Subject: TLD Managers and Wildcard Ethics

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 16 Sep 2003 11:59:55 -0400

Verisign's recent inclusion of wildcard RR's for the .net and .com TLD's
does not violate any standards in the DNS that I can find, although it has
raised some interesting questions with regard to the ethical behavior or
TLD managers.

I think that managers of the TLD's should not be allow to use wild card
RR's in this manner.  I think there is a vast difference between a second
level domain name holder using a wildcard and a TLD manager using a
wildcard.  That differnce being that the TLD managers are custodians of
second level domain names and as such the public trusts that they will
manage that domain name space in a fair and equitable manner.  TLD managers
charge the public for the right to use second level domains.  They should
not be allow to profit from the use of unused second level domains.  I
believe that TLD managers should have to choose between profiting from
their registration services and profiting from the use of the domain name
space they are trusted to manage.

I am not saying that TLD manager's should not be allow to profit from
second level domains they register for themselves.  They should be free to
register any second level domain name they can legally register and use it
for whatever purpose they wish.  They should be specifically prohibited
from using all unregistered second level domains by virtue of the fact that
they can synthisise any second level domain name on the fly due to their
technical position in the resolution path.

David Botham

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From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 16 Sep 2003 12:25:21 -0400

Hi David -

An interesting point, but probably one better made to ICANN.  Try 
[email-masked].  Since its not a standards or protocol issue its probably 
not an IETF issue.

Thanks - Mike

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From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 16 Sep 2003 12:56:54 -0400

> [email-masked].  Since its not a standards or protocol issue its
> probably not an IETF issue.

I disagree that this is not a protocol issue, as it certainly affects
operation of protocols.  There are probably issues for the DNS protocols
also - if nothing else it may be that some claification of the
specification is needed. 

It can be quite reasonable to make wildcard assertions about RRs that
are all within the same administrative domain, but arguably this
condition is not met for the COM or NET zones.

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From: Michael StJohns <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 16 Sep 2003 14:38:12 -0400

Hi Keith  -

>also - if nothing else it may be that some claification of the

I agree that there may be protocol issues, but the email specifically went:

I think that managers of the TLD's should not be allow to use wild card
RR's in this manner.
The remainder of the email was in the same vein.  That's an operational or 
policy issue best addressed elsewhere - and when resolved we should take a 
whack at the protocol implications.  E.g. how do we get the protocol to 
enforce the policy or does the policy break the robustness principle, etc..

>condition is not met for the COM or NET zones.

Agreed - but again, unless it breaks the protocol or has an adverse impact 
on robustness, (and not just some number of bottom lines) its probably 
better to resolve the policy issue before putting fingers on the protocol.

If someone wants to bang on DNS absent policy discussions - this may be the 
right place to start, with a very quick trip to namedroppers once the 
relevance was established.

My $.02...

Mike

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From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 16 Sep 2003 15:55:15 -0400

> better to resolve the policy issue before putting fingers on the protocol.

As convenient as it might be to find an excuse to keep IETF out of this
I don't think we can meaningfully separate discussions about the DNS
protocol from discussions about DNS semantics.

That, and we've put up with too much abuse from VeriSign for too long.