Germany, U.K. Oppose gTLD Intended to Resolve Object Identifiers
GENEVA -- An ITU-T request to ICANN for a top-level domain to resolve object identifiers shouldn’t be sent, Germany and the U.K. said in a submission to the study group developing a recommended international object identifier resolution system. Object identifier (OID) is an extensive hierarchical namespace for identifying countries, organizations, digital certificates, radio frequency identification, global sensors, e-health and power management, said participants in an ITU-T study group on telecom security. The identifiers also are crucial for cybersecurity, participants said. Potentially, many companies could implement a system for resolving OIDs, Rutkowski said.
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Object identifiers are allocated to many countries and organizations, including ICANN and the IANA secretariat, said study group participants. The object identifier namespace lacks a real-time resolution mechanism similar to that provided by the Internet domain name system, participants said. The proposed OID resolution system uses the DNS protocol between OID resolution clients and servers, they said.
Some opposition has emerged to the idea implementing the OID namespace at a top-level domain, participants said. A backup plan aims to implement the system as OID.ARPA, following previous examples “INternet ADDRess” and ENUM, said Tony Rutkowski of Netmagic Associates. “The ARPA namespace is almost equally satisfactory,” but will require more keystrokes from users, he said.
A third plan suggests letting “the Asia-Pacific continue to run it as an independent DNS implementation and Balkanize the DNS system,” Rutkowski said. South Korea, China and Japan implemented a DNS-based solution in the Asia-Pacific region for resolving a significant portion of the OID namespace in the “Internet of things,” he said. Plugging it and other portions into the larger DNS namespace boosts global functionality, Rutkowski said. Impeding the OID resolver system would fragment the Internet domain name space, Rutkowski said.
Reservation of a top-level domain is premature “and should be postponed,” Germany said. No support would be given for obtaining a gTLD of “.oid” without clarification of funding and management issues, the U.K. said. TLD management and costs should first be considered, Germany said. “Since DNS may have some weaknesses,” the OID resolution system technical aspects should be sufficiently clarified, Germany said. Alternative solutions should be investigated, Germany said, and ITU-T participants dealing with naming and number should be consulted.
The U.K. strongly urged discussion of implementation issues associated with “.oid.arpa” to “rapidly progress” the object identifier resolution system, the U.K. said. Infrastructure registration allocations under “.arpa” have been set by “.e164.arpa” in ITU-T, the U.K. said. Expert participants in the organization’s work on naming and numbering can give useful advice on procedures, time-scales and costs for establishing “.oid.arpa”, the U.K. said.
DNS-related issues should be urgently resolved in the draft recommendation for the object identifier resolution system, the U.K. said. Suggestions that the OID resolution system could be implemented with DNS server software with a DNS-like architecture and an independent root of “.oid” in what’s loosely dubbed a private DNS, “would add confusion to the world-wide use of the DNS,” the U.K. said.
Using “.oid.itu.int” isn’t recommended because the International Organization for Standardization and the International Electrotechnical Commission are also involved, the U.K. said. Rules for allocation under “.int” preclude using “oid.int,” the U.K. said.
If “.oid.arpa” is obtained from ICANN, a cost benefit analysis and commercial model should determine who would run the server containing the zone files for “.oid”, the U.K. said. The zone files and server should be managed by an independent organization, the U.K. said. An organization similar to South Korea’s National Internet Development Agency should be considered for managing and maintaining the zone files for “.oid.arpa” subject to “commercial, management and regulatory policy agreements,” the U.K. said.