The International Telecommunication Union is one of the most venerable of bureaucracies. Created in 1865 to facilitate telegraph transmissions, its mandate has expanded to include radio and telephone communications.
But the ITU enjoys virtually no influence over the Internet. That remains the province of specialised organisations such as the ICANN, the IETF the W3C and regional address registries.
The ITU, a United Nations agency, would like to change that. "The whole world is looking for a better solution for Internet governance, unwilling to maintain the current situation," Houlin Zhao, director of the ITU's Telecommunication Standardisation Bureau, said last year. Zhao, a former government official in China's Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, has been in his current job since 1999.
Though Zhao is far too diplomatic to state it directly, the ITU's increasing interest in the Internet could presage a power struggle between ITU, ICANN, and perhaps even the US government, which retains some oversight authority over ICANN and appears content with the current structure.
In a series of speeches over the last year, Zhao has suggested that the ITU could become involved in everything from security and spam to managing how IP addresses are assigned. The ITU also is looking into some aspects of VoIP communications, another potential area for expansion.
"Countering spam is just one of many elements of protecting the Internet that include availability during emergencies and supporting public safety and law enforcement officials," Zhao wrote in December. Also, he wrote, the ITU "would take care of other work, such as work on Internet exchange points, Internet interconnection charging regimes, and methods to provide authenticated directories that meet national privacy regimes."
ZDNet UK sister site CNET News.com recently spoke with Zhao about the ITU's increased interest in the Internet and its involvement in a series of meetings that will conclude in November with a UN World Summit on the Information Society in Tunisia.
Q: How do you see the ITU becoming involved in Internet governance over the next few years?
A: As you know, Internet governance was one of two hot topics left from the first phase of the UN world summit. Unfortunately we did not have a clear definition of Internet governance. Therefore the group established by Kofi Annan still has to work on these definitions.
Anything which concerns the future development of the Internet will be part of the question of Internet governance. It covers a very wide range of topics not just related to technology development, service development, but also policy matters, sovereignty, security, privacy, almost anything.
According to ITU's definition of "telecommunications", telecommunications covers almost anything. Therefore according to our own lawyers, the Internet is one of these telecommunications mediums. Others argue that "telecommunications" is too wide and it does not include the Internet.
Talkback
The biggest problem with the UN is itself. It has lost all the respect it ever had with the international community and become merely a "talking shop" for politicians.
It was this sort of attitude that it's predecessor - the League of Nations - set up after World War I encountered, and led to it's downfall. Part was apathy and part was the Great Depression of 1933; mainly though was the loss of confidence.
As far as the UN administering the Internet is concerned, I would ask them, why, when there has been so much adverse publicity aboout that organisation, from the Secretary General on down, do they think they should embark on another possibly ill-fated venture.
UN, put your OWN house in order first, THEN look at other problems.
My opinion is the UN should stay as far away from the internet includig the U.S. government from regulating the internet in any manner. Why? The internet was developed here in the U.S. in 1969 before the National Science Foundation released the Internet for public services. So that means U.S. taxpayers have been paying the government since 1969 for these services to be there for them.
The ITU is doing nothing about the abuse of internet dialup fraud that occurs as it is which involves telephone communications. There are still people out there who goes to a site unware that they are downloading a program that makes long distance charges to other other places without their knowledge.
ITU hasn't solved that problem.
The UN should just leave New York as they can't manage anything as it is. They might as well be on their own little island. See the IRAQ issue is pissing on their door right next to is IRAN as well. Manage nations is something the UN should be proud of doing but they might as well hang their heads between their legs and run. The UN is viewed as a global joke.
So should UN administer the internet. No it should not.
No - it's insanity. The UN has consistently demonstrated a lack of ability to manage anything. Look at the Oil for Food, look at the Sudan.
Definitely YES. Once upon a time, the Internet was a matter for academic and military in US. Today it serves billions of poeple on the Earth with an essential communication measure.
Think about the Tsunami warning system. It couldn't be realized without use of the Internet.
Although the Internet has become one of the most important infrastructures of the world, there is no international body which is responsible to manage the Internet in the manner based on the concensus of world participants.
This absence of administration causes major difficulties like unsolicited emails, virus and worms, and unfair assignment of IP addresses.
I think ITU is the only possible solution to finish this anarchy.
No, the internet should administer the UN.
Maybe not perfectly, but the Internet can administrate itself. By that I mean the users and providers are pable of eventually coming to some kind of reasonable concensus most of the time. Why does anyone thing the UN would be better able to solve the three main problems: spam, fraud and security, better than these?
Any other issues not covered at that level should be left down to national governments to address.