The Elliott School of International Affairs hosted a very interesting conversation today on “New Avenues to Govern Cross-Border Information Flows.”  SIIA co-sponsored the event together the Internet Society of Greater Washington, D.C.  The Institute for International Economic Policy (IIEP) presented the event.  Research Professor and Cross-Disciplinary Fellow Susan Aaronson moderated. I provided an industry perspective, and my talk is available here.  My written remarks focus on what we hope to achieve with respect to cross-border data flows in the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA), the WTO’s E-commerce Work Committee, the G20, G7, and the OECD.   However, as fellow panelist USTR Director for Digital Trade Sam DuPont concentrated on these fora, I emphasized in my spoken remarks four aspects of the cross-border data flow discussion.  First, key industry “asks” such as obligations to permit data flows, avoidance of serv ...

Today, there were two events devoted to Internet governance in Washington, D.C.  The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation organized “Passing the Torch: How will Internet Governance Change in a Post-American World.”  This event included as a panelist Chris Wilson from 21st Century Fox, an SIIA member.   Afterwards, the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee arranged a hearing on “Privatizing the Internet Assigned Number Authority,” which included an all-star cast of witnesses. Why the upsurge in interest?  The March 10 decision by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) board to transmit to the U.S. government a set of proposals to transfer to multistakeholder oversight the functioning of Internet’s address system, the Doman Name Server (DNS) system is the reason.  SIIA welcomed that decision.  The proposals are serious, thorough and have been developed through a ...

Yesterday, the Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications & Information Administration (NTIA) announced that it is extending the contract between the Commerce Department and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to perform the Internet Assigned Names Authority (IANA) functions.  The contract will be extended by one year from September 30, 2015 to September 30, 2016.