ICANN Announcements

Update: ICANN Projects Underway to Improve Whois Accuracy

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The following compliance projects, intended to improve Whois data accuracy and Whois service accessibility, are underway by ICANN.

  • ICANN Commences Whois Data Accuracy Study
  • Registrar Whois Data Reminder Policy Audit
  • Registrar Investigation of Whois Inaccuracy Claims Audit
  • Whois Accessibility Study

I. ICANN Commences Whois Data Accuracy Study

Over the years ICANN constituencies and others have observed apparent inaccuracies in Whois contact information provided by registrants when registering and maintaining their domain names. In an attempt to contribute to community discussion regarding Whois policy, ICANN has undertaken a study of domain name Whois contact information accuracy.

Industry News

Verisign Domain Name Industry Brief reports 146 Million Registrations

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The latest issue of the VeriSign Domain Name Industry Brief reports that the third quarter of 2007 ended with a total base of 146 million domain name registrations worldwide across all of the Top Level Domain Names (TLDs). This represents a six percent growth over the second quarter and 31 percent growth over the same quarter last year. The total base of ccTLD registrations was 54.6 million, a six percent increase quarter over quarter and a 38 percent increase year over year. Reviewing the total base of registrations in both global TLDs and ccTLDs, .COM has the highest base with the next two spots remaining unchanged with .DE (Germany) and .NET rounding out the top three. This quarter, .CN (China) moved solidly to the fourth spot. This leaves the fifth spot to be shared by .UK (United Kingdom) and .ORG with approximately the same number of total domain name registrations.

ICANN Announcements

Request to Provide Input to Issue Report on Introduction of IDN ccTLDs

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At its meeting on 2 October 2007, the ccNSO Council resolved to call for an Issue Report to examine the need for a Policy Development Process (ccPDP) to consider:

1. Whether Article IX of the ICANN bylaws applies to IDN ccTLDs associated with the ISO 3166-1 two letter codes, and if it does not then to establish if Article IX should apply.

2. Whether the ccNSO should launch a PDP to develop the policy for the selection and delegation of IDN ccTLDs associated with the ISO 3166-1 two-letter codes.

The Council requested that, in preparing the Issue Report, the Issue Manager identify policies, procedures, and/or by-laws that should be reviewed and, as necessary revised, in connection with the development and implementation of any IDN ccTLD policy.

The Council, also at the 2 October meeting, appointed Bart Boswinkel as Issue Manager by the ccNSO Council, responsible for producing the Issue Report.

Announcements

OBox Maintenance Downtime Notice – 29th December 2007

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Please be advised that the LogicBoxes System will be undergoing a planned downtime on 29th December, 2007 as per the Maintenance Window given below.

Why this downtime?

The Downtime has been scheduled for system upgradation and an extensive database migration. This downtime will ensure improved system performance, responsiveness and long term scalability.

The time frame for the migration has been selected after much deliberation and we have attempted to schedule it in a fashion that would cause our Registrars and their resellers and customers the least possible inconvenience. The 29th being on a weekend, allows us to make the necessary upgrades without significantly encroaching on regular business hours.

Also, we suggest that you and your Customers renew any Orders that might be up for Renewal before the 29th itself, in order to avoid them from expiring on account of the Downtime.