[ALAC] Public Comment on Red Cross national names

[Alan Greenberg]

The PC at https://community.icann.org/x/GoRHBQ is 
addressing a set of recommendations to protect at 
the second level the names of the various 
national Red Cross and Red Crescent societies.

I was an active member of the original Red Cross 
name PDP. The national names were not protected 
at that time for a number of reasons, largely 
technicalities. This PDP modification process was 
convened to attempt to correct the process. I 
also joined the reconvened WG, but stopped 
attending after three meetings, largely due to 
the slowness of the deliberations, but I did keep an eye on the mailing list.

The bottom line is that the reconvened PDP is 
recommending that the country names be protected.

In reality, I do not believe that this issue is 
really substantive in that fraudulent activity 
can still occur using minor modification of the 
names. But I believe that we should support it 
because it is significant example of ICANN 
addressing an issue with global public interest 
implications. In particular, one of the arguments 
against reserving these names in the past has 
been that by doing so, we are impacting freedom 
of speech - specifically not allowing other 
parties to use these names. Since these names are 
in fact protected by law in each jurisdiction, I 
personally believe that this argument has little merit.

I am reproducing the statement below for your convenience.

Alan

========

The ALAC appreciates the opportunity to comment 
on the Initial Report on the Protections for 
Certain Red Cross Names in all gTLDs – Policy Amendment Process.

The ALAC has always taken the position that as a 
humanitarian organization, and one that has been 
regularly the target of those seeking to 
fraudulently attract donations, the Red Cross 
should be afforded the courtesy of having its 
various identifiers protected at the second level in gTLD domain names.

The current process recommends additional 
protection in this area and the recommendations are supported by the ALAC.


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