Since 1999, every domain name registrant who loses a UDRP case has had the same safety net. If you file a lawsuit within ten business days, the registrar puts the transfer on hold until a court decides. ICANN’s proposed rules for disputes brought by intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) would remove that safety net in IGO cases.
On August 9, 2026, Leap of Faith Financial Services Inc. filed 105 pages of comments with ICANN on the proposed implementation. The issues are technical, so we’ve also made a short animated explainer that walks through some of them in under five minutes.
(The video’s narration uses a synthesized voice.)
Why the court stay matters
The UDRP is a fast, low-cost process run by private providers, not courts. Cases are decided on written filings, with no witnesses and no appeal inside the system. That bargain is only tolerable because a real court remains available. Every complainant must agree in advance to be sued in a court tied to the registrar or the registrant. This is called “Mutual Jurisdiction.”
IGOs, such as United Nations agencies and development banks, objected. They claim immunity from national courts. On April 30, 2023, ICANN’s Board adopted a compromise:
- IGOs are excused from Mutual Jurisdiction.
- In exchange, a losing registrant can choose binding arbitration as a backstop if the IGO’s immunity defeats the court case.
The adopted text was explicit. Under EPDP Recommendation 3(iii), the registrar must hold the transfer if the registrant goes to court or requests arbitration.
What the June 2026 drafts actually do
The draft rules ICANN published on June 30, 2026 depart from what the Board adopted. In our review, every departure points in the same direction:
- The court stay is gone. The drafts keep the arbitration trigger and delete the court trigger. A registrant who files a court claim on time still loses the domain on day eleven, while the lawsuit is pending.
- IGOs get a veto. If a registrant asks to arbitrate before the panel decides, the IGO “may, but is not required to, agree.” This contradicts the GNSO Council’s January 2026 confirmation that registrants may choose arbitration at any time.
- The arbitration trigger is too narrow. After a court case, arbitration is allowed only if the court declined on immunity grounds. If the court declines for lack of jurisdiction, no cause of action, or the wrong forum, the registrant gets no review anywhere.
- The notice is misleading. The mandatory notice to registrants drops the adopted words “at any time.”
- The forum is blank. No arbitration institutions, rules, fees, arbitrator lists or seat have been published. The draft literally contains a placeholder: “[link].”
- The time to fix mistakes is unequal. A complainant gets five days to correct a defective filing. A registrant’s defective arbitration request can lead straight to transfer.
- The choice of law is loosened. The adopted “shall elect” became “may elect,” along with other changes that widen the IGO’s options.
Why a premature transfer can’t be undone
When an ordinary complainant wins a domain and a court later rules the other way, the court can order the name returned. An IGO is different. It can claim immunity from the very court asked to order it back. To recover the name, the registrant must first win an immunity fight, in a forum it didn’t choose, at its own expense, years after the transfer. The stay matters because it is the only point at which the domain is still held by a party that court orders can reach.
Why this matters even if you never face an IGO
Short acronyms are some of the most valuable domain names, and many IGOs are known by three- or four-letter acronyms. Registrants who use a domain to comment on or criticize an international organization are the people most likely to need a real court. And rules written for one class of complainant have a way of becoming precedent for others.
Where things stand
The comment period closed on August 10, 2026 with 17 submissions, and ICANN published its summary report on September 1, 2026.
- Our main point was recorded. The report notes our call to restore the court stay.
- One IGO wants even less. In its submission, the OECD argued that letting a registrant request arbitration before a decision isn’t needed, even with the IGO’s consent, and “would only create confusion.” It also argued that the arbitration mechanism was meant only for challenging decisions an IGO has already won. The GNSO Council rejected that reading in January 2026, when it confirmed that registrants may choose arbitration at any time.
- Registrars were absent. No registrar or registrar group commented, although registrars are the ones who would have to operate these rules.
- ICANN gave no specific responses. The report says ICANN org “will consider the input received,” but it doesn’t respond to any of the specific issues we raised.
Bali: “outreach” for arbitration providers, silence for commenters
The IRT reviewed “key issues” and “legal issues” from the public comments in a 75-minute meeting on October 9, 2026. It meets again at ICANN87 in Bali on October 21, 2026, for 60 minutes at 08:30 UTC, which is 4:30 a.m. in Toronto. “Review of Public Comment Analysis” is one item on that meeting’s four-item agenda. That adds up to roughly two hours of meetings to deal with all 17 submissions.
The slides posted for the Bali meeting promise “outreach.” The only outreach they actually show is to arbitration providers, the institutions that hope to be designated to run the new proceedings. Nobody from ICANN has contacted us. The comment deadline passed more than two months ago, on August 10, 2026. In that time, nobody has asked about our 105 pages, the defects we identified, or the corrective text we proposed.
Talking to prospective providers is a legitimate part of implementation, since ICANN has to pick an arbitration institution. But it shows whose input ICANN is actively seeking. Prospective providers are being consulted on how to build the new forum. Registrants, the people who would have to use that forum, are left to find out what happened by reading meeting agendas.
Some of the problems we identified would require the drafts to be substantially rewritten, not tweaked. On the evidence so far, the review of public comments looks like lip service. If the IRT is serious about getting this right, we expect to see three things:
- the comment analysis published,
- each point answered on the record,
- unresolved disagreements referred to the GNSO Council.
A process problem
The IRT that produced these drafts was a closed group of eleven. The Registrar Stakeholder Group had no member on it. We are not permitted to participate. According to the IRT’s own mailing list, the IGO consent veto appeared after IGO participants objected to the GNSO Council’s January 2026 ruling. ICANN’s own guidelines say an IRT is “not a forum for opening or revisiting policy discussions.” The IRT’s job is to implement adopted policy, not to rewrite it.
What we’ve asked ICANN to do
None of this requires new policy. It requires following the policy the Board adopted:
- Restore the court stay, and end it only when the dispute is finally resolved.
- Allow arbitration whenever a court declines to hear the merits, for any reason.
- Remove the IGO veto and restore “at any time” to the notice.
- Publish the arbitration institutions, rules and fees, then reopen public comment on the complete package.
- Refer unresolved questions to the GNSO Council instead of settling them at the drafting table.
When rules can’t foresee a situation, they should default to the outcome that can still be corrected. Delay can be undone. A wrongful transfer to an immune party cannot.
What you can do
- Read the comments. Our full comments (PDF) set out each problem, the adopted text, and proposed corrective wording.
- Share the video with other domain name owners.
- Watch the October 21 meeting. Follow the meeting page and its recording, and see whether the issues above are actually discussed.
- Ask your registrar to weigh in. Registrars must operate these rules, yet none commented and none sat on the IRT. If ICANN is doing outreach, registrars should be on the list.
- Follow the proceeding on their Wiki and on any future public comment periods