ICANN

DNS Censorship Report Warns of Rising Domain Suspensions

ARTICLE 19 warns that governments are increasingly exploiting internet infrastructure to silence critics, using domain suspensions to block entire websites while regulators and registry operators debate how to balance online safety, technical abuse prevention and freedom of expression. more

ICANN Opens New gTLD Applications for First Time Since 2012, With $227K Entry Fee and 27 Scripts

ICANN reopens applications for new top-level domains after 14 years, charging $227,000 per bid while tightening rules, as it seeks to expand multilingual access and reshape competition in the internet's naming system. more

Authority Formation and Legitimacy in Parallel Governance Tracks

Africa's internet governance faces parallel tracks as AFRINIC's community-led reforms unfold alongside a continent-wide blueprint, raising questions over whether legitimacy will stem from participatory processes or increasingly coordinated external alignment. more

China and the Geopolitics of Africa’s 6.2 Million IPv4 Addresses

AFRINIC's fight over 6.2 million IPv4 addresses exposes how legal pressure, offshore vehicles and scarcity economics can strip Africa of leverage, turning a technical dispute into a test of sovereignty, institutional resilience and Internet governance. more

Mandate Laundering: From RIR Fantasy to Transition Architecture

Private internet registries have inflated narrow technical roles into quasi-sovereign authority, laundering mandate through ritual and rhetoric; a fragile system now faces legal, economic and political reckoning, prompting calls for coordinated transition urgent global reform. more

The Internet That Works for Some: Universal Acceptance Failures Across Asia Pacific

Across Asia Pacific, millions are excluded from digital services because systems fail to recognise non Latin scripts, exposing how flawed design assumptions about internet users entrench inequality across the region in welfare, finance and education. more

China, AFRINIC, and the Dangerous Precedent That Could Destabilize the Global Internet

A dispute over 6.2m IPv4 addresses at AFRINIC exposes how litigation and market incentives could erode regional stewardship, setting a precedent that risks turning the Internet's allocation system into a vehicle for global arbitrage. more

Competing Trademarks, One .BRAND: Making the Right Call in 2026

As ICANN opens its 2026 round, firms sharing trademarks must weigh applying for a .BRAND domain against legal risks and competitive loss, with evidence suggesting first movers gain advantage while objections rarely prevail. more

How DNSXplore Strengthens Internet Trust Across the Global DNSSEC Landscape

A once-trusted internet protocol is showing its age. DNSXplore, a global DNSSEC archive, exposes weaknesses, improves diagnostics and nudges adoption, helping secure the cryptographic chain underpinning online trust. more

Africa Is Not a Digital Quarry

Africa's internet registry crisis reflects not abstract design flaws but sustained legal and market pressure, as scarce address resources are drawn into global arbitrage, challenging stewardship and exposing the fragility of regional digital governance. more

ICANN Probes “Parked Domains” and Zero-Click Redirects Amid Growing Internet Governance Concerns

ICANN is examining the widespread use of parked domains and zero-click redirection, seeking to understand how automated traffic routing and advertising practices affect transparency, consumer protection and trust in the global domain-name system. more

The AI Effect: Why Brand Impersonation Is Becoming Industrialised

Generative AI has turned brand impersonation from a nuisance into an industrial-scale threat, eroding trust. As ICANN's 2026 round approaches, DotBrand domains promise a structural fix to spoofing that strategies failed to deliver in 2012. more

AI: The Squandered Opportunity in India

India's AI summit promised a Global South rethink of digital governance. Instead, a weak declaration and Delhi's accession to America's Pax Silica exposed widening power asymmetries, leaving countries like Brazil outside the real circuitry of control. more

NIS2: Act Now - Practical Solution for Article 28 Successfully Established

With the NIS2 Directive now in effect, a new annex to ICANN contracts offers registries and registrars a practical, flexible path to Article 28 compliance. Early adoption has drawn international praise. more

Who Authorizes Legitimacy if the Community Is Absent in the Redefined Procedural Space?

In African Internet governance, procedural authorship is quietly displacing community legitimacy. When conveners, not members, define reform processes, legitimacy becomes retrospective and trust erodes -- not by intention, but through unchecked structural roles. more