ICANN 52 kicks off in Singapore, tech leaders reaffirm commitment to multistakeholderism

ITRealms:

The Singaporean Minister of Communications and Information, Dr. Yaacob bin Ibrahim, and former Senior Advisor to President Bill Clinton, Ira Magaziner, spoke to the success of the multistakeholder model of Internet governance during the opening ceremony of the Internetr corporation for assigned names and numbers (ICANN's) 52nd public meeting today, reports ITRealms.

According to Ibrahim, "Singapore supports the shift to a multistakeholder model. We have consistently articulated our belief that no one person, organization, or even country, has a monopoly on the expertise and wisdom needed to meet the challenges that we are facing on the Internet on a day-to-day basis." 

He stressed that such an inclusive, multistakeholder approach will enhance the Internet's role as a catalyst for information flow and economic activity.

For Magaziner, "The fact of the matter is that Internet has worked and the growth has been phenomenal and the growth to WiFi, and the growth to mobile, and now the growth to the Internet of things and it has all worked.”

Magaziner emphasised that one see tremendous success coming from this model.

ICANN President and CEO, Fadi Chehadé, spoke about ICANN's continued prioritization of both maintaining the security, stability and resiliency of the Internet's Domain Name System (DNS) and reinforcing the multistakeholder model of governance.

"First, we have continued to strengthen the confidence in our operations," said Chehadé.
He also pointed out that ICANN has continued to make sure that its community, insisting that the multistakeholder model, is strong. 

“And all of this must continue to be rooted in the global public interest,” he said.

The start of the meeting comes on the heels of an announcement that, with the recent delegation of .NTT, .chat, .toshiba and .canon, the new gTLD programme has delegated over 500 new strings into the root zone of the Internet. 

"This is a significant milestone for the new gTLD program," said Akram Atallah, President of ICANN's Global Domains Division (GDD). Underscoring that the programme continues to make advancements and enable enhanced competition, innovation and choice.

ITRealms recalls that over 1,200 members of the global multistakeholder community, from over 100 different countries, will meet over the course of the week, both in-person and remotely, to discuss and debate the future of ICANN and Internet governance.
 

+Remmy Nweke (ITRealms) +ICANNnews 

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