Government Relinquishes Control of Internet

Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers

On October 1, 2016 ICANN or Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers went to private sector. That means ICANN is no longer governed by the NTIA (National Telecommunications and Information Administration) of United States Department of Commerce. Is that mean government relinquishes control of internet ?

Before I provide an answer for the question, there are few key players that you need to know.

IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) – responsible for the allocation of internet address and related system like IP address, domain naming system etc. IANA is a department of ICANN.

ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) – ICANN administer IANA’s activities and coordinates with NTIA.

NTIA (National Telecommunications and Information Administration) – executive branch agency that works as an adviser for the President of the United States. NTIA is part of the United States Department of Commerce.

ICANN and NTIA had a contract that let NTIA oversees ICANN’s activity and that contract ended in Oct 1, 2016.

History of ICANN
Before ICANN there was IANA. IANA works as a technical resource for the ARPANET (earlier version of today’s internet). ICANN was founded on September 18, 1998 and incorporated on September 30, 1998 in California USA as a nonprofit organization. It’s primary focus was to manage Internet protocol and Domain Name System. IANA became a part of ICANN.

What ICANN do –
Without using any technical or corporate jargon here in plain word-

“Along with other responsibilities ICANN also maintain a global record book of internet address. And information of this record book is shared by the rest of world. So everybody knows who is who. This is how internet remains as a global entity.”

Simple example – when you type www.linkmeshin.com in your browser, your computer send the request to your local ISP (the company that you pay your internet bill). Your local ISP have the access the ICANN’s global address book (there are other technical thing happen in the back end), they collect the necessary information regarding your request and let your browser open the www.linkmeshin.com webpage in your computer screen.

What ICANN Cannot Perform

• ICANN do not control content on the Internet.
• ICANN cannot stop spam.
• ICANN do not control the access of internet for general users.

What is the Importance of ICANN

Domain Name Services is one of the major service of ICANN. So what is Domain Name Services ?
Simple example – consider the domain name service as a phone book. Phone book contains name and phone number. You can remember names but not the number. So from your “phone book” you can select your friend’s name and your phone can call your friend by using the “number” associated with the name.

So a domain name services system contain something like this –

Final Thought
Transitioned to private sector does not affect ICANN. ICANN will continue its core responsibility and functionality. Instead of government agency it will be managed by various volunteer-based community. Users will not see change or difference. Internet users and internet service provider company will continue following all the rules and policies that they used follow all these years.

Writer – Rubayat M.