News Briefs

ICANN to Release Hundreds of Domain Names Matching Country Names

Hundreds of country and territory domain names are likely to be finally released this year based on the new resolution that calls for ICANN to take "all steps necessary" to do so. more

Google’s Simple Home Page Now Patented

Ryan Tate of Valleywag writes: "After a five-and-a-half-year fight, Google and its attorneys have managed to convince federal bureaucrats to bestow a patent on the company's iconic home page. We always thought the page was brain-dead simple, but apparently it's an innovative 'graphical user interface. ...In other words, subject to how the patent is enforced, Google owns the idea of having a giant search box in the middle of the page, with two big buttons underneath and several small links nearby." more

Google Public DNS Service Passes 70 Billion Requests Per Day, No Longer Experimental

Google reports that its "experimental" public DNS service launched in December of 2009 has now passed 70 billion requests a day and no longer considered experimental. From the announcement: "Google Public DNS has become particularly popular for our users internationally. Today, about 70 percent of its traffic comes from outside the U.S. We’ve maintained our strong presence in North America, South America and Europe, and beefed up our presence in Asia. We've also added entirely new access points to parts of the world where we previously didn't have Google Public DNS servers, including Australia, India, Japan and Nigeria." more

Domain Name Disputes Doubled Since 2003, Origin of Most Cases in US

Domain name disputes have been on steady rise for the past several years and have more than doubled since 2003. As reported today by Pingdom, while there was a period between 2000 and 2003 when the number of domain dispute cases declined, they have been continuously increased since 2003 with most cases involving more than one domain name. more

Somalia’s Extended Internet Outage Results in Millions of Dollars of Loss per Day, Says Government

Somalia's internet connection was finally restored on Monday after weeks of outage due to a severed undersea cable. more

Amazon Web Services to Charge for IPv4 Addresses Amidst Rising Costs and Scarcity; Urges Shift to IPv6

Amazon Web Services (AWS) will charge customers for public IPv4 addresses effective February 1, 2024. The charge will be $0.005 per IP per hour for all public IPv4 addresses, irrespective of whether they're attached to a service. more

Apple Uses the .NEWS TLD for Its News Platform

Apple has elected to use the .NEWS top-level domain for its new app on iOS 9. The 'apple.news' domain will also be used within the app for shortening news links. more

Government-Directed Internet Shutdowns and Fiber Cuts Continue in 2019 Impacting Various Countries

Internet disruptions observed in 2018 as a result of government shutdowns, cable problems, power outages, and distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks have already seeped into 2019. more

37.9% of Global Population Using the Internet, Says Internet.org Report

A new study by Facebook-led Internet.org, called "State of Connectivity: A Report on Global Internet Access," takes a look at the current state of global internet connectivity, who’s connected, who’s not and why. The paper uses existing data and incorporates its own new findings to examine internet penetration and barriers to further growth. "By early 2015, 3 billion people will be online. This is an incredible milestone, but it also means that only 40% of the world’s population has ever connected to the internet." more

DNS Under Strain: Technical and Policy Challenges in Supporting the Internet of Autonomous Things

A new IETF draft outlines critical limitations of DNS in supporting the Internet of Autonomous Things, highlighting challenges related to latency, mobility, security, and privacy, and proposing architectural improvements to meet evolving machine-driven demands. more

AFNIC Publishes New Issue Paper on “the Secondary Market in Domain Names”

Loic Damilaville writes to report: Today AFNIC is publishing its new issue paper on the secondary market in domain names. The paper -- written to inform individuals as well as businesses -- gives a detailed account of the concept of "secondary market", the valuation mechanisms used, and the main players involved. The secondary market covers over-the-counter sales of already registered domain names, as well as the market in "second-hand domain names" and the ecosystem made up of the various players involved in these matters. more

Complete Internet Shutdown Reported in Syria

While Syria's Internet disruptions in the recent past have been linked to Government's efforts to prevent cheating during national high school exams, today's complete Internet shutdown reported by Dyn Research is unknown and does not appear to be exam-related. more

Fadi Chehadé Named as ICANN’s New President and CEO

Fadi Chehadé has been named as the next President and Chief Executive Officer of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Chehadé, age 50, is a citizen of Lebanon, Egypt and the United States. He was born in Beirut, Lebanon, to Egyptian parents and left the then war-torn country in 1980 at the age of 18. He speaks fluent Arabic English, French and Italian. Chehadé succeeds current President and CEO Rod Beckstrom, who announced last August that he would leave ICANN at the end of his contract, which expires on 1 July. Chehadé will join ICANN on October 1 or earlier. Between July 1 and when Chehadé begins, Chief Operating Officer Akram Atallah will be the CEO. more

Google Not the Only Company Testing Wireless Access by High-Altitude Balloons

Oceus Networks Inc., a mobile 4G LTE broadband networking provider, recently demonstrated the efficacy of a deployable 4G LTE solution on a high-altitude balloon platform, which can be used to rapidly provide broadband coverage and communications services to first responders within the first 72 hours following an emergency or natural disaster. more

Over 2 Million VPN Passwords Compromised by Malware Attacks

A recent report from Specops Software reveals alarming security vulnerabilities within VPN password systems, highlighting over two million VPN passwords stolen by malware in the past year. more