The multi-billion dollar juggernaut Tata Group’s efforts
to secure a domain name .tata has hit a Moroccan wall. A province in the
African country bears the same name and has refused to give its endorsement to
Tata’s bid.
Tata Group has now approached the government of India to
open diplomatic channels to impress upon the Moroccan government not to
obstruct its application to Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN). “It is an example of issues faced in internet governance. The Tata
Group has requested the Indian Government to take up the matter with the North
African country through diplomatic channels,” sources said.
The group’s subsidiary TATA Motors has secured .tatamotors
domain name. Officials privy to the case reveal that the events started in 2012
following Tata’s application to ICANN, an American non-profit organisation for
coordinating the maintenance and procedures of databases of the name spaces of
the internet. After years of deliberations and evaluations, ICANN changed the
status of the industrial giant from “on hold” to “Will not proceed” in 2015.
Experts say that this means a nudge to the company to withdraw its application.
The bone of contention is a province in Morocco with a population
of about 150,000. This makes ‘Tata’ a protected geographic name, and the onus
is now on the Tata Group to show ‘unequivocal’ endorsement or non-objection
from the provincial government of Tata. Morocco has apparently written a letter
to ICANN that it may want the .tata domain name for itself.
As organisation ICANN is fine-tuning its rules for internet
governance, there have been instances of confusion previously.
DotConnectAfrica’s application for .Africa first got an endorsement from an
African Union representative only to be withdrawn later.
Officials say that the issue can be resolved amicably and
building Tata province a new school may open the doors for the Indian
conglomerate that has its presence from salt making to high-end luxury cars.
No comments:
Post a Comment