Description:
As ordered reported by the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on May 8, 2014
Under current law, the National Telecommunications and Information Agency (NTIA) has certain responsibilities in overseeing the Internet Domain Name System (DNS): the system that maintains files that link domain names with numerical addresses needed to locate computer services and devices. The agency has announced plans to transfer those responsibilities to the international community; in preparation for that event, NTIA has requested a proposal from global stakeholders outlining a transition plan.
H.R. 4342 would prohibit NTIA from relinquishing those responsibilities until the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has prepared a report reviewing the proposed transfer. The report must analyze advantages and disadvantages of NTIA’s diminished role, the proposals received from the international community for the transition plan, and the process NTIA and other agencies would use to evaluate those proposals. GAO would have one year after NTIA receives a proposal to complete the report.
CBO estimates that implementing H.R. 4342 would cost about $1 million over the 2015-2019 period, assuming the availability of appropriated funds. That amount includes administrative costs that would be incurred by NTIA as a result of the delay in transferring its DNS oversight responsibilities to a new organization and costs for GAO to prepare the required report. Pay-as-you-go procedures do not apply to this legislation because it would not affect direct spending or revenues.
H.R. 4342 contains no intergovernmental or private-sector mandates as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act and would not affect the budgets of state, local, or tribal governments.
