German Regional Court to Reconsider ICANN GDPR Case
A German court will revisit its ruling in ICANN's case against domain registrar EPAG, ICANN blogged. The injunctive action, filed in May in the Regional Court in Bonn, asked for "assistance in interpreting" the EU general data protection regulation after…
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EPAG said it will no longer collect registrants' administrative and technical contact information when it sells new domain names, for fear of violating the regulation (see 1805280001). The court ruled against ICANN (see 1805310014), which then appealed for an order requiring EPAG to reinstate collection of the data. The regional court had the option of re-evaluating or reaffirming its decision and chose the former to seek comment from EPAG, ICANN said Thursday. It's "pursuing this matter as part of its public interest role in coordinating a decentralized global WHOIS for the generic top-level domain [gTLD] system," ICANN said. Separately, the International Trademark Association said Tuesday it will continue to push for full access to Whois information. ICANN's "temporary specification" for gTLD registration, approved May 17 (see 1805140001), "seriously limits the amount of publicly available information and only provides an anonymous email address or web form from which an email could be forwarded rather than a live contact," INTA said. While the organization recognizes the importance of personal privacy, trademark owners need continued access to all Whois data to protect consumers online, said INTA Senior Director-Internet Policy Lori Schulman.