[LINK] RFI: Telecomms Act Powers re the .au TLD

[Ian Johnston]

Mark

>From the explanatory memorandum to the Telecommunications Legislation
Amendment Bill 2000
<http://scaleplus.law.gov.au/html/ems/0/2000/0/0642440972.htm>:

"The Government favours a self-regulatory approach to the management of
electronic addressing services such as domain names.  The amendments made by
this Bill are designed to provide clear and appropriate powers of
intervention for use in the event that self-regulation proved ineffective."

"The powers of the ACA and the ACCC are limited and are available only in
specified circumstances."

"If the ACCC determines that a manager is not promoting adequate levels of
competition or consumer protection, or the ACA determines that management of
an electronic addressing service is unsatisfactory, the ACA is able to
declare it a 'manager of electronic addressing' for a specified type of
electronic addressing.  The ACA and the ACCC can then give directions to the
manager to rectify problems."

Ian Johnston

> -----Original Message-----
> From: link-bounces at anu.edu.au [mailto:link-bounces at anu.edu.au]On Behalf
> Of Mark Hughes
> Sent: Friday, 30 January 2004 11:32 AM
> To: Link Institute
> Subject: RE: [LINK] RFI: Telecomms Act Powers re the .au TLD
>
>
> Hi Roger,
>
> I was involved in the .au domain name stuff at the time (board member of
> ADNA & then auDA, etc) and I remember from discussions with the folks at
> NOIE that they submitted some specific changes / wording to one
> of the acts
> to ensure that the government had 'reserve powers' to step in and take
> control of the .au DNS if necessary.
>
> Their intention was to ensure that if there ever was a major
> problem with a
> .au domain name Authority - whoever it might be: kre then, auDA
> now, or some
> other entity in the future - the government could as a last resort step in
> and enforce its authority.  i.e. including the wording in the act was not
> really related to change from kre to auDA.
>
> At my age my memory is increasingly dodgy, but I think NOIE was working on
> this at least 12 months before the transfer from kre to auDA.  I
> can't give
> you the details of which act / where in the act.  Someone at
> NOIE, or Jo Lim
> (ex NOIE, now auDA) could perhaps give more details.
>
> On reflection, I think NOIE's work on the act, to:
>
>   * ensure the government had reserve powers to take over if absolutely
> necessary
>   * to make the government role independent of, and make the act
> non-specific about, any one .au Regulatory Authority, therefore
> allowing for
> the possibility of changes in the Regulatory Authority
>
> was the right tack to take - so I reckon bouquets to NOIE on this one.
>
>
>
> Regards, Mark
>
> Mark Hughes
> Effective Business Applications Pty Ltd
> +61 4 1374 3959
> www.pplications.com.au
> effectivebusiness at applications.com.au
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: link-bounces at anu.edu.au [mailto:link-bounces at anu.edu.au]On Behalf
> Of Glen Turner
> Sent: Thursday, 29 January 2004 5:25 PM
> To: Roger Clarke
> Cc: link at anu.edu.au
> Subject: Re: [LINK] RFI: Telecomms Act Powers re the .au TLD
>
>
> On Thu, 2004-01-29 at 11:23, Roger Clarke wrote:
> > I'm finalising changes to my paper on the Internet in Australia, at:
> > http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/OzI04.html
> >
> > The Australian Government has powers in relation to the domain-name
> > .au.  (That was an important part of the justification for ICANN
> > transferring control of .au from Robert Elz to AuDA on 25 October
> > 2001).
> >
> > I've heard on various occasions that the power is part of the
> > monstrous Telecommunications Act 1997, which is at:
> >
> http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/num%5fact/ta1997n47o1997260
> /index.htm
> l
> >
> > I have two questions:
> > (1)  where the heck is it?
> >       (There seem to be no occurrence of 'domain' in the statute)
> > (2)  when was it enacted, i.e. in the original Act or in an
> Amendment Act?
>
> Hi Roger,
>
> At last, an easy Telco Act question :-)
>
> ISPs are Carriage Service Providers. Section 455 to Section
> 477 of the consolidated  Telco Act 1997 gives the ACA power
> over the "numbering plan" used by CSPs.
>
> The ACA, reasonably, argues that "numbering plan" includes
> DNS names.  S473 "Letters and symbols to be taken as
> numbers" is strong support for their position.
>
> However it is unwise to push this too much.  For example,
> following ACA's interpretation I should be able to obtain
> a copy of the "register of allocated numbers" for DNS
> names.  However, AusRegistry's limit on the number of
> requests for WHOIS entries from any one IP address
> fails to meet S465's requirements (and a good thing too
> or I'd have even more spam).
>
> So although the ACA have the power to regulate DNS names
> based on S455-S477 there are a lot of sections in the
> Telco Act where assuming only telephony numbering is meant
> leads to a sensible outcome.
>
> I wouldn't be so fast to assume that the Telco Act clauses
> were the motivation to alter the control of .AU (the Act
> would have just as readily allowed the ACA to delegate
> Robert as "manager of electronic addressing for DNS names").
> Rather they were the device which allowed the ACA to
> gain and then disburse control.
>
> I recall the motivations were a frustration at the slow speed
> of DNS name allocation, then the prices of the Melbourne IT monopoly,
> and finally a number of firms which saw a profit-making
> opportunity and weren't going to be delayed in reaching that
> pot of gold.  In a sense the ACA was along for the ride,
> rather than a core participant.
>
> The ACA also probably had a good eye on IANA and ICANN
> when mentioning its numbering powers.  It's easy to
> miscomprehend the IETF's slogan "We do not believe in kings,
> presidents, or voting" if the next sentence in the slogan
> is trimmed "We believe in rough consensus and running code".
>
> Doubtless other Linkers recall the times better than I do.
>
> Hope this helps,
> Glen
>
> --
> Glen Turner         Tel: (08) 8303 3936 or +61 8 8303 3936
> Network Engineer          Email: glen.turner at aarnet.edu.au
> Australian Academic & Research Network   www.aarnet.edu.au
>
>
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