[discuss] [bestbits] Fwd: Heads up on Brazil meeting preparation

Thu Jan 9 15:57:17 UTC 2014

Milton:

DoT is clearly the Department of Transportation - they are in charge of the Information Superhighway, n'est-ce pas?  As plausible as anything else in this theory....

I too asked for clarification regarding the IETF reference.  While we did not have the courtesy of a reply from M. Nothias, Stephen Farrell posted the following yesterday as a probable explanation:

On 01/08/2014 09:46 PM, Shatan, Gregory S. wrote:

> Since you do assert (or rather imply) one "fact" in an otherwise

> fact-free argument, I'd like to understand it.  When you say "IETF has

> a NSA employee at his board"  what person, what board, what position

> and what organization are you referring to?

Its as accurate as the rest of that mail. That is, it is not accurate at all, but I think I can guess what was meant.

The Internet Research Task Force (the IRTF, not the IETF) has a research group (CFRG) with a co-chair who's an NSA employee.

He's been a co-chair for about two years. Just before the holidays someone objected to having a research group co-chair who's an NSA employee, there was a list discussion, and the IRTF chair decided not to fire the co-chair. The person who made the request appealed that decision to the IAB (yesterday I think, maybe Monday) so that will be in-work with them.

As usual the relevant mailing list [1] has more detail than you probably want, but for this list, maybe the main points are that from the IETF point of view the CFRG is a mailing list with folks who have crypto expertise and to which IETF participants or sometimes working groups can direct detailed questions about crypto. CFRG is not directly involved in setting standards at all.

And any answers from the CFRG are treated just like other inputs to the standards process. The CFRG chairs have about as much influence on IETF standards as say the programme committee chairs of a reasonably good academic cryptography conference.

I'll just add one request - as you can see from the original post, reporting on this has been annoyingly inaccurate, partly due to people who don't understand the IRTF or IETF diving in with ready-made assumptions. If you're not already involved in that research group, but want to be part of that discussion, please try get up to speed on the CFRG and the specific discussion before engaging. Some people have failed to do that which was quite disruptive already IMO.

Interestingly, the higher level outcome of the controversy might turn out to be that the research group in question is revitalised, with a bunch of new folks doing work to help to make how we use crypto on the Internet better, that is, working to try make life harder for those like NSA or GCHQ who want to do pervasive monitoring. It looks like that at the moment, but we'll have to see if it lasts.

S.

[1] http://irtf.org/mailman/listinfo/cfrg

Greg Shatan

From: discuss-bounces at 1net.org [mailto:discuss-bounces at 1net.org] On Behalf Of Milton L Mueller
Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2014 10:19 AM
To: 'Jean-Christophe NOTHIAS I The Global Journal'
Cc: 1Net List; governance at lists.igcaucus.org
Subject: Re: [discuss] [bestbits] Fwd: Heads up on Brazil meeting preparation

Jean-Christophe:
You are confusing people by using inaccurate labels.

There is no "Department of Trade" in the US, there is a Department of Commerce, and although translating "Commerce" into French may be the same general meaning as "Trade," American readers will get confused if you switch the terms.

Same accuracy problem with your reference to the IETF Board. I do not know what the IETF Board is, do you mean the IAB? Or the ISOC Board of Trustees? What is the name of the NSA employee you are referring to?

From: discuss-bounces at 1net.org<mailto:discuss-bounces at 1net.org> [mailto:discuss-bounces at 1net.org] On Behalf Of Jean-Christophe NOTHIAS I The Global Journal
Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2014 2:50 PM
To: Shatan, Gregory S.
Cc: &lt, bestbits at lists.bestbits.net&gt<mailto:bestbits at lists.bestbits.net&gt>, ; 1Net List; Hartmut Glaser; governance at lists.igcaucus.org<mailto:governance at lists.igcaucus.org>
Subject: Re: [discuss] [bestbits] Fwd: Heads up on Brazil meeting preparation

ICANN/IANA are. And therefore everything that comes under ICANN's patronage and funding (1net...) has an obvious link to DoT. That makes quite a grouping. It would be naive not to put the I* under the same umbrella. IETF has a NSA employee at his board.

Le 8 janv. 2014 à 20:43, Shatan, Gregory S. a écrit :

I'm confused.  What "grouping" are you stating is under a "direct mandate" of the "US trade department"?

Greg Shatan

From: discuss-bounces at 1net.org<mailto:discuss-bounces at 1net.org> [mailto:discuss-bounces at 1net.org] On Behalf Of Jean-Christophe NOTHIAS I The Global Journal
Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2014 2:15 PM
To: John Curran
Cc: governance at lists.igcaucus.org<mailto:governance at lists.igcaucus.org>; &lt, bestbits at lists.bestbits.net&gt<mailto:bestbits at lists.bestbits.net&gt>, ; 1Net List; Hartmut Glaser
Subject: Re: [discuss] [bestbits] Fwd: Heads up on Brazil meeting preparation

John,

My report is based upon Lynn Saint Amour statements. It does not come out of personal considerations. The out of the public view is a reality you cannot deny.

Given the nature of the Internet, (no one owns the Internet, and all that bla-bla), it is amusing to finally come to a point where we suddenly have a grouping coordinating ... under the I* naming, appearing to be the governing board, under a direct mandate of the US trade department, and with the financial support of the major players. These meetings should have been publicized much more. And indeed, then, it is no surprise to have this coordination existing.

JC

__________________________
Jean-Christophe Nothias
jc.nothias at theglobaljournal.net<mailto:jc.nothias at theglobaljournal.net>
@jc_nothias

Le 8 janv. 2014 à 19:08, John Curran a écrit :

On Jan 8, 2014, at 6:14 AM, Jean-Christophe NOTHIAS I The Global Journal <jc.nothias at theglobaljournal.net<mailto:jc.nothias at theglobaljournal.net>> wrote:
...
It is amusing to note that thanks to the Montevideo statement, the existence of these meetings has now become a public information - a very-behind-close-doors-meetings!! The I-stars meetings were not publicized before the NSA scandal pressures the I-stars.

Jean-Christophe -

Your statement above is incorrect - the I* coordination meetings of the past have been
generally mundane events, but still reported by each participant as they see fit, e.g. -

>From <http://www.iab.org/documents/minutes/minutes-2011/iab-minutes-2011-11-30/>
6. Report from the I* Leaders Meeting

Bernard, Russ and Olaf attended a meeting of I* leadership in Miami on 29-30 November 2011. The meeting included participants from RIRs, ICANN, ISOC, and the W3C. Discussion topics included interactions with governments and the IANA RFP.

From: <http://www.nro.net/wp-content/uploads/nro-at-apnic-33.pdf>
* NRO workshop in 3-8 February, Miami, Florida - Hosted by ARIN
- Concurrent with ICANN/IANA distribution of last 5 /8s
- Met with ICANN, ISOC, IAB & IETF (I*) Executives

etc.

Given the nature of the Internet, it shouldn't surprise anyone that the various Internet organizations
have to coordinate and it's often more efficient to do his together than via many one-on-one meetings.
Such coordination may not have have been "publicized" (as in press releases) but information about
their existence of such meetings of the various I* leaders was certainly in the public as noted above,
and this was well before the Montevideo Statement on the Future of Internet Cooperation.

FYI,
/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

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