[ga] ICANN role in enforcing court orders in domain name disputes

["James Love" <james.love@cptech.org>]

What is the policy with regard to ICANN using its power to regulate
registrars to play a role in enforcing court orders?    I am interested in
this because of a dispute over CNNews.com, a Chinese news site.   The
registrar (Eastcom) is apparently in Hong Kong.  ICANN has recently written
the registrar, telling them to turn over the domain to Time-Warner's CNN
subsidiary.  There is a complicated legal dispute over whether or not the
Virginia court has jurisdiction over Eastcom, and even whether or not the
Virginia court has ordered Eastcom to do anything.  But CNN's lawyers wrote
the ICANN, who then wrote Eastcom, and say that Eastcom is obligated to
comply with the Virginia court order under terms of its accreditation
agreement.  Some of the correspondence on this is here:

http://www.cptech.org/ecom/jurisdiction/cnnews-icanncorrespondence2.pdf
http://www.cptech.org/ecom/jurisdiction/CNNEWS.pdf
http://www.cptech.org/ecom/jurisdiction/cnnews-fourthcircuitbrief.pdf

It does not appear as though CNN has taken steps to ask the Hong Kong courts
to enforce the Virginia court order, and it appears as though the Hong Kong
parties would resist.

Is there some policy guidance as to when ICANN should jump in and take
matters into its own hands to enforce one nation's court orders in a cross
border dispute over jurisdiction?  (There is no court order asking ICANN to
do anything).


Jamie
--------------------
James Love, mailto:james.love@cptech.org, http://www.cptech.org
voice +1.202.387.8030, mobile +1.202.361.3040, fax +1.202.234.5176

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