U.S. to Give Up Internet Governing Role

When you want to announce something important you wait until late Friday, right? That’s what the Obama administration did when they announced plans to give up a key role the United States plays in overseeing the Internet.

In a press release, the Department of Commerce said that its National Telecommunications and Information Administration would “transition key Internet domain name functions to the global multistakeholder community.”

Since 1998 the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has governed all domain names and Internet addresses for the Commerce Department.

The Obama Administration asked ICANN to put together a plan to transfer this role to the global community instead of a single country.

According to Lawrence Strickling, Commerce Department Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information, “We look forward to ICANN convening stakeholders across the global Internet community to craft an appropriate transition plan.”

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But the plan will not be universally accepted. The U.S. has wanted to make the move in the past but has faced opposition from business leaders and politicians who believed that it could create a national security concern.

And the opposition has already started. Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich said on Twitter,