To understand Verisign’s anti-competitive monopoly for dot-com domain name registration services, it is important to analyze its agreements with the US government. NTIA has a page on their website documenting aspects of their cooperative agreement with Verisign. However, that page is incomplete, as it only lists Amendments 10 through 35. The original agreement (between the National Science Foundation and Network Solutions) and the first 9 amendments are not published.
A Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request was made to NTIA to obtain those additional historical records. I’m happy to report that NTIA responded to that request and sent all the requested documents. [NB: the US government takes FOIA requests seriously, unlike ICANN’s broken Documentary Information Disclosure Policy, which pretends to be like the FOIA but is far inferior to it]
These documents are published below, to allow the public to research Verisign’s abusive monopoly, learn how it came to be, and understand how it evolved. Perhaps these documents will assist in an eventual challenge of that monopoly.
- Cooperative Agreement No. NCR-9218742 between National Science Foundation and Network Solutions
- Amendment 1
- Amendment 2
- Amendment 3
- Amendment 4
- Amendment 5
- Amendment 6
- Amendment 7
- Amendment 8
- Amendment 9