–lend a Caribbean perspective to hot topics

CARIBBEAN countries continue to lag behind in the global network of Information and Communication Technology (ICT), particularly in the opportunities to make formal contributions and in turn benefit from participation.

This is according to senior manager of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) Stakeholder Engagement for the Caribbean, Albert Daniels. He said there are a lot of things that are trending on the Internet globally that people of the Caribbean could have an input in. However, they have not been participating in global policy development.

Daniels’ company is currently in Guyana participating in the Ministry of Telecommunication’s Internet Week being staged at the Pegasus Hotel. According to Daniels, the lack of participation in the global fora is hindering the extent to which Caribbean countries can harness the benefits of technologies. The company’s focus at the event is to empower Guyanese on how best they can be part of the global village of Internet technology and encourage them to become involved in the overall policy development.

“If they don’t know what is happening at ICANN, or if they do not go to the meetings or participate or make comments when there is a request for public comments, then the Caribbean perspective will not feature with what is happening with the Internet,” Daniels told the Guyana Chronicle on Tuesday.
He said the Caribbean’s participation in the opportunities offered by ICCAN is very important if it is serious about moving forward technologically.

CRITICAL ROLE
ICANN’s role is critical to the users of the Internet. In fact, it is the sole provider of domains and Internet Protocols (IP) addresses. According to Daniels, ICANN helps to coordinate and support the unique identifiers across the world, and has a mission of helping to ensure a stable, secure and unified global Internet.

ICANN is part of the Internet ECO system, which includes six other organisations that together make a contribution to ensuring that a certain part of the Internet works. It focuses on names and numbers. All domain names, such as facebook.com, google.com and bankofguyana.gy are managed by ICAAN.

According to Daniels, the international organisation has a special fund that has been set aside for ICT projects across the world. This fund is usually accessed by countries that participate in ICANN’s meetings and scheduled forums.

“ICCAN now asks global governments, businesses, technical communities and academia how the money should be spent,” he said. “People who go to these meetings and participate in the discussions decide how the money should be spent,” he added. He said the Caribbean does not benefit from such opportunities, because it has no presence at the forums; there are also no proposals of ICT development programs within the Caribbean.

“And so, the other people from other countries who attend the forums and make their presentations have access to the funding,” he said.

On the issue of technicalities, Daniels explained that in order for any device to be able to connect to the Internet, it needs a unique identifier, a number or IP address. That system of numbering is managed by his company.

“What we do is we give out the numbers by regions, to regional organisations,” he said. “The Latin American and Caribbean Internet Addresses Registry (LACNIC) covers Latin America and parts of the Caribbean; and ARIN, that covers North America and parts of the Caribbean.”

CYBER SECURITY
According to Daniels, while ICANN has a very narrow focus on domain names and numbers, there is a threat to consumers. He said hackers can have access to the Domain Name System (DMS). Because his company is very concerned about security in this regard, it generated a programme called Domain System Security Extension (DMS-SEC) which transfers the IP numbers into actual names. But for that to work, the company has to carry out some top-level features of the Internet, and the local Internet service provider has to turn on DMS SEC so that the traffic could run smoothly. He said that is one area of security that ICAAN focuses on, but there are a lot of other things it does.

Internet Week Guyana has brought together Guyanese Internet stakeholders, regional Internet organisations, and the global technical community to address local Internet development. It consists of five premier events at one common venue, the Pegasus Hotel Guyana.

Among regional and international organisations participating in the event are The Latin America and Caribbean Internet Addresses Registry (LACNIC); the Caribbean Network Operators Group (CaribNOG); the Internet Society (ISOC); the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN); and the Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU).