国际政治大碰撞 谁来控制互联网的“心脏”？

国际政治大碰撞 谁来控制互联网的“心脏”？

作者： CNET科技资讯网 翻译：李海
CNETNews.com.cn 2005-07-12 10:1 AM

CNET科技资讯网 7月12日国际报道现在，一场国际性的政治争论正在进行，其内容是联合国是否应该控制互联网的心脏。

联合国官员以及许多欠发达国家的电信部长们认为，美国政府对网络运行施加了不正当的影响。现在，这些人开始采取行动了。

7月18日，一个联合国的工作小组将公布一个正式提案，很清楚，这个提案中将包含什么东西。提案将建议一个新组织对互联网的关键部件进行监管，他们认为，这个新组织要么归联合国管理，要么归国际电信联盟管辖。

所有这些问题的核心便是谁来增加新的域名，谁来分配互联网数字地址，谁来掌管互联网根服务器的问题。有人建议，新组织应该包括以下职责：进行互联网监督，对用户权益进行保护，甚至对域名使用进行征税等等。

这些建议是对互联网名称与数字地址分配机构(ICANN)的一种致命的政治挑战，目前，ICANN由美国政府掌管。

最近，联合国在瑞士日内瓦召开了一次闭门会议，专门讨论互联网控制权的归属问题。以下是与会各方的观点节录：

叙利亚：“每天，垃圾邮件的数量越来越多。谁是受害者？发展中及发达国家同是受害者。因为有好处，那些发送垃圾邮件的人没有收手的迹象。对于我们而言，唯一的解决途径是从那些垃圾邮件发送者所在的国家购买机器设备来处理这一问题。然而，这种方法，我们相信，是无法接受的。”

巴西，对ICANN批准.xxx域名的反应：“有些人还搞不懂三个x的域名是什么意思，让我们具体点说，就是主席先生。他们正在谈论色情。有很多东西，与许多国家的价值观背道而驰。在我的国家，巴西，我们对此类顶级域名获得通过感到非常担忧。”

中国：“我们主张，互联网的公共政策问题应该在联合国主权国家的框架内得到联合解决。例如，垃圾邮件，网络安全，与网络空间这些问题，我们应该寻求联合国专门的机构来处理这些问题。”

加纳：“毫无疑问需要一个额外的机构。这个机构应该处理与互联网有关的问题，它还应该归联合国管理。”

这些主张都是冲着布什当局最近作出的决定去的，布什政府宣布，他们不会将互联网域名的控制权交给其它组织。

双方的各不相让可能会给本周的ICANN卢森堡会议投去阴影。

除了惯常的外交压力与公开抱怨之外，巴西和中国这样的大国还可能采取实际行动。这就意味着，ICANN 没有批准的一个新的顶级域名可能会被世界上其它国家批准。这种负面影响显而易见，它可能会让两台计算机在同一地址发现不同的网站。

意大利锡拉库扎（Syracuse）大学的教授，同时也是参与“互联网监管项目”的Milton Mueller认为，互联网分裂的话题并不是什么新鲜话题，他说，一些大国的反应可能会导致互联网走向分裂。

这样的结果还比较遥远，但它有可能发生。这种可能性意味着，对互联网进行监管的晦涩争论忽然间变得异常的重要起来。(编辑：孙莹)

Will the U.N. run the Internet?

July 11, 2005, 4:00 AM PT

By Declan McCullagh

An international political spat is brewing over whether the United Nations will seize control of the heart of the Internet.

U.N. bureaucrats and telecommunications ministers from many less-developed nations claim the U.S. government has undue influence over how things run online. Now they want to be the ones in charge.

While the formal proposal from a U.N. working group will be released July 18, it's already clear what it will contain. A preliminary summary of governmental views claims there's a "convergence of views" supporting a new organization to oversee crucial Internet functions, most likely under the aegis of the United Nations or the International Telecommunications Union.

At issue is who decides key questions like adding new top-level domains, assigning chunks of numeric Internet addresses, and operating the root servers that keep the Net humming. Other suggested responsibilities for this new organization include Internet surveillance, "consumer protection," and perhaps even the power to tax domain names to pay for "universal access."

This development represents a grave political challenge to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which was birthed by the U.S. government to handle some of those topics.

A recent closed-door meeting in Geneva convened by the U.N.'s Working Group on Internet Governance offers clues about the plot to dethrone ICANN. As these excerpts from a transcript show, dissatisfaction and general-purpose griping is rampant:

? Syria: "There's more and more spam every day. Who are the victims? Developing and least-developed countries, too. There is no serious intention to stop this spam by those who are the transporters of the spam, because they benefit...The only solution is for us to buy equipment from the countries which send this spam in order to deal with spam. However, this, we believe, is not acceptable."

? Brazil, responding to ICANN's approval of .xxx domains: "For those that are still wondering what Triple-X means, let's be specific, Mr. Chairman. They are talking about pornography. These are things that go very deep in our values in many of our countries. In my country, Brazil, we are very worried about this kind of decision-making process where they simply decide upon creating such new top-level generic domain names."

? China: "We feel that the public policy issue of Internet should be solved jointly by the sovereign states in the U.N. framework...For instance, spam, network security and cyberspace--we should look for an appropriate specialized agency of the United Nations as a competent body."

? Ghana: "There was unanimity for the need for an additional body...This body would therefore address all issues relating to the Internet within the confines of the available expertise which would be anchored at the U.N."

The "nuclear option"
Those proclamations served to flush out the Bush administration, which recently announced that it will not hand over control of Internet domain names and addresses to anyone else.

That high-profile snub of the United Nations could presage an international showdown. The possibility of a political flap over what has long been an abstruse Net-governance issue casts a shadow over ICANN's meeting this week in Luxembourg, and will be the topic of a July 28 symposium in Washington, D.C., called "Regime Change on the Internet."

Beyond the usual levers of diplomatic pressure and public kvetching, Brazil and China could choose what amounts to the nuclear option: a fragmented root. That means a new top-level domain would not be approved by ICANN--but would be recognized and used by large portions of the rest of the world. The downside, of course, is that the nuclear option could create a Balkanized Internet where two computers find different Web sites at the same address.

"It wasn't until now" that a fragmented root was being talked about, says Milton Mueller, a professor at Syracuse University and participant in the Internet Governance Project. "China and other countries might be pursuing responses that lead to fragmentation."

Such an outcome remains remote, but it could happen. That possibility means an obscure debate about Internet governance has suddenly become surprisingly important.

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