A Visualized gTLd Sequencing Proposal

As a follow-up to our previous CircleID article "Strong Support for IDNs, GEOs and/or Communities to Go First" we have developed a flow chart which visualizes how the applications may be processed in a fair and transparent manner. The chart also shows that at the end of the day only about 1,200 new gTLDs may go online, that means that we will likely see about 730 drop outs. more

Live Data Visualization of DDoS Attacks

Google Ideas in collaboration with Arbor Networks has released a data visualization that maps daily, global DDoS attacks. The tool shows anonymous data linked to these attacks, allowing users to explore historical trends and make the connection to related news events. "The data is updated daily, and historical data can be viewed for any country worldwide." By surfacing this data and providing insights on the global patterns of DDoS attacks, the companies hope that more informed decisions can be made that can reduce the threat of digital attacks. more

Aged Security Flaw Renews Open/Closed-Source Debate

The recent announcement of a 13-year old security flaw found in an Open Source security library has renewed the debate between open source and closed source software. The library, crypt_blowfish, allows for fast two-way password encryption. The flaw introduces the potential for passwords to be easily compromised and affects PHP and a number of Linux distributions that include the crypt_blowfish library. more

Increasing the Strength of the Zone Signing Key for the Root Zone, Part 2

A few months ago I published a blog post about Verisign's plans to increase the strength of the Zone Signing Key (ZSK) for the root zone. I'm pleased to provide this update that we have started the process to pre-publish a 2048-bit ZSK in the root zone for the first time on Sept. 20. Following that, we will publish root zones with the larger key on Oct. 1, 2016. more

Security and Reliability: A Closer Look at Penetration Testing

As noted in my first article of this series (see part one, two and three), security and reliability encompass holistic network assessments, vulnerability assessments and penetration testing. This month I'd like to go deeper into penetration testing; however, first, let's go back for a quick refresh before getting started. more

Can Plural and Singular New gTLDs Both Be Successful?

Now that ICANN has stuck to its guns and only placed 4 new gTLD's strings that look confusingly similar into contention sets, rather than those that sound identical, such as .inc and .ink or those that have the same meaning like .Law and .Lawyer or those that are singular and plurals of the same word, like .deal and .deals, we now that many new gTLD's are going to have a very a tough marketing road and face a lot of consumer confusion. more

Google Is NOT Moving Into the Mobile Phone Business

It might appear paradoxical for Google to buy a company for $12 billion and to then not move into that business, but I believe this is the strategy supporting that company's purchase of Motorola Mobility. As many have already pointed out, the value of Motorola resides in its patents. For more than a decade this company has been a fading star... more

Gillette.ro WIPO Decision Provides Interesting Comments

One of the WIPO decisions published today relates to gillette.ro. The registrant (respondent) didn't make any submissions in their defence, so the decision could have been quite banal. However some of the panelist's comments under the "Registered and Used in Bad Faith" section are quite interesting... more

ICANN Publishes Its Annual Report and Reports $100 Million in Assets

ICANN just published its annual report for 2011 and god bless, in the worst economy of our lifetimes they managed to get up to just short of $100 Million in assets; cash, investments and accounts receivable for the year ending June 30, 2011. According to the report as of June 30, 2011, ICANN has over $29 Million in Cash, $51 Million in investments and over $15 Million in accounts receivable, and with some other assets all totalled, just short of $100 Million dollars. more

Russian IDN ccTLD .?? Opens for Registrations, Makes History

November 11, 2010, marked the day when the new Internationalized Domain Name (IDN) contry code Top-Level Domain (ccTLD) .?? (Cyrillic for ?????????? ?????????, Russian Federation) was opened for general registration. Prior to that date the registration was open only for trademark owners and governmental institutions. ... It turned out they needed less than three hours to reach to the 100,000 domain names! Such a gold rush was not expected, and numbers continued to grow - 200,000 within 6 hours... more than 460,000 by today. more

Where High Speed Internet Meets Smart Grid

Advanced internet technologies, energy management and the smart grid are coming together in a mid-sized city in South Tennessee. Tennessee based utility EPB has completed one of the fastest internet pipelines in the world and has activated the first automated switches on its electricity network. The combination constitutes the backbone for a DOE-funded smart grid network that is expected to save the utility and businesses tens of millions of dollars annually. more

Ossification and Fragmentation: The Once and Future ‘net

Mostafa Ammar, out of Georgia Tech recently posted an interesting paper titled The Service-Infrastructure Cycle, Ossification, and the Fragmentation of the Internet. I have argued elsewhere that we are seeing the fragmentation of the global Internet into multiple smaller pieces, primarily based on the centralization of content hosting combined with the rational economic decisions of the large-scale hosting services. The paper in hand takes a slightly different path to reach the same conclusion. more

ICANN Signs Agreement Giving UPU Managing Authority Over .Post Domain

ICANN and the Swiss-based Universal Postal Union (UPU) have signed an agreement giving the UPU managing authority over .post as a top-level domain (TLD). At the highest conceptual level, the agreement represents linking the TLD with the real-world physical networks of the postal system, with 600,000 global physical offices and proximity to most humans. To enable its customers to take advantage of the services the UPU envisions for .post, the UPU is already installing the first computers in many villages in their local post offices to provide those services, says the announcement. more

Is More Protection of Intellectual Property Rights Necessary on the Internet?

I firmly believe that we need to protect any form of intellectual properties (IP) built by one through hard and honest work. At the same time, I also believe that several of the current methods of protecting IP, such the as the copyright laws, patent systems and legislations, are not evolving fast enough in order to protect IP and avoid hindering the path of creativity and innovation. more

The Overlooked Signals of ccTLDs

Two ccTLD signals should get more attention when we're talking about the domains' benefits. Companies in emerging markets can signal their brands to expats and/or westerners. This ability to take the companies' appeal beyond their immediate, national markets deserves a look and some appreciation. Traditionally, Western companies have been the ones who registered ccTLDs to signal target="_blank" operations in overseas markets, while companies in emerging markets use them to signal their local brands to the local market. more