Comment from the IMF

["Nganga-Malonga, Auguste" <ANGANGAMALONGA@xxxxxxx>]

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) fully supports the comments made by other 
IGOs, including the United Nations, the OECD and the World Bank, in reaction to 
the GNSO recommendations.

These recommendations, while accepting protections for full names at both the 
top and second levels, refuse such protections for IGO acronyms.  Such outcome 
is not only extremely disappointing for the IMF but it also lacks any clear 
rationale.

More specifically, we have the greatest difficulties to understand why 
"International Monetary Fund" would be protected while "IMF" - which is our 
strongest identifier - would not. With the possible delegation of new gTLDs 
such as .fund, .bank, .financial or .financialaid, to take these examples 
alone, the unauthorized use of the acronym IMF in combination with such new 
strings may substantially increase the risks of financial scams and fraudulent 
financial schemes, the victims of which will be - first and foremost- the 
internet end-users ICANN is precisely supposed to protect.

The IMF has faced on many occasions situations involving the fraudulent use of 
its name and acronym, including through websites that sought to give the 
impression that they were official IMF websites, carrying out IMF activities. 
These attempts were mainly in connection with financial schemes seeking to use 
the IMF's name and credibility to attract 'clients', in an attempt to defraud 
them of sums that could reach tens of thousands of dollars. In addition, the 
IMF has a constant stream of email scams which do not involve the use of a 
website, but run the gamut from offering high-yield returns on investments to 
notifying the recipient of a surprise 'inheritance'. In reaction to that, the 
IMF has issued a number of public statements seeking to warn the public of 
these activities, including through its website (See:  
http://www.imf.org/external/scams.htm)

Denying IGOs to protect their acronyms equates to not offering any effective 
protection at all. Limitation of protection to full names would, indeed, defeat 
the very purpose of the envisaged protection and would carry a real cost for 
the vital public missions entrusted to IGOS by their Member States.

The IMF, along with other IGOs, has indicated on many occasions that its 
intention is not to prevent in absolute terms good faith use of its acronyms in 
the DNS by third parties. Rather, the IMF is looking for reasonable solutions, 
respectful of its immunities, that would pre-empt third-party abuse of its name 
and acronym to prevent user confusion.

Moreover, the GAC repeatedly advised that IGOs, as entities created by 
governments under public international law, are in an objectively different 
category to other rights holders and that there is a prevailing global public 
interest to provide special preventative protections for IGO names and acronyms 
at both the top and second levels.

The GNSO recommendations fail to take into account the above, thus forestalling 
any effective protection of IGOs in the DNS. The URS and UDRP are inadequate 
for IGOs, notably in light of IGOs immunities, but also because they are 
curative mechanisms rather than preventative ones. Where the IMF discovers that 
malevolent third parties have usurped its identity to defraud unsuspicious 
users,  harm has often already been done.  With aggravated risks of such 
fraudulent schemes, due to the delegation of new gTLDs, the IMF cannot possibly 
justify to the public opinion and to its 188 Member States that it has to wait 
for the results of protracted dispute resolution mechanisms before stopping 
malevolent third parties to misuse the IMF acronym.

The IMF therefore urges ICANN to adopt real preventative policies to protect 
the name and acronym of the IGOs in the DNS.

Auguste Nganga Malonga

Auguste Nganga Malonga
Counsel
Legal Department
IMF
700 19th Street, N.W.
Washington DC 20431
Tel: (1) 202-623-8144
E-mail: angangamalonga@xxxxxxx<mailto:angangamalonga@xxxxxxx>