Consensus finally reached over Internet authority

Despite fears that the Internet would remain forever in the hands of the US government, two rivals for power have reached a consensus on how to manage top-level domain names.

Network Solutions (NSI) and the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (Iana), yesterday published by-laws for an organisation called the Internet Cooperation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann). The proposal comes just two weeks before the US government's deadline for handing power over to industry.

Lack of cooperation between NSI and Iana had led to the cancellation of a public summit on the new independent Iana last week. But as one source close to the situation told Silicon News: "They were never against reaching a consensus. The Harvard summit was cancelled for other reasons, but NSI and Iana got the blame."

The joint proposal stands a high chance of being adopted by the US government. Iana's own proposal for an Internet committee had been accused of being US-centric and unaccountable. But Icann, based in Los Angeles, makes public accountability a high priority - in multiple languages.

Board members will be nominated by supporting organisations specialising in protocols, domain names and Web addresses - and no more than two nominees will be US residents.