Digital Rights + Internet Governance + Innovation Policy

IP Justice Comment on Olympic Committee and Red Cross Requests to be Granted Global Exclusive Licensing Rights to Words in the DNS

The comment was filed in response to requests from the International Olympic Committee and Red Cross groups who have asked ICANN to grant them the exclusive right to use in domain names several hundred words that these groups claim are their "exclusive property". Despite their grossly exaggerated legal claims and overblown fears, these groups lobbied the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) at ICANN to put pressure upon the ICANN Board and GNSO Policy Council to create such unprecedented rights over the use of words in domain names...

IP Justice Comment on Request to ICANN from Red Cross & Olympic Committee to Ban Others’ Use of Words in Domain Names

Today I write to express my personal disappointment with the way ICANN has mis-handled this request for special rights to prohibit the use of certain words in domain names which are desired by politically powerful, but ultimately arbitrary, interests. Unfortunately, this case represents another clear example of ICANN departing from its own established policies and stated principles of bottom-up governance to demonstrate that it is not quite ready to be a legitimate global governance institution that can be trusted to manage the security and stability of the domain name system in the public interest...

What does it mean for ICANN to act in the public interest?

ICANN should bake-in to its internal policy development process, consideration of the various interests and stakeholders that can together reach what can be called the 'public interest'. Consider principles that we agree help us to achieve what we think is the 'public interest,' like openness and promoting freedom and making sure the Internet enables education, communication, innovation, exploration ...

IP Justice Comments on ICANN Policy Proposal for Trademarks & New GTLDs

Statement in public forum regarding ICANN Board response to "scorecard" of the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) on trademark protections for new generic top-level Internet domain names. The GAC is pressuring the ICANN Board to dramatically expand the rights of trademark owners after heavy lobbying by trademark industry of governmental representatives who participate at ICANN.

San Francisco Civil Liberties Groups Comment on SF Entertainment Commission Proposal to Create Surveillance State in Local Arts Establishments

IP Justice signed comments from a number of San Francisco civil liberties organizations concerned about the draconian new proposal to turn local SF arts organizations into surveillance mechanisms for law enforcement. This proposal harms civil liberties like free expression and privacy and it will harm the local arts communities who will be forced to spy on their patrons if enacted. The comments are from PrivacyActivism, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, IP Justice, Patient Privacy Rights, the Center for Financial Privacy and Human Rights, Chip Pitts of Stanford Law School, Beat the Chip, and the Bill of Rights Defense Committee

IP Justice Statement on ICANN’s Responsibility to Respect Human Rights

IP Justice submitted a statement today in response to the U.S. Department of Commerce National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) regarding its relationship with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). In its submission, IP Justice argued that ICANN needs a better legal framework that will obligate the organization to respect internationally recognized [...]

IP Justice Comments on ICANN Plans for New Top-Level Domains: Keep the Core Neutral – ICANN Should Avoid Expanding Scope of Mission to Include Enforcing “Morality” and Fighting “Terrorism”

IP Justice submitted brief comments today to ICANN regarding its plan for introducing new Top-Level Domains (TLDs). Specifically, IP Justice raised concerns about policy proposals that threaten freedom of expression on the Internet and seek to expand ICANN's mission to include ensuring "Morality and Public Order" (MAPO) and preventing "terrorism" through personal background checks. IP Justice believes both of these ICANN proposals are mis-guided and will harm the healthy development of the Internet and the global public interest.

IP Justice Comments on ICANN Accountability & Transparency Concerns: Lack of Accountability to Non-Commercial Users Remains Problematic for ICANN’s Promise to Protect the Public Interest

IP Justice is deeply concerned that ICANN is insufficiently accountable to relevant non-commercial interests. Certain interests, such as business interests (in particular the trademark and domain name industries) are over-represented at ICANN both in structure and in practice. On the other hand, non-commercial interests and individual Internet users are not given the appropriate representation, although some improvements have been made in recent years. There is a real worry that ICANN is an "industry organization" and works predominantly for trademark interests and the domain name industry. Too often non-commercial concerns are ignored by ICANN; without any real "muscle" behind non-commercial interests, ICANN has little incentive to protect those interests in its policy development process...

IP Justice Statement to ICANN on Need to Respect Decision of Independent Review Panel on .XXX Domain

IP Justice supports the swift adoption of the decision of the Independent Review Panel (IRP) by ICANN and the inclusion of the applied for .xxx domain name into the root. This IRP decision should not be, and cannot be, a referendum on pornography as some comments urge. This decision is only about ICANN's accountability mechanism - its means of correcting its past mistakes, and in particular its mishandling of the .xxx domain name application...

Signup for the Latest News



Copyright 2022 IP Justice | All Rights Reserved

Go to Top