Today, the ITU launched a new survey asking member states, ccTLDs and other ITU member organizations to provide answers to a specialized questionnaire asking for their experiences on the use of IDNs. The ITU states that it is reaching out to ccTLDs to "collect information and experiences on Internationalized Domain Names under ccTLD (country code Top Level Domain) around the globe." One of the goals of this survey is to collate information on the "needs and practices" of each ccTLD that is surveyed -- so as to compile a report from the ITU that speaks to the implementation of IDNs around the world... more
A big security news event last night and today is that the Twitter.com Web site was hacked and content on the site replaced. TechCrunch reported it and it has been picked up globally. But - was the Twitter.com website really hacked? We now know it was not so. There are four ways that users typing in Twitter.com would have seen the Iranian Cyber Army page. more
An article based on the most recent study for the European Commission on the Policy Implications of Convergence in the Field of Naming, Numbering and Addressing written by Joe McNamee and Tiina Satuli of Political Intelligence.
"With relation to the Internet and also IP addresses, the "scarcity" is more complicated: there are not only intellectual property issues with regards to domain names, but there is also an issue of managing the integrity of the system. For any naming or numbering system to work, it is essential that the names and addresses used cannot be confused with any other -- in other words, no one system can have two end-points with the same fully qualified number or name..." more
Country code domain names are surging in popularity. .de, Germany's domain name, is the second most popular domain behind .com. .UK is more popular than .org. Five country code domains saw double digit growth in the last quarter: at (Austria), .es (Spain), .fr (France), .ru (Russia), and .us (United States). Major companies, including Volvo, are advertising sites based on the .us domain. But what happens to country code domain names that are no longer in use? more
If you have been following the debate over Internet governance over the past few years, you know that while ICANN supporters (U.S., Canadian, Australian governments; business lobby) and critics (developing world and occasionally Europe) argue over the optimal approach, particularly with respect to government involvement in the domain name system, the reality has been that possession is all. ...The alternate root has always lurked in the background as a possibility that would force everyone to rethink their positions since it would enable a single country (or group of countries) to effectively pack up their bags and start a new game. ...It is with that background in mind that people need to think about a press release issued yesterday in China announcing a revamping of its Internet domain name system. Starting tomorrow, China's Ministry of Information Industry plans to begin offering four country-code domains. more
The Council of European National Top-Level Domain Registries (CENTR) has released a public version of its 2024 Renewal Study, offering insights into the dynamics of domain retention within country code top-level domains (ccTLDs). more
In the coming months, we're set to witness the largest investment in America's digital infrastructure in history: $42.5 billion that should be a true lifeline for millions of Americans struggling with slow, unreliable, or nonexistent internet connections. But as with any massive government spending program, the devil is in the details - and Republican lawmakers, led by Texas Senator Ted Cruz, are doing their best to ensure those details work against their own constituents. more
A recent story in Medium describes yet again quite well why blockchains don't solve any real problems: Blockchain is not only crappy technology but a bad vision for the future. So what is their irresistible appeal? Bitcoins remind me of a story from the late chair of the Princeton University astronomy department. In 1950 Immanuel Velikovsky published Worlds in Collision, a controversial best-selling book that claimed that 3500 years ago Venus and Mars swooped near the earth... more
In light of the recent events caused by VeriSign's release of Site Finder for .net and .com domain names, CircleID is carrying out a 'Site Finder Special Coverage' and asking all stakeholders (all individuals and organization that own domain names or provide services) to submit their comments 'in favor' or 'against' Site Finder. All comments gathered will be posted on CircleID and distributed to key members of industry. more
In 2001, I published an article on "virtual crime." It analyzed the extent to which we needed to create a new vocabulary -- and a new law -- of "cybercrimes." The article consequently focused on whether there is a difference between "crime" and "cybercrime." It's been a long time, and cybercrime has come a long way, since I wrote that article. I thought I'd use this post to look at what I said then and see how it's held up, i.e., see if we have any additional perspective on the relationship between crime and cybercrime... more
At last week's meeting, the ICANN board uncharacteristially did something and voted to make their fee of 20 cents per domain-year nonrefundable. They expect this to stop both domain tasting and NSI's frontrunning, which it certainly will. It's not clear when this change will go into effect, but it might be within a month. more
In many ways, the emotionally charged debate on Network Neutrality (NN) has been a lot like hunting Unicorns. While hunting the mythical horse could be filled with adrenalin, emotion, and likely be quite entertaining, the prize would ultimately prove to be elusive. As a myth, entertaining; but when myths become reality, then all bets are off. The Network Neutrality public and private debate has been filled with more emotion than rational discussion, and in its wake a number of myths have become accepted as reality. Unfortunately, public policy, consumer broadband services, and service provider business survival hang in the balance. more
While the registration policies and accreditation of registrars are yet to be finalized for the newly announced .eu TLD, the following email may find its way to your inbox, if not yet already: "We are now accepting registrations for .eu domain names. You can check on our site to see if your ideal domain has been taken yet..." more
I am often asked how to get a ccTLD by folks just coming in to the domain industry. There is RFC1591 as a start for reading material on the subject matter, and then there is ICP-1. I defer them to IANA, who defers to ICANN, who in turn defers to ISO and the ISO3166-1 list being the definitive list, and then you have to factor in some of the "reserved code elements" from their decoding table to normalize 3166 against the list of IANA Country Codes for ccTLD delegations like .EU. How does one get their ccTLD into the ISO list? The ISO in turn (likely due to the masses that contact them hoping to list their country) defer the criteria for what it is to be a 'country' for being on the 3166-1 list, and partially defer to the United Nations. more
I received an e-mail from Google Adsense about its new interest-based advertising feature. The latest feature of Google AdSense allows Google to track the behavior of users who click on ads on their AdSense network. It also allows Google users to ‘select’ their interests—this way they would view advertisements based on their category of interest…
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