Featured Blogs

2016: The Year That Was in .brands TLDs

Back in June, I wrote about the progress of .brands at the half-way point of the year. At the time, the total number of domains registered in .brand TLDs had grown by 238% in just six months, including a number of significant, high-profile .brands that had publicly launched. I also shared several broad patterns of usage that had started to emerge. As we approach the end of 2016, let's take a look at the year that was. more

Good Faith and Abusive Registration of Domain Names

Not all domain names identical or confusingly similar to trademarks are actionable. Exhibit 1 are complainants whose trademarks postdate domain name registration. The latest example of this is Insight Energy Ventures LLC v. Alois Muehlberger, L.M.Berger Co.Ltd., D2016-2010 (WIPO December 12, 2016) (<powerly.com>) but there are other, more esoteric examples such as loss by genericide, Shop Vac Corporation v. Md Oliul Alam / Quick Rank, FA1611001701026 (Forum December 10, 2016). more

Leaving it to the Last Second - The Leap Seconds Conundrum

Thanks to the moon, the earth's rate of rotation is slowing down. It's a subtle interaction and the modeling of planetary dynamics predicts that the earth's rotation should be slowing down by an average of 2.3 milliseconds per century. But this is not quite so uniform... So what? Maybe we can start by looking at how we've defined time over history... It's only been in recent decades that we've turned our attention to timekeeping with an obsessive level of detail that rivals, and maybe even surpasses, train spotting. more

Yahoo’s 1 Billion Accounts Hacked is a Chilling Warning: Start Doing Things Differently or Die

Today, this is how easily "TRUST" by your users/customers can be shattered, your revenues devastated, your share value plunged into the abyss, and your business destroyed. Furthermore, conventional thinking belongs only in university libraries, not in board rooms. It is time to seriously consider other innovative Out-Of-The-Box Solutions and doing things differently, or start writing your business obituary. more

Curious Statement About 2012 gTLD Round Name Collision Fears at IGF

During his presentation at IGF on 7 December in Guadalajara, Akram Atallah, President of ICANN's Global Domain Division, said the following: So when you look at that, you'll see that we are left with only 20 to go. There are a few that need to be withdrawn that haven't withdrawn... This surprised me, but since the meeting was about possible new application procedures and not the handling of the last round's persistent problems, I decided not to ask at that point. more

The Christmas Goat and IPv6 (Year 7)

It was a great year for the goat! 2016 marked the 50th anniversary for the Christmas Goat and there was a grand opening ceremony along with music and fireworks. But only a few hours after the opening, a pyromaniac set the goat on fire. The only track the police have is a cap above that they hope to find DNA in and a crappy picture of the pyromaniac's back. more

Appearing Respondents Called Out as Cybersquatters

UDRP complainants prevail in the range of 85% to 90% which approximately correlates with the percentage that respondents default in responding to complaints. The annual number of complaints administered by ICANN providers has been hovering around 4,000 +. Astonishingly, the number has remained steady for a good number of years despite the phenomenal increase... Compared to the whole, there are a relatively small number of contested disputes, perhaps in the annual range of 400 to 500, and of those a larger percentage are called out as cybersquatters. more

Call for Participation - ICANN DNSSEC Workshop at ICANN58 in Copenhagen

Do you have new information about DNSSEC or DANE that you would like to share with the wider community? Have you created a new tool or service? Have you found a way to use DNSSEC to secure some other service? Do you have new statistics about the growth or usage of DNSSEC, DANE or other related technology? If so, and if you will be in Copenhagen, Denmark, for ICANN 58 in March 2017 (or can get there), please consider submitting a proposal to speak at the ICANN 58 DNSSEC Workshop! more

Will Harding’s Mistakes in International Telecommunication Cooperation be Repeated?

The International Telecommunication Union recently began a well-deserved celebration of one of the real success stories in international cooperation -- the 110th anniversary of the Radio Regulations as a treaty instrument. An ITU publication describes the historical highlights. Global cooperation among governments in managing radio spectrum via the Radio Regulations has been generally regarded as essential from the outset in the early years of the 20th Century and remains so today. more

A Three Minute Guide to Network Automation Bliss

The cloud computing paradigm has been making steady progress in 2016. With the DevOps model making its way from cloud to networking, the business upside of fully automated service architectures is finally beginning to materialize. The associated service agility is expected to unleash new business models that transform the ways in which applications and connectivity can be consumed. more

All About the Copyright Office’s New DMCA System

Website publishers that want to protect themselves against claims of copyright infringement must participate in a new online registration system created by the U.S. Copyright Office for the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") -- even if they have participated previously. The new program, launched on December 1, 2016, offers a mandatory online registration system for the DMCA that replaces the original (and clunky) "interim" designation system, which was created in 1998. more

Sledgehammer DDoS Gamification and Future Bugbounty Integration

Monetization of DDoS attacks has been core to online crime way before the term cybercrime was ever coined. For the first half of the Internet's life, DDoS was primarily a mechanism to extort money from targeted organizations. As with just about every Internet threat over time, it has evolved and broadened in scope and objectives. The new report by Forcepoint Security Labs covering their investigation of the Sledgehammer gamification of DDoS attacks is a beautiful example of that evolution. more

Where is the Standard ‘Socket’ for Broadband?

When you plug into a broadband socket, what you are accessing is a distributed computing service that supplies information exchange. What is the service description and interface definition? For inspiration, we can look at the UK power plug. One of the great unsung fit-for-purpose innovations in British society is the BS1363 13 ampere power plug and socket. This is superior to other plugs by virtue of its solid construction and safe design. more

From ICANN57 Hyderabad to the 3rd WIC Wuzhen Summit: A Moment of Consensus on Internet Governance

Two events that happened last month deserve an additional note. One is the ICANN57 conference held in Hyderabad on November 3-9. The other is the 3rd World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit held in Zhejiang Province on November 16-18. Though being completely overwhelmed by the result of President election in the United States, both events mark the victory of non-state actors and serve as good news for the community. more

Overseas TLD Registries Licensed by Chinese Government

It was reported that .XYZ, .CLUB and .VIP have obtained official license from the Chinese government. The approval notices can be found on the website of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology ("MIIT"), the domain name regulator in China. It is the first batch of overseas top-level domains (TLD) being officially approved. Previously, only two legacy TLDs -- .COM and .NET -- have been issued such approval. The "green light" means that Chinese registrars are able to sell these domains legally in China. more