Dear All,

This is an interesting thread.

As one collects more data, the risk of breaches and cyber-attacks increases.

This is the governing maxim on every exercise in "Data Collection". Are we erring in this maxim with a good intention of provisioning for verification?

Garnering high-quality data is essential for accurate analysis. However, with the influx of data from various sources, ensuring its accuracy and consistency can be daunting. One must establish stringent data validation processes to avoid the pitfalls of erroneous data, which can lead to poor decision-making. Cleaning and maintaining data quality is a continuous process that requires significant resources and attention.

Integrating disparate data sources can be challenging and requires strong middle ware to tide over differing formats.

Navigating the ethical boundaries of data collection is increasingly complex specifically when it comes to marking the evidences and chalking out [or controlling] its propagation in the Internet.

One needs an "ICANN Space" to address all these concerns simultaneously. There have been methods of limited use that can now be labeled "Served a Limited Purpose" and proving difficult to integrate, interoperate or scale and hence too expensive to maintain.

I go back to the question at the beginning of this post and wait for comments.

Gopal T V
0 9840121302
https://vidwan.inflibnet.ac.in/profile/57545
https://www.facebook.com/gopal.tadepalli
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Dr. T V Gopal
Professor
Department of Computer Science and Engineering &
Director, Centre for Applied Research in Indic Technologies [CARIT]
College of Engineering, Guindy Campus
Anna University
Chennai - 600 025, INDIA
Ph : (Off) 22351723 Extn. 3340
       (Res) 24454753
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From: John McCormac via CPWG <cpwg@icann.org>
Sent: 18 February 2025 03:10
To: CPWG <cpwg@icann.org>
Subject: [CPWG] Re: [ALAC] Re: Statement on Registration Data Accuracy
 
  17/02/2025 13:15, Theo Geurts via CPWG wrote:
> Steinar,
>
> While you raise a valid point, it is part of a more extensive economic
> discussion.
>
> To have better or more accurate data, it needs to be combined with
> verification systems, or else it does not make sense.
> Mickey Mouse with a valid address is still not accurate data.
>
> These verification systems are costly.
> To verify Dutch registrants, would cost around 400.000 Euros each year
> for the registrar I work for.
> Belgium registrants will set us back around 200.000 Euros.
> So with only two countries, it is 600.000 Euros a year and I still need
> to cover 191 other countries.

There seems to be a massive disconnect between what governments/European
Commission want and reality. Governments typically take a solution that
may work for their country and try to apply it globally and this seems
to be what is happening here. The common infrastructuture (digital
signature services) and common legislation are not present.

At a European Commission show and tell for NIS-2, I asked a simple
question of the EC's people: have you quantified the number of DNSes
that would be affected by your legislation? They hadn't. An amendment by
a Dutch MEP to NIS-2 to make it more rational was rejected. NIS-2 is now
part of national legislation in most EU countries.

Because ICANN and the various constituencies talked about things for
years, governments simply went ahead and created legislation (as the
European Commission did with GDPR) while everyone was busy talking. The
Registration Data Accuracy issue and NIS-2 is another example of events
overtaking discussions.

> With the current profit margins, the entire thing is not economically
> feasible. Sure prices can go up, but at some point, people cannot afford
> a domain name and then the issue of the digital divide enters the
> discussion.

The Digital Divide is a major problem for ICANN especially with the next
round of new gTLDs. I've been working on mapping the web hosting
providers and gTLD markets. I already have the gTLD registrars and
resellers and their in-country and external website hosting counts as
part of the monthly Registrars and Resellers report. The problem with
the Digital Divide is that, despite all the best intentions of ICANN and
the people working on the new gTLDs, the Digital Divide isn't going away.

Some developing countries have minimal in-country hosting due to the
lack of Internet infrastructure and the costs of domain name
registration. The recent price hikes in .COM/NET have not helped. Some
of the cheaper 2012 round new gTLDs have started to replace the smaller
legacy gTLDs (.NET/ORG/BIZ/INFO) in some countries often because they
are cheaper.

A digital signatures approach is very much a solution that does not yet
scale globally. The unfettered Domain Tasting of the mid-2000s
accelerated the uptake of the ccTLDs at the expense of the gTLDs. In
many countries, the monthly new registration volume of the local ccTLD
is multiples of that of the gTLDs.

People may think of gTLDs as being single markets like ccTLDs. They are
not. They are composite markets of a small global market and many
country level markets. Those countries often have different levels of
development in terms of infrastructure and things like digital
identities. Businesses may have easily verified registration data such
as business numbers. Ordinary registrants may not. If they were to use
government issued tax or public services numbers, that creates a layer
complexity in handling Personally Identifiable Information (PII).

An unintended consequence of digital signatures and more onerous
registrant requirements is that they essentially turn a gTLD into a
managed TLD. Managed TLDs have lower registration volume than TLDs
without entitlement requirements where a registrant has to prove some
kind of entitlement (in this case that all their registration data is
accurate, verified (by who?) and digitally signed) to register a domain
name.

One effect of the Digital Divide is that resellers from developing
countries host the websites and services of their clients outside their
country's infrastructure. Some countries can have more than 50% of their
registrations hosted outside the country's infrastructure. The costs of
becoming an ICANN accredited registrar are prohibitive for resellers in
developing and even well developed countries. The registrar geography of
ICANN's registrars shows the Digital Divide:

ICANN Region - gTLDs
AF      13      187,666 (Africa)
AP      616     39,941,560 (Asia-Pacific)
EUR     188     33,698,426 (Europe)
LAC     11      969,182 (Latin America/Caribbean)
NA      2,044   157,070,357 (North America)

ICANN's registrar model was a great solution for the 1990s and more
agile and cost-effective ccTLD rgistrar accreditation is becoming the
more commercially viable option in many countries. But that is a
different discussion.

Just what will the effect of the new RDA rules and digital signatures be
on those resellers using ICANN registrars outside their own country? Who
ensures RDA? Will it be the reseller or the registrar? Some large gTLD
registrars have thousands of resellers in multiple countries. The damage
will be measured in lost gTLD registrations.

Regards...jmcc
--
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John McCormac  *  e-mail: jmcc@hosterstats.com
MC2            *  web: http://www.hosterstats.com/
22 Viewmount   *  Domain Registrations Statistics
Waterford      *  Domnomics - the business of domain names
Ireland        *  https://amzn.to/2OPtEIO
IE             *  Skype: hosterstats.com
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