U.N. Panel Presents 4 Internet Options

A U.N. panel created to recommend how the Internet should be run in the future has failed to reach consensus but did agree that no single country should dominate. The United States stated two weeks ago that it intended to maintain control over the computers that serve as the Internet's principal traffic cops. In a report released Thursday, the U.N. panel outlined four possible options for the future of Internet governance for world leaders to consider at a November "Information Society" summit. One option would largely keep the current system intact, with a U.S.-based non-profit organization, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, continuing to handle basic policies over Internet addresses. At the other end, ICANN would be revamped and new international agencies formed under the auspices of the United Nations. The 40 members of the panel hailed from around the world and included representatives from business, academia and government. Some countries were satisfied with the current arrangement, while others, particularly developing ones, wanted to wrest control from ICANN and place it with an intergovernmental group, possibly under the United Nations. Leaders ducked the issue and directed U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to convene the working group to come up with a proposal for the second and final phase of the summit, in Tunisia in November....

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