Revised .com/.net/.org Agreements Forwarded to Commerce Department

16 April 2001 (Marina del Rey, California,USA). The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers(ICANN) today forwarded to the US Department of Commerce (DOC)final copies of proposed revisions to the agreement with VeriSign,Inc. under which VeriSign operates the .com, .net and .org registries.The Memorandum of Understanding between the DOC and ICANN requiresthat any revisions to the VeriSign agreement during its initialterm must be ratified by the DOC.

The revised agreements would significantlyrestructure the contractual relationship between ICANN and theoperator of the world's largest domain name registries. In summary,they will:

• largely normalize the relationship betweenICANN and VeriSign, operator of the most important name registriesin the Domain Name System;
• eliminate most of the vestiges of specialtreatment of VeriSign resulting from its legacy activities;
• commit VeriSign to participate equitablyand without special limitations in the financial support of ICANN'sactivities;
• separate the single legacy registry agreementcovering the three registries now operated by VeriSign into threeseparate registry agreements, thus allowing the Internet community,through the ICANN process, to decide on the operator for eachregistry individually and not as a group, as required under the1999 agreement;
• require VeriSign to give up control overthe .org registry by the end of 2002; and
• provide for a competitive process in 2005to determine the future operator of .net.

The new agreements were approved by ICANN'sBoard of Directors on 2 April 2001, subject to final legal documentation.The agreements submitted today to DOC include significant changesfrom the original agreements as the direct result of commentsreceived from many members of the Internet community, includingICANN's Names Council and its member constituencies.

ICANN's President and CEO M. Stuart Lynnsaid, "It is in the interests of all Internet users—commercialand private, businesses and individuals—that ICANN continueto develop and mature as a vehicle for consensus policy development.These new agreements, by eliminating much of the unique legacytreatment of VeriSign/NSI, will be a major step in that direction.They will help to maintain the continuing stability of the DNSas an important and effective part of the Internet, and willimprove the ability of ICANN to serve as an effective administratorof this important resource."

For more information on the ICANN/VeriSignregistry agreements, see https://www.icann.org/tlds/agreements/verisign/.