On 26 June 2009 the Board of Directors of the Internet Corporate for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) approved a resolution (2009.06.26.18: http://www.icann.org/en/minutes/resolutions-26jun09.htm#6) requesting that the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) and the Security and Stability Advisory Committee (SSAC), in consultation with staff, convene an Internationalized Registration Data Working Group (IRD-WG) comprised of individuals with knowledge, expertise, and experience in these areas to study the feasibility and suitability of introducing display specifications to deal with the internationalization of registration data.

The Board further directed the IRD-WG to solicit input from interested constituencies including country code top level domain (ccTLD) operators and the Country Code Names Supporting Organization (ccNSO) during its discussions to ensure broad community input. Subsequently, the SSAC and the GNSO formed the IRD-WG. On 15 November the IRD-WG published an Interim Report (http://gnso.icann.org/issues/ird/ird-wg-final-report-15nov10-en.pdf) that summarizes the Group's discussions. This Interim Report was posted for Public Comment through 14 March 2011. This session provides a preliminary discussion of the comments received on the Interim Report both in the Public Forum and in targeted outreach sessions for the ICANN community.

Who Should Attend? | Registrars, registries, and other third parties who need to examine and understand the issues related to supporting characters from local scripts in the context of current and future applications that provide for the submission, usage and display of domain names and registration data, including WHOIS.