TLD Updates: Nordic Domain Days 2022 Registration Opens; More .TH SLDs; COVID Surge For .SK; .PT Adds Webcheck; First Governing Board for .GH; .DK Changes and CIRA Commits To A Greener Internet

Registration for the 2022 Nordic Domain Days to be held in Stockholm in May 2022 has opened. The conference that focusses on the domain name industry in the five Nordic countries – Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland, and let’s not forget the Faroe Islands, Greenland and Åland as well, is aimed as a means of discussing domain name issues for the Nordic region, and is aimed at registries, registrars, resellers, service providers and investors.

Continue reading “TLD Updates: Nordic Domain Days 2022 Registration Opens; More .TH SLDs; COVID Surge For .SK; .PT Adds Webcheck; First Governing Board for .GH; .DK Changes and CIRA Commits To A Greener Internet”

TLD Updates: EURid Continues Monitoring .EU For COVID Misuse; Changes in .FR and .DK T&Cs; .FR Turns 35, Internet in Afghanistan; ZADNA Release RFI For .ZA Registry

Due to the ongoing pandemic, the European Commission has asked EURid, the .eu registry, to continue monitoring new .eu domain name registrations using their APEWS – Advanced Prevention and Early Warning System – platform for Covid-related keywords until 31 December 2021. The initial measures for these checks were set in early April 2020 in order to protect end-users from possible misuse of domain names.

Continue reading “TLD Updates: EURid Continues Monitoring .EU For COVID Misuse; Changes in .FR and .DK T&Cs; .FR Turns 35, Internet in Afghanistan; ZADNA Release RFI For .ZA Registry”

.DK Allows Domain Registrations With German “ẞ” Character

It is now possible to register Danish domain names with the German character ẞ – also called scharfes S or double-s.

Continue reading “.DK Allows Domain Registrations With German “ẞ” Character”

DK Hostmaster Running Courses On How To Protect Your Domain Name

DK Hostmaster is running free courses on IT security in May at their offices in Copenhagen. The courses are to help gain an insight into different techniques to tighten security of domain names.

The courses are run over 4 days from 6 to 9 May and each day’s course is listed below:

  • Monday, May 6: learn to understand DNS concepts, configurations and basic security aspects of DNS
  • Tuesday, May 7: introduction to DMARC, which can effectively upgrade the security of email systems.
  • Wednesday, May 8: learn more about DNSSEC, which is a signing method that prevents hackers from changing the name server process and thereby take control of a domain name.
  • Thursday, May 9: learn to understand the latest developments in email and web traffic protection and learn about DANE, which is an extension of the security offered by DNSSEC.

All courses take place at DK Hostmaster in Ørestaden, Copenhagen and include catering.

To register, send an e-mail to registration@dk-hostmaster.dk with name, company name and course title.

.DK Introducing Domain Name Transfer Fee

DK Hostmaster is to introduce a fee for transferring .dk domain names for the first time as of 1 January 2019. The fee will be DKK50 (€6.70/US$7.60).

DK Hostmaster, Denmark’s country code top level domain (ccTLD) registry, said in their announcement the fee must be paid when the new registrant accepts the transfer on DK Hostmaster’s self-service portal.

The new fee covers the administrative costs associated with the transfer. For registrants with more than one user ID, they will still be able to bring all their .dk domain names under the user ID by using the “Merge User ID” feature using DK Hostmaster’s “self-service”, but only if the domain names have the same registrant information.

There are 1.322 million .dk domain names, with registrations declining by about 90,000 in the last 12 months. There are also 72,000 internationalised .dk domain names and 24,000 signed with DNSSEC.

DK Hostmaster Wins Global Award For Efforts Combating Cybercrime

The Alliance for Safe Online Pharmacies (ASOP Global) presented its annual Internet Pharmacy Safety E-Commerce Leadership Award to .DK Hostmaster, which was announced at ICANN63 Tuesday

The Alliance for Safe Online Pharmacies (ASOP Global) presented its annual Internet Pharmacy Safety E-Commerce Leadership Award to .DK Hostmaster, which was announced at ICANN63 Tuesday.

DK Hostmaster, the Danish country code top level domain (ccTLD) manager, won the award based on their commitment to ensuring citizen safety by maintaining transparent WHOIS data, proactively enforcing identity accuracy policies to increase consumer trust and safety online.

DK Hostmaster has increased identity checks for Danish and foreign customers and deleted over 3,000 domain names of suspected fake stores since November 2017. In addition, DK Hostmaster supports an open WHOIS, which is helping to create transparency so it continuously is possible to see who is behind a .dk domain name.

“ASOP Global is pleased to recognise DK Hostmaster for their outstanding efforts to prevent the illegal use of domain names for online drug sales and rapidly responding to any complaints,” said Libby Baney, Principal at Faegre Baker Daniels Consulting and senior advisor to ASOP Global.

ASOP Global is a 501(c)(4) non-profit organisation headquartered in Washington, D.C. with activities in the U.S., Canada, Europe, India, Latin America and Asia. It’s dedicated to protecting consumers around the world, ensuring safe access to medications, and combating illegal online drug sellers.

“DK Hostmaster is honoured to receive this award for our continued efforts to ensure a safe and trustworthy .dk zone through transparency and focus on ensuring the identity of the owners of a .dk domain name” said DK Hostmaster CEO, Jakob Truelsen.

“DK Hostmaster’s policy to keep WHOIS data open and transparent creates a more secure, trustworthy environment in the .dk namespace,” Baney commented. As a member of the Coalition for a Secure and Transparent Internet, ASOP Global further commends DK Hostmaster for their policy on transparent WHOIS and encourages other registries and registrars to follow thier lead.

“Transparency has shown to be an effective tool to prevent abuse. Sunlight has proven to an effective disinfectant” said DK Hostmaster CEO, Jakob Truelsen.

Nominations for ASOP Global’s third Internet Pharmacy E-Commerce Safety Award are now open. Award recipients will be announced during ICANN66 in November 2019 in Montreal, Canada.

Denmark’s ccTLD Introduces ‘Intensified Control of Registrants Abroad’ Plus New Terms and Conditions

dk-hostmaster-logoDK Hostmaster has introduced “an intensified control of the identity of customers living outside Denmark” in an effort to combat abuse of the country’s ccTLD. The move follows the implementation of mandatory identification with NemID for Danish costumers in November

dk-hostmaster-logoDK Hostmaster has introduced “an intensified control of the identity of customers living outside Denmark” in an effort to combat abuse of the country’s ccTLD. The move follows the implementation of mandatory identification with NemID for Danish costumers in November.

One of the reasons given for the change was the number of domain names seized for selling counterfeit goods. In 2017 alone there were 992 .dk domain names seized, the majority to registrants outside Denmark.

DK Hostmaster intends the intensified identity control to ensure Denmark’s country code top level domain is as free of abuse as possible. With this initiative it is expected the number of seized .dk domains will decrease in the future. Documentation required by DK Hostmaster for registrants living abroad will be assessed on a case-by-case basis.

There are also new terms and conditions for .dk domain names. The new T&Cs came into effect on 19 December. The changes involve:

  • Making it more transparent to a DK Hostmaster customer with rewritten terms that are streamlined and reorganised and written in a more understandable language with clarifications in some areas.
  • The T&Cs are also significantly reduced, with a reduction from 35 to 10 pages. The procedures which made up a lot of the T&Cs previously have been taken out and can now be found on the website instead. The terms and conditions are therefore more about registrant rights and obligations.
  • The terms also reflect the substantive changes made to DK Hostmaster products. These include:
    • the proxy will now be able to perform more actions on behalf of the registrant without the registrant having to approve the actions each time. Only in case of transfer and deletion must the registrant confirm the actions.
    • DK Hostmaster will be able to suspend a domain name on the basis of risk of confusion in connection with obvious risk of financial crime.
    • An emphasis on the importance of the registrant keeping contact information updated
    • The implementation of the new identification process.

The changes to the terms and conditions have come about following a consultation with the Danish internet community in 2017.

DK Hostmaster believes these changes will support transparency on the Danish internet and help prevent cybercrime.

E-Shops Selling Counterfeit Goods Often Use Re-Registered Brand Domains, European Study Finds

Companies letting their domain names expire are often finding e-shops are re-registering their domain names and using them to market trademark infringing, or counterfeit, goods. But there’s no correlation between the use of the domain name prior to the e-shop and what the e-shop sells.

Companies letting their domain names expire are often finding e-shops are re-registering their domain names and using them to market trademark infringing, or counterfeit, goods. But there’s no correlation between the use of the domain name prior to the e-shop and what the e-shop sells.

The study by the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) [pdf], through the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights, was on online business models used to infringe intellectual property rights. The study found when domain names were available for re-registration the entities operating the e-shops would systematically re-register the domain names and shortly after set up e-shops marketing goods suspected of infringing upon the trademarks of others. It was a characteristic that the prior use of the domain names was completely unrelated to the goods being marketed on the suspected e-shops. There were examples of domain names previously used by politicians, foreign embassies, commercial businesses and many other domain name registrants.

The study was conducted in 2 phases. Phase one looked at .dk (Denmark) from October 2014 to October 2015. During this period 566 .dk domains were re-registered by suspected infringers of trademarks immediately after the domain names had been given up by their previous registrants and became available for re-registration. Phase 2 looked at Sweden, which as a Scandinavian country would be assumed comparable with Denmark, Germany and the United Kingdom, which have very well-developed and large e-commerce sectors, and a country with a large e-commerce sector in southern Europe, Spain.

Phase 2 found the same phenomenon previously documented in Denmark also occurs in the Swedish, German, British and Spanish ccTLDs.

According to the study, the “total number of detected e-shops suspected of infringing the trade marks of others using a domain name under the ccTLD” ranged from 2.9% in .de (Germany) to 9.5% in .se (Sweden) while the “total number of detected e-shops suspected of infringing the trade marks of others using a domain name under the ccTLD where the domain name had been previously used by another registrant” ranged from 71.1 % of suspected e-shops in .uk (United Kingdom) to 81.0% in .es (Spain). The average was 5.41% across all ccTLDs in the study and 75.35% respectively.

Based on the research, the researchers believe it must be considered likely that the same also occurs in other European countries with well-developed e-commerce sectors.

An analysis of the 27,970 e-shops in the study identified a number of patterns including shoes were the product category most affected, accounting for two-thirds (67.5%) of the suspected e-shops and then clothes, accounting for 20.6%, while 94.6% of the detected suspected e-shops used the same specific e-commerce software.

Additionally, 40.78 % of the detected suspected e-shops in Sweden and the United Kingdom were registered through the same registrar, 21.3 % of all the e-shops used the same name server and a quarter (25.9%) of the suspected e-shops had the hosting provider located in Turkey, 19.3 % in the Netherlands and 18.3 % in the United States.

Even if the domain name was previously used for the marketing of goods, the study found the current e-shops were marketing a different type of product at the time of analysis. The study examined 40 case studies that indicated the sole reason for re-registration of the domain names is to benefit from the popularity of the website that was previously identified by the domain name. The benefits would include search engine indexing, published reviews of services and/or products and links from other websites that have not yet taken the current use into consideration. The case studies used also indicate a high degree of affiliation between the e-shops is likely. The research seems to indicate that what on the surface seems like thousands of unrelated e-shops are likely to be one or a few businesses marketing trade mark infringing goods to European consumers.

The 140 page study is available for download from:
https://euipo.europa.eu/tunnel-web/secure/webdav/guest/document_library/observatory/documents/reports/Research_on_Online_Business_Models_Infringing_IP_Rights.pdf

ICANN Publishes Attendance Statistics For Johannesburg Meeting

ICANN59_Johannesburg_logoThere were 1,353 people attending the recent ICANN meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa, the 59th, with over one-third (498) listing their region as Africa. This compares to the previous meeting, ICANN58 held in Copenhagen, Denmark, where there were 2,089 checked-in participants, with 1,012 listing their region as Europe

ICANN59_Johannesburg_logoThere were 1,353 people attending the recent ICANN meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa, the 59th, with over one-third (498) listing their region as Africa. This compares to the previous meeting, ICANN58 held in Copenhagen, Denmark, where there were 2,089 checked-in participants, with 1,012 listing their region as Europe.

For the African meeting, one-third (33%) were first-time attendees compared to 31% in Copenhagen.

Other stats from the meeting, with Copenhagen statistics in brackets, were:

  • 236 sessions held, for a total of 423 hours (348 sessions held, for a total of 642 hours)
  • Top three sessions by attendance:
  1. General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and its Potential Impact: Looking for Practical Solutions
  2. Cross-Community Discussion on Next-Generation gTLD Registration Directory Services (RDS) Policy Requirements
  3. Who Sets ICANN’s Priorities?
  • 39,729 schedule website page views
  • 8.2 terabytes of data as network traffic (9 terabytes).

For the Copenhagen meeting there were also:

  • 2,094 unique mobile app visits
  • 78,587 schedule website page views.

Click on this link to download the full ICANN59 Community Feedback report [PDF, 734 KB].

Click here to download the full ICANN59 By the Numbers report [PDF, 6.06 MB].

CENTR Report On Everything You Want To Know About What Happened At ICANN58

Did you want to know what happened at the recent ICANN meeting in Copenhagen? Or did you go and spend the week networking and socialising, and miss what happened in the meeting rooms? CENTR have produced a comprehensive report with 13 pages of meeting reports to get you through.

Did you want to know what happened at the recent ICANN meeting in Copenhagen? Or did you go and spend the week networking and socialising, and miss what happened in the meeting rooms? CENTR have produced a comprehensive report with 13 pages of meeting reports to get you through.

The highlights, or the issues highlighted in the executive summary, were the ccNSO Council giving the green light to start the work on the Policy Development Process on the review mechanisms for the delegation, revocation and retirement of ccTLDs and to combine this with a PDP for the retirement of ccTLDs while the GAC expressed its strong dissatisfaction with the ICANN Board’s resolution on 2-letter country codes at the second level for new gTLDs. The CENTR report notes it was pointed out that previous GAC advice was simply ignored, the notification and comments period were scrapped and that the process lacked transparency. And then a surprisingly big chunk of time of a global conference was dedicated to a “rather European problem”, i.e. the potential clash of ICANN WHOIS requirements with the upcoming EU data protection regulation (GDPR).

The CENTR report goes into more detail on a number of issues including:

  • Working group updates on New gTLD Auction Proceeds, Guidelines Review Committee, CCWG on Use of Country/Territory Names as TLDs, ccNSO Strategic and Operational Planning WG, TLD-OPS Standing Committee
  • Accountability issues
  • Towards a data-driven ICANN
  • Updates on the Governmental Advisory Committee

There were also reports on geographic names with a focus on 2-letters at the second level and data protection, among several other sessions.

To check out and download the CENTR report on ICANN58 in Copenhagen last week, go to:
https://www.centr.org/news/news/centr-publishes-its-report-on-icann58.html