2026-03-26 APRALO Policy Forum Webinar Series on A Multilingual Internet: Webinar #2: IDN Policies and Implementation

Date: Thursday, 26 March 2026

Time: 06:00 - 07:15 UTC (for the time in various time zones click here)

Zoom Registration: https://icann.zoom.us/meeting/register/_y89VstfQmChbVRzXMFxmA

(After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.)

Zoom Recording: EN

Chat:

Participants: Satish Babu, Justine Chew, Abdulrahman Abotaleb, Adebunmi Akinbo, Amrita Choudhury, Antonia Chu, Ashirwad Tripathy, Ashutosh Maharaj, Barkha Manral, Bukola Oronti, Cheryl Langdon-Orr, Christabel Mebaghandu, Dipankar Barua, Gunela Astbrink, Juliana Harsianti, K Mohan Raidu, Manas Joshi, Maureen Hilyard, Mohammad Abdul Haque Anu, Mustafa Alhalawi, Riyadh Zehrah, Saima Nisar, Nancy Kanasa, Naomi Emma Ekwealor, Norman Angel, Pramod Dhungana, Priyatosh Jana, Valentine Melkudi, Aftab Siddiqui, Olaide Olawuwo, Aris Ignacio, Frank Anati, Rupam Barui, Taruna Bamrah

Apologies: Harsha Wijayawardhana

Staff: Sarmad Hussain, Pitinan Kooarmornpatana, Gisella Gruber, Siranush Vardanyan, Yeşim Sağlam

Call Management: Yeşim Sağlam

 

 

Following the first webinar on Multilingual Domain Names, the APRALO Policy Forum is delighted to present the second in the series of 3 webinars to introduce ICANN’s goal for a “Multilingual Internet” and its engagement of relevant stakeholders to deliver this goal.

You are invited to Webinar #2: Multilingual Domain Names on 26 March 2026 at 06:00 UTC for 75 minutes, where Satish Babu will host Sarmad Hussain, Senior Director, IDN & UA Programs, ICANN and Pitinan Kooarmornpatana, IDN Programs Director, ICANN in an introduction to IDN related policies and their implementation for enabling secure and stable use of IDNs under both gTLDs and ccTLDs.

If you are unfamiliar with the ICANN IDN Program, IDN related policies and wonder how these and you can contribute in making the Internet truly multilingual, then join us and get your answers! 

Don't forget to pre-register your participation! And if you have any, please let us have your questions on this topic by posting them as comments to this wiki page below; or if you prefer,submit them by emailing staff at staff@atlarge.icann.org

Open

1. Staff introduction - Staff (2 mins)

2. Welcome and introduction - Satish Babu (2 mins)

Session content - Sarmad Hussain and Pitinan Kooarmornpatana (60 mins) 

Open

3. Background: Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) Variant Issues Project (Sarmad, 10 Mins)

• Motivation: Variants identified for Han in RFC 3743 in 2004, IDN ccTLD Fast Track Process in 2009.

• Six script case studies in 2011, followed by Integrated Issues Report 2012

• Variant TLD Definitions: Root Zone Label Generation Rule (RZ-LGR) and RFC 7940

• Variant TLD Management: IDN Variant TLD Recommendations

4. IDN Policies (Sarmad, 20 Mins)

• Final Report on the new gTLD Subsequent Procedures Policy Development Process (SubPro)

• IDN Expedited Policy Development Process (IDN EPDP Phase 1)

• IDN Expedited Policy Development Process (IDN EPDP Phase 2)

• Proposals for the (De-)Selection of IDN ccTLD Strings and Variants (ccPDP4)  

5. IDN Implementation in New gTLD Program: 2026 Round (Pitinan, 20 Mins)

• Registry Service Provider (RSP) Program

• DNS Stability Review

• String Similarity Evaluation

• Registry Agreement (Specification 6, Specification 14) 

• IDN Implementation Guidelines version 4.1 

6. What’s Next?  (Pitinan, 10 Mins)

• Single Character TLD, Latin Diacritics PDP, IDN PDP Phase 2 and ccPDP4 Board consideration

7. Q&A / Discussion - moderated by Satish Babu (10 mins)

8. Poll (to run concurrently with Q&A) - Staff

9. Wrap up - Satish Babu (1 min)

Speaker & Moderator Profiles:

Open	Sarmad Hussain has been with ICANN since 2014. He is currently involved with Internationalized Domain Names and Universal Acceptance initiatives at ICANN. He has a background in research and development of local language technology, including localization and specifically speech and language processing. He has been a professor of Computer Science before joining ICANN.
Open	Pitinan Kooarmornpatana is a Computer Engineer professional. Pitinan joined ICANN in August 2017 as an Internationalized Domain Name (IDN) Programs Manager. She is currently focused on facilitating various Script Generation Panels to develop the Label Generation Rules proposals for the root zone. She previously worked as a Director of Information Technology Infrastructure Office in the Electronic Transactions Development Agency, in Thailand. Prior to that, she worked as a Business Analyst at Accenture, and has worked on projects for both public and private sectors in Thailand, Singapore and Philippines. Pitinan holds a Master of Information System and Management from Carnegie Mellon University in USA. She is passionate in enabling the effective and efficient use of Information Technology for everyone through technology localization.
Open	Satish Babu is an ALAC Member representing the Asian, Australasian and Pacific Islands Regional At-Large Organization (APRALO) and the former APRALO Chair. He was the Co-Chair of the At-Large IDN WG and also represented ALAC on the IDN Implementation Guidelines 4.0 Working Group that worked during 2015-2018. He also represented the ALAC on the Expedited Policy Development Process on IDNs which deal with IDN Variant Management. Satish is based out of India and volunteers in multiple organizations including ICANN At-Large, Internet Society, IEEE and the Computer Society of India. He is an open source advocate and the founding Director of the International Centre for Free and Open Source Software (ICFOSS) of the Government of Kerala, India.

Post-Event Report: