Sen. Rockefeller Seeks Limited Rollout of New gTLDs

LOS ANGELES—Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, sent a letter to ICANN last week expressing serious concerns he has about the prospect of massive defensive registrations associated with the planned rollout of hundreds of new generic top-level domains. In the letter, which was dated June 26 and addressed to Dr. Stephen D, Crocker, the chairman of ICANN’s board of directors, Rockefeller strongly suggested that ICANN commit to a limited rollout of TLDs. “Last year,” wrote Rockefeller, “stakeholders publicly provided comments to ICANN regarding the perception that companies and non-profit organizations would need to submit expensive applications for defensive registration. Citing their past experience in registering domains under the existing domain structure, these organizations commented that ICANN had still not done enough to establish procedures to protect company brands and trademarks and prevent consumer confusion. “Although ICANN committed to addressing these concerns,” he added, “more than a year later, many of these same issues remain.” Rockefeller wants ICANN to slow down the pace of its anticipated rollout of domains in order to “fully consider and act upon” the advice proffered by its own Government Advisory Committee (GAC), which in April “issued a communiqué advising [the ICANN] board to reinforce existing processes for raising and addressing stakeholder concerns. The GAC also asked that ICANN weigh its advice for future and existing rounds of gTLD expansion.” The Democratic Senator from W. Virginia then said ICANN “should consider a limited first round of gTLDs to allow for an effective one year review, as required under ICANN’s Affirmation of Commitment’s with the Department of Commerce.” The review, he said, “will be critical to adequately gauging the impact of this expansion on Internet users who are, ultimately, ICANN’s greatest stakeholders.” The strengthened safeguards, he added, could also be applied to “existing top-level domains.” ICANN does not have the best track records taking GAC recommendations to heart, but perhaps Sen. Rockefeller’s willingness to invoke ICANN’s relationship with the Commerce Department will add some heft to his requests.  And while the defensive registration issue may not resonate with the domainer community—which is really ICANN’s most important constituency—it is hardly a theoretical problem out in the real world. Indeed, for the latest rollout of a new TLD, approximately 70 percent of its registered domains were recently identified as “defensive blocks.” Senator Rockefeller's letter to ICANN can be read here.