The US Is Rapidly Losing Control Of The Internet

At a recent summit in Uruguay, all of the major internet organisations made a pledge to free themselves of US government influence. This includes the directors of ICANN, the Internet Engineering Task Force, the Internet Architecture Board, the World Wide Web Consortium, the Internet Society and all five of the regional Internet address registries!

In a statement, the group called for “accelerating the globalization of ICANN and IANA functions, towards an environment in which all stakeholders, including all governments, participate on an equal footing”.

Currently the US department of commerce has oversight of ICANN, but it looks like all that is about to change as the group say they’ve strong concern over the undermining of the trust and confidence of internet users globally, especially in light of recent monitoring and surveillance issues with the NSA and other bodies.

Also, it has been announced that the Internet Governance Summit will now be held in Brazil, where the president has been extremely critical of the US over web surveillance in recent months, only reinforcing the groups ideals of being more open.

In a statement announcing the location of the summit, Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff said: “The United States and its allies must urgently end their spying activities once and for all.”

There is certainly something huge brewing here, but as for what it all means in the long term I am truly uncertain.

Thank you Wired for providing us with this information.