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.
The demand for .fi domain names has soared since the start of the global COVID-19 pandemic in March, with registrations recently passing the half million milestone, Traficom, the Finnish Transport and Communications Agency, reported last week.
Nic.at’s sister company ipcom has signed up another partner to their RcodeZero DNS anycast network, taking the total number of top-level domains using the service to at least 22. Last week the Austrian ccTLD registry announced DNS Belgium had signed an agreement that will see their 1.6 million .be, .vlaanderen and .brussels domain names hosted on the Austrian company’s RcodeZero DNS anycast network.
Registrations of .fi domain names has increased markedly since the last northern autumn when the Finnish registry introduced a new registry-registrar model. From the beginning of 2017, more than 40,000 new .fi domain names have been registered and at the end of June, the number of .fi domain names registered totalled 430,000.
The Finnish ccTLD registry attributes a large portion of the increase has been attributed to the new model where FICORA has delegated registrations to registrars only, dropping the role it also had, as well as allowing registrations to anyone, anywhere in the world.
“The new operational model from last autumn has involved an increased interest in .fi domain names”, says Juhani Juselius, Chief Specialist at FICORA. âNow anyone anywhere in the world can register .fi domain names.â
During the first half of 2017, 40,079 new .fi domain names were registered. In June alone there were 5,642 new registrations and at the end of the month, the total number of .fi domain names registered was 430,143.
“Compared to the same period a year ago, the growth has been up to 34% as the number of domain names registered in June 2016 was 29,861”, continued Juselius.
There are some big changes coming for .fi domain names in early September. The Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority (FICORA) is lowering the registry fee and registrants will need to deal with a registrar and not FICORA.
The new prices charged to registries as of 5 September will be lower than before with the prices being â¬9 per year and domains able to be registered for up to five years at a time.
On the move to what is recognised by many as an international registry/registrar model, the current system for .fi and all related user IDs will cease to exist on Friday 2 September at 16:15. It will not be possible to modify domain names between 16:15 on Friday 2 September 2016 and 10:00 on Monday 5 September.
After 5 September, if a registrant wishes to place a domain name under a registrar’s management and does not have a registrar yet, the customer will need a registrar transfer key. The key can be requested at FICORA’s customer service and FICORA sends it directly to the customer.
A registrar transfer key may only be sent to an address that FICORA can verify either through its own register or the registers of the Finnish Patent and Registration Office or the Population Register Centre. The registrar transfer key may also be sent by email or text message provided that the email and telephone number details in the register are up to date.
If the contact details entered in FICORA’s register are outdated, the customer should check that the information at the Finnish Patent and Registration Office or the Population Register Centre is correct. The contact details in FICORAâs register may then be verified and updated on the basis of the other registers.
Other changes coming is that from 7 September a list of domain names currently banned by law will become available. The domain names include generic or country code top level domains (gTLDs or ccTLDs), abbreviations of enterprise, foundation or association forms and expressions that are insulting or incite into criminal activity. The banned domain names will be released for registration at 10:00 on Wednesday 7 September.
The Norwegian ccTLD, .no, reached the 700,000 registrations milestone in late June with individuals adding significantly to the number of registrations since they were allowed to register domains in the ccTLD in June 2014.
But today the total number of registrations has dipped backed below the milestone and number 6999,876 of which 408,793 are DNSSEC secured.
Since June 2014 the number of .no domain names registered by individuals has reached 50,000.
The Kenya Network Information Centre (Kenic) has reduced the price charged to registrars for .ke domains to Sh650 ($6.40) per domain from Sh1,000 ($9.85); with a recommended retail selling price set at Sh1,000, according to a report in the Kenyan Business Daily.
There are also âplans to make it compulsory for new companies seeking registration to have a website as part of efforts to get at least half of local enterprisesâ to use the Kenyan ccTLD.
Kenic âalso plans to make it possible to register for the domain name at any Huduma Centre countrywide.â Huduma Centres provide Kenyans access to various Public Services and information from One Stop Shop citizen service centres.
Ficora is transitioning to a new registry-registrar model and as part of the plans to implement the change .fi will undergo maintenance operations between 16:15 on 2 September and 10:00 on 5 September.
The current domain name system and all related user IDs will cease to exist on Friday, 2 September at 16.15. This means that domain names cannot be modified between Friday, 2 September 2016 at 16.15 and Monday, 5 September 2016 at 10.00. Which also means it will not be possible to renew or change registrant information during this period. The new system which will only be for registrars will open at 10:00 on 5 September.
Other changes that will occur as a result of the new system will be that the registration of certain domain names currently banned by law will become available. Domain names that will become available include:
These restrictions are abandoned in the Information Society Code and the banned domain names will be released for registration on Wednesday, 7 September 2016 at 10.00. The release takes place on Wednesday in order to provide registrars a chance to check their account balance and deposit enough money to their account for the registrations.
Other changes for registrars include:
FICORA has issued a regulation on domain names that end with fi or ax and the registration of such names. The regulation enters into force on 5 September 2016 as fi- and ax-domain names switch to the new international registry-registrar model.
Domain Name Regulation 68/2016 M
This announcement was sourced from:
https://domain.fi/info/en/index/tietoa/ajankohtaista/2016/P_9.html
The Finnish ccTLD registry is to stop selling domain names as part of a number of changes being introduced from 5 September. From this date, registrants will be required to register their domains with their own registrar while FICORA, the .fi registry, will act as the registry and policy and regulatory body.
Additionally, the local presence requirement for applicants is abandoned. This means that foreign companies, organisations and private persons become eligible to register .fi domain names regardless of their place of residence. The age limit of 15 for domain name holders is also abandoned. Furthermore, domain names that consist of a combination of a person’s first and last names may be freely registered. .FI domains may also be registered with the purpose of redelivery which is currently still illegal.
EURid, the .eu registry, has announced that preparations for the launch of .eu in Cyrillic are nearing completion. The official launch date for .eu in Cyrillic is 1 June. EURid will fully enforce the basic rule that the second level script must match the top-level script. This means that the current domain names registered in Cyrillic under .eu (Latin string) will undergo a âscript adjustmentâ phase.
All policies, procedures and features currently available for .eu (Latin string) such as transfers, bulk transfers, multiyear, DNSSEC, registry lock, Customised Reduction Schemes, Co-funded Marketing Programme, etc., will also apply to .ÐµÑ (Cyrillic string).
The current .eu Registration Policy, Terms & Conditions and WHOIS policy will apply to domain names registered under .ÐµÑ (Cyrillic string).
A complete list of important administrative, legal and technical guidelines regarding the implementation of .eu in Cyrillic is available here.
Red.es is advising that registrants of .es domain names need to update the data associated with their .es domains.
Red.es or the accredited registrar s currently contacting registrants to ensure that the date is correct, truthful and updated, which it is required to be at all times. Any registrant that doesnât comply with the terms and conditions may find their domain is cancelled.
Another change for .es domains is that as of 28 May, the current SSL certificate will be replaced with a new one, with a key length of 2048 bits and SHA-256 algorithm. With this update, Red.es will improve its portal protection and increase the security of established connections with the website.
[news release] Finnish domain name applicants favour reliability and Finnish origin in their choice of domain name, because the demand of fi-domain names has remained high. The popularity of the fi-domain name does not reflect on their information security, because only a fraction of domain name holders deploy the Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSec) FICORA has offered for a year now.
About 52,000 new domain names are granted each year, but despite the success of the fi-domain name, the deployment of the DNSSec extension is at its infacy in Finland. There are only 63 domain names protected by DNSSec, which is very low in the international comparison. For example, as many as 145,000 Swedish domain names ending with .se use DNSSec extension. The world’s fourth most common top-level country code, the Netherlands’ .nl domain has more than a million domain name holders using the DNSSec.
DNSSec (Domain Name System Security Extensions) is an extension improving the information security of the name service, which ensures the origin and integrity of the information received from the name server. When DNSSEC is in use, responses to name system queries are digitally signed. DNSSEC ensures that responses to name system queries come from the right sender and that the response information has not been modified. This guarantees that people using the internet are only shown the actual website that they intended to call up.
FICORA recommends strongly that fi-domain name holders deploy DNSSec. More information on the extension can be found at domain.fi. Domain name holders may inquire about the DNSSec support from their service provider.
To continue reading this FICORA news release, go to:
https://domain.fi/info/en/index/tietoa/ajankohtaista/2012/P_50.html
[news release] The Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority (FICORA) is examining hundreds of deliberately misspelled fi-domain names of Finnish companies and services. A total of 886 fi-domain names are being examined. They were applied for via a Maltese registrar but registered under a Finnish holder.
FICORA has contacted the Finnish holder and the Maltese registrar and continues to investigate the case. The Maltese registrar’s right to apply for new fi-domain names has been denied until further notice.
Spelling mistake leads to advertisement site
It is typical of the misspelled domain names that the difference between them and a business name, trademark or similar protected by the Domain Name Act is hardly noticeable, which is when the internet user ends up on a false site due to e.g. a spelling mistake. For example, http://www-mol.fi/ is such a misspelled address.
Typically, a website utilising a misspelled address contains advertisement links to various services. If the user, who has entered the site by accident, clicks on the advertisement link, the site maintainer gets paid by the advertiser. The phenomenon is called ‘typosquatting’ in English.
This FICORA news release was sourced from:
https://domain.fi/info/en/index/tietoa/ajankohtaista/2012/P_29.html
To register your .FI domain name, check out Europe Registry here.