"Today we are protected against malevolent DNS not by institutions but by
people.  Today all that protects us is the good will of the people who
have their hands on the buttons of the top (root) and intermediary (TLD)
DNS servers.  Those groups who, through historical chance, run one of the
13 root servers happen, are, for the time being, honorable and
public-minded.

"But times change, people change.  And sometimes people, or organizations
are coerced to depart from past behavior.  One of the great failures of
internet governance under the hand of the US Department of Commerce and
it's unacknowledged offspring, ICANN, is that the root servers are
answerable only to themselves."

Karl Auerbach, February 13, 2006

http://www.cavebear.com/cbblog-archives/000232.html