Control of the Internet

You'd expect an announcement that will change the face of the internet to be a grand affair.

But unless you knew where he was sitting, all you got was David Hendon's slightly apprehensive voice through a plastic earpiece. The words were measured and unexciting, but their implications will be felt for generations.

Mr Hendon, the director of business relations at Britain's Department of Trade and Industry, was in Geneva representing the British Government and European Union at the third and final preparatory meeting for next month's world summit on the information society. He had just announced a coup over the running of the internet.

Representatives from Britain and the US sat near each other but looked straight ahead as Mr Hendon said the EU had decided to end the US government's unilateral control of the internet and put in place a new body.

The issue of who should control the net proved extremely divisive, and for 11 days the world's governments traded blows.

For most people who use it, the only real concern is getting on the net. But with the internet now essential to countries' basic infrastructure, the question of who has control is critical.

And the unwelcome answer for many is that it is the US government. In the early days, an enlightened US Department of Commerce pushed and funded expansion of the internet. When the net became global, it created a private company, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers to run it. But the department retained overall control, and in June said it would retain indefinite control of the internet's foundation - its "root servers", which act as the basic directory for the whole internet.

A number of countries represented in Geneva, including Brazil, China, Cuba, Iran and several African states, insisted the US relinquish control, but it refused.

The meeting "was going nowhere", Mr Hendon said, and so the EU took a bold step and proposed two stark changes: a new forum that would decide public policy, and a "co-operation model" comprising governments that would be in overall charge.

To the distress of the US, the idea proved popular. Its representative hit back, saying it "can't in any way allow any changes" that went against the "historic role" of the US in controlling the top level of the internet.

But that strengthened opposition, and now the world's governments are expected to agree on a deal awarding themselves ultimate control. The proposal will be officially raised at a United Nations summit of world leaders next month and, faced with international consensus, there is little the US government can do but acquiesce.

But will this move mean, as the US ambassador David Gross argued, that "even on technical details, the industry will have to follow government-set policies, UN-set policies"?

No, according to Nitin Desai, the UN's special adviser on internet governance. "There is clearly an acceptance here that governments are not concerned with the technical and operational management of the internet. Standards are set by the users."

But the author of Ruling the Root, Milton Mueller, is not so sure. An overseeing council "could interfere with standards. What would stop it saying 'when you're making this standard for data transfer, you have to include some kind of surveillance for law enforcement'?"

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