ICANN Investigating Sexual Harassment During Marrakech Meeting, Seeks Possible Policy Changes
ICANN's ombudsman is continuing to conduct a confidential investigation into allegations of sexual harassment during ICANN’s meeting earlier this month in Marrakech, Morocco. The group does “not condone any such conduct, and there should be zero tolerance for it within…
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the community,” said acting CEO Akram Atallah in a blog post Friday. “ICANN’s staff and Board takes the issue of harassment or other improper conduct at its meetings very seriously.” The behavior standards that ICANN stakeholders are expected to follow during ICANN meetings don’t specifically address sexual harassment incidents, but they do “provide our global, diverse multistakeholder community with a set of high-level guidelines for interacting with one another, which encompasses harassment and other improper treatment of others,” Atallah said. The ICANN board is “looking at whether it makes sense to enhance this language” in light of the incident in Marrakech, he said. ICANN also wants the community to lead any changes to its policy for handling sexual harassment complaints, Atallah said.