Crunch time for US negotiators working to keep Internet rules out of UN treaty

[Geee]

The Hill:

Delegates from the United States are running out of time to bury proposals that could have a major effect on the Internet as a United Nations treaty conference heads into its final week.

 

The top item on the U.S.'s agenda is to confine the scope of the international treaty to telecommunications networks, so its regulations only apply to major operators like AT&T and Verizon. Members of the U.S. delegation, led by Ambassador Terry Kramer, are pushing back against proposals from Russia and other countries that want to include measures in the treaty that apply to the Internet.

But with just days until the conference wraps up on Dec. 14, the matter remains unresolved.

"That's looking very much like one of the sticking points," said Sarah Parkes, a spokeswoman for the United Nations International Telecommunications Union (ITU), which is hosting the treaty conference in Dubai.

The countries are convening to update the U.N. International Telecommunications Regulations treaty for the first time since 1988. The treaty governs how telephone calls and other communications traffic are exchanged internationally.