Number Resource Society
POA & representation
A shared position becomes collective action when members give NRS a mandate. A Power of Attorney lets NRS speak and act for your network inside the registries.
On this page
Why your mandate matters
Your business depends on continued use and recognition of its IP addresses. When the institutions governing those resources create uncertainty, the consequences can reach your customers, contracts, revenue and ability to operate. NRS Shield makes the case for facing that exposure through coordinated member action.
A Power of Attorney (POA) is how you turn support into authority. It gives NRS a mandate to represent your network in the registries: to speak and act in your name where the rules are made.
Explore NRS Shield and the risk in your RIR
What your mandate covers
NRS represents its members in Internet number-resource governance, bringing their voices together in the institutions and decisions that affect their businesses. Your POA names who acts for your organisation, on which matters and on what terms.
Your mandate covers governance and legal representation in RIR matters. It never transfers your addresses, your assets or your company: NRS acts for you, and the resources stay yours.
How authority becomes action
With your mandate, NRS brings members together in elections, policy debates and the push for institutional reform. Where an election needs a specific proxy or instruction from you, NRS asks for it in time, so your voice is counted when it matters.
The ambition reaches beyond any single election: resource holders must have a real voice in the rules governing their networks. Your mandate is how that voice is heard, and NRS reports back on what it has done with it.
Read NRS’s AFRINIC 2025 election record
Before you sign
Ask the NRS team for your POA and the completion instructions. Read them with your counsel alongside your organisation’s RIR agreement, so the mandate fits your network.
Your POA sets out who represents you and on which matters, how long it lasts, how you can withdraw it, how your instructions are recorded and how NRS keeps you informed. Ask the team anything that is not clear; a confident mandate is a stronger one.
The POA Start Pack is NRS’s guide for AFRINIC members’ counsel. It compares what a member can do alone with what members can do together, and sets out the questions counsel should answer.
Open the AFRINIC POA Start Pack for counsel
Request your POA
Tell NRS your organisation, your RIR and the matters on which you want NRS to act. The team sends you the POA, answers your questions and confirms your mandate once it is signed, together with any step an action needs.
Every mandate makes the movement harder to ignore. Request yours through NRS Shield below.
NRS answers to you
Ask what NRS is seeking to change, what it has done in your name and what comes next. Give the team your instructions on the matters that affect you, and expect updates. The organisations that stand with NRS are listed publicly, and so is the record of our actions.