A Simple Suggestion for President Biden Regarding the Cuban Internet

Last September, I asked what had happened to the proposal for a branch connecting the ARCOS undersea cable, which has a landing point in North Miami Beach, to Cojimar, Cuba. The consortium that operates the cable had applied for permission to connect Cuba in July 2018, and the FCC granted a request for streamlined processing, which should have taken less than 45 days, but nothing happened until September 2020 when the application was referred to a Justice Department committee... more

AOL Has a Security Hole, and It’s Our Problem

Two weeks ago I wrote about Yahoo's unfortunate mail security actions. Now it's AOL's turn, and the story, as best as I can piece it together, is not pretty. Yahoo used an emerging system called DMARC, which was intended to fight phishing of often forged domains like paypal.com. A domain owner can publish a DMARC "reject" policy which, oversimplifying a little, tells the world that if mail with their name on the 'From:' line didn't come from their servers, it's not from them so you should reject it. more

Over 750 Domain Name Registrars Expected to Shut Down in the Next 12 Months, ICANN Predicts

ICANN estimates over 750 accredited domain name registrars are likely to close within the next 12 months as a result of the over-saturated drop-catching market. more

Big Telegraph

On my flight back from Washington, DC last night, I prepared much of what follows, minus references. Today, while looking for references, I uncovered a very recent (6 June 2012) posting to the ITU blog that seemed entirely appropriate to mention here. It is fascinating reading, and I especially like one snippet "we are not about to take over the Internet - that suggestion is frankly ridiculous". I quite agree and hope that the ITU is genuinely interested in working with others to ensure that nothing of the sort happens. Now on to what I had prepared. more

Fixing WHOIS (and Some Other Stuff Too)

ICANN is the only institution with responsibility for the functioning of DNS. And so it is natural that when there is a DNS problem for people to expect ICANN to come up with the solution. But having the responsibility to act is not the same as having the ability. Like the IETF, ICANN appears to have been designed with the objective of achieving institutional paralysis. And this is not surprising since the first law of the Internet is 'You are so not in charge (for all values of you). more

ICANN 53: Accountability, Brand Policy & New Round of New gTLDs

In June, MarkMonitor joined our colleagues once again at the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 53rd public meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Several high-profile and contentious issues were on the agenda, many of which have significant impact on the interests of intellectual property and brand owners. Among these are the ongoing ICANN Accountability issues and the impending departure of ICANN CEO Fadi Chehadé; registrant information (Whois) transparency, accuracy and accessibility; and the timing of the next round of new gTLD applications/delegation. more

What Trademark Owners Need to Know to Avoid Reverse Domain Name Hijacking

A cybersecurity company recently attempted reverse domain name hijacking for an exact match domain name of its brand, and in so doing, failed in both its bid to take ownership of the domain and potentially damaged their reputation by using this somewhat nefarious tactic and abusing the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) process. more

Popular ccTLDs for Domain Name Disputes

As I've written before, the registry operators for many country-code top-level domains (ccTLDs) have adopted the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) or a variation of it, while other ccTLDs have crafted their own dispute policies, or none at all. Although no ccTLD appears as frequently as .com in domain name disputes, it's interesting to see which ccTLDs are subject to dispute the most often. more

Digital Marketing & gTLD Strategy Congress - London, Sept 2013

In partnership with Momentum event group, CircleID will be updating this page to provide up to date information for the Digital Marketing & gTLD Strategy Congress taking place in London, September 26 - 27, 2013. more

A Case of Mistaken Identity

As far as facebook is concerned, your email is your identification. This is true for other social networks like linkedin, and is slowly catching on to many other Web 2.0 services. It actually makes a lot of sense that your unique identifier (your "ID") would be your email -- it's unique by definition, it's easy to remember and most services need the email information anyway... So if email is destined to become the equivalent of your social security number or identification number (depending on which country you live in) how do we proof check that the email address we typed does not contain any typos? more

Why Do Chinese Enterprises Ignore the Internet?

Judging from the development of the Internet in the world, the popularity rate of domain names is one of the primary parameters to measure whether the Internet is well developed or not in a country. The popularity rate of domain names is 11 percent in North America and reaches as high as 12.5 percent in Europe, while in China, which has over 20 million enterprises, there are only more than 300,000 domain names under .CN and the total number of domain names is only 1.187 million, including a lot of governmental and individual websites. more

A Perfect Storm Brewing for European ccTLDs?

The European country code top-level domain (ccTLD) market is at a crossroads, facing a confluence of challenges that could reshape its trajectory in the coming years. From slowing growth and rising renewal prices to shifting user behaviour driven by AI, the market is undergoing profound changes. These trends suggest a potential decline in domain volumes and a shift in how domains are valued and used. Here's a closer look at the factors contributing to this "perfect storm" and what it means for the future of European ccTLDs. more

Big Rumble in Tokyo Over JPRS’s Announcement to Offer gTLD Domains

In an announcement at a registrars meeting in Tokyo on October 19th 2010, JPRS announced that they would be offering generic Top-Level Domains (.com, .net, .org, etc.) to their .jp accredited registrars in the near future. JPRS is already famous for their double-dipping practices, acting as both registry and registrar for .jp domains, for their dubious "campaigns" which are aimed at being dis-advantageous to smaller registrars and for their famous registrar back-end "system" which is circa 1995 technology and even prone to accidental DOS attacks by registrars trying to simply drop-catch domains. more

The Internet and the Legitimacy of Governments

In two recent debate events I participated in, on iFreedom and privacy in the online world, mistrust of government and government's intentions and motivations on and towards the Internet were abundantly present with more than just a few people in the audiences. The emotions were not new to me, no, it was the rationality that surprised and sometimes almost shocked me. Why? Well, should these sentiments get the support of the majority of people, it would undermine all legitimacy of a government to govern. Let's try and take a closer look. more

ICANN and DOC Announce New Three-Year Agreement

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and the United States Department of Commerce (DoC) today announced that they agreed to extend their joint Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for three additional years until September 30, 2006. more