Domain Names: New gTLD .INSURANCE, What You Need to Know

source: .Insurance: What You Need to Know About the Newest Internet Domain Name | Goodwin Procter LLP - JDSupra

New gTLD .INSURANCE Eligibility Requirements, Remedies Are Available

source: Blog: Online Eligibility Requirements Will Frustrate Some Insurance Businesses, But Remedies Are Available | Cooley LLP - JDSupra

How Much Would You Pay To Not Suck?

How Much Would You Pay To Not Suck? | Burns & Levinson LLP - JDSupra:
.SUCKS, new gTLD domain

.SUCKS New gTLD Options for Protecting Your Brand

Sunrise Registration Opens: Options for Protecting Your Brand in the .sucks gTLD | Lewis Roca Rothgerber - JDSupra:

The Next New gTLD Sucks for Brand Owners

The Next New gTLD Just .Sucks for Brand Owners | Foley Hoag LLP - Trademark, Copyright & Unfair Competition - JDSupra:


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ICANN Seeking Panel Members for New gTLD Public Interest Commitment Dispute Resolution

Resources - ICANN: Public Interest Commitment Dispute Resolution Process (PICDRP):
The PICDRP addresses complaints that a Registry may not be complying with the Public Interest Commitment(s) in Specification 11 of their Registry Agreement. 

[expvc.com Contributing Editor's Note: Specification 11 is "buried" at the end of the Registry Agreement (pp. 90-91 of a 92 page pdf--note that pagination is absent from pages 90-91--just go to the end of the document)--which you may be able to locate and download from the ICANN website here. From how ICANN has obfuscated all of this as much as possible from "public view," it appears ICANN really doesn't care about the "public interest"  and when you actually find and read Specification 11 it looks like it was written by the DNA* -- actually in a sense it may have been since the current Executive Director of the DNA was "architect" of the new gTLDs program when he was Chief Strategy Officer of ICANN before his resignation due to a conflict of interest--the particulars of which ICANN has never disclosed to its multi-stakeholders. So much for transparency and accountability and the public interest!]

*UPDATE: a registry’s ability to amend or revoke its PICs and the lengthy, expensive, and adversarial process required to enforce PICs by the limited class of parties able to bring enforcement actions, does not protect the public interest! [See ICANN Business Constituency letter (pdf)].

Also Review the PICDRP [PDF, 208 KB]

Seeking Panel Members for New gTLD Public Interest Commitment Dispute Resolution - ICANN:
"ICANN plans to expand the Standing Panel responsible for administering the Public Interest Commitment Dispute Resolution Procedure (PICDRP), which supports the New gTLD Program. Parties with relevant experience and the desire to serve the Internet community are invited to submit expressions of interest.

"PICDRP Standing Panel members play an important role in upholding the integrity of the Domain Name industry and protecting the public interest," said Akram Atallah, president of ICANN's Global Domains Division.

"The PICDRP is designed to serve the interests of the Internet community. When a report arises alleging that a registry has violated its public interest commitment(s) as outlined in its contract with ICANN, members of the PICDRP Standing Panel can be called upon to review the report, and if necessary, recommend remedies to ICANN. Therefore, all Standing Panel members must be impartial and independent.

"Download the official Call for Expressions of Interest [PDF, 110 KB] to serve on the PICDRP Standing Panel.

"ICANN welcomes applicants with international dispute resolution experience and a sound technical understanding of the Internet and the Domain Name System. Expertise in any of the following areas is also highly desired:
Contract interpretation
Cross-cultural issues
Cyber security
Judicial and/or legal work
Licensing
Online content
Public policy
Regulatory environments
Social research
Trademark protection"

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Donuts Alleges ICANN Board Breached Its Own Bylaws and Articles

Today on Domain Mondo is a post "Former ICANN CSO Kurt Pritz says ICANN Violated Its Own Policies" about the IRP (Independent Review Process) Donuts Inc vs ICANN filed before the International Centre for Dispute Resolution in regard to applications for new gTLDs (new generic Top-Level Domains) .SPORTS, .SKI and .RUGBY. Donuts Inc., subsidiaries applied for 307 new gTLDs, including .SPORTS, .SKI and .RUGBY, which at an applicant fee of $185,000 per new gTLD means Donuts has an "upfront" new gTLD investment of $56,795,000 in ICANN applicant fees alone.

ExpVC.com has added a link on its web page footer (below) "ICANN Independent Review Process Documents" to allow readers a link to the ICANN web page that provides information about the Donuts Inc., IRP, and all other pending Independent Review Processes.

The IRP filed by Donuts Inc., is of particular interest, as the allegations made in the Request for Independent Review Process by Donuts Inc., are both extensive and serious. Donuts Inc., alleges in its Request for IRP that ICANN, by and through its Board of Directors ("the Board"), has breached its own Bylaws, Articles and other ICANN governing principles:

"“[T]he powers of ICANN shall be exercised by … the Board.” App. A Art. II § 1. The entire new gTLD program emanates from the Board’s exercise of that power. In June 2008, the Board adopted GNSO policy recommendations for a new gTLD program... The Board Allowed Decisions on .SPORTS and .SKI to Result from Conflicts… The Board Failed in All Three Case to Exercise Independent Judgment to Ensure Consistent Application of Documented Governing Policies, Violating the Bylaws and Articles in a Number of Ways… The Board failed to “inform” community objection panels sufficiently for them to apply “documented policies” appropriately… The Board has failed to make divergent results consistent with “documented policies,” resulting in “disparate treatment.”… Inconsistent application of “documented policies” contravenes applicable law… the Board has breached the covenant of good faith and fair dealing in contravention of “local” law and the Articles… The Board Must but Has Failed to Act with Accountability and for the Benefit of the Internet Community As a Whole… The subject objection rulings go against key provisions of the Bylaws, Articles, Guidebook and other principles on which ICANN and its new gTLD program rest.  The Board has neglected to assure consistent application of Guidebook rules, implement an appeals process or otherwise correct decisions that fail to apply documented policies, despite Donuts’ significant investment in reliance upon such rules and their  predictability.  This Panel should direct the Board to reinstate Donuts’ three applications and either (i) reverse the objection rulings or (ii) vacate them and appoint properly trained panels to rehear the objections as to those TLDs." (source: Request for Independent Review Process by Donuts Inc.)

Follow the Donuts Inc. IRP, and other IRPs, through the link provided on the footer of the expvc.com web page.

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ICANN 51, Los Angeles, Schedule Highlights

ICANN 51 | Los Angeles: 12-16 October 2014 #ICANN51

• Full Schedule
• Daily Schedule: Oct 11-18

Schedule Highlights by Day and Event (as selected by expvc.com staff):
Saturday, 11 October: 

17:30 to 18:00 PDT--GAC Meeting: Transition of US Stewardship of IANA and Strengthening ICANN Accountability and Governance

ICANN 51 highlights for Sunday, 12 October:
 09:00 to 16:30 PDT  GNSO Working Session

10:30 to 12:30 PDT GAC Meeting: Transition of US Stewardship of IANA and Strengthening ICANN Accountability
14:00 to 15:00 PDT  GAC Meeting: WHOIS
15:00 to 16:30 PDT  GAC / GNSO Joint Meeting
17:00 to 18:00 PDT GAC: Accountability and Transparency (BGRI) Meeting

18:30 to 19:30 PDT--GAC / GNSO Consultation Group Meeting

Monday, 13 October

08:30 to 10:00 PDT--Welcome Ceremony and President's Opening Session

10:30 to 12:00 PDT--SO/AC-Led High Interest Topic Session

10:30 to 12:00 PDT--IANA Department - Who, What, Why?

10:30 to 12:00 PDT New gTLD Applicant Group (NTAG)
12:15 to 13:45 PDT CWG Meeting: IANA Stewardship Transition/ Naming Related Functions

16:00 to 1715 PDT--ICANN Accountability and Governance Cross Community Group Meeting

16:45 to 18:00 PDT --New gTLD Program Update

Tuesday, 14 October

08:30 to 16:45 PDT--Board Meetings with various Groups (see below)

• Board with the At-Large 14 Oct 2014 - 08:30 to 09:30 
• Board with the ccNSO 14 Oct 2014 - 09:45 to 10:45
• Board with the Commercial Stakeholders 14 Oct 2014 - 11:15 to 12:15
• Board with the Registries 14 Oct 2014 - 13:00 to 14:00 
• Board with the Registrars 14 Oct 2014 - 14:15 to 15:15 
• Board with the Non-Commercial Stakeholders 14 Oct 2014 - 15:45 to 16:45 PDT

09:00 to 17:00 PDT--gTLD Registries Stakeholder Group

09:30 to 12:15 PDT --Non Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC)

13:00 to 15:30 PDT --Non Commercial Stakeholder Group (NCSG)

14:00 to 15:00 PDT--GAC / ALAC Joint Meeting

17:00 to 18:00 PDT--Joint Meeting of the GAC & ICANN Board

Wednesday, 15 October

08:00 to 09:30 PDT--GAC Open Forum
08:30 to 10:15 PDT--GNSO Discussion Group - New gTLD Subsequent Procedures
09:30 to 10:00 PDT--GAC Briefing to the ICANN Community - Protection of Geo. Names in gTLDs
10:30 to 11:30 PDT--GAC Discussion with IANA Stewardship Transition Coordination Group
11:30 to 12:30 PDT --GAC Communiqué Overview
13:00 to 15:00 PDT --GNSO Public Council Meeting Part I
13:30 to 14:45 PDT--What the Journalists Think
13:30 to 14:45 PDT--Rights Protection Mechanisms: User Feedback Session

16:30 to 18:15 PDT--2015 and Beyond - An Internet Governance Update

Thursday, 16 October

08:30 to 09:45 PDT--Enhancing ICANN Accountability
10:00 to 12:00 PDT--Community Discussion with the IANA Stewardship Coordination Group (ICG)

12:00 to 13:30 PDT--GNSO Wrap-Up Meeting Constellation
13:30 to 17:00 PDT--Public Forum Los Angeles
17:00 to 18:30 PDT--ICANN Public Board Meeting Los Angeles

Friday, 17 October

09:00 to 17:30 PDT--ICG Meeting--working session of the IANA Stewardship Transition Coordination Group (ICG).

Full Schedule in Printer format

see also: What's Hot At #ICANN51? by Michele Neylon

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ICANN Follies, New gTLD Domain Names, New Security Threats

As a result of ICANN's New Generic Top Level Domains (new gTLDs), being rolled-out, new security threats are increasingly being reported--

Recently introduced TLDs create new opportunities for criminals | CSO Online: Sep 22, 2014 "...The [new g]TLDs ... [have] become a goldmine for criminals, who can often bypass network defenses guarding against phishing and C&C communications by using a domain that's outside of the norm. According to researchers at Malwarebytes, many of the newly released TLDs have been linked to various malicious activities on the Web in the last 60-days, including malware propagation and phishing. Some of the [new g]TLDs that were singled out include .pictures, .club, .xyz, .email, .company, .directory, .support, and .consulting... many of them were properly registered. However, the web servers they're pointed at were compromised. Many of the compromised servers were being used to propagate the Angler Exploit Kit. The Angler kit targets vulnerable Internet Explorer browsers, Java installations, and Adobe products. It's also known to attempt an infection without writing the malware to the system's drive, leaving the code running in memory. Angler mostly installs Zeus-based malware, targeting authentication credentials and financial data. At the same time, it's able to deliver any payload available depending on the campaign. Earlier this year, it was linked to a massive phishing campaign, which compromised more than 46,000 systems...." (read more at link above, emphasis added)

https://yourfakebank.support -- TLD confusion starts! - Internet Security | SANS ISC: Sep 16 2014 "Phishing emails per se are nothing new. But it appears that URLs like... [looks similar to this: hxxps://url-bofa.support/BankofAmerica.com] in the phishing email... have a higher success rate with users. I suspect this is due to the fact that the shown URL "looks different", but actually matches the linked URL, so the old common "wisdom" of hovering the mouse pointer over the link to look for links pointing to odd places .. won't help here. But wait, there's more! Since the crooks in this case own the [new gTLD] domain [name], and obviously trivially can pass the so-called "domain control validation" employed by some CA's, they actually managed to obtain a real, valid SSL certificate!..." (read more at the link above, emphasis added)

ICANN's Fresh Top Level Domains: a Gift to Phishers - Infosecurity Magazine: 18 Sep 2014 "... “Pretty much ever since TLD .biz went online a couple years ago, and the only ones buying domains in this space were the scammers, we kinda knew what would happen when ICANN's latest folly and money-grab went live,” SANS researchers said in a bulletin. It looks like a number of the new top-level domains, like .support", .club, etc. have now come online. And again, it seems like only the crooks are buying.”...." (read more at link above, emphasis added)

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Domain Names Industry, ICANN, Regulatory Capture

"ICANN has been largely captured by the [domain] names industry"

What is "capture?"

Regulatory Capture: definitions--
Regulatory capture - Wikipedia: "Regulatory capture is a form of political corruption that occurs when a regulatory agency, created to act in the public interest, instead advances the commercial or special concerns of interest groups that dominate the industry or sector it is charged with regulating. Regulatory capture is a form of government failure [or Internet governance failure in the case of ICANN]; it creates an opening for firms to behave in ways injurious to the public (e.g., producing negative externalities). The agencies are called "captured agencies"."

Regulatory Capture Definition | Investopedia: "Regulatory capture is a theory associated with George Stigler, a Nobel laureate economist. It is the process by which regulatory agencies eventually come to be dominated by the very industries they were charged with regulating. Regulatory capture happens when a regulatory agency, formed to act in the public's interest, eventually acts in ways that benefit the industry it is supposed to be regulating, rather than the public."

"... regulatory capture occurs because groups or individuals with a high-stakes interest [ICANN's high-stakes stakeholders--e.g., Registries, Registrars, and Registry service providers] in the outcome of policy or regulatory decisions can be expected to focus their resources and energies in attempting to gain the policy outcomes they prefer, while members of the public, each with only a tiny individual stake in the outcome, will ignore it altogether.[1] Regulatory capture refers to the actions by interest groups when this imbalance of focused resources devoted to a particular policy outcome is successful at "capturing" influence with the staff or commission members [i.e., ICANN groups, committees, Board of Directors] of the regulatory agency [ICANN], so that the preferred policy outcomes of the special interest groups are implemented..." (source: Wikipedia, supra)

Regulatory economics - Wikipedia: "... Countering, overriding, or bypassing regulation is Regulatory Capture where a regulatory agency created to act in the public interest, instead advances the commercial or special concerns of interest groups that dominate the industry that the agency is charged with regulating. The probability of regulatory capture is economically biased, in that vested interests in an industry have the greatest financial stake in regulatory activity and are more likely to be motivated to influence the regulatory body than dispersed individual consumers, each of whom has little particular incentive to try to influence regulators. Thus the likelihood of regulatory capture is a risk to which an agency is exposed by its very nature..."

This is a well-known flaw at the heart of multistakeholderism. To paraphrase George Orwell, within ICANN, all stakeholders are equal, but some are more equal than others. ICANN's high-stakes stakeholders with vested interests--e.g., domain name registry operators, service providers, and registrars--have "captured" the organization, dominate its decision-making, policies and outcomes, Board of Directors, and are generally over-represented throughout its organizational structure. The most effective counter to powerful commercial vested interests are governments, but in the case of ICANN, governments are relegated to an advisory capacity except for the United States government which still holds "ultimate power and authority" by virtue of its agreements and contracts with ICANN. As for domain name registrants, who are the actual customers or consumers of domain names (and who pay a fee to ICANN included as part of the registration fee for each domain name), they have almost no representation within ICANN--there is no "Registrants Group" within the ICANN structure (unlike the multiple groups who represent registries (one for gTLDs, one for ccTLDs, etc.) and registrars. Unsurprisingly, ICANN's record of protecting domain name registrants from price-gouging and other abusive registry and registrar practices is almost non-existent. So much for the multistakeholder model of Internet governance as practiced by ICANN.

A good example of  ICANN's capture by the Domain Names Industry is ICANN's new gTLDs program where ICANN, ridden with conflicts of interest at its highest levels, subverted the wider public interest in favor of the high-stakes stakeholders' interests--

Ethics Fight Over Domain Names Intensifies - New York Times  March 18, 2012: "The Commerce Department ...warned the organization [ICANN] that it needed to tighten its rules against conflicts of interest or risk losing a central role.... ICANN has come under heightened scrutiny because of an initiative to increase vastly the number and variety of available Internet addresses. Under the plan, which ICANN is putting into effect, hundreds of new “top-level domains” — the letters like “com” that follow the “dot” in addresses — are set to be created. Some business groups say the expansion of domains will cause a rise in trademark violations and cybersquatting, while some governments object to Icann’s move to create address suffixes like .xxx, for pornography. But the initiative has been cheered by companies that register and maintain Internet addresses. A number of current and former members of the ICANN board have close ties to such registrars or to concerns involved in other areas that stand to benefit from the expansion... [Rod] Beckstrom [former ICANN Chairman]... “... all [ICANN] top leadership is from the very domain-name industry it is supposed to coordinate independently... “A more subtle but related risk is the tangle of conflicting agendas within the board...”... the United States government is also dissatisfied with ICANN. The Commerce Department said it had canceled a request for proposals to run the so-called Internet Assigned Numbers Authority because none of the bids met its requirements: “the need for structural separation of policy-making from implementation, a robust companywide conflict of interest policy, provisions reflecting heightened respect for local country laws and a series of consultation and reporting requirements to increase transparency and accountability to the international community.” Eyebrows were raised last year when Peter Dengate Thrush, former chairman of ICANN and a fan of the domain name expansion, joined a company that invests in domain names. [Read more at the link above--a version of this article appeared in print on March 19, 2012, on page B6 of the New York edition with the headline: Ethics Fight Over Domain Names Intensifies.]

See also:

• Most New gTLD Domain Names Are On Life-Support, Infecting Other gTLDs
• ICANN Board of Directors, Conflicts of Interest
• For Domain Name Registrants, ICANN Is Useless
• ICANN Process for New gTLDs Dysfunctional -- from the beginning
• ICANN, New gTLD Domain Name Renewal Fees, Price Gouging
• ICANN Fails to Prohibit Warehousing OR Speculation in Domain Names by new gTLD Registry Operators and Registrars
• ICANN, Kurt Pritz, Conflict of Interest, new gTLD domain names program
• New gTLD domain names, exorbitant prices, ICANN Incompetence
• Does ICANN Exist Primarily to Enrich Insiders and Contractors?

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