Hi everyone:

Today there was a GNSO call on WHOIS Studies. As you may recall from the Cairo meeting, the Registries Constituency presented a compilation and systematization of the proposed studies and such ended up serving as framework for the further discussions in the council.

The debate over which study to pick and then to prioritize is still open as not all constituencies have presented their preferences on one study or another. The deadline for doing so is January 21st. As NCUC has voted against further studies, as well as the RrC, in the chart provided to fill in with numbers from 0 to 5 regarding priority and feasibility of each study, both constituencies filled in with zero.

The matter that raised some concern, and for which we request your input, is the “WHOIS Study Terminology Draft Working Definitions”. Such document was created by staff after some discussions that we had at the Cairo meeting over some broad terms presented in the summary of the studies. Such terms, as has being argued, could lead to misinterpretations and for that it was advisable to reach some consensus on their meanings. Also, those definitions would guide the work of the experts hired to work on the studies.

The document attached is the version presented to us at GNSO with some initial comments from Tim Ruiz. During today´s call some changes have been made. I proposed, for instance, the exclusion of “government restricted or censored information” as an example of what could be understood as “undesirable content” (item 1) for the purpose of the studies. A new version is to be provided by staff as soon as possible, contemplating the changes made at today´s call.

In the meantime, it would be great if you could take a look at those definitions, taking into account that they will guide the elaboration of the WHOIS studies. Another GNSO call on this issue is scheduled for January 21st and until there it would be great to hear further suggestions from our constituency on possible changes to such definitions.

The document is attached to this message. Please let me know if you have any doubts about today´s discussion on this everlasting WHOIS issue.

All the best,
Carlos Affonso


Centro de Tecnologia e Sociedade (CTS)
Escola de Direito da Fundação Getulio Vargas
tel. 55 21 25596065