Hearing on Internet Domain Name System
Testimony of
Dr. George Strawn, Division Director
Advanced Networking Infrastructure and Research
National Science Foundation
Before the House Commerce Committee
Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade and Consumer
Protections
June 10, 1998
Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, thank you
for allowing me the opportunity to give a brief presentation
on the Internet domain name system, how it began,
why it was created and how it operates. I am Dr. George
Strawn, Division Director for Advanced Networking
Infrastructure and Research in the Directorate for
Computer and Information Science and Engineering of
the National Science Foundation.
Federal government support of fundamental research
and development has been critical to the growth of
the Internet and information technology in the United
States. The Internet has its roots in the pioneering
work supported by the federal government over several
decades: from research first supported by the Department
of Defense in the mid 1960's, to the sponsorship of
the NSFNET by the National Science Foundation in the
mid-1980's, to today's robust global activity on the
World Wide Web.
According to the Computing Research Association, the
United States now holds a commanding lead in Internet
technology and that lead is "the result of an extraordinary
50-year partnership among government, industry and
academia". That partnership was integral to the creation
of the Internet and will be integral to the creation
of the next generation of computer-communication technologies.
NSF has supported some of the most successful and
innovative computer-communications concepts and technologies
at their earliest, most experimental stages.
Significant NSF-supported breakthroughs include:
- Creation of the popular MOSAIC web browser
software - This development spawned industry
leader Netscape Communications and eventually
led to the blossoming of a multi-billion dollar
industry.
- Network video-conferencing software - CUSeeMe
Software developed through NSF support was one
of the first software programs for low-cost video
conferencing. It is the precursor of most Internet
video conferencing software commercially available
today. CUSeeMe is now available free on the Internet
and is widely used in many elementary and secondary
schools.
- CAVE 3-D Virtual Reality - This 3-D environment
gives scientists and engineers a powerful tool
to visualize their data. A researcher can walk
through the enzyme she is studying or fly through
a developing galaxy as seen, for example, in the
new IMAX film "Cosmic Voyage".
This support has led to significant accomplishments
and breakthroughs that have not only pushed the frontiers
of science and engineering forward, but have created
real economic and societal benefits for the Nation
and the American people. At NSF we are proud of our
record of accomplishment in computer networking and
communications. We hope to build on this record in
the future.
NSF Support of the Internet
To understand the complex issue of Internet Domain
Name registration more fully, I want to first discuss
briefly NSF's role in fostering the growth of the
Internet. The domain name issue has roots in the early
development of the Internet and the present system
of domain name registration stems from decisions made
when the Internet was conceived and used as a tool
dedicated primarily for research and education.
The Internet began with the creation of a system for
communication among networks designed and used by
small groups of government and academic researchers.
The earliest group was engaged in military research
that received principal support from the Department
of Defense in the 1960's and 70's. Scientists and
engineers at U.S. universities working on basic research
funded primarily by the National Science Foundation
soon began to join the network. In the mid-1980's,
NSF began supporting national supercomputing centers
in order to enable U.S. scientists, engineers and
their students greater access to state-of-the-art,
high performance computing.
Creation of these national supercomputer centers by
NSF was critical to the development of the Internet.
To further enhance U.S. scientists' access to these
centers, NSF established the NSFNET national backbone
network that connected the NSF supercomputing centers
to U.S. universities. NSF also promoted the creation
of regional networks to connect colleges and universities
to the NSFNET. When the NSF-supported regional networks
sought additional members from the private sector,
one of the great technology transfer successes of
all time was set in motion.
I cannot overstate the enormous differences in the
computing and communications environment just a few
short years ago when compared with today. A good example
is the vast increases in computing power that have
occurred during this time. Today a Nintendo game machine
contains roughly the same amount of computing power
as the most powerful supercomputers in the world of
only a few years ago.
The Domain Name System - A Brief
Overview
The Internet is now a mainstream communications medium.
You cannot watch T.V., listen to radio or glance at
a billboard without seeing an Internet domain name.
Domain names are the .gov's, .edu's and especially
the .com's, where individuals, governments, schools
and corporations maintain a presence on the World
Wide Web.
A key strength of the Administration's White Paper
is that it is comprehensive in scope, creating a new
not-for-profit entity formed by the private sector
that will address all of the elements of the Domain
Name System. This is because the domain name system
is actually comprised of several elements that work
together, including:
- Internet Protocol Numbers and their assignment;
- The Root Server System - a set of file servers
that together contain authoritative databases
listing all top level domains; and
- The system of registering names for Internet users
- the familiar .com, .edu domain names and others.
Like the phone in your home or office, each of the
millions of individual computers connected to the
Internet has one or more unique 12 digit numeric "addresses"
to permit other connected computers to send communications
to it. Thus every computer connected to the Internet
has a numeric address, called an IP number.1
The domain name system was an attempt to make these
numeric addresses unnecessary to remember. Initially
when there were only a few hundred computers connected
to the network, users informally assigned names to
their computers and these names were tracked and associated
with their corresponding numbers in a file maintained
centrally but available to all sites. The current
domain name system came into being in 1987, when the
Department of Defense was still the principal supporter
of what was then a mostly U.S. domestic system of
the interconnected networks forming the Internet.
The Internet at this point had grown to about 2,000
active computers and a decision was made to implement
a formalized hierarchy of alphabetic names and a regular,
scalable system for their distribution. Most of the
connected sites could be easily identified by their
institutional name and a three letter descriptive
abbreviation known as top level domains or TLDs:
- .INT for international treaty organizations;
- .MIL and .GOV for military and civilian federal
agencies;
- .EDU for colleges and universities;
- .ORG for non-profit entities;
- .NET for network service providers; and
- .COM for commercial entities.
The three-letter Top Level Domains were intended to
describe the type of organization that was registering.
As the system expanded to other countries, two-letter
country codes such as .UK for the United Kingdom,
.FR for France, or .CA for Canada were added, among
many others.
History of Domain Name Registration
In the mid-1980s, most new registrants on the "research
internet" were research and educational institutions
- primarily in the .edu TLD - which were likely to
be supported by NSF and other civilian research agencies,
rather than military sites and defense contractors.
Consequently, DOD sought to reduce its involvement
and funding.2
When DoD determined that it was no longer appropriate
for them to support non-military registration that
was unrelated to the defense effort, a group of the
federal agencies involved in using or supporting the
Internet3
asked NSF to assume responsibility for supporting
registration services for the non-military portion
of the Internet.
In April 1993, in order to serve an expanding base
of research and education users, NSF, after an open,
competitive process, entered into a 5-year cooperative
agreement with Network Solutions, Inc.. Our objective
was to provide support for Internet registration services
for the non-military part of the Internet, which was
then primarily composed of research and education
institutions.
When the Internet was a U.S. government-supported
research project, the original authority overseeing
the registration of Internet addresses rested on the
consent of the governed. Today, the vast majority
of domain name registrants are commercial interests
whose activities now go well beyond the research and
education community that NSF is chartered to serve.
Now that the Internet is a global industry, the "Internet
Community" is struggling to find an appropriate structure
commensurate with the demands and novel issues of
this burgeoning enterprise.
This rapid growth and transfer to the private sector
of the Internet is a success story of which the Congress
and the Executive Branch should be proud. In 1980,
scientists and engineers had only limited access to
the highest levels of computational power. Today,
they employ desktop systems with power comparable
to the supercomputers of the late 1980's and now,
linking these workstations through the Internet, these
same scientists and engineers also have access to
a collection of supercomputing facilities with capabilities
they could only dream about a decade ago. Over this
same period, the number of host computers on what
is now the Internet has leapt from about 200 to over
10 million in 1996 -- a 50,000 fold increase.
The Future of Domain Name Registration:
Promoting Private Sector Solutions
NSF has been slowly withdrawing our support of technologies
and concepts related to the commercialized Internet.
This shift includes our decommissioning of the original
NSFNET backbone in 1995 and our recent determination
that further support of Internet domain name registration
should be transferred to the private sector.
The reason for this transition is obvious. It is clear
that the Internet is now the domain of the venture
capitalist, not the adventurous academic. Internet
companies that did not exist five years ago are now
giants in a billion-dollar industry and are front
page news. The Internet has become a global communications
infrastructure, it is no longer a medium that primarily
supports the conduct of Federally-supported research
within the science and engineering research and education
community -- the original reason for NSF involvement.
NSF believes its strength and expertise lies in the
support of merit-based, cutting-edge research and
education in such areas as the Next Generation Internet
Initiative. Through these new initiatives, the Foundation
hopes to take computing, information and networking
to a new level of technological, economic, educational,
and societal impact, continuing to enhance Internet
capabilities for research and education and subsequently
for many other societal purposes. NSF will continue
to invest in research and education efforts to change
how we learn and create, how we work and how we live.
While NSF has determined that our role in domain name
registration should be concluded, we also recognize
our special relationship with the Internet. That is
why we support the principles for management of the
Domain Name System that are expressed in the just-issued
White Paper. We will do so by pursuing the following
objectives:
- Ensuring Stability - While we will no longer provide
support for what is now a private sector enterprise,
we will promote actions that will ensure stability
of the system - a system that works;
- Promoting Self-Support - NSF will pursue policies
that will spur private sector solutions to Internet
registration. It is our belief that this transition
should occur as soon as is practicable.
As I mentioned earlier in my testimony, we are proud
at NSF of our record of accomplishment in fostering
the growth of the Internet and we hope to build on
this record in the future. This means that NSF will
turn to supporting even more innovative communications
and computing projects, while the private sector should
be allowed to take the lead in solving the "growing
pain" problems associated with the Internet. That
is why NSF is working with the Department of Commerce
and the other relevant agencies to ensure a smooth
transition to a regime where the Internet can continue
to flourish as a stable global communications network
of the 21st Century, free of overly intrusive federal
regulation or oversight.
Thank you.
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