Re: [ga] The Network Solutions contribution to international terror

["William S. Lovell" <wsl@cerebalaw.com>]

L Gallegos wrote:

> I do agree that if we are getting into content policing, it has nothing
> whatever to do with the DNSO or ICANN.  Where the registrars are
> involved is registration of domain names and that would be affected by
> laws in the US only when the registrant or admin contact is based in an
> embargoed country.  That is simply doing business where it is not
> allowed, period.  It is not a free speech area.
>
> Joop is correct, IMHO, where domain name holders are concerned.  If a
> website contains illegal content it is up to the FBI or other law
> enforcement or judicial agency to deal with it (in the US).  We've gone
> too far astray on this list.
>

This whole "free speech" issue is a red herring -- a knee jerk reaction --
and indeed has nothing whatever to do with prohibiting U.S. entities
from doing business, of any kind, with entities domiciled in embargoed
countries.  Joop's equation of "terrorism/free speech/censorship" is a
creation of his own.  It is not the content of the communication, but
rather whether U.S. providers can lawfully help provide to an
embargoed entity the means for making any communication at all.
(These embargoes do not just refer to countries; they also apply to
a select list of terrorist organizations, which the U. S. Government
can lawfully do under its Commerce Clause authority.)
The objection that "undesired content" can easily be switched to
some other site that is not embargoed begins with the false premise
that the purpose here is to control content, which it is not -- it is to
ensure that lawful U. S. embargoes are obeyed -- by ICANN,
Verisign, ISPs, registrars, and registrants. (It would seem that a
registry is merely a record keeper, as I now look at it, but I
could be corrected.)

Bill Lovell

>
> Leah
>
> On 4 Dec 2001, at 14:39, Joop Teernstra wrote:
>
> > At 08:40 3/12/01 -0400, Joanna Lane wrote:
> > >  They [the terrorists]
> > >are no more worthy of "freedom of speech" rights, than child pornographers
> > >or Nazis, yet less than a handful of people here have taken a responsible
> > >attitude or even shown an interest.
> >
> > Responsible attitute is also a great reluctance to encourage Registrars to
> > exercise power to judge who is worthy of free speech and who is not.
> > Responsible attitude is also not to allow ICANN any mission creep in the
> > form of  content policing until (Individual) Domain Name Holders are fully
> > represented at all levels. And even then...
> >
> > If I understand you right, your main objection is the Hamas press release
> > on the Palestine-info site. The site registration itself, being registered
> > to an admin contact in Beirut, may or may not be currently in violation of
> > US statute. This violation might disappear when particular content would be
> > removed. This is between the US Registrars and the FBI, and really up to
> > the FBI.  They may consider it more useful to keep such well known sites
> > above ground. (this is *really* off-topic) The problem is that content such
> > as is offending you and me, can be moved tomorrow to
> > ostriches-on-the-beach.com registered to another entity with no "terrorist"
> > links.
> >
> > It is one thing to hold DN holders responsible for content on their sites,
> > quite another to hold Registrars responsible for registering Domains that
> > may post "terrorist" content.
> >
> > Urging ICANN to have the Domain yanked is using an "elephant gun on a fly"
> > approach. A lot of collateral damage and the fly will appear somewhere
> > else. There are better ways to apply the law to deal with illegal content.
> >
> > >There is a thunderous silence from all
> > >the leading Registry and Registrar Compliance Executives, and many are
> > >reading this list. Why? Are they cowards, or in denial?
> >
> > I do not want to speak for Registrars, but I may speak against them if the
> > security of Registered Domains becomes dependent on their subjective
> > judgement on who is a terrorist or what is illegal content. Registrars must
> > respect their registrants, until the proper authorities force them to act
> > otherwise.
> >
> > O.K., I grant you that some of this is on topic.  NSI may want to address
> > it or it may choose not to.
> >
> > But war on  can be a highly divisive topic
> > at a time when the GA needs to pull together to guard its rights in the
> > ICANN structure.
> >
> > --Joop
> >
> > --
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> >
>
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--


The URLs for Best Practices:
DNSO Citation:
http://www.dnso.org/dnso/gaindex.html
(Under "Other Information Documents"; "August 2001:
Proposal for Best Practices for the DNSO GA." This
page also includes much else about the DNSO.)
Part I:
http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/20010813.GA-BestPractices.html
Part II:
http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/20010813.GA-BP-flowchart.pdf
(Access to the .pdf file requires the Adobe Acrobat Reader,
available for free down load at
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html.)
Part III:
http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/20010813.GA-BP-PartIII.html


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