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Right now, the U.S. has control over the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers or ICANN, which is an organization that records all domain names and their corresponding IP addresses. This control is about to expire come Friday with no hope of it getting renewed. The ICANN will gain true independence.
For 18 years, the ICANN has maintained control over what was essentially the address book of the internet, ensuring that every domain name will have a coordinated number match. Throughout those years, the U.S. has had a lot of influence over how the organization worked, USA Today reports. Once the contract with the U.S. Commerce Department's National Telecommunications and Information Administration ends on September 30th, this will no longer be the case.
Ever since the possibility of the U.S. losing control over such an important aspect of the smooth functioning of the internet was brought up, politicians in favor of renewing it have been lobbying to do just that. Among the most prominent of these public figures is Senator Ted Cruz, Texas-R, who considers the move a threat to internet freedom.
Many in the Republican Party are particularly incensed at the idea of giving up control over the organization, saying that it’s giving away the internet. Unfortunately for them, the ICANN, as well as the Commerce Department, believe otherwise, Ars Technica reports.
Since its inception, the organization was always meant to be a completely independent body at some point. This should have actually happened earlier, but it was put on hold during the Bush administration.
In a statement, the ICANN stated that not only does America not own the organization right now, it never has. More than that, nothing will change once the contract expires.
"The US government has never, and has never had the ability to, set the direction of the (ICANN) community’s policy development work based on First Amendment ideas," the statement reads. "Yet that is exactly what Senator Cruz is suggesting. The US government has no decreased role. Other governments have no increased role. There is simply no change to governmental involvement in policy development work in ICANN."
