Australian Government Proposes Internet Naming Law

The federal government introduced the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment Bill 2000 into the senate, part of which attempts to clarify the powers of the government in relation to "electronic addressing" services such as Internet domain names. If passed, the government claimed, it will clarify existing provisions in the Telecommunications Act 1997 for the Australian Communications Authority (ACA) and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to declare9 and direct9 a manager of electronic addressing. It will also introduce a new provision into the Australian Communications Authority Act 1997 which would allow Richard Alston to instruct the ACA to assume direct responsibility for an electronic addressing service, "should self-regulation prove inappropriate at any time in the future." "This legislation underpins the Government's strategy to foster effective self-regulation for the .au domain name system," said the National Office for the Information Economy. "Government intervention of this type would only be necessary in extreme circumstances."