[arin-ppml] On the history of early number registrations, ARIN, and ARIN's role in the administration of the Internet number registry

[John Curran]

On 14 Apr 2022, at 11:07 PM, Jo Rhett <geek at jorhett.com<mailto:geek at jorhett.com>> wrote:

As a matter of point, you make this same argument yourself:


  1.  ARIN was formed for the purpose of administration of the registry in North America and took over that responsibility at the time of our formation – including the transfer of the registry database to ARIN at USG direction.
  2.  ARIN’s administration of the registry is be performed in accordance with our community-developed policies – and we are aware of no obligations that prevent ARIN from doing so for all number resources in the registry, including legacy resources.

Absolutely, provable true on both points.

I know you want to play nice and encourage participation, so you soft-pedal your statements. But please acknowledge the truth--there is no basis in law for someone to fail to recognize your authority and perform what was expected of them at the time of assignment, which ABSOLUTELY DID include respecting changes in policy over time.

To be perfectly clear - yes, there is a little doubt that ARIN can operate the registry in accordance with its bylaws as a membership organization and in conformance with the registration agreements that we’ve entered into with ARIN’s customers – and that includes making changes to fees, services and policies of the registry.

However, that is not the complete picture, since those who requested and received address assignments before ARIN’s formation may indeed have an “agreement” of sorts with a predecessor registry and that may included terms implied and/or understood.  Frankly, this a fairly challenging argument due to the nature of prior registry operators (as contracted parties to the US government) but it cannot be excluded.

So, no, it is not just a desire “to play nice” that motivates my statements: there’s potentially both ethical and legal issues if one goes to operate in a manner that might be viewed contrary to past commitments.  As the successor registry operator, ARIN inherits all of the ambiguity of these earliest “agreements” and we continue to honor the intent as we can best derive it – hence why legacy resource holders continue to receive essentially the same services in place at the time of ARIN’s formation (publication in Whois, reverse DNS services, ability to update their registration, etc.) without fee or explicit contract.   To the extent that there are to be changes to registry operations for legacy resource holders, it would be best if they were the result of community-developed policy, and legacy resource holders who have concerns about the potential for their registry services are encouraged to participate in the open policy development process.

Thanks,
/John

John Curran
President and CEO
American Registry for Internet Numbers



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.arin.net/pipermail/arin-ppml/attachments/20220415/1fc8cdf0/attachment.htm>