US officials, lawmakers and technology leaders offered a resounding “no” on Thursday to proposals to bring the Internet under United Nations' control and said they would lead efforts to stop the move.
At a congressional hearing, the comments were united in opposition to place the Internet under the jurisdiction of the International Telecommunications Union, a U.N. agency which governs telecom systems.
A top State Department official reaffirmed the opposition of the Obama administration to U.N. governance of the Internet, saying intergovernmental controls over the Internet would lead to “very bad outcomes”. “It inevitably would diminish the dynamism of the Internet,” the official said.
The comments come ahead of a meeting in December of the ITU where some nations will be pressing for the agency to formally govern the Internet.
Some nations, including Russia and China, say the Internet is still controlled by the United States and that a U.N. effort would give a greater voice to the developing world. But many in the U.S. fear a U.N.-governed Internet would give authoritarian nations the power to throttle free speech, and allow others to impose tariff or other restrictions.
