ICANN Board Conflicts of Interest Review - Independent Expert Report

Comment/Reply Periods ^(*)

Important Information Links

Comment Open:

5 June 2012

Comment Close:

6 July 2012

Close Time (UTC):

23:59 UTC

Public Comment Announcement

Reply Open:

7 July 2012

To Submit Your Comments (Forum)

Reply Close:

28 July 2012

View Comments Submitted

Close Time (UTC):

23:59 UTC

Report of Public Comments

Brief Overview

Originating Organization:

ICANN Board/Board Governance Committee

Categories/Tags:

ICANN Board/Bylaws

Purpose (Brief):

To receive public comment on the Report prepared by the team of independent international experts as part of their review of ICANN's conflicts of interest and ethics frameworks.

Current Status:

This Report will be discussed at a public session on 25 June 2012 at the Prague Meeting. The Board Governance Committee and the Board are also considering the Report and the adoption of the recommendations within the Report.

Next Steps:

The BGC and the Board will consider the public input to guide further Board action on the Report.

Staff Contact:

Amy Stathos, Deputy General Counsel

Email:

amy.stathos@icann.org

Detailed Information

Section I: Description, Explanation, and Purpose

As a part of ICANN's commitment to enhancing its overall culture of promoting superior ethics, integrity and transparency, ICANN is posting for public comment the Report developed by the team of independent international experts with recommendations on enhancing ICANN's conflicts and ethics frameworks.

Section II: Background

Over the past year, heightened attention and scrutiny has been placed on how the ICANN Board addresses conflicts of interest, and on enhancing ICANN's ethical culture. While ICANN has a robust conflict of interest policy and code of conduct in place, work has been ongoing with the community and experts to determine how these, or implementation of them, can be further enhanced.

The work posted for public comment today represents one stage of ICANN's three-stage review. ICANN engaged a team of international ethics experts to provide recommendations for the enhancement of ICANN's ethical culture, drawing on international sources, including practices in other not-for-profit organizations. The team of experts produced the Report posted for public comment that will be discussed during the ICANN meeting in Prague.

Other work arising out of this three-stage review has already been presented to the community. ICANN engaged two sets of outside counsel – one that is familiar with ICANN to perform a holistic review of our policies to identify how they can be refined; and another set that is not familiar with ICANN to provide a review and recommendations for enhancements. The Board has already adopted the recommendations from those two stages of the review. As another facet of this work, the ICANN Board has finalized and announced rules on how Directors with interests in specific New gTLD applications may participate in New gTLD-related discussions and in post-Board service activities. In addition ICANN announced stringent communication rules for its staff regarding communications with potential new gTLD applicants.

Section III: Document and Resource Links

The Report prepared by the team of independent ethics experts is available at: http://prague44.icann.org/meetings/prague2012/presentation-ethics-coi-final-report-25jun12-en.pdf [PDF, 570 KB]

Section IV: Additional Information

Information and links to some of the other work arising out of this three-stage review is available at: http://www.icann.org/en/news/announcements/announcement-2-15may12-en.htm