Late last night, ICANN announced that its Board of Directors “made the decision to reject the proposed change of control and entity conversion request that Public Interest Registry (PIR) submitted to ICANN.” A private entity company called Ethos Capital had a deal in place to acquire .org registry operator Public Interest Registry from the Internet Society. The news was shared on Twitter at around 10:30pm Eastern:
After a thorough evaluation process, the #ICANN Board is withholding consent to the request for a change of control of the Public Interest Registry (PIR). Read Board Chair Maarten Botterman’s blog for more information > https://t.co/qz8ub99lOt pic.twitter.com/oFrM0pulyM
— ICANN (@ICANN) May 1, 2020