auDA and InternetNZ have launched the Australia and New Zealand Internet Awards (the ANZIAs) for 2012. Now in its fourth year, the ANZIAs are an annual event organised by the policy and regulatory bodies for .AU and .NZ and celebrate the achievements of organisations, businesses and individuals that have made significant contributions to the development and use of the Internet in Australia and New Zealand. ANZIA winners receive recognition as industry leaders, for setting new standards in making the Internet a more inclusive, accessible and safe place. The Awards also offer winners public and industry exposure, positive media coverage, networking opportunities, recognition of hard work for staff and volunteers and an $AUD2500 cash prize for eligible entrants. Entries are invited in six categories: Security and privacy Internet access & digital skills Innovation Information Diversity IPv6. InternetNZ Chief Executive Vikram Kumar says the ANZIAs are a great opportunity for New Zealand and Australian businesses and individuals to have their online endeavours celebrated. “The six ANZIA categories cover all facets of the global Internet, from the highly-technical to the cultural, humanistic and innovative. We know there are a number of wonderful Internet-related projects happening in the Trans-Tasman region and we encourage all those involved to register their interest now for their chance to get recognised.” auDA Chris Disspain echoed Mr. Kumar, saying “the ANZIA awards distinguish the premier businesses, individuals and organizations in Australia and New Zealand that use the internet to enrich the lives of others and advance the cause of using the internet in positive and inventive ways.” Among the ANZIA winners in 2011 were Australian Indigenous HealthInfoNet, The Australian Lions Drug Awareness Foundation, and DTS NZ. ANZIA has in recent years celebrated the achievements of CanTeen, The National Library of New Zealand, Hector’s World Limited and Darwin City Council’s GRIND Youth Initiative. Registrations of interest are now open. Interested parties can register to receive instructions on how to enter. Applications will open on 1st June and close on 31st July, with all winners announced at a gala dinner in Canberra on 8 October. For more information see internetawards.org.au .

The third .NXT conference will be held in London from 20 to 22 June with registrations now open with early bird rates now available for £399 until 12 April. The conference will be held immediately preceding the ICANN meeting in Prague , which will be held from 24 to 29 June. Some of the topics to be covered include batching, current reviews, legal opportunities and risks, the Registrar Accreditation Agreement, lessons from a CEO on running a TLD, privacy laws, laws and threats, the Internet Governance Forum, the importance of registrars in setting up a new TLD, SOPA and more. More information including a preliminary agenda is available from the .NXT website at dot-nxt.com/london .

The system of Internet highways and byways is being reconfigured to cope with the size and shape of traffic heading over it, while Internet companies are dreaming up fresh approaches to avoid. It’s an old story with a new twist. The big fret among users was once the idea that the Internet would run out of bandwidth before the end of the 2000s, or that its IP address space was soon to be exhausted. Not every techno-prophet subscribed to these notions, but most agreed that the somewhat haphazard fashion in which the Internet was built-out in the 1990s and 2000s did not take account of the traffic demands that it faces in the 2010s. The IP address availability issue rumbles on still, as the remedy – migration from the legacy IPv4 protocol to IPv6 – is only just getting going in most regions. The core bandwidth issue – that is, whether the existing Internet infrastructure can manage with the proliferating volumes of traffic being loaded onto it – has largely been sorted out by advances in switch/router technology and ingenious innovations by the networking companies for obtaining greater capacity from the available routes. To read this report in Engineering and Technology Magazine in full, see: eandt.theiet.org/magazine/2012/03/internet-jams.cfm

ICANN have published the proposed new registry agreement with Verisign for the .COM and .NET TLDs. The main issue on everyone’s minds when this agreement is renewed is price. The new agreement sees a maximum price per .COM and .NET domain payable to ICANN for registry services, which will increase to $7.85 per domain, from the $6 per domain name as of 2006, as of 31 December 2012, and then a maximum of a seven per cent increase per year afterwards for the life of the agreement. Six months notice to ICANN is required for any fee increase. The new agreement for both .COM and .NET will also see the registry fee replaced with a lump sum quarterly fee based on an additional $0.25 per transaction in the TLD instead of a one-time lump sum payment of, in the case of .COM, $625,000. ICANN Notes this is a substantial increase in Verisign’s contribution. In Verisign’s current agreement with ICANN (Section 4.2), it specifies that the pricing and renewal provisions (among others) are not subject to change through the agreement renewal process. If the .com pricing provisions were to be changed to be similar to the other large gTLDs then that would most likely allow Verisign to raise prices by 10% per year in each of the six years of the agreement, as in the .biz, .info, .net, and .org agreements. The agreement is a 22 page document and also includes a number of other provisions including: support for IPv6 and DNSSEC publication of registry abuse contact information to periodically negotiate in good faith regarding implementation of new escrow, Whois and technical specifications compliance with IDNA and IDN guidelines allow ICANN to use multiple monitoring locations for DNS and to monitor TCP queries. There are also a number of changes to bring the registry agreement for .COM and .NET into line with other registry agreements in addition to the $0.25 fee per domain such as requiring the registry operator to implement ICANN ordered registrar suspensions to facilitate ICANN’s contractual compliance efforts. Another new provision allows the registry operator to temporarily prevent the registration of one or more names in the TLD in order to respond to an imminent threat to the security and/or stability of the TLD or the internet. The agreement also clarifies that the use of traffic data would be limited to “thin” registry model data even if registry were to follow the “thick” registry model as well as clarification that prohibition on “SiteFinder” or other universal wildcard functions does not prohibit provision of name service or any other non-registry service for a domain or zone used for other than registration services and broad indemnification rights in favour of ICANN. There will also be no requirement in the new agreement for Verisign to comply with the rights protection mechanisms (RPMs) developed for new gTLDs: Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS), Post-Delegation Dispute Resolution Process (PDDRP), and the Trademark Clearinghouse. There are six documents posted for public comment with more information and links at www.icann.org/en/news/announcements/announcement-27mar12-en.htm . Public comment is open until 26 April and the new agreements will be considered by the ICANN Board after public comment. Public comments will be posted at www.icann.org/en/news/public-comment/com-renewal-27mar12-en.htm .

While the campaign for Scottish independence from Britain is controversial, the move for a .SCOT top level domain has proved uncontroversial gaining the support of the British government, with The Scotsman reporting British government ministers are “relaxed” about the proposal. Alex Salmond, First Minister of Scotland, claimed that Scotland would “soon be independent in cyberspace” and that the internet shake-up would be a “great boost” to Scottish businesses and tourism, The Scotsman noted on Monday. But support is not quite universal with Yorkshire Tory MP Andrew Percy dismissing the idea of .SCOT as “nonsense”. “Scotland hasn’t even voted yet on whether to go independent, and all this is doing is giving Alex Salmond’s Nationalists a propaganda coup,” Percy said according to the report in The Scotsman. But north of the border it was a different story. “Scotland is well on the road to independence, and it looks like we will soon be independent in cyberspace too – the dotScot domain name will be a great boost in promoting Scotland around the globe,” a spokesman for Salmond told The Scotsman. However should Scotland become independent it would then be entitled to its own country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD), and then have two TLDs.

Microsoft announced it had, in conjunction with the financial services industry successfully executed a coordinated global action against some of the most notorious cybercrime operations that fuel online fraud and identity theft. As part of the operation, Microsoft and its partners took down two Internet Protocol addresses behind the Zeus command and control structure, and Microsoft is currently monitoring 800 domains secured in the operation, which are helping identify thousands of computers infected by Zeus. The legal and technical action led to a number of the most harmful botnets using the Zeus family of malware worldwide have been disrupted in an unprecedented, proactive cross-industry action against this cybercriminal organisation. Partners in the operation were Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC) and NACHA – The Electronic Payments Association and Kyrus Tech Inc. Through an extensive and collaborative investigation into the Zeus threat, Microsoft and its banking, finance and technical partners discovered that once a computer is infected with Zeus, the malware can monitor a victim’s online activity and automatically start keylogging, or recording a person’s every keystroke, when a person types in the name of a financial institution or ecommerce site. With this information, cybercriminals can steal personal information that can be used for identity theft or to fraudulently make purchases or access other private accounts. In fact, since 2007, Microsoft has detected more than 13 million suspected infections of the Zeus malware worldwide, including approximately 3 million computers in the United States alone. “With this action, we’ve disrupted a critical source of money-making for digital fraudsters and cyberthieves, while gaining important information to help identify those responsible and better protect victims,” said Richard Boscovich, senior attorney for the Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit. “The Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit has long been working to combat cybercrime operations, and today is a particularly important strike against cybercrime that we expect will be felt across the criminal underground for a long time to come.” For more detailed information on the operation, see the New York Times report titled Microsoft Raids Tackle Internet Crime at www.nytimes.com/2012/03/26/technology/microsoft-raids-tackle-online-crime.html and the Microsoft news release Microsoft Joins Financial Services Industry to Disrupt Massive Zeus Cybercrime Operation That Fuels Worldwide Fraud and Identity Theft at www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2012/mar12/03-25CybercrimePR.mspx .

An American company has filed for trademark protection for a number of its existing portfolio of 482 of what it claims to be generic Internet Top-Level Domains (gTLDs), many of them plurals of a variety of words. Name.space was founded in 1996, and describes themselves as a privately held TLD registry company based in New York City. The company also claims to own the world’s largest exclusive portfolio of gTLDs and that they are the bona-fide originator of hundreds of gTLDs. “This is an exciting day for all of us here at name.space,” said Alex Mashinsky, CEO of name.space. “We have been using these gTLDs in commerce since 1996, and so we already have trademark protection for these and our other gTLDs. But filing for formal recognition is part of our strategy to help the market realize the value of our existing portfolio of gTLDs and the high quality of service name.space provides and that users actively associate with these gTLDs and name.space.” name.space say they will be participating in the 2012 ICANN application round, both to file applications for ICANN recognition of name.space’s gTLDs and to protect name.space’s existing rights. In addition, name.space will apply for ICANN recognition of 118 gTLDs that are still pending from the 2000 application round. Some of those gTLDs name.space will be claiming their rights to include some of the more hotly sought after strings including .MUSIC, .GREEN, .SHOP, .GAY and .NYC. A full list is available on their website here . “ICANN will have to resolve these open applications to preserve the integrity of the application process,” said Paul Garrin, name.space’s founder. “We have noted the plans of other registry hopefuls to participate in the 2012 application round. But none of those other entities has our combination of longstanding origination and use and existing unresolved applications from the 2000 process. That puts us in the leading position.”

Abstract: New security technologies are never neutral in their impact; it is known that they can alter power relations and economic dependencies among stakeholders. This article examines the attempt to introduce the Resource Public Key Infrastructure (RPKI) to the Internet to help improve routing security, and identifies incentives various actors have towards RPKI implementation. We argue that RPKI requires ISPs to achieve security at the expense of autonomy, requires all actors to tradeoff simplified global compatibility and centralization of power, and affects the policies and business models of the Regional Internet Registries and their relationship to ICANN. While the Internet remains a space where authority is highly distributed, elements of hierarchy do exist, especially around critical resource allocation, and it is likely that security and other concerns will lead to continuing efforts to leverage those hierarchies into more powerful governance arrangements. To download this paper by by Brenden Kuerbis & Milton Mueller, originally published in Communications and Strategies, in full, see: ssrn.com/abstract=2021835

[ICANN news release] Addressing the ICANN Public Meeting in San Jose, Costa Rica’s 49th President, Laura Chinchilla said, “The Internet is the hope of an integrated world without frontiers, a common world without controlling owners, a world of opportunities and equality. This is a utopia that we have been dreaming about and is a world in which each and every one of us are protagonists of a destiny that we have in our hands.” She stressed the importance of increasing broadband access for Costa Ricans. “We want to bridge the digital gap to provide broadband access to 100 per cent of our educational institutions and to make it widely available to all people,” said President Chinchilla. “We want to allow Costa Ricans to make a qualitative leap in our development and go to an economy based on innovation and developing a broadband infrastructure, in order to overcome the barrier of 15 per cent penetration.” The President made her comments in the welcoming session of ICANN’s 43rd public meeting. ICANN Board Chair Steve Crocker described the President’s speech as “wonderful,” and said it would be remembered around the world. The President’s remarks received a standing ovation and many in the audience stressed that they considered the President’s visit a great honor for ICANN. “Costa Rica is fully integrated into the international movement that works towards the achievement of e-government, seeking an improvement in the quality of life, and seeking a more competitive state that will improve the productivity of our companies and attract foreign investment in a more dynamic way,” said President Chinchilla. President Chinchilla noted ICANN’s ability to involve participants in its meeting sessions from around the world. “Your promotion of virtual international meetings is helping to eliminate carbon footprints.” To read a transcript of President Chinchilla remarks, see costarica43.icann.org/node/29527 .

[ICANN news release] Costa Rica’s 49th President, Laura Chinchilla, will address the opening session of ICANN’s public meeting when it convenes in San Jose on Monday, 12 March. President Chinchilla and Costa Rica’s Minister of Science and Technology, Alejandro Cruz, have declared next week’s ICANN meeting to be of “national interest.” “We are deeply honored to have President Chinchilla address our 43rd public meeting,” said Rod Beckstrom, ICANN’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “Her plans to improve broadband access in Costa Rica speak to her understanding of the vital role the Internet plays in all aspects of modern life.” Last year President Chinchilla told graduate students at California’s Stanford University that Costa Rica’s plan to install an extensive broadband cabling system would more than double high speed Internet access in Costa Rica from the current 7% to 15% by 2014. “This would make Costa Rica the second most connected country in Latin America,” she said. The President said she wants to provide laptops for students in less-developed regions of her country and to open “digital community centers” where everyone would have access to the Internet. President Chinchilla took office in May 2010 after a landslide electoral victory. She is the first woman to be elected President in Costa Rica and was formerly a vice president under her predecessor, Nobel Peace Prize-winner Oscar Arias. To see a live video stream of the opening session of ICANN’s meeting on 12 March, see: costarica43.icann.org/node/2952 To learn more about ICANN’s 43rd public meeting in Costa Rica, see: costarica43.icann.org/full-schedule