After ICANN and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) signed the Affirmation of Commitments (AOC), Rep. Henry A. Waxman, Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Rep. Rick Boucher, Chairman of the Communications, Technology, and the Internet Subcommittee spoke out in support of the agreement.  Rep. Boucher praised the AOC’s ability to ensure accountability and transparency within ICANN. 
 
Back in June, Rep. Boucher’s committee held a hearing at which the then-CEO of ICANN, Paul Twomey, testified.  A pressing issue at that time was the amount of accountability ICANN had, not only to the government but to all of its shareholders.  There was a consensus among committee members that ICANN needed to be more transparent in its processes and more accountable to the general public.  Later this summer, in August, Rep. Boucher and Rep. Waxman, along with other members of the Energy and Commerce Committee, wrote a letter to Secretary Gary Locke of the DOC calling for an extension of the Joint Project Agreement (JPA) in some form, as well as permanent ties between ICANN and the U.S. government.
 
So it would appear that the mission has been accomplished.  ICANN and the U.S. government are now linked through the new AOC.  There’s just one problem – the AOC doesn’t provide the level of accountability that these Congressmen have called for, never mind the level ICANN needs as an organization.  The AOC creates a number of panels that will periodically review ICANN, and the U.S. government only holds a seat on one of them.  Yes, it is a positive thing that ICANN is still tied to the U.S. government through this agreement, but ICANN is no more accountable than it was under the JPA. 
 
In reality, the AOC simply does not include the accountability mechanisms that they had been pushing for. It is unlikely that this agreement will solve the problems that have existed within ICANN, and there is a chance that those problems will actually get worse.  ICANN cannot fall off Congress’s radar, because there is still work to be done. I hope the AOC is not just a way to check the ICANN issue off their list and check out of the matter without doing more of the important work that needs to be done.