The 62nd international meeting of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is taking place this week, from June 25-28, 2018, in Panama City, Panama. Several members of Winterfeldt IP Group are attending ICANN 62.
ICANN 62, the second of three global meetings that will take place in 2018, is framed as a policy forum meeting, the shortest of ICANN’s three rotating meeting styles. The policy forum format focuses on cross-community collaboration, with a much more limited number of meetings of individual constituencies and stakeholder groups. The Panama City meeting will offer a number of working group sessions, presentations on high-interest topics, and cross-community panels, with a goal of sharing viewpoints from different facets of the stakeholder community. The GNSO Council (the body that develops global domain name policy) and the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC), the body of over 175 country and territory representatives that advises the ICANN Board, will hold their traditional meetings, albeit on a more abbreviated schedule, and there will not be a dedicated Constituency Day.
Many activities during the Panama City meeting will continue to focus on WHOIS/GDPR (European data protection regulation) issues. In addition, several sessions will be devoted to rights protection mechanisms and the new generic top-level domain (gTLD) program, including continued planning for subsequent rounds of new gTLD applications.
Please reach out to us at internet@winterfeldt.law if you are interested in receiving a summary and analysis of key takeaways from select sessions, including GAC sessions relating to GDPR matters, a GNSO working session, meetings of the New gTLD Subsequent Procedures Working Group, and community sessions on geographic names and GDPR issues, presented on Monday, June 25 in Panama City.
