ICANN 55

Event
Process	ICANN
Date	Mar. 5, 2016 – Mar. 10, 2016
Region	AF
Country	Morocco
City	Marrakech
Venue	Circuit de la Palmeraie BP
Websites	meetings.icann.org/en/marrakech55
← ICANN 54 ICANN 56 →

ICANN 55 was ICANN's 55th Public Meeting, held from March 5–10 2016 in Marrakech, Morocco. ICANN55 took place amid finalization of the IANA stewardship transition package and the associated Cross-Community Working Group on Enhancing ICANN Accountability (CCWG-Accountability) Work Stream 1 recommendations, alongside continued work on new gTLD program safeguards, future rounds timing, and registration data policy and implementation issues discussed across SO/AC sessions and Board-community exchanges.

IANA Stewardship Transition

ICANN 55 occurred during final community and Board processing of the IANA stewardship transition package. The ccNSO dedicated substantial agenda time to implementation-facing questions, including progress on implementing the CWG-Stewardship proposal, development of service level expectations (SLEs), and what actions ccTLDs and the ccNSO would need to take in implementation and post-transition operations.

The GAC reported that the HLGM enabled ministers and senior officials to assess transition outcomes and the move from U.S. Government stewardship to a community-based arrangement with enhanced accountability.

CCWG Work Stream 1

At ICANN 55, the GAC held several sessions on its role as a Chartering Organization for CCWG-Accountability Work Stream 1. In the GAC’s agreed response transmitted to the CCWG co-chairs, the GAC supported Recommendations 1–10 and 12, but noted a lack of consensus on Recommendation 11 and on the "carve-out" provision referenced in Recommendations 1 and 2; the GAC also stated it had no objection to transmitting the proposal to the ICANN Board despite differing internal views.

At-Large/ALAC recorded formal internal actions during ICANN 55 tied to CCWG-Accountability WS1, including ALAC approval of the CCWG-Accountability final proposal recommendations and confirmation that At-Large would be a participant in the post-transition “empowered community” mechanisms contemplated in WS1.

The GAC–Board meeting discussion highlighted workload management across concurrent PDPs and inter-community dependencies, with discussion of forming a small ad hoc group (Board, GNSO, ccNSO, GAC) to consider workload timing and management; the Board also referenced the upcoming "B meeting" structure as a venue for cross-community progress on substantive issues.

New gTLD Program Safeguards and Future Rounds

Within the GAC's inter-constituency exchanges at ICANN 55, Board–GAC discussions included both the timing of future gTLD rounds and a Board–GAC exchange on gTLD safeguards.

In its other discussions, the GAC identified follow-up work on gTLD safeguards in the current round, emphasizing maintaining and improving existing safeguards (including those tied to prior GAC advice) and encouraging GNSO and ALAC work to review Public Interest Commitments (PICs) for strings in highly regulated sectors, including via a dedicated group if possible; the GAC also pointed to process lessons and the role of the Board–GAC Review Implementation Working Group (BGRI-WG) in improving Board–GAC communications.

Links

ICANN 55 Full Schedule

Africa, according to the ICANN Geographic Regions (ICANN Geographic Regions).

Internet Assigned Numbers Authority

Generic Top-level Domain

Country Code Names Supporting Organization. Develops and recommends to the Board global policies relating to country-code top-level domains (ICANN Bylaws).

Country code top-level domain. Determined by "ISO 3166-1: Codes for the representation of names of countries and their subdivisions — Part 1: Country codes".

Governmental Advisory Committee. Considers and provides advice on the activities of ICANN as they relate to concerns of governments, particularly matters where there may be an interaction between ICANN's policies and various laws and international agreements or where they may affect public policy issues (ICANN Bylaws).

At-Large Advisory Committee. Considers and provides advice on the activities of ICANN related to the interests of individual Internet users (ICANN Bylaws). Not to be confused with the Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group.

Policy Development Process

Generic Names Supporting Organization. Develops and recommends to the Board substantive policies relating to generic top-level domains and other responsibilities set forth in the Bylaws (ICANN Bylaws).