Minutes of Technical Policy Committee - 25 February 2008

Present: Jamie Baddeley (Chair), Don Stokes, Peter Macaulay.

In attendance: Keith Davidson, Campbell Gardiner, Simon Riley.

Opened: 3.08pm

Apologies: Sam Sargeant, Jonny Martin (Apricot Conference, Taipei).

Minutes of Last Meeting – 13 December 2007:

Minutes of last meeting adopted as a true and accurate record.

Action Points / Matters Arising from the Previous Minutes

Previous AP - Jamie to forward a list of network integrator contacts to Keith.

Previous AP - Keith to begin conversations re: IPv6 with network integrators.

Project Priorities

IPv6 and Certificate Authority projects rank high on the list of priorities. NZCERT is also a high priority; brief discussion followed on the latest document from Brendan Murray, and whether we buy into the mini-CERT “concept” he has presented. Jamie pointed out that Keith’s action point from the last meeting re: potential NZCERT scoping parties is yet to be reported back on.

Broadband Measurement is a mid to high priority; short discussion followed on what InternetNZ wants to achieve from the project from a policy and measurement point of view i.e. how good is New Zealand’s Internet infrastructure vs. international.

It was agreed that APRICOT Travel and the World Internet Project are low priorities; business as usual. The Chair then parked the remainder of this agenda item until later in the meeting.

Peter Macaulay left the meeting at 3.25pm.

Simon asked that the Tech-Pol mailing list be sent the relevant project summaries (containing project updates, status, name of project sponsor and staff support person) before each meeting.

Certificate Authority

Liverton’s draft strawman document was presented. Discussion followed on root certificates and the role government plays in establishing and running Certificate Authorities.

Simon pointed out that the CA project has been around for a long time and that Liverton’s strawman, in presenting various scenarios, is a useful document. It was agreed that unpacking and working through the document will require a small workshop. Depending on the outcome/s of a workshop, InternetNZ could then decide where to go with the CA project.

The workshop would be jointly held by the SSC and InternetNZ. Attendees would include the SSC, NZRS, interested Tech-Pol members, including Michael Wallmannsberger and some from the research community. Don suggested TradeMe may also be interested in attending.

Jamie reiterated that Liverton still hasn’t delivered on the objectives of their original CA works proposal.

Discussion followed on quantification of the market opportunity, and ratio of certificate vs. non certificate activity in the .nz domain space. Don questioned how many .nz domain name registrants have certificates; from there it should be relatively easy to work out how much new registration activity requires a certificate. He suggested undertaking a quantitative analysis of demand using NZRS data.

Simon pointed out that the SSC can quantify the .govt demand, and that InternetNZ could crawl non .govt domains using NZRS data. That would be a useful piece of information for a stakeholder workshop jointly hosted by the SSC and InternetNZ.

AP – Jamie to speak with Michael Wallmannsberger about Liverton’s strawman, and with Keith about a joint workshop with SSC.

AP – Keith to discuss with the DNC access to the .nz zone file in order to provide a quantitative analysis of SSL-enabled web servers in .nz.

NZCERT

Brendan Murray’s NZCERT proposal is about New Zealand establishing a low cost foothold in the international CERT community.

Jamie is unwilling to progress the proposal without some kind of an alternative, competitive analysis. And Simon thinks we should ask Brendan how much it would cost, following which InternetNZ could establish the budget impact and perhaps release an RFI/RFP.

It was suggested that staff put together a draft RFI/RFP containing a set of questions relating to establishing a CERT, outlining constraints identified to-date & calling for proposals for improving New Zealand’s computer emergency response situation.

Jamie suggested we send Brendan’s proposal as a strawman to John Hine, Daniel Ayers, Peter Guttmann, Mike Harmon, Peter Benson and Colin Jackson. Based on their views on if and how they think the project should proceed, InternetNZ may release an RFI/RFP.

AP – Keith to ask Brendan about the proposal costs, and let him know it will be released as a strawman.

AP – Staff to release proposal as a strawman to those identified above.

Industry Best Practice Programme

The Best Practice Programme was briefly presented at the NZNOG conference in January. Jamie has received limited feedback from the NOG, with the exception of one attendee who thought the $2500 travel incentive is too low. Jamie suggested following up with the NOG list on the bullet points presented at the conference.

New Zealanders typically don’t engage at the IETF level, and the Best Practice Programme is aimed at encouraging support for a community of practice in New Zealand as a precedent to engaging at IETF levels.

Don believes that floating drafts on the NZNOG list for consensus may prove difficult. Discussion followed on the method proposed for the Best Practice Programme and whether there is the enough energy among the technical community, with Simon noting that the people with the most amount to contribute have the least amount of time.

4.36pm – Keith Davidson joined the meeting

The feedback on Best Practice that Keith has received is positive. He thinks we need to draft a paper to go the NZNOG list, detailing the Best Practice Programme. Nathan Ward, Brian Carpenter, Jonny Martin and Jamie can be involved in formulating the draft, and lend their support when published on list.

AP – Campbell to work with those identified above on drafting a one-page Best Practice summary for the NOG.

Outstanding Items for Keith’s Input

Re: NZCERT - Keith has spoken with Colin Jackson about scoping. Colin is interested but is tied up with OOXML at present. The Chair appraised Keith of the NZCERT discussion held earlier in the meeting. Keith agreed that an email be sent to those identified asking for feedback on Brendan’s CERT “strawman”.

Re: CA – Keith thinks a workshop to work through Liverton’s strawman is a good idea but noted that the invite list will have to be carefully considered.

Broadband Measurement

Jamie pointed to a website run by US-based firm Keynote (www.internethealthreport.com), which provides a matrix of interconnectivity between all providers in the USA. He has spoken briefly with Keynote about replicating this in New Zealand, and wants a teleconference with Keynote and someone from the InternetNZ office to discuss further.

Epitiro is missing the interconnected status of providers, which can show for instance the outcomes of peering. It is also important to ensure we understand things from both a consumer perspective and an inter-provider perspective.

Keith has received a report from MediaLab/WAND, which will be circulated among Tech-Pol for discussion.

Broad discussion on the “problem we’re trying to solve,” and what we want to measure. For instance, helping consumers being more aware of the difference in quality of service providers, and measuring key indicators such as latency, packet loss and jitter.

AP – Keith to circulate MediaLab/WAND report to Tech-Pol for comment.

AP – Jamie and Keith to arrange a teleconference with Keynote.

IPv6

Jamie is still to forward his list of network integrator contacts to Keith.

The Packet Clearing House IPv6 workshop will be held in Christchurch later this year. Keith also will be in Christchurch shortly and is planning to visit Allied Telesyn among others to discuss IPv6. Minister Cunliffe, apparently, has also been getting animated about IPv6.

The APNIC meeting is in August 2008, and the APAN meeting in Queenstown. Simon is concerned that a team of active participants needs to be put in place ASAP to start organising the IPv6 Hui. Keith noted that there is a team who will shortly kick into gear. Simon suggested having Christine Gooding as the Christchurch-based logistics person for the Hui.

NZNOG

Item not discussed.

Honeypot

Item not discussed.

Technical Capability Development Fund

Keith has taken some money out of the fund for sponsoring two people to attend Webstock. He noted that InternetNZ got very low “bang for our buck” in terms of sponsorship.

AP - Keith to advise Council/Tech-Pol of amount used from TCDF for the Webstock attendees.

Project Priorities (Cont…)

Keith believes IPv6 is the top priority, closely followed by Certificate Authority and NZCERT. Best Practice and Broadband Measurement rank equal third in priority.

Re: Peering – a report and media release is pending from ISPANZ. Discussion on peering next steps with Keith noting that the Ministry of Culture and Heritage broadcasting bill (workshops) will bring together content and service providers and could be a good opportunity to re-engage with people re: peering.

Broad discussion on the nature of peering, including metered models.

General Business

There were no items of general business.

Closed: 5.21pm

Date of next meeting: TBC

Signed as a true and correct record:

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Jamie Baddeley, Chair

Action Points Register as at: 25 February 2008