GOP lawmakers: It’s unconstitutional for Obama to relinquish U.S. Internet control

A group of Republican lawmakers says that the Obama administration’s plan to hand technical control of the servers and other infrastructure necessary to keep the Internet running smoothly could be unconstitutional and dangerous.

Last year, the Commerce Department announced that it would relinquish control of ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), a nonprofit group that manages the Internet’s address functions, to the “global stakeholder community.”

The root zone file for the Internet was developed with the help of a federal grant and has since been overseen by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration through a contract with the Commerce Department.

Because the U.S. has invested resources and government property in Internet oversight, a group of GOP lawmakers is questioning whether the Constitution prohibits the administration’s attempt to sign over control because of a provision allowing only Congress to “dis­pose of … prop­erty be­long­ing to the United States.”

In a letter released this week, Sen­ate Ju­di­ciary Com­mit­tee Chair­man Chuck Grass­ley, House Ju­di­ciary Com­mit­tee Chair­man Bob Good­latte, Sen. Ted Cruz and Rep. Dar­rell Issa asked the Government Accountability Office to make clear whether the move will lead to the handing over of government property.

At the heart of the lawmakers’ argument against handing over control of ICANN is the root zone file, which the federal government currently designates as a “national IT asset.”

“Creation of the root zone file was funded by the American taxpayer and coordinated by the Department of Defense, and the file has remained under United States control ever since,” the lawmakers explained in the letter.

A 2000 GAO report the lawmakers cited found that, at the time, it was unclear whether transferring authority over ICANN would actually include the transfer of physical U.S. assets.

The lawmakers said they want clarification before the ICANN transfer occurs next year.

Cruz has been blocking Senate passage of the Dotcom Act, House-approved legislation to allow the ICANN transfer to go ahead as long as Congress reviews the details of the plan, since early summer.

The Texas Republican argues that the transfer could potentially allow countries with harsh free-speech restrictions to limit global Internet access.

“If the con­tract gov­ern­ing U.S. over­sight of the In­ter­net is in­deed gov­ern­ment prop­erty, the Ad­min­is­tra­tion’s in­ten­tion to cede con­trol to the ‘glob­al stake­hold­er com­munity’– in­clud­ing na­tions like Ir­an, Rus­sia and China that do not value free speech and in fact seek to stifle it — is in vi­ol­a­tion of the Con­sti­tu­tion and should be stopped,” he said in a state­ment.

The post GOP lawmakers: It’s unconstitutional for Obama to relinquish U.S. Internet control appeared first on Personal Liberty®.

from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2015/09/29/gop-lawmakers-its-unconstitutional-for-obama-to-relinquish-u-s-internet-control/

from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2015/09/29/gop-lawmakers-its-unconstitutional-for-obama-to-relinquish-u-s-internet-control/