The UK needs tougher rules to curb the dominance of Google and Facebook, including powers to break them up, the Competition and Markets Authority has said.
Google and Facebook too powerful, says UK watchdog
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UK and Europe renew calls for global digital tax as US quits talks
Britain and other European countries are continuing to push for a global digital tax on technology companies such as Google, Facebook and Amazon, despite the US pulling out of the negotiations this week.
Nominet Donating £1 To Samaritans With Every New .UK Domain Registration
Nominet is donating £1 to the Samaritans for every new, paid for .uk domain registered from 9 December 2019 until 17 January 2020. Going by new registrations statistics provided by Nominet for 2019, Samaritans is likely to benefit to the tune of around £170,000.
Funds raised through new domain registrations ending in .co.uk, .uk, .org.uk, .me.uk, .ltd.uk, .plc.uk and .net.uk, will support Samaritansâ work developing its vital webchat service from its pilot stage to launch.
Samaritans is the leading suicide prevention charity in the United Kingdom, and is the only organisation that provides free emotional support 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to anyone across the UK and Ireland who is struggling to cope. Nominet, the registry for the .uk country code top-level domain (ccTLD), notes the latest suicide rates in the UK rose for the first time in five years and revealed, in particular, in recent years the rate of suicide in young people has increased.
Samaritansâ webchat pilots have already demonstrated clear evidence of the need for this service, with the charity receiving many first-time contacts from young people in states of severe distress. The aim is to make the online environment safer for young people by offering them more ways to contact Samaritans, ensuring the charityâs vital services are accessible to everyone and in ways that work best for the user.
âNominet is already supporting us to build essential new digital products that will enable Samaritans to improve our services and reach more people who need them,â said Francis Bacon, Assistant Director of Digital Services and Change, Samaritans. âWeâre very grateful that they have chosen to support us even further with this festive fundraising initiative via .UK domain registrations. The additional contribution will accelerate our ability to bring our webchat pilot to launch, which will be a milestone achievement for the charity as we endeavour to always be there for everyone.â
Nominet is a Samaritans Digital Transformation partner. Earlier this year, Nominet announced it is providing £175,000, in addition to lending their expertise as one of the countryâs leading technology companies, to support the development of the two new digital products. These are a self-help tool for coping with distress and suicidal thoughts, and a new system which will allow volunteers to respond to significant volumes of additional contacts. Overall, with a guaranteed minimum contribution from the .UK registration campaign of £140k, Nominetâs total contribution to Samaritans will be over £300k.
In 2018, Nominet supported Children in Need with a similar domain registrations initiative. The funds raised went towards the charityâs projects that use digital or new technology to support disadvantaged children and young people across the UK.
Nominet Consults On Reducing Phishing, Reducing Criminal Activity and Drop List For .UK
Nominet has opened a consultation process that will see the .uk registry seek feedback on reducing phishing, law enforcement landing pages for domain names suspended for criminal activity and implementing a drop list for expired domains.
The 2019 consultation invites feedback on three important issues:
I. Reducing the use of .UK domain names for phishing attacks
II. Implementing law enforcement landing pages following suspensions for criminal activity
III. Implementing a .UK drop list to provide a transparent and orderly process for the re-registration of expired domains
On phishing, since 2018 Nominet has used Domain Watch, an anti-phishing initiative. The initiative operates as a risk-based enhanced verification of registration data for all newly-registered domains. It uses a combination of technical algorithms and manual intervention to highlight suspicious domains. Of the 3.6 million newly registered domains in the 12 month period July 2018 to July 2019, over 1,500 domains were blocked in the DNS as a result of our Domain Watch initiative.
Nominet are asking if they should update their policies to specifically allow them to prevent resolution in the DNS where they have identified a high risk of phishing use.
On implementing landing pages following suspensions for criminal activity, while Nominet does not have the means to remove content or alter websites, they can disrupt the impact of criminal behaviour by removing or suspending a domain name. So Nominet is now seeking views on what should happen following the suspension. One option proposed is an informational landing page.
And lastly, on a drop list, Nominet is consulting on implementing a .uk drop list to provide a transparent and orderly process for the re-registration of expired domains. They also want to know if there is support for the publishing of official information for registrars to clarify when expired domains will become available for general registration. Theyâre also asking if Nominet should encourage competition in the .uk secondary domains market?
Looking forward, in the consultation paper Nominet raises several other issues they are considering to improve the .uk namespace including:
- Moving to an inter-registrar transfer system that is more widely adopted across the industry
- Standardising domain name renewals, expiry and cancellations in line with generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs) by implementing RFC 3915 and a life cycle to match gTLDs
- Removing the option for direct registration of domains with Nominet, without operating through a registrar.
âWe are committed to running a world leading registry and are always looking for ways to improve,â said Eleanor Bradley, MD of Registry Solutions and Public Benefit at Nominet. âAs the environment in which we operate evolves, we actively engage with a wide variety of UK stakeholders to ensure that the policies we maintain reflect emerging threats, changes in stakeholder expectations and new industry practices.â
âThis consultation sets out ambitious ideas to ensure .UK maintains its position as a vibrant and trusted namespace and provides an important opportunity for the UK internet community to provide input. We believe open consultation creates better policy so I encourage all interested parties to engage and look forward to hearing from you.â
Since 1996 Nominet has operated .uk, developing policies that provide the framework of principles for the .uk namespace. They are developed in consultation with a wide variety of stakeholders and aim to ensure a connected, inclusive and secure space for the UK internet community.
The .UK Policy Consultation invites feedback from all interested stakeholders by 16 December 2019. A roundtable event towards the end of the consultation period will be held on 4 December 2019. Interested parties can find out more and submit responses here.
Nominet Suspends 33,000 .UK Domains Following Law Enforcement Notifications
Almost 33,000 .uk domain names were suspended in the 12 months to the end of October 2018 following notification from the police or other law enforcement agencies that the domain name was being used for criminal activity. Continue reading Nominet Suspends 33,000 .UK Domains Following Law Enforcement Notifications
Nominet Donating Minimum of £200k To BBC’s Children in Need
Nominet, best known for managing .uk, is donating £1 for every new .uk domain name registered to BBC Children in Need until Monday 19th November. With a minimum commitment of £200k from new domain registrations, funds raised will go towards projects that use digital or new technology to support disadvantaged children and young people across the UK.
Money raised through new domain registrations, including those ending in .co.uk, .uk, me.uk and org.uk, will go on to support projects using digital to produce strong outcomes for children and young people. For example, clubs which provide technology sessions for children and young people affected by poverty and social exclusion, with the aim of helping them develop and gain new digital skills, whilst learning about new software technology, coding, robotics and digital arts.
âWeâre focused on delivering public benefit initiatives that support a vibrant digital future, so it makes perfect sense for us to partner with BBC Children in Need to fund projects that engage and develop the skills of children and young people who might otherwise be excluded from the opportunity that new advancements in tech, digital skills and online inclusion can provide,â said Russell Haworth, CEO, Nominet. âWe need to stamp out the growing digital divide, so the more young people who are able to make the most of being online and derive benefits from tech, the better. We hope our donation from domain registrations will go some way to help enable this.â
âItâs great that the funding raised by Nominet will support projects which utilise technology to support disadvantaged children and young people,â said Simon Antrobus, Chief Executive at BBC Children in Need. âWe are excited about the benefits this funding will bring and are delighted to have Nominet on board as new partner for 2018.â
BBC Children in Need is currently supporting over 2,700 projects in communities across the UK that are helping children and young people facing a range of disadvantages such as living in poverty, being disabled or ill, or experiencing distress, neglect or trauma. Further information on BBC Children in Need can be found at bbc.co.uk/Pudsey.
With the proceeds of its successful registry business and cyber security services, Nominet has donated over £45m to tech for good initiatives helping over 10 million people. Its aim is to achieve lasting social impact focusing on enabling positive change on a range of emerging issues born out of our digital age such as online safety and digital inclusion, to existing social challenges where technology can play a pivotal role, and is committed to improving the lives of one million people a year. Find out more about Nominet public benefit initiatives here â https://www.nominet.uk/about/public-benefit/
Under this initiative Nominet will donate £1 to Children in Need for each new, paid for domain registration for the country code top level domain (ccTLD) ending in .co.uk, .uk, .org.uk, .me.uk, .ltd.uk, .plc.uk and .net.uk.
CIRA Explains Why Registering ccTLD Domains Benefits the Local Internet Community
Registering domain names in a country code top level domain often has benefits to that country’s local internet community. In the case of Canada’s ccTLD, Byron Holland, President and CEO of CIRA who manages .ca, recently explained how in a post on the company blog. Continue reading CIRA Explains Why Registering ccTLD Domains Benefits the Local Internet Community
.BR Hits 4 Million Domain Name Registrations
Brazilâs ccTLD manager, NIC.br, announced [Portuguese only] Monday theyâve reached the 4 million registrations mark after âmore than 25 years of flawless operationâ.
There are over 120 second level domains under which .br domain names can be registered from blog.br and wiki.br for individuals to eng.br and adv.br for liberal professionals, tv.br and tur.br for legal persons, rio.br, sampa.br and curitiba.br for cities those reserved for specific purposes such as gov.br, jus.br, b.br and org.br among others. Some of these have as few as 10 registrations, while the largest, com.br has 3,645,125 accounting for 91.2% of all registrations.
According to the latest Verisign Domain Name Industry Brief, .br is the seventh largest country code top level domain (ccTLD). Verisign already had .br at 4 million domain name registrations at the end of 30 June, probably through rounding, up in this case, to the nearest hundred thousand. Chinaâs ccTLD was the largest with 22.7 million followed by Tokelauâs free .tk (21.5m), Germanyâs .de (16.3m), the United Kingdomâs .uk (12.0m), Russiaâs .ru (5.9m), the Netherlandsâ .nl (5.8m). Following .br is the European Unionâs .eu (3.8m), Franceâs .fr (3.2m) and rounding out the top 10 is Italyâs .it (3.1m).
Revenues from .br registrations allow NIC.br to, in addition to providing and maintaining the infrastructure behind .br, invest in a series of actions and projects that generate benefits and improvements to the internet infrastructure in Brazil. These include the operation of internet traffic exchange points, which promote the interconnection of networks that form the Internet in Brazil, reducing distances and costs; the handling security incidents and tracking internet statistics.
Nic.br notes that other advantages of registering .br domain names include additional security features, such as token and encryption, that strengthen both the accounts of Registro.br users, and their respective domains. There is another recent feature: a redirection feature that lets you point a .br domain to any URL, whether it’s on a website or the preferred channel on social networks, keeping identities and active tags on the Internet permanently. Servers distributed by Brazil and other regions of the world guarantee speed and reliability in the resolution of .br and a team exclusively dedicated to meet and assist users in their doubts complete the description.
Complaints Made About 0.0065% Of .UK Domain Names in 2017
A total of 712 complaints relating to 783 domains, representing just 0.0065% of the domain names on the .uk register, were made in 2017 according to Nominetâs annual summary of domain name disputes brought before its Dispute Resolution Service (DRS).
Over half of the complaints (55%) in 2017 in the .uk country code top level domain (ccTLD) resulted in a domain transfer. By comparison, there were 703 complaints in 2016, 53% of which resulted in a domain transfer.
The year also saw an increase to 15% in the number of disputes resolved with the domain name being voluntarily transferred to the Complainant by the Respondent upon receipt of the complaint. In 2016, 10% of complaints were resolved in this way.
âThanks to the efficient DRS processes in place and the many Experts who generously offer their time and expertise, we can see in the numbers that the DRS is continuing to prove a useful tool for .UK customers,â said Russell Haworth, Nominetâs Chief Executive. âA steady increase in the number of .uk second level domain names being disputed year on year â almost doubling since 2015 â also reflects how the shorter domain is increasing in popularity and importance for individuals and businesses.â
Brands such as Jaguar Land Rover, Clydesdale Bank Plc, Virgin Enterprises Limited, Moncler S.p.A., âDr. Martensâ International Trading GmbH and the Sony Corporation used the DRS in 2017.
Other users of the service included St Neots Town Council, the fashion designer Philipp Plein, The Commissioners For HM Revenue And Customs, The Secretary Of State For Health and Puddy Cats Cattery in Maplethorpe.
âThe increase in disputes relating to .uk second level domains is an interesting point. The Right of Registration that some .co.uk Registrants hold over the corresponding .uk domain name comes to an end on 10 June 2019,â said Nick Wenban-Smith, General Counsel at Nominet. âIn the next two years this could lead to a further increase in the number of .uk domain names being subject to disputes as more and more potentially desirable names are made available to be registered on a first-come first-served basis. To avoid such a dispute, itâs important for .co.uk owners to review their options and act sooner rather than later.â
In their announcement, Nominet highlighted the following cases resolved through what they describe as their award-winning Dispute Resolution Service (DRS):
- guntree.org.uk
The Complainant, Gumtree.com Limited, is a wholly owned subsidiary of eBay Inc. It operates an online classified advertisement website, and has registered the trade mark âGUMTREEâ. The Respondent argued that GUNTREE has been derived from the artistic concept of a tree made of guns or an artistic gun made from wood. GUNTREE advertises weapons to a specific market and therefore, does not offer the same services as the Complainant. The independent Expert agreed with the Complainantâs claim that there is an overlap between the two sites which is likely to confuse Internet users. Domain transferred.
- victoriasecretbeauty.co.uk
The Complainant was Victoriaâs Secret, an American designer and manufacturer of womenâs lingerie and beauty products. The Respondent was a beauty therapist, operating a salon in Mayfair, London. The Respondent claimed not to have known about the Victoriaâs Secret brand at the time when the Domain Name was registered. In the view of the Expert, âthis is not a credible claim, particularly taking into account that the Respondent operates in field of beauty servicesâ. Domain Transferred.
- cybfx.co.uk
The complaint was brought by Clydesdale Bank PLC (Clydesdale and Yorkshire Bank), after they found that the domain name had been registered by someone who was asking for almost £100,000 in return for transferring the registration. The Expert agreed with the Complainant: that on the balance of probabilities the Respondent noted the Complainantâs trade mark application and purposefully registered the domain name in order to then sell it specifically to the Complainant at a later date. Domain Transferred.
- dignity.co.uk
The Complainant was Dignity Funerals Ltd, and the Respondent was an individual who had previously entered into a coexistence agreement with the Complainantâs predecessors in title, providing financial and insurance services through his companies. The Expert stated âit does not appear the Respondent is doing anything that is confusing Internet usersâ, and that âdignity.co.uk shall remain with the Respondentâ. The Complainant appealed against this decision, but a panel of three members of the DRS Expertsâ Review Group dismissed the appeal, whilst upholding a finding of âReverse Domain Name Hijackingâ â using the DRS in bad faith.
Nominet also highlighted the following additional statistics:
- In 2017 there were three appeals. Two appeals upheld original No Action findings. In the third Appeal case, the Appeal Panel agreed to combined two cases together for a review and two domain names were returned to the original Registrant.
- The most common industries were Automotive (9) Electronics and Fashion (8 respectively), Retail (7) and Banking & Finance (6)
- The year saw cases bought by complainants from 29 different countries, led by the UK (553) followed by the US (42), Germany (27) and France (20). Respondents came from 34 different countries. Again, the UK leads with 598 respondents, with the US second (17) and China third with 15
- The overall average length of time DRS cases take from being filed to being closed was 57 days
- Mediated cases took an average of 56 days to resolve in 2017 compared with 47 days in 2016. Cases being resolved by a Summary Expert decision took the same time that they did in 2016 (62 days), whilst Full Decision cases took on average 4 days less.
- The majority of cases (87.5%) involved .co.uk domains, 6% were .org.uk or .uk domains and 0.5% were .me.uk
- Court costs avoided in 2017 were almost £7 million â assuming court and legal fee savings of £15k per complaint that progresses into formal dispute resolution
New gTLDs Plummet, .NET Slides, While .COM and ccTLDs Continue To Grow: Verisign DNIB
The growth in domain names was once upon a time not so many years ago on a sharp upward trajectory. But over the last couple of years that growth has slowed dramatically, with registrations growing 1.0% in the year to the end of the first quarter in 2018, or 3.2 million, to approximately 333.8 million domain name registrations across all top level domains, according to the latest Domain Name Industry Brief from Verisign for the first quarter of 2018. For the quarter, registrations grew approximately 1.4 million, or 0.4%, compared to the fourth quarter of 2017.
This growth compares to the year to the end of the first quarter of 2010 when domain name registrations grew by 11 million, or 6%, or the year to the end of the first quarter of 2017 when registrations grew 11.8 million, or 3.7%.
Total country-code top level domain (ccTLD) registrations were approximately 146.3 million at the end of the first quarter of 2018, with an increase of approximately 0.2 million domain name registrations, or 0.1%, compared to the fourth quarter of 2017. ccTLDs increased by approximately 3.2 million domain name registrations, or 2.2%, year over year. This is a noticeable improvement on 12 months ago when the growth was 1.7% year over year. In the year to the end of the first quarter 2010 growth was 3.2%.
The .com and .net TLDs had a combined total of approximately 148.3 million domain name registrations in the domain name base at the end of the first quarter of 2018, with an increase of approximately 1.9 million domain name registrations, or 1.3%, compared to the fourth quarter of 2017.
The .com and .net TLDs had a combined increase of approximately 4.6 million domain name registrations, or 3.2%, year over year. As of 31 March, the .com domain name base totalled approximately 133.9 million domain name registrations, up from 128.4 million 12 months ago, while the .net domain name base totalled approximately 14.4 , down from 15.2 million 12 months ago.
New .com and .net domain name registrations totalled approximately 9.6 million at the end of the first quarter of 2018, compared to 9.5 million domain name registrations for the first quarter of 2017.
Total new generic top level domain (new gTLD) domain name registrations were approximately 20.2 million at the end of the first quarter of 2018, with a decrease of 0.4 million domain name registrations, or 2.0%, compared to the fourth quarter of 2017. New gTLDs decreased by approximately 5.3 million domain name registrations, or 20.7%, year over year.
Among the top 10 TLDs, the first 7 are the same as one year ago – .com is the largest followed by .cn (China – 21.4 million), .tk (Tokelau – 19.9m), .de (Germany – 16.3m), .net (14.4m), .uk (United Kingdom – 12.0m) and .org (10.3m). In eighth place was .info (6.2m) followed by .ru (Russian Federation – 6.1m) and .nl (Netherlands – 5.8m). In 2017 places 8 to 10 consisted of .ru, .nl and .xyz.
In their report Verisign note that their figures include domain names in the .tk ccTLD. .tk is a free ccTLD that provides free domain names to individuals and businesses. Revenue is generated by monetising expired domain names. Domain names no longer in use by the registrant or expired are taken back by the registry and the residual traffic is sold to advertising networks. As such, there are no deleted .tk domain names.
This article can be read with images at:
http://www.domainpulse.com/2018/06/15/new-gtlds-plummet-net-slides-while-com-and-cctlds-continue-to-grow-verisign-dnib/