The body that manages the global internet domain name system has opened a ‘hub office’ in the Turkish city of Istanbul, which in turn is planned to cover Africa.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) performs functions such as coordinating the global Domain Name System (DNS), Internet Protocol (IP) addresses and country code (ccTLD) Top-Level Domain name systems.
ICANN has opened the office as part of its plans to spread its operational functions across three global headquarters: Los Angeles, Istanbul and Singapore.
“We chose Istanbul because of the quality of its infrastructure, growing ICT sector, business-friendly environment and its close cultural and geographic proximity to Europe, the Middle-East and Africa,”says ICANN chief executive officer Fadi Chehadé
The Istanbul hub office is planned to be led by David Olive, ICANN’s vice president for policy development.
ICANN says a number of its staff are also planned to relocate to Istanbul over the coming months while local staff are expected to be hired as well.
Binali Yıldırım, Turkey’s minister of transport, maritime affairs, and communications; said, “The ICANN European HUB is being established in Istanbul to act as an epicenter that will help shape internet policy to deliver a more connected community across Europe, Middle East and Africa.”
ICANN currently is overseeing the implementation of more than 1,400 new generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs), representing one of the biggest changes to the internet since its inception. The first wave of these domains will come online in the coming months.
One of the newly proposed top level domain names is .africa.
Earlier this year, ICANN said it plans to expand in Africa by having six new ICANN representatives on the continent.
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