5394">linkedin</font></a><font color="#1155cc"> </font></span></b></b></span></p><p style="margin:0px;line-height:normal"><b style="font-size:x-small"><a href="https://x.ai/calendar/gregthomas" target="_blank"><font color="#0b5394">Schedule a call</font></a></b></p><p style="margin:0px;line-height:normal"><b style="font-family:"Trebuchet MS";font-size:14px"><span style="font-size:12px"><font color="#000000"><br></font></span></b></p><p style="margin:0px;line-height:normal"><b style="font-family:"Trebuchet MS";font-size:14px"><span style="font-size:12px"><font color="#000000">Check out</font><span style="color:rgb(15,58,98)"> </span></span></b><span style="font-family:"Trebuchet MS""><b><b><span style="font-size:12px"><a title="https://dns.substack.com" href="https://dns.substack.com/" target="_blank"><u><font color="#0b5394">DNSDecrypt</font></u></a><font color="#351c75"> </font><font color="#000000">and find </font></span></b></b></span><span style="font-family:"Trebuchet MS""><b><span style="font-size:12px"><font color="#000000">independent information resources for Internet stakeholders and investors.</font></span></b></span><br></p></div><div><font face="tahoma, sans-serif"><b><br><br></b></font></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>