Design Team – Competition policy and Conflicts of Interest.

Without prejudice as to what specific new institutional structure, or none, emerge from the IANA/NTIA transition, the resulting power within the decision-making entities is a relevant consideration. 

At least in Europe and the United States, if not elsewhere, each recent attempt at de-regulation, self-regulation and hands-off public policy has resulted in questionable outcomes, not least in the financial sector, resulting in a global recession. This has inevitably and rightly led to greater scrutiny of the relevant institutions within each sector, including the Internet.

Accordingly the Design Team would review, discuss and quickly conclude as to the merits or otherwise of a balanced and independent stakeholder composition of the relevant entities (existing or future).

The Detailed description below illustrates the scope of the issue.

Composition of the Design Group

Convenor

Secretariat (ICANN)

Members:

�	one Large Registrar, owning several gTLDs
�	one Small gTLD Registry, independent of any Registrar
�	one ccTLD 
�	one independent Internet user (At Large or equivalent)
�	one delegate from one GAC member with practical experience in anti- trust/competition policy.

CSC/MRT confidentiality and the perception of conflicts of interest - Developing conflict of interest requirements for the CSC like body. Most discussions have proposed that the membership of a CSC type body have, as a minimum, significant representation from registries. Is this desirable in a context where members of the CSC will be provided with access to information that is confidential and sensitive with respect to all registries?

Detailed description:  IANA confidentiality and the perception of conflicts of interest -  The oversight manager (MRT?), or a subset (CSC?), could be placed in a privileged position (as is currently the case with NTIA) with respect to accessing IANA performance information, issues with specific requests or security matters. This was not an issue with the NTIA given that it is part of the USG and is not involved in any commercial activities related to the DNS. Transferring this responsibility to representatives of registry operators at a minimum creates the potential for conflict of interest situations in that they could gain access to sensitive or confidential information of their competitors or use their position to negatively influence requests from competitors. The reverse situation is also a concern in that members of the oversight manager if composed of registry representatives could be perceived as being in a potential conflict of interest situation given they could use their position to influence requests from their respective registries. As such the CWG should decide if those individuals that will be responsible for the regular monitoring of IANA performance and interfacing with IANA on a regular basis to discuss and resolve any potential issues or escalating them can be in a conflict of interest position. If the recommendation is to avoid conflict of interests for those individuals it would then be important to decide who should carry out these responsibilities.