Root Server System Advisory Committee

The Root Server System Advisory Committee (RSSAC) was created under the Article VII Section 3 (b) of the ICANN Bylaws which gave ICANN Board the mandate to appoint the initial Chairman of the Committee, after which the following chairman will be elected by the members of the committee. Jun Murai, who was one of the nine initial directors of the ICANN Board in 1998 was appointed chairman of RSSAC.

Responsibility

RSSAC was delegated to advise the ICANN Board regarding the operational requirements of the root name servers of the Domain Name System (DNS) which include hardware capacities, operating systems, name server versions, network connectivity, physical environment as well as its security aspects. RSSAC was also tasked to review the number, location, and distribution of the root name server and its total system performance, robustness, and reliability.

RSSAC Projects

Since its inception, the committee continuously performs projects under a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA between ICANN the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) and National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to conduct a collaborative study to address the operational and technical requirements of the root name servers to be able to establish a more robust and secure management of the Internet (DNS) root server system.

RSSAC Working Group

The RSSAC Working Group is composed of:

• Harald Tveit Alvestrand
• Steve Crocker
• Bruce Tonkin

Root Server System Advisory Committee. Advises the ICANN community and Board on matters relating to the operation, administration, security, and integrity of the Internet's Root Server System (ICANN Bylaws).