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[IP] WashPost on VeriSign



The way I read this is that this is the first real test of the nets self governance and certainly ICANN's ability to be an effective part of that. Lets see if they can be effective??

Dave


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14818-2003Sep28.html


VeriSign Ignores Request To Suspend New Service
Web Regulators Say SiteFinder Abuses Firm's Power

By David McGuire
Special to The Washington Post
Monday, September 29, 2003; Page E05

A long-simmering debate over who controls the Internet boiled over this week as VeriSign Inc., the firm that operates a key piece of the Internet address system, defied a request from its oversight body to suspend a new service it launched to make money off the typos of Web surfers.

VeriSign's Network Solutions division in Herndon is one of a few dozen companies authorized to sell ".com" and ".net" addresses, but it is the sole company authorized by the Commerce Department to administer the registry that tells computers where to find Web addresses ending in .com and .net.

Critics alleged that VeriSign abused its monopoly power when it set up a service to steer Web surfers to its own online directory when they incorrectly typed Internet addresses. Moreover, some engineers alleged that VeriSign's service has triggered a cascade of unwanted side effects on the Internet, such as weakening anti-spam e-mail filters.

VeriSign countered that it is simply helping Web surfers find what they are looking for and insisted that its service, dubbed SiteFinder, is within its contractual powers. VeriSign officials said they would not comply with a request issued last Monday by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a sort of regulatory body, to shut down the service while experts explore its effects.

"We have not done anything to impact the stability or the security of the Internet," said Stratton D. Sclavos, chief executive of Mountain View, Calif.-based VeriSign. He said many technical criticisms are based on misconceptions about the service, which he contended complies with all existing Internet standards.

"We're in the business of innovation to generate new services that our customers want and to generate new revenue streams," he added.

ICANN Chairman Vinton G. "Vint" Cerf, one of the Internet's founders, said his group is considering options for response while its lawyers pore over VeriSign's contracts to determine whether the firm has violated any clauses. Options include arbitration and litigation, he said.

"One would hope that something of this magnitude would be properly covered in the contracts," Cerf said. It would be in nobody's interest to take control of .com away from VeriSign, Cerf said, but ICANN may face an all-or-nothing choice of whether to revoke VeriSign's contract.

Cerf said SiteFinder represents such a fundamental change in Internet navigation that it could have an effect on technologies that haven't been invented. "There is great concern over anything that would impair either the stability or the integrity of the domain name system," he added.

The service has heightened friction between VeriSign, a publicly traded company, and ICANN, the nonprofit group created by the federal government to oversee the domain name system. Because no one really owns the Internet, the upshot is a lack of clarity about who can tell VeriSign what do.

"Here comes the issue that [ICANN] was designed to solve, and we find they are potentially toothless," said Karl Auerbach, a software engineer who used to serve on ICANN's board. "It's very unclear that ICANN has any authority to deal with this."

VeriSign's SiteFinder, launched Sept. 15, redirects people who type nonexistent or inactive Internet addresses to a site created by VeriSign. In addition to offering links to sites with names similar to the query, SiteFinder presents a search box and Web directory full of advertising. Its directory competes with similar search services from the likes of Google, Microsoft and others. Its ads are provided by Overture, a company being bought by Yahoo Inc.

Typos on the Internet may seem an unlikely source for an advertising bonanza, but up to 20 million mistaken Web addresses, or domain names, are typed into Web browsers daily, including many that no one has registered. Before SiteFinder, people typing those names used to get an error message or, depending on how they accessed the Internet, they might see a search page operated by Microsoft or America Online.

Microsoft and AOL have their own ways to route erroneous queries to their commercial services, but they can do so only with people who choose to use their products. VeriSign, however, acts as a traffic cop for the entire Internet.

SiteFinder has already provided a big traffic boost to VeriSign. Before the service went live, VeriSign's Web site was drawing about 100,000 visitors on a typical weekday, according to ComScore Networks Inc. Afterward, VeriSign's traffic skyrocketed to 1.3 million to 1.7 million weekday visitors.

Two rival companies have filed lawsuits against VeriSign, claiming its service represent unfair competition: Orlando-based Popular Enterprises LLC, owner of the Netster search engine, and Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Go Daddy Software Inc., which sells Internet addresses. A class-action suit was also filed against VeriSign last week.

Technologists blame SiteFinder for hampering systems designed to block unsolicited "spam" e-mail because SiteFinder replaces bogus Internet addresses with its own legitimate address.

Paul Vixie, chairman of Internet Software Consortium of Redwood City, Calif., said his group released a software patch that network administrators can use to thwart the service. Several Internet service providers apparently are using the patch, among other things, to foil SiteFinder.

But Vixie said the service has sparked a long-overdue policy debate over ownership of the .com traffic system: "VeriSign kicked the sleeping dog," he said.


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