Leap day on the Internet: 29 February 2012 is also a special day for the .at-zone. At 11.35 a.m., the local domain registry nic.at activated the security extension DNSSEC for .AT domains. DNSSEC guarantees the authenticity and integrity of DNS transactions on the Internet and makes sure that domain queries are actually responded by the proper server without being manipulated during the process. It protects the user from being redirected in the DNS system – without noticing it. So-called Cashe Poisoning, which is the forging of DNS data and redirection to manipulated websites, is prevented this way. In other words: a DNSSEC signature guarantees the users that they will actually access the right website when they type a domain name into their browser. While nic.at provides the signature for the entire .at-zone, it is the task of the ISP or registrar to provide the signature on the domain-level. Only this guarantees a seamless encryption. More information on DNSSEC can be found at: www.nic.at/en/service/technical_information/dnssec/ as well as in the DNSSEC specific FAQ www.nic.at/en/faq/dnssec/ . The nic.at DNSSEC policy is described in the following  document [PDF]. This nic.at news release was sourced from: www.nic.at/en/uebernic/current_issues/nicat_news/news_view/article/81/nicat-fuehrt-sicherheitsstandard-dnssec-fuer-at-domains-ein/ To register your .AT domain name, check out Europe Registry here .

Almost one in eight (12.3%) of .EU registrations in the second quarter of 1011 were now for multiyear registrations following the registry’s implementation of this option, EURid announced in their quarterly report. On the fifth birthday for .EU in April 2011, registrants were given the option for registering domain names for up to ten years. To promote multiyear registrations, EURid introduced a promotional offer (that was valid until 31 May) where registrars received a 50 per cent discount on all new .EU registrations of two, five and ten years. “It is one of our duties as the .EU registry to continually add value to the services we offer registrars. Extending the length of time .EU domain names can be registered for is one such service and I am encouraged by how well .EU multiyear registrations were received during the second quarter,” said Marc Van Wesemael, EURid’s General Manager. During the quarter, registrations for .EU domains decreased by 1.2 per cent to 3.35 million, making .EU the fifth largest ccTLD. The number one ccTLD in terms of active registrations is .DE (Germany), currently with 14.577 million registrations followed by .UK (United Kingdom – 9.559m), .NL (Netherlands – 4.641m) and .RU (Russia – 3.410m). The decrease in registrations came about due to every April a large number of registrations are not renewed, coinciding with the anniversary of .EU’s launch. In addition, two countries, Cyprus and Luxembourg, reported reduced volumes as some registrars did not renew large sections of their .EU portfolios. However year-on-year there was a 4.2 per cent increase in registration numbers. EURid’s full report for Q2 2011 is available for download at: link.eurid.eu/reports . To register your .EU domain name, check out Europe Registry here .

Vietnamese internet users in rural areas have taken to the Vietnamese language internationalised domain name, making up a large proportion of the 320,000 Vietnamese language domains that have been registered since 28 April. “Internet users in rural areas were especially fond of using Vietnamese-language domain names since they used Vietnamese almost exclusively on the internet. The meaning of Vietnamese domain names was also clearer and more understandable to Vietnamese users,” said Tran Minh Tan, deputy director of the VNNIC, part of the Ministry of Information and Communications. “The Vietnamese IDNs represent a concerted effort on the part of VNNIC and Dot VN to reach the whole of the Vietnamese population and not just those that reside in major cities. While many online services have focused almost exclusively on urban users in major cities, those users represent but a small fraction of the over 89 million people that make up the population of Vietnam.” said Dot VN President Lee Johnson. “We hope to be a leader in the development of services for the as yet underserved majority of existing and potential internet users. The Vietnamese IDN resonates with the whole of Vietnamese Society in a fundamental way and engages Vietnamese users in their native speech in a way that is far superior to standard Vietnamese domain names. We believe that it is this connection that will allow us to reach countless millions of new Vietnamese users with a depth and scope not yet achieved through the power of their native language. As VNNIC’s partner in the IDN project we will continue to dedicate ourselves to reaching all corners of Vietnam from the cities to the fields with the very best products and services.” Up until early this year, there were strict limitations on the allocation of .VN domain names. But on 10 January the regulations changed. To assist on their uptake, .VN domains are allocated to Vietnamese and foreign organisations and individuals on a first-come, first-served basis according to VNS report. The allocation of free .VN domains commenced on 28 April. To register your .VN domain name, check out Europe Registry here , although more information on .VN domains is available from dotVN here .

Nominet have established an issue group to review domain name expiry policy while also launching two customer satisfaction surveys. The review will take into account issues relating to the expiry period, post expiry and the renewal of expired domain names more generally. To get discussion going there is an issue brief available to outline the focus of the group’s discussions. The issue group process is designed to allow stakeholders to continue to give us regular input as the issue group discussion progresses. The group brings together expertise and experience from within and outside the domain name industry with participants who will form the core of this issue group, chaired by Gordon Moir, a lawyer and former Chair of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Task Force on Telecoms and ICT. The group’s first meeting will take place on 27 September 2011. For the customer satisfaction surveys, they are designed to measure the level of satisfaction with the support services that Nominet offers. These surveys are being carried out on Nominet’s behalf by an independent market research company called The Leadership Factor. The findings from both these surveys will be published once the research and analysis is completed. The member and registrar satisfaction survey will help Nominet measure service levels and identify areas for improvement through a short telephone research interview for members and registrars, who have recently used support services. The second survey is a registrant satisfaction survey for registrants who have used support services. For this survey an email will be sent inviting participation. The registrant satisfaction survey measures the level of satisfaction delivered by Nominet’s registrant support service. The survey results will be used to make further improvements to our systems and services. Previous years surveys are available here . To register your .UK domain name, check out Europe Registry here .

The Russian registry, the Coordination Center for TLD RU, has undertaken a rather unique way of promoting its ccTLD and internationalised ccTLD, .RU and .РФ respectively, to the public by sponsoring an expedition of two small flex-wing trikes, an expedition timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of Valery Chkalov’s flight to the Far East. As of 4 August, the pilots had travelled over 6000 kilometres, making stops in many cities, including Novosibirsk, Irkutsk, and Chita raising awareness in the various Russian regions of the national domain space and promotion of the new Cyrillic domain, .РФ. “I am flattered to note that we stir interest in almost every place where we stop. We were interviewed in the city of Irkutsk, and in the village of Khorinsk we are very popular with the locals: everyone is curious to know of our route and our flying machines. Everybody knows AN-2 or helicopters; however, people are unfamiliar with an exotic small flex-wing trike,” wrote Alexander Scherbakov in the crew’s blog. En route, the pilots are engaged in educational activities related not only to the small aircrafts but also for the sponsors to the logos on the ultralight trikes’ wings. To register your .RU or .РФ domain, check out Europe Registry here .

As it approaches the one million mark for .XXX domain name expressions of interest, ICM Registry has announced it will be extending its Sunrise period, running for 50 days from 7 September, due to the volume of prelaunch interest in the domain. ICM Registry has received nearly 900,000 expressions of interest for .XXX domain names during its pre-reservation process. The “Sunrise” period, due to commence in fifty days time, has been designed to both permit domain registration from members in the adult entertainment business, and to assist brand managers from other industries who want to protect their trademarks ahead of wider availability. The new Sunrise period will now run for 50 days commencing 7 September 2011 and finishing on 28 October 2011. The extended period will enable ICM Registry to receive and process all applications from existing domain name and trademark owners who have applied to either opt their brand in or out of the .XXX registry. While ICM Registry holds responsibility for administering the .XXX domain name, it is working closely with individual domain registrars – the vendors handling the registration and exemption process for .XXX. The one-off fee to exempt, set by individual registrars, provides businesses with a cost-effective solution which to permanently safeguard their Intellectual Property (IP) within the .XXX registry. This service, which ensures web addresses are not registered by others at a later date, is without annual fees, and will only be available to rights owners during the restricted Sunrise period. “We believe the Sunrise period offers businesses a comprehensive rights protection mechanism where they can protect their brands and trademarks,” said Stuart Lawley, CEO of ICM Registry. “We are advising businesses to either opt-in or opt-out and want to give them the best opportunity to do so at the launch of our new TLD. Given the high level of interest in the domain, we see that many businesses wish to be proactive in avoiding any brand conflicts.” After the close of Sunrise, a Landrush period will run for 18 days where businesses from the adult entertainment industry will have premium access to remaining .XXX domains, following which general availability will ensue. Sunrise applicants using registered marks to qualify will be required to own a subsisting trade or service mark registration of national effect. “Although the .XXX extension is targeted at the adult entertainment industry, brand owners from any industry will need to be aware of its launch,” said Jonathan Robinson, Director, IPRota. “The Sunrise period offers brand managers a unique opportunity to secure relevant trademarked terms ahead of wider availability, effectively safeguarding them.” “We wanted to take an innovative approach to the launch of .XXX and show best practice at all stages including investing in a global awareness campaign,” said Lawley. “ICM Registry believes in consumer choice, and while we believe the .XXX will satisfy the needs of the sponsored community, we recognise there is also an audience who would like to opt-out and safeguard their IP prior to the domain going live”. The pre-reservation for .XXX is now closed, with on-going enquiries being handled by ICANN-accredited registrars. For more information, please see icmregistry.com or Europe Registry , your ICANN-accredited registrar.

[news release] EURid, the registry for the .eu top-level domain, successfully tested its disaster recovery plan yesterday during a business continuity exercise. During the exercise, the .eu registration systems were transferred from the registry’s data centre in Brussels, Belgium, to an alternative data centre in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. “As the custodian of the .eu top-level domain, we take our duty of maintaining the .eu registration systems very seriously. This year’s business continuity exercise showed that our back-up systems are robust,” said Marc Van Wesemael, General Manager of EURid. “We took this exercise beyond roll-playing and by doing so, actually tested EURid’s real-time capacity for disaster recovery.” It is good business practice to anticipate worst-case scenarios. Yesterday’s exercise prepared registry staff for what to do in the event of a real disaster and so reduced operational risk, allowing EURid to maintain a high level of service to its .eu accredited registrars. Registrars are crucial to the .eu registry’s core business – the registration of .eu domain names. The exercise ran from 10.02 until 12.22 CEST. Following the completion of the exercise, all .eu systems came back online and registrars were able to register .eu domain names once again, proving that should disaster strike, EURid can continue its operations in a sustainable manner. EURid’s 2011 business continuity exercise was externally audited by PriceWaterhouseCoopers. This EURid news release was sourced from: www.eurid.eu/en/content/eu-passes-disaster-tests To register your .EU domain name, check out Europe Registry here .

After a relatively modest increase in new registrations in 2009 at the height of the global financial crisis, new .BE registrations rebounded strongly in 2010 with another record in the number of new registrations according to the 2010 annual report. There were more than 257,000 new .BE registrations in 2010, almost ten per cent better than in the previous year. Renewal numbers were also very good in 2010 with an 83 per cent renewal rate of existing .BE domain names, ranking in the top five globally. The growth in active domain names was nearly 13 per cent in 2010, meaning that 2010 was the year in which the magic mark of 1,000,000 domain names was passed. At the end of June 2011 there were 1,156,953 .BE domains registered. DNS.be also did some research into why .BE domain names are registered. The findings were broadly similar to previous years with over three quarters (77%, 77.7% in 2009) of registrants linking an email address to the domain and a website in 84.3% of cases (82.3% in 2009). The registry found that only 12.2 per cent of registrations are defensive (and hence is not linked to either an email address or a website) compared to 12.4 per cent in 2009. In recent years DNS.be have seen a fall in that percentage. The registry considers this a positive change because it means a larger number of domain names are being used more actively. Most registrants have only one domain name registered, with over three quarters (435,794 – 78%) of registrants having just one domain name. 64,868 (12%) registrants registered two domain names while the average registrant has 1.96 domain names. In other news in 2010, security was increased with a new procedure was introduced in July 2010 that ensures tighter checks are made on all new registrations. This will result in higher quality of whois data. At the same time, these new checks make it more difficult for fraud and other illicit practices to gain a foothold. Greater security in the .BE zone is also a particular focus in the registry’s objectives for 2011. For 2011, one of the key developments will be the replacement of all of the hardware on the registration platform, including a number of network connections. This will enhance the performance and availability of the platform. It will also mean an optimisation of costs for DNS.be over time. DNS.be are integrating some of their name servers as part of anycast clouds, while a number of European locations will receive new equipment. The DNS.be 2010 Annual Report contains a lot more statistics and information on .BE domain names. To download the report in full, see www.dns.be/pdf/Annual_Report_en_2010.pdf . To register your .BE domain name, check out Europe Registry here .

The proliferation of registrars offering pre-registrations for new generic Top Level Domains has become alarming. There have been no approvals for new gTLDs, nor indeed have there even been any applications with the three month application window only opening on 12 January 2012. Blacknight Solutions , an Irish registrar, has raised this as an issue noting that many of the gTLDs being touted that may never even exist. Just because some would like to apply for a gTLD does not mean they will. There will be an extensive application process as well as the upfront application fee to ICANN of $185,000. After receiving several queries from customers, Blacknight said they discovered that registrants interested in acquiring domains in rumoured new gTLDs had become confused by these offers as they are not familiar with how the new TLD implementation might work. They note that this sort of speculative offer is the equivalent of taking a down payment on a concept car that has not been approved for production. It is a false promise. So just by putting your name down for pre-registration means nothing in your ability to get the domain should any new gTLD be approved. Even if approved, it is possible you might not be eligible to apply for your desired domain name. About the only thing you are likely to gain from pre-registration with a registrar you do not normally deal with is unwanted communications cluttering your email inbox! Any approved gTLD is going to have sunrise and landrush periods for interested registrants. So if you desire a domain name in a new gTLD, keep an eye out on what gTLDs are approved. Check out the eligibility and if you still want one, contact a registrar such as Europe Registry .

[news release] Following the closure of the Landrush application phase for the 2,640 remaining .uk short domains on 15 June, Nominet received payment for a total of 10,663 applications. This follows the allocation of 178 domain names in the registered and unregistered rights “sunrise” phases which enabled rights holders to register domain names prior to general availability. 599 domain names have a sole applicant and will be registered in the name of the applicants on 23 June. If you have registered one of these domains you will be contacted by your registrar. 1,327 domain names have more than one applicant and will therefore go through to the auction phase of the process. The domain name will be awarded to the applicant which places the highest bid. The net profits from the short domains release process will go to the Nominet Trust . All domain names for which there were no applicants (713 .net and 1 .me) will be made available on a first come first served basis from 27 June 2011, subject to the rules of registration. Nominet is currently reviewing the auction schedule with its auction partner, NFPA . Parties involved will be notified of the schedule, together with instructions for participation, directly by NFPA in the week commencing 27 June. Auctions are scheduled to start on 20 July. Due to the volume of auctions being held, it is anticipated that they will be held over several weeks during July, August and September. The five most heavily applied for domain names are: bb.co.uk (43 applicants), ip.co.uk (40 applicants), dj.co.uk (37 applicants), dr.co.uk (35 applicants) and cv.co.uk (33 applicants). The most heavily applied for single character domain is 1.co.uk (32 applicants). You can see the status of the domain name using Nominet’s Sunrise WHOIS tool. This Nominet news release was sourced from: www.nominet.org.uk/news/latest/?contentId=8464 To register your .UK domain name, check out Europe Registry here .