Page History

GNSO Council Meeting #8 of 2024 held on 8 August 2024 

• Agenda
• Matters of Interest
• Meeting Details
• Meeting Record
• Special Summary Report

GNSO Council Meeting #8 of 2024 held on 8 Aug 2024

Full Agenda  |  Documents  |  Motions

• Item 1: Administrative Matters
• Item 2: Opening Remarks / Review of Projects List and Action Item List. 
• Item 3: Consent Agenda
  • GNSO Review of the GAC ICANN80 Communiqué
• Item 4: COUNCIL VOTE - GNSO Liaison to the GAC Replacement
• Item 5: COUNCIL VOTE - Adoption of the SPIRT Charter
• Item 6: COUNCIL VOTE DISCUSSION - Accuracy Scoping Team (vote deferred)
• Item 7: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - Accuracy of Registration Data
• Item 8: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - Small Team Plus on Singulars/Plurals
• Item 9: COUNCIL UPDATE - Transfer Policy Review PDP - Initial Report Format
• Item 10: COUNCIL UPDATE - Intellectual Property Constituency Request for Reconsideration
• Item 11: Any Other Business

  • 11.1 - Independent Review Process - Implementation Oversight Team

    • Deadline for public comments: 16 September

  • 11.2 - ICANN's Draft Five Year Strategic Plan

    • Deadline for public comments: 17 September
  • 11.3 - Continuous Improvement Program - Community Coordination Group (CIP-CCG) Phase 3 Update
  • 11.4 - Publication of Preliminary Issues Report on Latin Script Diacritics 
    • Deadline for public comments: 10 September

  • 11.5 - ICANN Board Seeks Input on Applicant Support Program Use of Auction Proceeds - blog post

  • 11.6 - Board Letter & RrSG Input Letter re: Urgent Request

  • 11.7 - IDNs-EPDP Phase 2 recommendations related to harmonized IDN tables

For notes on highlighted items click on MATTERS OF INTEREST tab above

Matters of interest to ALAC/At-Large 

• Item 1: Administrative Matters
  • Minutes of the GNSO Council Meeting on 12 June 2024 were posted on 01 July 2024.
  • Minutes of the GNSO Council Meeting on 18 July 2024 were posted on 02 August 2024.
• Item 4: COUNCIL VOTE - GNSO Liaison to the GAC Replacement
  
  • The GNSO Liaison to the GAC role was first piloted in FY15-16 (1 July 2014 to 30 June 2016) as part of a broader initiative of the GAC-GNSO Consultation Group to facilitate early engagement of the GAC in GNSO policy development activities.
  • Due to the success of the pilot, the GNSO Liaison to the GAC is now a permanent role and an integral part of communications between the GAC and GNSO. The term of the liaison role is two years, and the term limit is two consecutive two-year terms. As the current liaison’s term will expire at the 2024 Annual General Meeting (ICANN81), the GNSO Council will now appoint a new liaison to assume the role at ICANN81. 
  • Following a review of candidates by the Standing Selection Committee (SSC), Council will vote to confirm the SSC's recommendation of Sebastien Ducos as the new GNSO Liaison to the GAC. (voting threshold of simple majority) 
• Item 5: COUNCIL VOTE - Adoption of the SPIRT Charter
  • Council enlisted a Drafting Team to develop a draft charter for the SPIRT, which is a standing implementation review team recommended in the New gLTD Subsequent Procedures Final Report.
  • When issues arise after ICANN Board adoption of the Applicant Guidebook and during the course of the New gTLD Program that need to be addressed, the Standing Predictability Implementation Review Team (“SPIRT”) will utilize the Predictability Framework, which is an output of the implementation effort developed by ICANN org, in coordination with the Subsequent Procedures (“SubPro”) Implementation Review Team (“IRT”); the Predictability Framework and the SPIRT Charter should be mutually coherent. And Council is responsible for the oversight of the SPIRT.
  • In developing the draft charter, the Drafting Team considered elements such as scope, formation, the operating principles and decision-making of the SPIRT, et.al. The New gTLD Subsequent Procedures Final Report included an annex that provides detailed guidance on how the SPIRT should operate, which served as a basis for the drafting of the charter.
  • Following the 12 June 2024 update to Council on the draft charter, focusing on the sections that differed from the implementation guidance in Annex E of the New gTLD SubPro Final Report, including specific language, the Drafting Team is now submitting a final version of the SPIRT Charter which Council will vote on. (voting threshold of simple majority).
• Item 6: COUNCIL VOTE DISCUSSION - Accuracy Scoping Team
  • The Registration Data Accuracy (RDA) Scoping Team was initiated by the GNSO Council in July 2021 per the formation instructions. 
  • The Scoping Team completed Assignment #1 (enforcement and reporting) and Assignment #2 (measurement of accuracy) and submitted its write up to Council on 5 September 2022. In its write up, the Scoping Team suggested moving forward with two proposals that would not require access to registration data, namely a registrar survey (recommendation #1) and a possible registrar audit (recommendation #2) that may help further inform the team’s work on assignment #3 (effectiveness) and #4 (impact & improvements), while it awaits the outcome of the outreach to the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) by ICANN org in relation to proposals that would require access to registration data (recommendation #3). 
  • On 19 October 2023, ICANN org provided an update on Registration Data Accuracy efforts, and Council discussed the update during its 16 November 2023 meeting. During that meeting, some Councilors noted that, barring (i) completion of the Data Processing Agreement, (ii) implementation of the NIS2 directive, or (iii) publication of the Inferential Analysis of Maliciously Registered Domains (INFERMAL) Study, it may not be the appropriate time to reconvene the Accuracy Scoping Team.  Council voted to extend the deferral of the Accuracy Scoping Team’s recommendations by another six months during its meeting on 15 February 2024.
  • Following discussion during the meetings in June and July, Council discussed the limitations noted by ICANN org and determined there would be limited value in proceeding with the Scoping Team’s two recommendations (#1 and #2). Council also discussed the limited value in restarting the Scoping Team at this time due to limitations in access to data for the purpose of assessing accuracy. Given the importance of this issue within the ICANN community, the Council will continue to discuss how to best proceed on this topic (see item 7)
  • Council will vote to reject the Scoping Team’s recommendations #1 (voluntary registrar survey) and #2 (registrar audit). (voting threshold of simple majority) At the request of the IPC Councilors to defer a vote on this issue, Council will now discuss next steps instead.
• Item 7: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - Accuracy of Registration Data

  • Following the ICANN80 GNSO Council Wrap-Up session, the GNSO Chair asked Councilors to consider the following questions: 

    1. Evaluation of Proposed Alternatives: In its write-up, ICANN noted limitations in processing data for the purpose of assessing accuracy and proposed two alternatives (analyzing historical audit data and engagement with Contracted Parties on ccTLD practices – see detail below). Is pursuing these alternatives worthwhile? If not, are there other alternatives for obtaining data Council should consider?
    2. Consideration of Scoping Team Restart: Given the limitations with respect to access to data, would there be value in restarting the Scoping Team at this time?
    3. Advancing the Topic: If restarting the Scoping Team at this time is not deemed advisable, what other ideas do you have to advance this topic given its importance to the ICANN community? 
  • During the Council’s July meeting, Council agreed that restarting the Scoping Team at this time is not recommended. Councilors requested additional time to discuss additional alternatives with how to proceed on the topic of accuracy and will be asked to present proposals.
  • Council will discuss the feedback received from Councilors’ groups.
• Item 8: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - Update from Small Team Plus on Singulars/Plurals
  
  • In March 2023, the ICANN Board approved the majority of the recommendations contained in the Final Report on the new gTLD Subsequent Procedures PDP, but also placed some recommendations into a pending status. Council convened a small team that worked collaboratively with the ICANN Board to resolve all pending recommendations. While the majority of the pending recommendations were able to be adopted by the ICANN Board, recommendations across six Topics were non adopted by the ICANN Board. 

  • Council tasked the Small Team Plus with developing Supplemental Recommendations on five of the six Topics, i.e., Registry Voluntary Commitments / Public Interest Commitments, Applicant Support, Terms and Conditions, String Similarity Evaluations, and Limited Challenge/Appeal Mechanisms. Based on the expected implementation as it relates to the Continued Operations Instrument (COI), the Small Team Plus determined it was unnecessary to develop a Supplemental Recommendation for Topic 22: Registrant Protections. The Small Team Plus developed Supplemental Recommendations for all five topics and shared them with Council.

  • Because of information received just prior to Council consideration in April 2024, Council elected to defer consideration of the Supplemental Recommendation related to String Similarity Evaluations, or more specifically, singular/plurals. The new information received was a strawperson developed by ICANN org, which provided a potential path forward for singular/plurals. The Council asked to consider whether it felt that the strawperson was promising enough to task the Small Team Plus considering whether strawperson, or and amended version, could be agreed upon.

  • Council will receive another update from the Small Team Plus on Singulars/Plurals.
  • An electronic vote to adopt the Small Team Plus' Supplemental Recommendations 24.3 and 24.5 is foreshadowed for after this meeting.
• Item 9: COUNCIL UPDATE - Transfer Policy Review PDP - Initial Report Format

  • At its meeting on 18 February 2021, the GNSO Council unanimously adopted a motion to initiate a Policy Development Process (PDP) to review the Transfer Policy and determine if changes to the policy are needed to improve the ease, security, and efficacy of inter-registrar and inter-registrant transfers.

  • The Transfer Policy Review PDP WG has published its consolidated Initial Report, and is now seeking public comments. Because the Initial Report covers many topics and includes many policy recommendations, the Working Group has updated the format of its Initial Report in an effort to make it more digestible to readers (including, eventually, the GNSO Council and ICANN Board). 
  • Council will receive an overview of the format update.
• Item 10: COUNCIL UPDATE - Intellectual Property Constituency Request for Reconsideration

  • On 22 November 2023, the Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC) filed a Request for Reconsideration  of the ICANN Board Resolutions 2023.10.26.11 and 2023.10.26.122, regarding (i) the actions and inactions that led to (a) the ICANN Board’s public comment of 6 December 2018 on the Initial Report of the Cross-Community Working Group on New gTLD Auction Proceeds (CCWG-AP), (b) the organization of the public comment phase on the Proposed Final Report of the New gTLD Auction Proceeds Cross Community Working Group, (c) the ICANN Board Resolutions 2022.06.12.13 to 2022.06.12.16 , and (ii) the actions and inactions involving the implementation of the ICANN Grant Giving Program.

  • During its meeting at ICANN80, a few GNSO Councilors volunteered to draft a letter to the Board regarding the Request for Reconsideration.

  • Council will hear an update on the draft letter and discuss potential next steps for the Council, if any.

GNSO Council Meeting #8 of 2024 held on 8 Aug 2024 at 21:00 UTC: https://tinyurl.com/3wxk2kd2   

14:00 Los Angeles; 17:00 Washington DC; 22:00 London; 23:00 Paris; 00:00 Moscow (Friday); 07:00 Melbourne (Friday) 

GNSO Council Meeting Remote Participation: https://icann.zoom.us/j/92283565389?pwd=QnlHK1JSbzdiSFFZSjRjamxMTkNGdz09

Non-Council members are welcome to attend the meeting or call as listen-only observers.

Records of 8 Aug 2024 Meeting

• Audio Recording
• Zoom Recording (includes chat and visual and rough transcript. To access the rough transcript, select the Audio Transcript tab)
• Transcript
• Minutes

Special Summary Report of 8 Aug 2024 Meeting to ALAC

For brevity, I will just highlight a few things here. For some of the issues, you can glean a wider perspective from GNSO Council Aug 2024 Matters of Interest and/or from GNSO Council Aug 2024 Meeting Records.

1. GNSO Liaison to the GAC

• A role piloted in FY2015-2016 now becomes permanent and integral in GNSO-GAC communication. Sebastien Ducos is appointed as the new GNSO Liaison for a 2-year term starting at end ICANN81 to end ICANN87, replacing Jeff Neuman who terms out. Sophie Hey is named as the alternate in the event the need for an alternate arises.

2. Standing Predictability Implementation Review Team (SPIRT, pronounced as spirit) Charter

• Council resolved to adopt the charter of the SPIRT, acknowledging the possibility of future amendments as a result of material changes to the Predictability Framework which could occur after the final public comment on the draft Applicant Guidebook (AGB) for the next round of new gTLDs.

3. Registration Data Accuracy (RDA) and Accuracy Scoping Team

• I am taking these two topics together as they are closely related issues, and ones which Council have been grappling with for some time now.  
• In short, the desire to somehow establish the accuracy of domain name registration data has not been able to be acted on as under GDPR, ICANN has no legal basis to process registration data for the purpose of assessing accuracy.  With no data being legally available to ICANN, the Registration Data Accuracy (RDA) Scoping Team that had been initiated by Council in July 2021 has been unable to move forward since completing its Assignment #1 (on enforcement and reporting) and Assignment #2 (on measurement of accuracy) andhaving submitted its write up to Council on 5 September 2022.
• During its most recent meetings in June, July, and now, August, Council revisited and discussed the limitations noted by ICANN org resulting in limited value to proceeding with the RDA Scoping Team’s two recommendations (#1 and #2). Council also discussed the limited value in restarting the RDA Scoping Team due to limitations in access to data for the purpose of assessing accuracy. 
• However, given the importance of this issue within the ICANN community, Council decided to establish a new small team to see if there might be other ways to move forward - including reframing the issue(s) to perhaps focus on how registrants could be contacted for relevant reasons (such as DN abuse) in order to establish accuracy of their registration data rather than assessing accuracy for the sake of establishing accuracy of registration data.

4. SubPro Small Team Plus: Policy development on Singulars/Plurals of the Same Word in the Same Language as TLDs

• This an ongoing discussion at the GNSO Subsequent Procedures Small Team Plus, which I have been reporting on and discussing extensively at CPWG (see CPWG 15 May 2024, 22 May 2024, 10 Jul 2024, 17 Jul 2024 , 31 Jul 2024 and 7 Aug 2024)
• It is also the last of the recommendations, i.e. 2 recommendations under String Similarity Evaluations, or more specifically, singular/plurals, as contained in the Final Report on the new gTLD Subsequent Procedures PDP, which were not adopted by the ICANN Board. The Small Team Plus proceeded to craft a Supplemental Recommendation which attempted to address the Board's concerns/reasons for not adopting the 2 recommendations.
• The Board also instructed ICANN org to propose an alternative to these 2 recommendations, to address the Board's reasons for non-adoption. Because of information received just prior to Council consideration in April 2024, Council elected to defer consideration of the Small Team Plus' Supplemental Recommendation. The new information received was a strawperson developed by ICANN org, which provided a potential path forward for singular/plurals. Council was asked to consider whether it felt that the strawperson was promising enough to task the Small Team Plus with considering whether strawperson, or and amended version, could be agreed upon.
• NCA Councilor Paul McGrady, Small Team Plus lead, reported on the continued work of the Small Team Plus, which had started from consideration of the ICANN org strawperson around public crowdsourcing for reporting incidences of strings applied-for being caught as the singular/plural of the same word in the same language and if an exceptions process should be contemplated. 
  • By "exceptions process", we mean could an applicant whose applied-for string that has been caught in such a singular/plural report be able to explain how its string would not lead to consumer/end user confusion - as against an existing TLD or another applied-for singular/plural string - if it were allowed to delegated, and if so, how (ie what criteria could be used, new process, vs existing process).
  • Noting that such an exceptions process must not rely on 'intent of use' (an approach which the Board has rejected) but could rely on other grounds, such as registrant restrictions, so long as if any Registry Voluntary Commitments (RVCs) were involved then these RVCs must be enforceable under the ICANN Bylaws and as a practicable matter.
  • The Small Team Plus eventually attempted to craft a second strawperson supplemental recommendation by fleshing out details the exceptions process but could not arrive at any clear consensus on the same. In an attempt to get the Small Team Plus to coalesce around something it could support, a third strawperson was proposed. That ultimately did not enjoy Small Team Plus' consensus agreement either, so a further attempt was made to revisit the original 2 recommendations, to extract portions which did not attract the Board's objections while discarding/replacing portions which did, and to account for the Board's resolution of 8 Jun 2024 on Approach for Handling Registry Commitments that Restrict Content and/or Usage of gTLDs in Next Round Registry Agreements.
• At the time of this Council meeting, the Small Team Plus had not concluded its work and Council determined that the Small Team Plus must do so before/by Council's September 2024 meeting.

Action by ALAC Liaison

• •  Justine Chew to continue to update ALAC/CPWG on the progress of the Singular/Plurals issue.

4. Transfer Policy Review Policy Development Process (TPR PDP)

• TPR PDP Working Group Chair, Roger Carney, provided Council with an update on the working group's Initial Report, concentrating on highlighting the format of the report in an effort to make it more digestible to readers (including, eventually, the GNSO Council and ICANN Board). Councilors provided positive feedback to Roger on the format.

5. Intellectual Property Constituency Request for Reconsideration

• On 22 November 2023, the Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC) filed a Request for Reconsideration  of the ICANN Board Resolutions 2023.10.26.11 and 2023.10.26.122, regarding (i) the actions and inactions that led to (a) the ICANN Board’s public comment of 6 December 2018 on the Initial Report of the Cross-Community Working Group on New gTLD Auction Proceeds (CCWG-AP), (b) the organization of the public comment phase on the Proposed Final Report of the New gTLD Auction Proceeds Cross Community Working Group, (c) the ICANN Board Resolutions 2022.06.12.13 to 2022.06.12.16 , and (ii) the actions and inactions involving the implementation of the ICANN Grant Giving Program.

• During its meeting at ICANN80, a few GNSO Councilors volunteered to draft a letter to the Board regarding the Request for Reconsideration.

• A draft letter has since been prepared and Council agreed that it should be issued to the Board shortly, and that Council would socialize this letter with other SO/ACs so that they may choose to also provide input to the Board on this issue. 

Action by ALAC Liaison

• •  Justine Chew to bring Council's letter on IPC's Request for Reconsideration to the attention of ALAC Leadership/ALAC.

6. Input on ICANN Board's Approach to use Auction Proceeds for Applicant Support Program

• Council is supportive of this approach and will provide input to the Board on it. 

7. EPDP on Temporary Specification Phase 1Urgent Requests

• The present concern is limited to the issue of urgent requests, stemming from Recommendation 18 of the Expedited Policy Development Process on Temporary Specifications' Phase 1 Final Report which has been adopted by the ICANN Board on 15 May 2019, and which had gone onwards for implementation by ICANN org through an Implementation Review Team (IRT).
  • Rec 18 reads, "A separate timeline of [less than X business days] will considered [sic] for the response to ‘Urgent’ Reasonable Disclosure Requests, those Requests for which evidence is supplied to show an immediate need for disclosure [time frame to be finalized and criteria set for Urgent requests during implementation].
• This is an ongoing concern between the GNSO, GAC and the Board, where most recently, the Board having responded to the GAC (Board Letterre: Urgent Request) which has received support from the RrSG (RrSG Input Letter). 
• Part of the issue is a procedural one, in that there is no existing mechanism that allows for revisiting a policy recommendation that has been approved by the Board.
• Council has now prepared a letter to the Board proposing that a meeting be schedule between the Board, interested GAC and PSWG representative representatives and Council to discuss the concerns in detail, explore the complexities involved, and determine the most effective way to proceed.

8. EPDP on Internationalized Domain Names Phase 2 recommendations related to harmonized IDN tables

• The Expedited Policy Development Process on Internationalized Domain Names Working Group (EPDP-IDNs) received a request from ICANN org to stabilize the WG's Phase 2 recommendations related to harmonized IDN tables, namely Preliminary Recommendation 6 and Implementation Guidance 7 in response the charter question C5. According to ICANN org, the stability sought is a prerequisite to ICANN launching the Registry Service Provider Evaluation Program in November.
• The WG has agreed to prioritize their discussion on PR 6 and IG 7 to reach the stability sought by end of August. However, to enable the RSP Evaluation Program to proceed in November would mean that PR 6 has to be implemented before the WG's Phase 2 Final Report even reaches Council for consideration (and assuming it is approved by Council, it still has to go to the Board for consideration/adoption). As this is procedurally unprecedented, Council has been asked to provide guidance to the WG on a path forward.