Re: [IANAxfer@apnic] Key elements of the transition of IANA stewardship
Dear David,
Thanks for this and please see embedded comments below.
Best,
Richard
> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Conrad [mailto:drc@virtualized.org]
> Sent: mercredi, 10. septembre 2014 16:58
> To: rhill@hill-a.ch
> Cc: ianaxfer@apnic.net
> Subject: Re: [IANAxfer@apnic] Key elements of the transition of IANA
> stewardship
>
>
> Richard,
>
> On Sep 10, 2014, at 1:51 AM, Richard Hill <rhill@hill-a.ch> wrote:
> > NOTE: this message has been cross-posted individually to the RIR mailing
> > lists dealing with this issue.
>
> (Perhaps it’s only me, but I feel this proliferation of lists
> dealing with the IANA transition is getting to be a bit much.)
>
> > Thus, the ICANN Board has ultimate responsibility for IP
> address policies.
>
> Not really. Ultimate responsibility for IP address policies
> resides with the ISPs that abide by those policies.
That is true de facto. What I meant is that de jure ultimate responsibility
resides with ICANN. Whether or not this is significant can be debated, see
the further comments below.
>I figure the
> role of ICANN’s Board is primarily to provide a mechanism by
> which interests outside of the RIR world can provide input into
> Internet numbering policies.
Meaning that you would accept that the ICANN Board could override RIRs
policies? For example, on the basis of advice from GAC?
>
> > Up to now, under the IANA functions contract with the NTIA, ICANN was
> > clearly bound to defer to the RIRs for what concerns IP address
> policies.
>
> While it is true the IANA functions contract requires ICANN to
> abide by the outcome of RIR policies/processes, that particular
> clause of the contract was entirely unnecessary (just like the
> clause discussing protocol parameters).
Obviously the US government did not consider it unnecessary, because they
imposed the contract when the community solution did not foresee any such
contract: I refer to the IAHC MoU.
>If ICANN did not abide
> by the outcome of RIR policies/processes, the RIRs had already
> created an entity (the NRO) that was specifically designed to
> provide the exact same top-level coordinative service that IANA
> staff performs (that is, allocating top-level blocks of numbers
> to the RIRs) should ICANN be unable/unwilling to do so.
Yes, but, absent the contract with NTIA, ICANN has no obligation to defer to
the NRO.
My point is that, if people think that the NRO should have ultimate
authority, then the procedural and legal framework should specify that
explicity.
>
> > If there is no contract between ICANN and some external entity,
> then ICANN
> > would have unrestricted ultimate authority over IP addresses.
> That is, the
> > ICANN Board could, if it considered it appropriate, override
> RIR policies.
>
> The ICANN Board could also declare Pi = 4.
The value of Pi is determined by mathematics, so it is what it is no matter
what anybody says it is.
That is not the case for IP address allocation policies, which are
determined by human beings. The question at hand is which human beings have
the ultimate authority for those policies.
>
> > This puts too much power in the ICANN Board which, under ICANN's current
> > structure, is not accountable to any external entity.
>
> This is a common misunderstanding by folks who come from a world
> of top-down national law or treaty-based legal fiats to define policies.
I guess that you are referring to telephony and ITU treaties. If that is
the case, I fear that you misunderstand the situation. There are no
treaties that impose use of the ITU-assigned telephone numbers, and some
national laws don't impose use of those numbers either. Further, most
national laws don't impose routing of all ITU-assigned telephone numbers,
not even the familiar country codes. That is, operators are free not to
implement a particular country code.
And this is not just a theoretical situation, it actually happens: certain
country codes generate so little traffic that some operators don't implement
them.
Contrast this to the situation with respect to domain names, which are
automatically implemented world-wide as soon as the IANA database is
updated.
>
> The Internet numbering world doesn’t work that way.
>
> Under the current Internet architecture, all the power resides in
> the entities that provide value to Internet numbers. The vast
> majority of that power resides in ISPs who provide routing
> services.
This is similar to the current situation for telephony.
>A small amount of power resides in ICANN and the RIRs
> by their guarantees of uniqueness and by providing access to
> registration data.
Again, this is similar to the current situation for telephony, if you
replace ICANN/RIRs by ITU/national regulators.
>ICANN (and the RIRs) is ultimately accountable
> to the folks who make use of those uniqueness and registration
> services. If ICANN (or the RIRs) screw up sufficiently, they’ll
> simply be replaced.
Yes, but the replacement is hardly "simple" and would create significant
disruption.
>
> The entire Internet numbering administrative hierarchy is merely
> a way of avoiding ISPs having to enter into a myriad bilateral
> agreements about who “owns” what parts of the address space.
> ICANN and the RIRs provide a _coordinative_ service, ensuring
> address space assignments are not duplicated and that network
> operators can identify who “owns” a particular block of
> addresses.
Of course, same as telephony. It makes to sense to allow each country to
choose its own country code, so everybody agrees that one central authority
will publish the agreed list of codes.
>In that light, the concerns about ICANN running amok
> and overriding RIR policy is simply FUD spreading.
I think that you are confusing two separate issues. I'm not suggesting that
IANA would run amok and publish nonsense. I am concerned that the ICANN
Board could, absent the contract with NTIA, override NRO/RIR
decisions/policies, if the Board felt that it was its fiduciary duty to do
so.
Some people might have no problems with that, and might be willing to accept
that indeed the ICANN Board should have ultimate authority.
I take a different view of the matter.
>
> If you don’t believe me, try the following (reductio ad absurdum)
> thought experiment:
>
> Assume, for sake of argument, that the ICANN Board go stark
> raving mad and decides to revoke all IPv4 allocations. They
> instruct ICANN staff to erase the text file that represents the
> existing ICANN-maintained registry for IPv4 addresses and have
> the IANA whois server return “unallocated” for every IPv4 query
> (I wonder how many people even know that IANA provides a whois
> server for top-level IP address blocks).
>
> Beyond the folks who will be hired to provide complete custodial
> care for the ICANN Board members (and political bodies who will
> try to take advantage of the situation), who would actually care?
> Would any operational body even notice?
>
> Do you believe ISPs will spontaneously decide to terminate
> routing service for the IPv4 address space they announce?
Of course not. But consider a different scenario.
A US Court orders ICANN to transfer a certain set of IP addresses from a
certain country to certain private parties. ICANN fights the order in
court, but eventually loses. ICANN puts pressure on the concerned RIRs,
asking them to revoke the addresses in question.
The non-US based RIRs refuse to comply. ICANN then considers what steps to
take. This leads to a great deal of confusion and uncertainty.
Or consider the scenario where GAC, for whatever reason, decides to advise
ICANN not to comply with some new NRO/RIR policy. And suppose that the
ICANN Board agrees to abide by the GAC advice.
Depending on the case, the NRO/RIR might well decide to declare that ICANN
could no longer carry out the IANA functions role to its satisfaction, and
set up a new IANA function. But think of the mess and the disruption that
would be caused.
In my experience, contracts are not all that different from insurance: they
protect against worst-case outcomes. If two parties have a business
relation, nobody pays much attention to the contract so long as things are
going well. But if things sour, then the contract becomes very important.
So I think that, as outlined in my original post to this list, it would be a
good idea for the NRO to follow the precedent established by the IETF and to
negotiate a binding contract with ICANN for the IANA functions related to IP
addresses.
>
> Regards,
> -drc
> (ICANN CTO but speaking only for myself)
>
>