'Global' Internet Governance Invites Censorship

[Commentary] The Commerce Department announcement about Internet governance comes at a time when global Internet freedom has never been more important or under greater threat.

Governments around the world are considering measures to squelch free speech or free enterprise on the Internet. The International Telecommunication Union has historically had authority over certain international telephone rates and global spectrum allocations. At its next conference in South Korea in October, the ITU's 193 member states will likely consider extending the agency's authority to the Internet. The U.S. can influence this and other multilateral gatherings, working to convince countries on the fence that a free and open Internet promotes economic growth globally and within countries that embrace it.

Toward this end, changes in the US relationship with ICANN should be designed to preserve the unrestricted flow of information and data over the Internet. This means, first of all, that any entity that might replace the US oversight role cannot be a government entity. Instead, it must be a multistakeholder body rooted in the private sector and civil society, preserving the decentralized, nongovernmental approach that has "governed" the Internet from its inception. Otherwise, no deal. The Commerce Department made such conditions implicit when it announced its intention to eventually transfer its current oversight role with ICANN. We believe these conditions should become explicit and nonnegotiable.

[Genachowski, former chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, is managing director at The Carlyle Group. Goldstein is managing director at Silver Lake.]