The Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers held its latest round of meetings in Berlin this week and preliminarily endorsed the anti-cybersquatting tactics submitted by the World Intellectual Property Organization.
Earlier this month, the WIPO outlined ways to ward off cybersquatters — those who register popular Internet addresses with the intent of selling them at a high price. While the group endorsed the WIPO findings, members say more discussion is needed before a final recommendation on the issue is made by ICANN.
This week’s meetings also led to the formation of the Domain Names Supporting Organization (DNSO) and the Protocol Supporting Organization (PSO), two of three groups that will oversee participating domain name registrars. The third group, the Address Support Organization (ASO), is expected to be created during ICANN’s next series of meetings in Santiago, Chile in August.
By September 2000, ICANN will have taken over responsibility for coordinating the management
of the Domain Name system, the allocation of IP address spaces, the coordination of the adoption of
new Internet protocol parameters, and the management of the Internet’s root server system.
The purpose of this week’s meetings were to organize the initial board and develop operational standards for the future, said Esther Dyson, ICANN’s interim chairman.
Other issues dealt with at the meeting included the approval of its $5.9 million budget and the formation of an independent review board to consider complaints.
