As we approach the end of 2023, our ICANN Latin American and Caribbean Global Stakeholder Engagement (LAC GSE) team is beginning to review its work and prepare for future engagement efforts in 2024. As always, we have kept ourselves busy. This year, we made notable contributions towards empowering members of ICANN's technical community and engaging in discussions on Internet governance. During 2023, we engaged in over 70 meetings and events (face-to-face and online), reaching a huge number of stakeholders across the region.
Since the launch of the Knowledge-Sharing and Instantiating Norms for DNS and Naming Security (KINDNS) initiative, our team has been actively promoting it at every technical engagement opportunity. This ICANN-sponsored initiative provides a vital resource for DNS operators of any size when adopting modern DNS security best practices in a simple and self-paced fashion.
As a very welcome result, NIC.br adopted the recommendations offered through the KINDNS initiative and partnered with ICANN to post a YouTube training in Portuguese this October titled "Setting up your DNS Simply and Securely." The three-hour course has already received over 9,000 views. Many thanks to NIC.br for the partnership!
The commitment of NIC.br was only one notable example. Overall, we found that regional Internet service providers (ISPs) welcomed the opportunity to review and adopt KINDNS best practices. As a result of our efforts, the LAC region currently leads in the number of DNS operators participating in the KINDNS initiative. We wish to extend a big thank you to the LAC technical community for engaging with us and helping make the Internet safer for everyone, especially in the LAC region. A special thanks goes to our KINDNS champions: PowerNet Solutions, Solução Network, i8 Digital Brazil, RNP Brazil - EduDNS, Brazil Tecpar, Intercol Brazil, and Tempus Group Paraguay.
As previously announced, our team actively promoted the first DNSSEC Day Paraguay. Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) ensure origin validation and integrity of DNS queries responses. Like most things related to the Internet, DNSSEC requires collaboration across many organizations to work, including from domain name registries, registrars, and ISPs. Participants in the inaugural event learned from experts on how the technology operates, its importance, and how to implement it in cooperation with their providers.
To celebrate DNSSEC Day Paraguay, the LAC GSE team partnered with La Asociación de Proveedores de Servicio de Internet del Paraguay (ASISPY), NIC.py, and the Centro de Emprendimiento e Internet (CEILAC). Planning for this event began last year, and on 21 September 2023, we celebrated the adoption with ASISPY members during the second ASISPY Meeting in Ciudad del Este, Paraguay.
We are happy to report that over 20 ISPs from Paraguay have joined the initiative so far. Now Paraguay validates over 45 percent of DNS queries with DNSSEC, fourth most in South America according to APNIC Labs.
In addition to these engagement efforts, our team also held events and provided capacity development training across the LAC region, including in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Grenada, Honduras, Mexico, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. We partnered with many local and regional technical organizations such as NIC.ar, the Internet Address Registry for Latin America and the Caribbean (LACNIC), the Latin American and Caribbean Network Operators Group (LACNOG), the Caribbean Network Operators Group (CaribNOG), the Latin American and Caribbean Internet Exchange Points Association (LAC-IX), and the Latin American and Caribbean Top-Level Domains (LACTLD).
Please subscribe to our regional mailing list to learn more about our engagement activities in the LAC region. We look forward to working with you in 2024!
