Save Domain Privacy

[Jenna Weidenbenner <jvweidenbenner@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear ICANN,

As a high school teacher and youth minister, I count on domain privacy to
protect my identity as well as the identities of the youth I interact with
online. I have several domains reserved (mostly unbuilt) for various
projects involving sensitive topics (such as recovering faith after
childhood sexual abuse or advocacy within the LGBT community) as well as
student assignments. Although I'm careful to avoid revealing specific
identifying details about location or names of people and to ensure
appropriate attributions of any referenced materials, the proposed changes
to proxy providers would allow any complainant to request my personal
information from GoDaddy if they perceive a trademark or copyright
infringement.

Perception of infringement can be highly subjective to a layperson, since
there is room for interpretation in Fair Use for classrooms, derivations of
digital work, and creative works inspired by popular culture. If a
complaint can be lodged without a formal legal process for demonstrating a
credible basis for the complaint, a disreputable opponent/competitor could
claim content infringement merely to discover identifying information for
the website owner and launch an ideological attack. This would not only put
me at risk for religious and sexual harassment -- for which the current
climate in the US is well primed -- but would also allow people to readily
triangulate my information via other internet sources and identify some of
the vulnerable individuals I try to protect.

At the very least, requesting domain holders' information should require a
legal process with verification of the alleged complaint and oversight to
ensure complaints are legitimate and identifying details secure in the
hands of legal counsel rather than anyone who feels justified in bringing a
complaint.

Thank you for considering the need to protect vulnerable voices and
identities in online spaces via proxy services.

Best,
Jennifer Weidenbenner
-- 
Jennifer Venker Weidenbenner, MLIS, MAT
PhD Student, Biblical Counseling
Instructor, PSY 101 (Introduction to Psychology)

(217) 778-4963

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/creativej
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