The ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) was an agency that was formed in September 1998 to keep the Internet stable, safe, and secure. It is a not-for-profit partnership organization which has members from all over the world. They oversee the registering of the domain names over the Internet. They also overlook the maintenance of domain names and settle the issues over the trademark of the domains. The ICANN began with and works with one slogan One World, One Internet.

Managing the Domain Name System (DNS) is a crucial and important task. The Internet should be accessed by the common masses and it should flow in the readable format rather than the technical format. The ICANN has given the authority to maintain the websites to more than 1,000 independent registrars who can give the space on the Internet for hosting websites. In the earlier period, the cost of creating a domain was a big task and you needed to pay a lot of money for it. However, after the introduction of the ICANN, the competition in the market increased which lead to price drop of almost 80% in the market. You cannot directly host a website with the ICANN but only with the authorized domain name registrars that are recognized by and come under the purview of the ICANN.

Another significant move by the ICANN is the launch of UNDRP (Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy). The Internet is a market where millions of websites are active. Thousands of websites are given birth to everyday. It’s quite natural that disputes stir up between the websites on issues of ownership. ICANN is the parent organization which resolves the disputes between the websites over various issues. Everyday thousands of disputes are being settled by the ICANN. The introduction of the UNDRP was with the assistance from the World Intellectual Property Organization. Even though the ICANN is an independent organization, it must be legally abide to the laws of United States. It can be taken to court too.

As with the expansion of the Internet, there are new top-level domains (TLD) that enter the online market. It is the ICANN that approves the new entry of domains to increase the online space in the Internet. From time to time, the ICANN gives approvals to several domains. The ICANN has also opened up the Internet by giving access to open the domain names in major international languages.

The role of the ICANN is the fact that it administers this massive and complex structured network. Without the ICANN, the Internet that we see would have been completely different.