[kictanet] 2nd Internet Governance Online Discussion Report

[Walubengo J]

Apologies, had send this earlier with the "wrong title" -guess I am not good at night-running on the web like Nyaki...

Nway, Attached is the online discussion report on Internet Governance issues. Listers should confirm that their views were correctly captured before we meet in the upcoming .KE Internet Governance meeting.

walu

¬¬¬¬¬¬¬Executive Summary Starts¬¬¬¬¬¬¬

KICTANet commissioned the 2nd online discussion on Internet Governance, aiming to continue raising awareness of the global Internet Governance issues while reviewing corresponding country positions based on new developments. Specifically, discussions were centered around Infrastructure & Content Issues (Undersea Cable, ccTLDs, IXPs, IPv6), Cyber-Security (Consumer and Data Privacy, National Security Strategies) and
Socio-economic issues (ePayment Platforms).

The anticipated landing of several undersea cables on the East African Coast raised discussions on the impact (or lack of) these would have on Access, Affordability, Content and Quality of the Internet Service. It was felt that reliable and affordable last-mile (Local-Loop) solutions would need to be provisioned in order to realise affordable Internet Services. The current mobile (3G) service was welcome but not sufficient to
drive down the costs as much as Fiber-To-The Homes (FTTH) and Fixed Wireless technologies would. In other words, International Bandwidth prices may drop but expensive last mile solutions would continue to justify high costs of Internet services – even with competition at both the local and international market layers.

With regard to the Quality (Broadband) Issues, participants felt that Quality of the Services was subjective and an aspect of User expectations and Usage patterns. However, members agreed that Broadband Service was a factor of BOTH Reliability and Affordability. Providing reliable but expensive (exclusive) services would therefore fail the test of Broadband services. Furthermore, it was noted that most Service Providers
gave poor contention-ratios on their uplinks to the Internet leading to highly degraded Internet services.

The discussion on the management of the Country Code Top-Level Domain (ccTLD) was one-sided with most participants registering their reservation about the new law that required all second-level domain registrars to be licensed. This issue continues to remain cloudy particularly because the Regulator is yet to publish the regulatory details of how a split dot.KE registry would be managed as well as the criterion for applying, approving
and revoking licenses.

With respect to IPv6 some participants felt that it was not important while others warned that it was a threat in terms of missing opportunities that the next generation internet presents. The role of the Internet eXchange Point (IXP) was widely acknowledged and the Government departments challenged to move content online in order to enhance and optimise the use of the Kenyan IXP.

With regard to Security, it was noted that the provisions of KCA (amendment) Act, 2009 represented the primary threats, an indication that the government recognized cyber security related issues. However, a culture of cybersecurity could be established through management tools such as data classification, security awareness training, risk assessment and risk analysis. These tools would facilitate the identification of threats, classification of assets and rating of assets vulnerabilities in order to implement effective security controls. In addition Users should be encouraged to develop a culture of reading terms and conditions websites – particularly eCommerce based sites.

Participants indicated that privacy and security on the internet was usually not a concern until a user encountered an infringement. Resolution to violation to right of privacy and security was limited by the fact that most citizens do not have the time or money to start legal proceedings. ‘Social re-engineering’ was proposed as the best method to overcome
these challenges.

The determination of the level of cybersecurity preparedness was emphasized given that the availability of high capacity and quality international bandwidth delivered by submarine cable would increase the vulnerability of services and networks in the country. It was proposed that the level of cybersecurity preparedness could be determined with use of the ITU National Cybersecurity/critical information infrastructure protection (CIIP)
Self-Assessment Tool. Additionally, participants supported the establishment of the national CERT using the public private partnership (PPP) model.

Participants noted that the national and regional Internet Governance Forums were an indication of the success of the IGF in providing an inclusive governance process. Participants supported the continuation of the IGF as it was based on a multi-stakeholder processes and provided a globally unique environment for a constructive and open exchange of ideas.



      
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