Dear all,

Here is my report of the GNSO Council's 17 October 2024 meeting. 

I am happy to take questions ahead or during or after the next ALAC Monthly Call on 22 October - if raising by email, please do so in response to this email to ease follow up.

Council had a very packed October meeting, and in some cases, could not complete deliberations during the call, hence opting to have follow up on its mailing list.  I have concentrated on what I think are the key matters of interest to us in my attempt to summarize this report. Even so, my report is unavoidably  long.

You can also read this report posted at the ALAC Liaison to the GNSO workspace, or by simply using the links included below to navigate to/around the October 2024 entry.

Special Summary Report of 17 Oct 2024 Meeting to ALAC

For brevity, I will just highlight a few things here. For some of the issues, you can glean a wider perspective from GNSO Council Oct 2024 Matters of Interest and/or from GNSO Council Oct 2024 Meeting Records.

1. Consent Agenda

• The vote to defer the Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPMs) Policy Development Process Phase 2 was deferred to the Nov meeting.

2. Expedited Policy Development Process on Internationalized Domain Names (EPDP-IDNs)

• Council received an extensive update (presentation) on the EPDP-IDNs Phase 2 Final Report and is expected to vote on its adoption in the Nov meeting

3. Latin Script Diacritics

• A circumstance has been identified in that an ASCII gTLD and the Latin script diacritic version of the gTLD are not variants of each other yet may be found to be visually similar to each other and hence, may not be delegated. The circumstance is theoretically possible for any existing ASCII or Latin script IDN gTLD pairs, and is essentially infinite for future applied-for ASCII or Latin script IDN gTLDs, where diacritics are involved.
• Following Council's 16 May 2024 request, ICANN’s Policy Support Staff prepared a Preliminary Issue Report on Latin Script Diacritics. The objective of the Preliminary Issue Report was for ICANN org to assess all relevant issues related to Council's request, and, following Community Input during the Public Comment phase, to recommend a course of action to Council. 
• The Final Issue Report (presentation) now includes a draft charter prepared by ICANN org for which Council may determine that edits are required before adopting the charter, in the event Council wishes to initiate a PDP to address the deficiency of the circumstance described. Council is expected to determine during its Nov meeting if a PDP should be initiated, but may choose to separate the decision on PDP initiation and approval of the draft charter.  

4. Registration Data Accuracy (RDA)

• Council has been grappling with the deferral of recommendations of the RDA Scoping Team which was complicated by ICANN org's determination that assessing collected registration data for the purpose of determining its accuracy was not a valid legal purpose under GDPR. This eventually led to a larger span on views amongst councilors no that problem was intended to be solved. There was also ambiguity on whether upcoming legislation (NIS2) might also impact the intent of work in this area. Thus, as a path forward, Council leadership devised a set of proposed questions to determine how best to proceed. 
• Council discussed the updated proposal on how to solicit additional feedback from ICANN org, GNSO groups and ACs with directed questions, in order to receive information from which the Council can decide how to handle, including what mechanism would be best suited to do so.
• Council will follow up on next steps over its mailing list on account of insufficient time at this meeting.

5. Registration Data Request Service (RDRS)

• The RDRS Standing Committee is tasked to review the data that will be produced by ICANN org on a monthly basis following the launch of the RDRS, and in particular, is expected to analyze the data and consider: 
  • Assignment #1. Trends that can be identified over a month-by-month period; 
  • Assignment #2. Possible technical updates that should be considered to RDRS and/or related messaging and promotion (recognizing that the RDRS will only be running for a two-year period and limited resources may be available to implement such updates); 
  • Assignment #3. Specific lessons learned that should be factored into the consideration of how to proceed with the SSAD recommendations; 
  • Assignment #4. Suggestions to the Council for a proposed recommendation(s) to the ICANN Board in relation to the consideration of the SSAD recommendations.
• This Standing Committee has been functioning since the inception of the RDRS in Nov 2023.
• Council received a (part) update (presentation) from Sebastien Ducos, Chair of RDRS Standing Committee, which will continue at Council's Nov meeting.
• In particular, Sebastien raised the need to separate discussions within the Standing Committee on how to improve the RDRS as a product/service versus policy questions. More on this at ICANN81.

6. Next Steps on Board Letter Re: Contention Sets

• GNSO Chair Greg DiBiase had in Sep drew Council's attention to the receipt of a 13 Sep letter from Board Chair regarding Contention sets for the New gTLD Program: Next Round (Next Round) where; 
  • Board has determined that they are not allowing private resolutions, and intends to reverse its adoption of the SubPro Final Report recommendation 20.6 
  • Meaning that a JV meant to resolve a contention set could now be in violation of this principle
  • Asked councilors to consider what Council's response might be in context of the Board approval process per ICANN Bylaws Annex A Section 9.
• Subsequently, GNSO Council had its informal call with GNSO Board members In the interim to better understand the rationale of the said Board Chair's letter.
• Council leadership is suggesting to not formally object to the Board's action on this, but to draft letter explaining Council's thoughts and concerns in reaction to the said Board Chair's letter. Given the lack of time at this meeting, GNSO Chair proposed to take this up via Council mailing list.

7. Intellectual Property Constituency Request for Reconsideration

• On 22 November 2023, the Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC) filed a Request for Reconsideration  of the ICANN Board Resolutions 2023.10.26.11 and 2023.10.26.122, regarding (i) the actions and inactions that led to (a) the ICANN Board’s public comment of 6 December 2018 on the Initial Report of the Cross-Community Working Group on New gTLD Auction Proceeds (CCWG-AP), (b) the organization of the public comment phase on the Proposed Final Report of the New gTLD Auction Proceeds Cross Community Working Group, (c) the ICANN Board Resolutions 2022.06.12.13 to 2022.06.12.16 , and (ii) the actions and inactions involving the implementation of the ICANN Grant Giving Program.

• During its meeting at ICANN80, a few GNSO Councilors volunteered to draft a letter to the Board regarding the Request for Reconsideration.

• A draft letter was prepared and Council had agreed that it should be issued to the Board, and that Council would socialize this letter with other SO/ACs so that they may choose to also provide input to the Board on this issue. 
• GNSO Chair Greg DiBiase noted that a new draft of IPC's letter is out after taking into consideration comments from some councilors. No objections have been received thereafter. Council leadership will follow up with an email on this issue prior to sending the letter to the Board.

8. Board Readiness Project

• The Board Readiness project emanated from Council's 2023 Strategic Planning Session (SPS) wherein Council seeks to limit the likelihood of Council approving PDP recommendations that the ICANN Board is ultimately unable to adopt by ensuring it submits “board-ready policy recommendations” to the Board, to the extent possible.
• This project is being driven through a Council Small Team which is tasked to:
  • Develop a survey/questionnaire related to the Board’s rejection/non-adoption of policy recommendations, which may be administered to relevant PDP Chairs, PDP WG members, ICANN org Support Staff, and Board members. (Examples: EPDP Temp Spec Phase 1 and 2; Subsequent Procedures)
  • Administer the survey/questionnaire and conduct interviews with relevant PDP Chairs, PDP WG members, ICANN org Support Staff, and Board members. 
  • Synthesize the findings from the survey/questionnaire and interviews into a set of findings and develop a set of recommendations intended to inform Council work on improving Board readiness.
• Council received an update (presentation) from Kurt Pritz, Board Readiness Small Team Chair.