Mutual Internet Practices Association

Mutual Internet Practices Association (MIPA) facilitates cooperation among independent organizations, to ensure a basic level of safe, reliable service across the Internet. MIPA members collaborate on a common set of best operational practices, to achieve predictable and efficient interoperability among participating organizations.

The Need

Technology and standards are not enough. Organizations must not only adopt common standards. The critical question is who else uses them and do they use them correctly?

When services are abused, operators need a means of protecting themselves, including the ability to distinguish between sites that are knowledgeable, good neighbors, versus sites that require special care.

One approach is to develop mechanisms that derive from governmental authority.

The Internet prefers a different approach:

Provide a venue for collaborative development, assistance, monitoring and reporting of safe operational practices.

Service providers of all types can reach agreements about technical solutions and standards, as well as developing recommendations and tutorials for their use.

To Begin

Currently, MIPA is an informal, nascent, grassroots effort. There is a concrete vision for the organization, with an clear sense of the scope of work it could pursue.

For now, activities are limited and opportunistic, although suggestions are encouraged.