Ballot Forum-1 Establish Forum Infrastructure Working Group
The voting period for Ballot Forum-1 has ended and the Ballot has passed. Here are the results.
Voting by CAs – 14 votes total including abstentions
- 14 Yes votes: Buypass, Certigna (DHIMYOTIS), DigiCert, Disig, Entrust Datacard, GDCA, GlobalSign, GoDaddy, HARICA, Izenpe, Network Solutions, SSC, TrustCor, Trustwave
- 0 No votes:
- 0 Abstain: 100% of voting CAs voted in favor
Voting by browsers – 6 votes total including abstentions
- 6 Yes votes: Cisco, Google, Microsoft, Mozilla, Opera, 360
- 0 No votes:
- 0 Abstain: 100% of voting browsers voted in favor
Under Bylaw 2.2(g), a ballot result will be considered valid only when more than half of the number of currently active Members has participated. Votes to abstain are counted in determining a quorum. Half of currently active Members as of the start of voting is 10, so quorum was 11 votes – quorum was met.
Bylaw 2.2(f) requires a yes vote by two-thirds of CA votes and 50%-plus-one browser votes for approval. Votes to abstain are not counted for this purpose. This requirement was met for both CAs and browsers.
At least one CA Member and one browser Member must vote in favor of a ballot for the ballot to be adopted. This requirement was met
The ballot passes.
Because this was not a Ballot for a Draft Guideline or Draft Maintenance Guideline, there is no Review Period, and Ballot Forum-1 took effect on August 27, 2018.
Purpose of Ballot The CA/Browser Forum has grown considerably over the last few years and is now dividing its work into multiple working groups to more carefully address specific certificate needs. The responsibilities of managing the various pieces components of infrastructure necessary for the Forum to conduct its work, such as the wiki and mailing lists, has grown considerably. With immense gratitude to each of the Forum members that have helped to provide this infrastructure, the work of managing it should no longer be left as a volunteer best-effort function of any single Forum member. This ballot would establish a working group chartered to help ensure the infrastructure supporting the Forum continues to meet its needs.
The following motion has been proposed by Jos Purvis of Cisco and endorsed by Tim Hollebeek of Digicert and Wayne Thayer of Mozilla.
Motion begins
Establish Forum Infrastructure Working Group
Upon approval of the CAB Forum by ballot in accordance with section 5.3 of the Bylaws, the Forum Infrastructure Working Group (“FIWG”) is created to perform the activities as specified in this Charter, subject to the terms and conditions of the CA/Browser Forum Bylaws and Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Policy, as such documents may change from time to time. The definitions found in the Forum’s Bylaws shall apply to capitalized terms in this Charter.
Scope The authorized scope of the Forum Infrastructure Working Group shall be as follows:
- To oversee the acquisition, operation, and maintenance of the common CA/Browser Forum website and wiki resources;
- To coordinate updates to public and Forum-facing web and wiki content in support of the Forum Webmaster role established in the Bylaws;
- To create and manage the division of access and content spaces required to help ensure the separation of the work of various Working Groups and accompanying IP commitments, as described in the Forum’s IPR Policy;
- To manage the Forum-level email lists and to offer management of working-group and subcommittee mailing lists as needed in support of the Forum List Manager role established in the Bylaws;
- To perform other activities ancillary to the primary activities listed above.
Out of Scope The following items are considered out of scope for the Working Group under this charter: • The FIWG will not address coordination of Forum or Working Group face-to-face meetings. • The FIWG will not create Final Guidelines or Final Maintenance Guidelines as defined in the Bylaws and IPR Policy. • The FIWG shall provide recommendations of infrastructure acquisition or use to the Forum, but shall not impose requirements upon the rest of the Forum. • The FIWG will not address the acquisition or maintenance of software or services used for online meetings of the Forum Plenary or Working Groups. In addition to the above, the work of the FIWG in managing content updates to online content shall be offered to Working Groups and Subcommittees, but shall not supplant the responsibilities of Forum chairs or members to do so as required by the Bylaws.
Anticipated End Date Given that the work of infrastructure support and management is expected to be consistent and ongoing, the FIWG is chartered without a specific end date. However, the FIWG may be dissolved at any time through a Forum ballot, as specified in the Bylaws, section 5.3.2c.
Personnel and Participation Initial Chairs and Contacts The proposer of the ballot, Jos Purvis, will act as chair of the FIWG until the first Working Group Teleconference, at which time the group will select a chair and vice-chair either through election or acclamation of those present. The chair and vice-chair will serve two-year terms, the first of which will start upon their election and run through 31 October 2020.
Members Eligible to Participate The FIWG welcomes the participation of any Member organization of the Forum Plenary interested in this work, and also invites Interested Parties and Associate Members as defined in the Bylaws to participate in its meetings and work. In addition to organizations choosing to participate in the FIWG, the following people shall be automatically declared as Members of the FIWG: • The Forum Plenary Chair; • The Forum Plenary Vice-Chair; • The Forum Plenary Webmaster; • The Forum Plenary List Manager; • The Forum Plenary Questions List Coordinator. The Chair of each Forum Working Group shall be automatically declared a Member of the FIWG unless they specifically designate an alternate in their place. Participation in the FIWG does not alone qualify a participant for Forum membership.
Membership Declaration Member organizations of the Forum that choose to participate in the FIWG may declare their participation and must do so prior to participating, in accordance with the IPR agreements of the Forum. The Chair of the FIWG shall establish a list for declarations of participation and manage it in accordance with the Bylaws and the IPR requirements documents.
Voting and Voting Structure Voting in the FIWG shall be limited to FIWG members who are listed as a voting Member of any other Working Group in the Forum. Voting shall be egalitarian: all Members shall vote together as a single class, with one vote granted to each Member organization. Ballots shall be adopted by the FIWG if the number of votes cast meets Quorum, and the number of votes in favor exceeds 50% of the votes cast. Quorum is defined as the larger of 3 or the average number of Member organizations that have participated in the last three FIWG Meetings or Teleconferences (not counting subcommittee meetings thereof). For transition purposes, if three meetings have not yet occurred, quorum is three (3). For the purposes of counting votes, automatically included members such as the Forum Webmaster may not cast votes separate from their Member organization.
Summary of Major WG Deliverables and Guidelines The deliverables of the FIWG are defined in the Scope section above. In addition to the general focus of the Working Group, however, the following specific deliverables are defined: • A review of the current web, document review, and wiki software in use to help ensure it meets the security and content needs of the Forum; • Creation of separate wiki space for each Forum Working Group, to enable the division of content required by the IPR Policy; • A review of the current public web content and reorganization as required to support the new Forum Working Group changes.
Primary Means of Communication The FIWG will communicate primarily through listserv-based email, and shall conduct periodic calls or face-to-face meetings as needed.
IPR Policy As with all Forum Working Group activity, the CA/Browser Forum Intellectual Rights Policy v1.3 or later shall apply to all activities and work of the FIWG.
- MOTION ENDS The procedure for approval of this ballot is as follows: Discussion Period (7 days): Start Time: Monday, 13 August 2018 at 0900 UTC End Time: Monday, 20 August 2018 at 0800 UTC Vote for Approval (7 days): Start Time: Monday, 20 August 2018 at 0900 UTC End Time: Monday, 27 August 2018 at 0900 UTC