DNS

The New gTLD Chess Game

On June 20th, the ICANN board voted to move ahead with the new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) program, intended to add hundreds, if not thousands of new names to the DNS root. Now what? Not even the most enthusiastic ICANN supporters think that any new TLDs will be added before the end of 2012, but there are other things going on that greatly complicate the outlook. more

gTLDs Opponents Create the Very Confusion They Decry

It's ironic and amusing that while a few well-connected opponents of the new gTLD program were testifying before the U.S. Senate committee, I was asked to help educate top executives of one of the largest global ad agencies and their major clients on the brand marketing and advertising implications of the program. It was clear from the start that virtually all these high-powered executives knew about the program they had learned from the eleventh hour negative campaign. more

Aging the Internet Prematurely, One PDP at a Time

After blogging about ICANN's new gTLD policy or lack thereof [also featured on CircleID], I've had several people ask me why I care so much about ICANN and new top-level domains. Domain names barely matter in a world of search and hyperlinks, I'm told, and new domains would amount to little more than a cash transfer to new registries from those trying to protect their names and brands. While I agree that type-in site-location is less and less relevant, and we haven't yet seen much end-user focused innovation in the use of domain names, I'm not ready to throw in the towel. I think ICANN is still in a position to do affirmative harm to Internet innovation. more

ICANN and the Data Quality Act: Part VI

This is the sixth part of a multi-part series reported by ICANNfocus. This part focuses on ICANN's Strategic Plan. Read previous parts: Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V. "The requirement that ICANN develop a Strategic Plan offers an important opportunity for achieving meaningful reform of the organization. The Strategic Plan is one of the key new ICANN duties contained in the most recent amendment to their Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Department of Commerce. The MOU specifies in considerable detail the elements that ICANN is to include in the Plan including issues ranging from executive compensation to mechanisms for ICANN accountability..." more

How a DNS Proxy Service Can Reduce the Risk of VoIP Service Downtime

Consumers are embracing VoIP services now more than ever as they get used to calling over Internet application services such as Skype, Facetime, and Google Hangouts. Market Research Store predict that the global value of the VoIP services market is expected to reach above USD140 billion in 2021, representing a compound annual growth rate of above 9.1% between 2016 and 2021. more

$100 Million Lawsuit Filed Against VeriSign

Popular Enterprises LLC, the parent company of Netster.com, has filed a $100 million dollar lawsuit against VeriSign, Inc. The Complaint alleges antitrust violations, unfair competition and violations of the Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act based upon VeriSign's release of the Site Finder product. The suit requests injunctive relief to prevent VeriSign from operating Sitefinder, and to otherwise cease what Popular Enterprises believes to be its monopolistic practices. more

July 2010: The End of the Beginning for DNSSEC

July 15, 2010 (yesterday) marked the end of the beginning for DNSSEC, as the DNS root was cryptographically signed. For nearly two decades, security researchers, academics and Internet leaders have worked to develop and deploy Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC). DNSSEC was developed to improve the overall security of the DNS, a need which was dramatized by the discovery of the Kaminsky bug a few years ago. more

Europeans Moderate GAC Principles, But…

A U.S.-led Task Force in ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) released version 3 of its "Whois Principles" in preparation for the ICANN meeting in Brazil, where it will be debated and finalized. European countries pushed back against U.S. Government efforts to stop ICANN from respecting privacy concerns in its handling of domain name registrant contact data... more

A Postitive Look at DENIC’s .Net Bid

The outcome of the .Net rebid process will involve the security, stability and diversity of management of the Internet's critical infrastructure. As well, the rebid process introduces competitive forces that will flow through to users in the form of cost savings and improved service levels. DENIC has submitted a bid that is consistent with the goals and interests of the Internet community and is the only proponent that has done so. Let us consider the following factors and assess the alignment of the bids with the goals and interests for the Internet community. more

The Bright Side of Decentralized Domain Names

With solution providers such as Unstoppable Domains or Handshake, and blockchain technology-friendly browsers, such as Brave, that are more than happy to assist on the implementation front, decentralized alternatives to the traditional Domain Name System has been receiving more and more attention lately. Centralized vs. decentralized... what will it be? more

Internationalized Domain Names: The Babelization Factor

As current statistics now clearly indicate, two-thirds of the estimated 560 million people online are non-English speakers. As one would expect, in the upcoming ICANN Shanghai Meeting of October 28, 2002, IDNs (Internationalized Domain Names, also known as Multilingual Domain Names), are one of the main topics of discussion. This global affair is also fueling the growing list of Internationalized Domain Name Certified Registrars that offer domain names in many other non-English characters with .com, .net, and .org. more

IPv6 in Slovak Academic Network

The main reason for developing a new internet protocol was based on lack of address; however this was not the only reason. Unfortunately, many people think of IPv6 only as enormous address space, but there are a lot of other advantages, for example... authorizations and authentication function are implemented directly in the protocol and are mandatory... automatic configuration of network interfaces based on their physical address... protocol itself recognizes data streams which must be transmitted in real time, and the data must be processed with highest priority... more

Report on TLD Preference by Country

Which domain extensions do people prefer? How do these preferences vary by country? This article reports the results of a poll of domain extension preference by country of residence conducted from May through October, 2003 by Domain Name Journal and the DomainState forum. Approximately 133 people from 34 different countries participated. This poll has limitations that we will discuss, but it does measure the extension preferences of domain registrants and developers in a manner that has not been done elsewhere and it produces some interesting results. more

New gTLDs, Last-Minute End-Arounds, and Fundamental Fairness

The ICANN community is ever closer to realization of its goal to bring long-overdue consumer choice and competition to Internet naming. Regrettably, but perhaps predictably, reliance on the Final Applicant Guidebook (AGB) is being challenged at the last minute by recent proposals from the Business and Intellectual Property Constituencies (BC/IPC), which demand "improvements" to the already extensive trademark protections that will be part of the new gTLD landscape. more

Failed Expectations: A Deep Dive Into the Internet’s 40 Years of Evolution

In a recent workshop, I attended, reflecting on the evolution of the Internet over the past 40 years, one of the takeaways for me is how we've managed to surprise ourselves in both the unanticipated successes we've encountered and in the instances of failure when technology has stubbornly resisted to be deployed despite our confident expectations to the contrary! What have we learned from these lessons about our inability to predict technology outcomes? more