The UN's desire to control the Internet: UN pirates sailed into Tunis this November 16-18, looking to take the helm of Internet supervision from U.S. hands

New American, The, Dec 12, 2005 by Steven J. DuBord

Do you treasure the freedom to wade out into the vast sea of information that is the Internet and surf the World Wide Web? Then look out for what is coming over the horizon: a fleet of ships is bearing down on you and your little surf(key)board, and they are flying the blue Jolly Roger of the United Nations.

You will see among them such ships of state as Russia, China, Cuba, Iran, Sudan, and Zimbabwe, hardly paragons of liberty and human rights. All of them are waving their cutlasses in outrage that the United States is refusing (for now) to relinquish its supervisory role over the private-sector, not-for-profit Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Even the European Union has revealed its true colors and fired a broadside of protest against supposed U.S. dominance of the Internet. The captain of this bunch is none other than the UN secretary-general himself, Kofi "oil-for-food" Annan.

Treasure That Should Stay Buried

ICANN is essentially the mapmaker for the Internet. It handles the technical operations of the root servers of the Internet, mapping the relatively easy-to-remember domain names like apple.com or whitehouse.gov to the unique numerical address assigned to that domain. Since its inception in 1998, ICANN has plotted this map with a minimum of governmental interference and for only nominal fees.

Even without the UN's meddling, ICANN is a collaborative effort of the global community. The ICANN website notes that "citizens of Australia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, France, Germany, Ghana, Japan, Kenya, Korea, Mexico, the Netherlands, Portugal, Senegal, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States" have all served on the organization's board of directors. "ICANN's President directs an international staff, working from three continents," ensuring that "all users of the Internet can find all valid addresses" through the organization's domain name map.

Now, Captain Annan has his eye trained on this map, looking not only for control of cyberspace, but for the buried treasure of taxing access to it. To this end, he convened the first World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva from December 10-12 of 2003, and also a second such summit this November 16-18 in Tunis.

To get a good idea of what the summit in Tunis was all about, one need only pay heed to Senator Norm Coleman's (R-Minn.) preview of the Geneva summit in the November 7, 2005 Wall Street Journal: "It sounds like a Tom Clancy plot. An anonymous group of international technocrats holds secretive meetings in Geneva. Their cover story: devising a blueprint to help the developing world more fully participate in the digital revolution. Their real mission: strategizing to take over management of the Internet from the U.S. and enable the United Nations to dominate and politicize the World Wide Web. Does it sound too bizarre to be true? Regrettably, much of what emanates these days from the U.N. does." Sen. Coleman should know: his Senate investigation into the UN's oil-for-food scandal has exposed the entrenched bureaucratic corruption of the world body.

Anti-American Audacity and Duplicity

In "Make Way for the UNternet?" in our January 26, 2004 issue, this publication quoted the blunt statement of a UN official at the Geneva summit: "What we are looking at is the future management of the Internet. It's [about] what is the best way to manage what has become a natural resource for all humanity." The summit in Tunis took up where Geneva left off, holding fast to this course of audacity and duplicity.

The audacity comes in the form of declaring the Internet to be a "global resource" belonging to the world. While this "resource" is global in scope, it clearly bears the stamp "Made in the U.S.A." Its origin can be traced back to U.S. Defense Department efforts in the 1960s to build an interconnected network--or "Internet"--of computers that could survive a nuclear war. Although others have contributed to the Internet, the primary technology and hardware that make it possible belong to the United States. To declare that the U.S. has done such a good job of creating the Internet that it is now obligated to give it up for the sake of the world is ludicrous.

Through the technical know-how of automobile manufacturers such as Volkswagen and BMW, Germany has excelled at making automobiles. Is Germany going to turn over these companies to the United Nations because everyone in the world deserves an affordable, fuel-efficient vehicle? Nokia of Finland owns 32 percent of the global cellphone market. Is Finland going to turn Nokia over to the UN's International Telecommunication Union because 100 percent of the world's inhabitants deserve to have a cellphone? Sony Corporation of Japan has become the leader of the home game console market with its PlayStation 2, and is gearing up to release a powerful new version next year. Is Sony going to turn over this technology to UNICEF because every child in the world deserves to play games? Don't hold your breath waiting for these or any other members of the UN to put a new car, cellphone, or game console under your Christmas tree.