[kictanet] WCITleaks just launched

Thu Jun 7 11:10:36 EAT 2012

@Kivuva,

I tend to see it that way too.  As a global community, we have to chose whether we want the Internet to governed from Washington or NYC (UN-aka-ITU).

Either way, Uncle Sam will somehow retain veto power.  I remember reading somewhere that one Congress man said that he cannot understand how - assuming Internet Governance goes the United Nations way - he could NOT understand how the US would have the same vote/powers as say Somalia, Afghanistan and others (e.g Kenya?) whose society may not be as intricately tied to the Internet as thiers is..

What is worse, the motive of some countries to control the Internet is quite suspect - recall an earlier post I made about Google not "working" from Guangzhou, China? I suspect most African governments are coming in from this perspective and use ITU to sanitize such agenda with the correct diplomatic legalese.  ITU plays along since they would not mind a redifned role (control internet) in the current dispensation of a knowledge economy.

But that's just my personal view and I do hope am wrong.

walu.

--- On Thu, 6/7/12, Kivuva <Kivuva at transworldafrica.com> wrote:

From: Kivuva <Kivuva at transworldafrica.com>
Subject: Re: [kictanet] WCITleaks just launched
To: jwalu at yahoo.com
Cc: "KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions" <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
Date: Thursday, June 7, 2012, 10:17 AM

Well, the issue of Internet governance is a hot topic involving hard diplomacy. US has put fifth gear in its propaganda machinery. We all know that the Internet is Governed from Washington, with president Bush in his reign vetoing many proposals from ICANN. We all know how powerful this behemoth ICANN is, and that it reports to USA Department of Commerce.

The revenue these California firms get from gTLDs an other payouts is huge, so don't expect them to relinquish control over the internet without a fight.
We all know anybody who controls root servers, the domain names, IP numbers, and AS numbers, control a huge chunk of the internet. They can even refuse to propagate a zone file for a particular ccTLD. US still has the majority primary root servers.

Are we forgetting SOPA?
Is there anybody who never heard of wikileaks.org? The US put pressure on registrars to drop it like hot coal. Julian Assange had to seek refuge on ccTLDs and mirror sites to broadcast his message.  So if we are talking about internet freedom, "the land of the free" is the true jail for our beloved internet.

Bottom line, is it better for the life of the internet to be controlled from Washington (read one country), or for it to be controlled by UN? Of course UN is still not the most neutral place, with US bankrolling it.

On 7 June 2012 09:28, Walubengo J <jwalu at yahoo.com> wrote:

What ? 

GG,

at this rate, we are likely going to see how Kenya has been voting all along on this matters!

If this was from Nollywood(Nigerian movie) soon to be replaced by our very own Riverwood (Nairobi River Road) I would say "the plot thickens" .

walu.
--- On Thu, 6/7/12, Grace Githaiga <ggithaiga at hotmail.com> wrote:

From: Grace Githaiga <ggithaiga at hotmail.com>
Subject: [kictanet] WCITleaks just launched
To: jwalu at yahoo.com

Cc: "KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions" <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
Date: Thursday, June 7, 2012, 12:48 AM

http://wcitleaks.org/
Wednesday, June 6, 2012

			     	Today we’re launching WCITLeaks.orgAs you may have heard, the UN is trying to take over the internet.
 Well, that’s not really true, but member states of the UN’s 
International Telecommunications Union (ITU) are definitely going to 
negotiate an agreement related to the Internet at the World Conference 
on International Communications (WCIT - pronounced ‘wicket’) this 
December in Dubai. U.S. officials have warned that some member states, including Russia and China, have put forth proposals to regulate the Internet. Vint Cerf has warned
 that “Such proposals raise the prospect of policies that enable 
government controls but greatly diminish the ‘permissionless innovation’
 that underlies extraordinary Internet-based economic growth to say 
nothing of trampling human rights.”
So what are these proposals? Well, we don’t know exactly. To see 
them, you have to have access to the ITU’s password protected website. 
This lack of transparency brings to mind secret negotiations like the 
one that gave us ACTA, and several civil society groups have written to the ITU demanding access to the documents.
The proposals are not classified and it’s not illegal to share them. In fact, they often are shared. At a recent panel discussion
 that I attended, the State Department’s Richard Beaird said, “Access to
 the proposals, of course, as I have done and others have done, is if 
you ask me, I will give you those proposals. I don’t want to have a 
flood of requests coming in from the room or those int he television 
audience.”
At the time, I tweeted:
 “If someone will pass them to me, I volunteer to host a site with gov 
WCIT proposals.” It seemed weird to me that someone wasn’t collecting 
and publishing the documents, like how opencrs.com does with 
Congressional Research Service reports. I promptly forgot about the 
idea, but was reminded yesterday when Milton Mueller wrote this post urging the U.S. to make documents available. He wrote:

Today, IGP has learned that the U.S. government is in possession of
 a document that brings together descriptions of all the WCIT proposals 
emerging from the ITU’s Council Working Group. The document, known as TD
 64, compiles all the proposals on the table into a single document 
without attributing them to any specific government. No law or treaty 
stops the US government from making this document available to the 
public. We urge the U.S. government to release TD 64 of the ITU Council 
Working Group immediately.

Of course, while it’s not illegal, publishing these documents is 
probably not considered polite in the rarefied diplomatic circles of the
 ITU. So, I thought we’d give folks with access to the documents a 
helping hand.
Yesterday Eli Dourado and I spent a couple of hours putting together a website at WCITLeaks.org.
 The idea is simple: If you have a WCIT or ITU related document you’d 
like to share, submit it anonymously and we will publish it. That’s it. 
We hope you find it useful and that you’ll spread the word.

//Cynthia M. WongDirector, Global Internet Freedom
 Project
Center for Democracy & Technology

CDT  •  1634 I Street NW  •  Suite 1100  •  Washington, DC 20006E cynthia at cdt.org P +1-202-407-8835 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting FREE +1-202-407-8835end_of_the_skype_highlighting F +1-202-637-0968

Keeping the Internet Open, Innovative & Free!
Follow our work on Twitter @CenDemTech @cynthiamw

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