DNS root zones

See the following -

In sudden announcement, US to give up control of DNS root zone

Cyrus Farivar | ArsTechnica | March 14, 2014

In a historic decision on Friday, the United States has decided to give up control of the authoritative root zone file, which contains all names and addresses of all top-level domain names...Signs point to fallout from NSA spying that lead to "multi-stakeholder" model. Read More »