On Mon, July 23, 2012 11:52 am, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
> On 23 July 2012 13:54, David Cake <
[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> As far as the issue of charitable names being exploited for
>> fraudulent purposes, as discussed by Evan and Milton - it seems to me,
>> from
>> discussions with the charities, that the *real* solution that the
>> charities
>> need (and not just the ICRC, with its unique legal protections, but ANY
>> charity) is basically a takedown solution like those provided by the
>> APWG
>> etc. Fraud is fraud, we need good solutions to stop fraud - but not only
>> will special rules for the ICRC not have a large effect on fraud
>> targeted
>> against charities in general, it won't even eliminate fraud against the
>> ICRC - much fraud against the ICRC appears to use domain names that
>> don't
>> include the specific protected designations redcross etc, but just
>> variations such as just
somethingrc.org. If the specific redcross term
>> and other protected designations were protected at the second level,
>> we'd
>> see fraudsters simply switch to less preferred names, such as variations
>> on
>> namerc type 2LD names, and 3LDs and such.
>
>
> Agreed 100%.
>
> The kind of issue people in ALAC were responding to were the short-term
> scam sites such as "
redcrosshaitirelief.com", ones that specifically used
> the charity's name (specifically its conventional Internet 2LD names)
> inside bogus 2LD strings. As I mentioned in the earlier email, there's
> also
> agreement that nothing is special about the Red Cross in this regard, I
> would consider "
unicefhaitifelief.org" or "
oxfamhaitirelief.net" to be
> just
> as bad.
>
> As such, I would remind that ALAC has never been in favour of any Red
> Cross
> or IOC or IGO restrictions on TLDs -- ever. Some of you may recall that I
> was in the room near the end of the g-council debate on the issue in San
> Jose, ready if necessary to detail ALAC's just-passed statement supporting
> the NCSG position. There is similarly no belief in special treatment for
> IGOs, *especially* considering that most of them possess the rare
> qualifications for the exclusive .int TLD already. So our position on
> gTLDs
> is still one of no change to existing policy.
>
> Furthermore... I never, in my original comment, suggested that prior
> restriction -- at any level -- was our direction, only that a legitimate
> larger issue, buried within the RC/IOC/IGO mess, did bare consideration.
> We
> don't claim the answer yet, just ask the question (that indeed does not
> yet
> appear to have been asked -- in all these years -- from the PoV of the end
> user rather than the registrants.) There are many possible approaches, not
> all of which have had a proper hearing to date. We're totally aware of the
> limitations of ICANN and domain names, and that removing obviously
> fraudulent strings won't eliminate phishing or fraud. But it is also wrong
> to refuse to do anything because no solution can be complete. And denying
> of scammers the ability to use (clearly) fraudulent domain names impairs
> their ability to do SEO to increase traffic to their sites.
>
> ICANN's denial of responsibility for cleaning up a problem that its policy
> enabled (ie, creation of fraudulent domains) simply offers useful
> ammunition to those who would dispense with the multi-stakeholder model
> completely, through demonstrating that one significant stakeholder -- the
> end user being scammed -- is going unheard by the MSM.
>
>
>
>> Their is a fundamental difference between the ICRC arguments based on
>> its
>> special legal status, and arguments based on the ICRCs mission and
>> specific
>> operation concerns. The arguments based on the ICRCs special legal
>> status
>> are one thing. But the arguments based on the humanitarian mission and
>> operational concerns of the iCRC could just as easily apply to
>> organisations such as the MSF or UNHCR. I wish a lot more of the effort
>> that has gone into the ICRCs arguments had gone into practical fraud
>> takedown measures that would be applicable to all charitable
>> organisations.
>>
>
>
> Agreed. IMO, ALAC is seeking to drive this forward in a useful manner, by
> steering and focusing (rather than outright rejecting) the claims in a
> manner that benefits the public interest.
> It would be nice if we could do this together with the NCSG, which is why
> I'm writing this.
>
> - Evan
>