14 November, 2010

Emergency Considerations



Not enough attention has been paid to the "Emergency Back-End Registry Operator Temporary Transition Process" (presumably because it was only discussed in the private registry-registrar meeting in Tokyo that excluded all other ICANN participants).

So what is it?  In a nutshell, it's a process to be used for new gTLDs primarily when the following conditions are met:

     • A registry is in breach of its Registry Agreement
     • A Critical Function is being performed below the Emergency Thresholds resulting in a situation of unacceptable risk

When that happens, an Emergency Back-End Registry Operator will operate Critical Functions until the underlying issues are solved, or the gTLD is transitioned to another operator using one of the previously described Registry Transition processes.

... and where does the money come from to operate this process?  "Funding for use of the Emergency-Operator’s services during the first five years of the new gTLD will be drawn from the respective reserve fund required of new gTLD registry operators.  Emergency Operators will be paid a fixed retainer fee while in stand-by ready mode, and an active fee that will vary depending on the size of the operation."

We are told that operators will be selected  from geographically diverse regions, and must have 3 years of experience with DNS operations.  Also, "Emergency-Operator applicants will be evaluated using similar processes to those for new-gTLD applicants".

What we haven't seen yet is the RFP for the Emergency Operators.

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