[ALAC] Fwd: R: Confidentiality

Tue Jan 21 01:02:08 UTC 2014

Dear all,

an IT problem caused that this message from Roberto Gaetano, Chair of
the At-Large Board Candidate Evaluation Committee never arrived on the
ALAC working list. You may have seen my and Tijani's replies, but not
Roberto's message, which must have been a bit confusing.

Please be so kind to find the two emails below from Roberto, for your
information.
Kind regards,

Olivier

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	R: Confidentiality
Date: 	Mon, 20 Jan 2014 14:02:21 +0100
From: 	Roberto Gaetano <roberto_gaetano at hotmail.com>
To: 	Olivier MJ Crepin-Leblond <ocl at gih.com>
CC: 	'ICANN At-Large Staff' <staff at atlarge.icann.org>, 'ALAC Working
List' <alac at atlarge-lists.icann.org>

Following up on this thread, having also read all the comments, I would
like to clarify a few things.

Then, the ball will be in the hands of ALAC Leadership for decisions.

The original point was about access to the 360 review, not to the
candidates EoI. On the other hand, the EoIs are meant to be information
available to all people involved in the decision, not just the BCEC:
therefore there is no confidentiality issue there.

The point was that the owner of the 360 review is the ICANN Board, and
that the Chair of the BGC had agreed to give the document to BCEC,
provided that all the members sign a non-disclosure agreement to commit
to confidentiality. Therefore the BCEC will not provide this information
to other parties. Whether philosophically the ALAC voting members have
or not the right of accessing this information is not a BCEC problem,
but a matter of an agreement between ALAC and the BGC. If the ICANN
Board agrees, the BGC will give access to this information under the
conditions that will be negotiated. Personally, I believe that a
non-disclosure agreement would be necessary, but it is just my opinion.

The good news is that the ICANN Board is at fault as it has not provided
yet the document, which is extremely unlikely, at this point in time, to
reach the BCEC before we produce the slate of candidates. As observed by
Tijani, who chairs the committee who owns the schedule, no extension to
the deadline will be authorized. This means that we have a pretty good
reason for asking that the full voting body has access to the 360
review, because the BCEC did not have it on time to take it into account.

The bad news is that the reference letters and the interviews with the
referees, that have been recorded are also part of the documentation on
which the BCEC has also committed to confidentiality. For instance, one
referee has explicitly stated that he/she would not have accepted to
provide information if there was any chance of leaking to a wider
audience than the BCEC.

If the ALAC voting members believe that reference checking is an
essential part of the evaluation and vote, I recommend that action is
taken as soon as possible to contact all referees and ask their explicit
authorization for releasing the reference letters and/or recordings to a
wider audience. Be aware that I expect some refusals, and in this case
you need to decide how to weight the not accessible references.

I know that this is a sticky issue that will cause a lot of traffic, but
the sooner there is a decision, the better it is. For my part, I can
confirm that I will remain committed to the non-disclosure paper that I
have signed.

Cheers,

Roberto

*Da:*Roberto Gaetano [mailto:roberto_gaetano at hotmail.com]
*Inviato:* martedì 17 dicembre 2013 18:20
*A:* Olivier MJ Crepin-Leblond (ocl at gih.com)
*Cc:* 'ICANN At-Large Staff'; 'ALAC Working List'
*Oggetto:* Confidentiality

I was trying unsuccessfully to ask for the floor after the comments from
Tijani and Alan, maybe my line was muted, then I had to go back to my
meeting, where I am right now.

I would like to go on record saying that:

·         I share completely what Tijani has said -- as a matter of fact
we had discussed and agreed in Buenos Aires our common position. The
wider the number of people that have access to a piece of information,
the higher the risk that we have leaking data, and from that on the step
to the information being public is very small.

·         BCEC has taken the issue of confidentiality very seriously, I
have consulted with the NomCom Chair and with ICANN General Counsel and
then decided to require the non-disclosure to be signed by all, before
giving access to confidential material.

·         If the principle of access to the current Board member
evaluation by the voters, although being a theoretically valid question,
brings as a corollary the question on why should the voters also not
have access to the reference letters for all candidates. You see that,
step by step, we can undermine completely the confidentiality, and
therefore the trust in the process.

·         The ALAC can decide to open up to a larger audience but I
would strongly recommend, if you do so, to at least require a
non-disclosure similar to the one that BCEC members have signed. I would
also encourage you to look for advice by General Counsel.

·         The hypothesis of having BCEC members to informally share
information with the regional voters is in open violation of the
confidentiality agreement signed by BCEC members.

Thanks,

Roberto