Currently, there are only 21 top level domains and only a few of those are available to the general public. These are the extension endings that domain names contain and usually take the form of .com, .net, .co, .org and others. However, ICANN plans on releasing the new gTLD sometime later this year, an event that has caused quite a bit of controversy. This could significantly affect users and businesses around the world as domains will now have endings like .auto, .house, .NewYork, .ART and so many more.

Essentially, people will now have hundreds of different domain options to choose from.  The idea is that these extensions will help categorize websites more efficiently on the search engines, but also allow new businesses to choose domains in keeping with their industry.

2 – Chinese Characters for Top-Level Domains

ICANN also recently announced that the organization will offer Chinese character option in top-level domains later this year. These characters will be allowed in the domain address after the dot and these would replace the .com, .net., .org or other extension.

This rollout is a part of ICANN’s  future intentions of adding other endings other than the alphabet. These will include languages including  Arabic, Russian, Japanese and Korean.

3 – Better  Branding Options

With the launch of new gTLDs ICANN plans on using branding extensions for some top-level domains. In other words, some brands will be able to use the Trademark name as their domain extension. An example of this might be ‘.mcdonalds’. Apparently the plan is still a go, despite considerable controversy. Many believe the release of so many domain name options could spur security issues and confusion among users.

4 – ICANN’s Suggestion for DDoS Attacks

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers has also recently offered an important suggestion with regards to the proliferate DDoS attacks. They suggest that while hosting companies can help website owners circumvent the attack, any owner that notices such a criminal act of violence should also contact their national law enforcement agency. Although this won’t help mitigate any existing attack, it may help catch the criminals. If caught participating in DDoS attacks, criminals can expect convictions and jail time.

5- ICANN announces New Office Location in Istanbul, Turkey

Just recently, ICANN announced its first office in Istanbul.  Chief Executive Office Fadi Chehade, announced ICANN is becoming increasingly international in its policies and future outlook. The new Istanbul Hub office will focus on growing the ICANN infrastructure in Europe, the Middle-East and Africa. This move extends the organization’s intentions of extending its global influence.  This new Istanbul Hub will act as an epicenter for Internet policy and connections between Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Bottom Line

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names seems to be in a growth stage, and possibly expects great returns on the soon to be released gTLDs. This is the most likely reason for the several recent developments and plans made by the organization.

One of the first questions a prospective new website owner asks is, “What type of domain should I get? Should I get a .com, .net, or .co extension?” Well, the answer is really dependent on the industry you work in, but in most cases, registering your name with all three of the .com, .net and .co is in your best interest for the following reasons.

1 – Your Business Remains Unique

If you have a specific niche or area that you specialize in, owning all three extensions is in your best interest because it prevents copycat businesses from turning up. Although there are extensive branding regulations now, it is still possible, and fighting a lawsuit against another business can be expensive. It is much less expensive to protect your brand by making an initial purchase of the various extensions of your domain. For example: Let’s say you are the founder of a website called savannahgroceries.com, delivering quality produce in the Savannah area. Then someone comes along and sees your website and thinks “Hey this is a great idea. I’ll do the same thing, except I’ll call it, savannahgroceries.org.” You now have direct competition. You could sue for trademark issues but that may be a prolonged process; and in the meantime, you could lose business.

2 – Help Customers Find You

Often, users forget whether you have a .com, .org, .net or .co extension. So when searching for your website, they may use an extension that isn’t yours. By purchasing other extensions you can redirect these to your website – and never lose an existing customer again.

3 – Get More Search Engine Listings

When you own more than one domain name extensions, and you submit these to the search engines, you may be able to get additional search engine listings. You see, the search engines only allow you one submittal per domain name. So if your website is savannahgroceries.com, you can only have one index listing for that domain name, no matter how many times you submit it to the search engines. However, if you have several domain extensions of the same name (savannahgroceries.net, savannahgroceries.co, savannahgroceries.org,) you could get each of these listed on the search engines. So If you are listed in position #5 under savannahgroceries.com, you could get listing #6, and #7 for savannahgroceries.co, or savannahgroceries.net.

4 – Duplicate Content

When you have a business that needs to offer information in two languages, you don’t want to duplicate the web pages and content on the same website. So a solution may be to register other domain name extensions – such as .net, or .co, and then add the information in the other language to those domain names, and then link these back to the main domain name.

5 – Assume There Will Be Misspellings

Another reason you might want to multiple domains is to compensate for misspelled words, especially if a word in your online business name can easily be misspelled. For instance, if the word ‘guarantee’ is a part of your web domain, as in myguarantee.com, then you might want to purchase misspelled versions of the domain. These might be ‘guarentee.net’ or ‘guaranty.co.’ You can then redirect these to your main domain. Then when people use these common misspellings of your domain they will still be directed to your website and you’ll have stopped yourself losing a customer.

Bottom Line

Domain names are not expensive, so you really shouldn’t skimp on buying enough of them to cover the spectrum of your business. You want to buy different extensions or even variations of your name to protect your brand, help your readers find you and to prevent your needing to add duplicate pages of content to the same domain.

Domain names generally cost very little these days. However, if you are a serious Internet marketer or entrepreneur and want a highly desirable domain name, it could cost you millions of dollars.

Domain names of various extensions are often historically sold in auctions and private sales throughout the world.

“The domain brokerage business is heating up as more and more domain owners turn to sales as a way to replace PPC revenues that evaporated in recent years,” said Ron Jackson, DN Journal. “Those newly motivated to sell joined an already sizeable contingent of domain investors who had always put sales first, resulting in a flood of new business for experienced brokers that had a track record of success.”

Here are the three most expensive domain names sold:

INSURE.COM (Sold for $16 Million in 2009)

Foster City-based Company Quin Street, Inc., a leader in vertical marketing and media online, bought this domain name for $16M. This is the most expensive domain name ever sold.

“We have sold our Insure.com name and specified website content in a significant cash transaction that we think is in the best long-term interest of our shareholders,” remarked Robert Bland, chairman and CEO of the Insure.com.

SEX.COM (Sold for $13 Million in 2010)

Second to the list is the domain name sex.com, which was brokered by Jeff Gabriel, president of Domain Advisors. It was sold at $13M, reported as the most expensive domain sale. Gabriel shared his insights and tips on domain selling on the DN Journal.

“We work together frequently discussing active opportunities, negotiation strategies, brainstorming to generate lists of potential buyers and collaborating to formulate a plan for success,” said Gabriel to DN Journal.

FUND.COM (Sold for $9.99 Million in 2008)

The domain name fund.com was technically sold (private sale) for $9,999,950 in an all-cash transaction. This is the highest cash price sale ever reported, topping Porn.com, which was sold for $9.5M.

“With the highest sale on record, another three sales in the six-figure range and 44 sales reaching at least five figures this was a pretty darn good week for domains especially when the rest of the economy is believed to be mired in a recession,” said Jackson.

Just because these domain names were acquired for millions, doesn’t mean that they get high traffic and page ranks. These domain names were considered assets to the companies, and it’s a great profit for brokers and resellers too.

Neustar, the operator of the .Biz domain registry, recently notified the International Corporations for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) that it will raise the cost of the.Biz extension domain name registrations to $8.63.

Neustar’s .BIZ Hike – Will it Produce the Expected Revenue?

In order for people to reach a website, they have to type in an address, or an address has to appear in the search engines. This address consists of a name or number that is unique, followed by a.com, .net, .org, .edu, .biz, .info or other extension. This name and extension is associated to a particular registry and allows Internet servers to know where to find the address.

In the early days of the Internet these domain names were identified with a .com, .net, .org or an extension specific to a certain country. However, there came a point when finding the availability of a particular name became almost impossible. This led to intensive competition for a specific domain name, causing providers and businesses to sell specific domain names for exorbitant prices.

The .biz, .info, .mobi and .us domain extensions were later created to relieve some of this competition for domain names with the .com extension, each with a specific purpose. For instance:

• Biz extensions are for small businesses.
• Org are designed primarily for non-profit organizations.
• Edu extensions serve websites that focus on education.
• Mobi domains are for the mobile industry.
• US is the newest extension made for U.S. based websites.

What Does This Price Hike Mean?

While .com addresses have always been the preferred domain registry system, and the extension considered a top tiered system, it is also highly competitive and more expensive than the other registries. While a .com domain name typically comes at a price of up to $12, other similarly named domains registered as a .biz, .US, .info, .mobi or any of the other available system extensions costs substantially less. This makes these domain names attractive to website owners who need more than one domain name.

Bottom Line

Website owners owning, 10, 20, 30 or more websites have previously found the lower price of .biz domains more appealing. But this new hike in price will raise the wholesale price by $.78, taking it to $8.63, which is comparable to the price of a first tier .com domain names. Neustar believes this increase will add to their revenue, and it may for existing domain names that are renewed by owners. However, it may also deter the sale of new domain names, as website owners may not consider the price worth paying, as the more conventional .com domain extension are available at comparable prices.

Google, Mozilla and Microsoft have recently had major concerns regarding a fraudulent digital certificate that could allow any online criminal to impersonate the Google domain.  This issue was first detected over the 2012 Christmas holidays and while there were no major catastrophes, it is still an issue that needs to be addressed.

When Did This Happen?

The Google Chrome team only became aware of the issue over the holidays. They were then able to track the fake certificate back to an intermediate certificate authority, TurkTrust. The company, a Turkish certificate vendor, now states that the problem has existed since August of 2011, when a software migration operation took place.

The TurkTrust Investigation
When TurkTrust was alerted to the mistake, they started an immediate investigation and found that they had twice mistakenly issued the wrong type of security credential to website clients. This mistake gave these clients intermediate certification, instead of the low-level certificate they required.

One of these went to the Turkish public transit agency. What the agency did with the certification is unknown, but Microsoft claims it was used to create a fraudulent digital certificate for Google.

The Fraud
The fraud consisted of someone making a fake credential that claimed to be Google+ social network. The good news is the con was spotted when the Google Chrome team noticed the fraudulent certificate.

The Response
Google responded immediately to the threat by updating Chrome’s certificate on December 25. This blocked the intermediate CA that was issued by TurkTrust. Microsoft has also blocked the fraudulent Google certificate issues.

The Final Google Fix
Google has taken steps to address the immediate issues, and given the severity of the problem, promises to update Chrome again, and to discontinue the acceptance of extended validation from certificates issued by TurkTrust.

The Implications
This issue has made experts re-evaluate the current certificate authority system. Some now believe that future mistakes could allow fraudsters to impersonate any website or browser they choose.  Actually, some experts suggest that the system has been broken for a number of years, and it may be time to start looking for new more effective certificate safety procedures. ]]> http://www.resell.biz/blog/domain-fraud-google-uncovers-shady-digital-certificates/feed/ 0 http://www.resell.biz/blog/domain-trouble-in-disneys-magic-kingdom/ http://www.resell.biz/blog/domain-trouble-in-disneys-magic-kingdom/#comments Fri, 29 Mar 2013 21:11:32 +0000 Jake Neeley http://www.resell.biz/blog/?p=1007

In a case that blurs the lines between copyright law and domain registration, Disney pursued the rights to 13 domain names that were being held by a GoDaddy customer and was successful in obtaining the rights to all but three of the domains referred to in the claim.

The domains that avoided Disney’s grasp all had “Aladdin” in the name, which brings into question how someone was able to defeat Disney, even partially, for the rights to domain names that reference a notable Disney series.

What Is the UDRP?

UDRP stands for “Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy,” and in simple terms it provides a framework for deciding if an entity has a stronger claim to a domain name than the other in case of disagreement. The exact terms of the UDRP are fairly extensive, as most legal documents tend to be, but the core of the idea is that the defendant of the claim must demonstrate that: the domain name is not overly similar to trademarks held by the claimant, they have a legitimate interest in holding on to the domain name, and they are not using the domain names in “bad faith.”

Thanks to the wording of the UDRP, its bias towards the complainant has been called into question, but it remains the primary resolution format and was the one used when Disney sought to gain the following domain names: Aladdinonbroadway.com, Aladdinthemusical.com, Aladdinmusical.com, Disneymeetup.com, Disneyonbroadway.net, Disneythemusical.com, Mickeymouseonbroadway.com, Spider-manonbroadway.com, Spider-manthemusical.com, Spidermanonbroadway.net, Tangledonbroadway.com, Thedisneydream.com, and Thedisneyfantasy.com.

Why Did Disney Lose Their Claim for the Aladdin Domains?

The domains that were granted to Disney included ones with obvious references to their trademarks. Given that Aladdin and associated characters have been used by Disney in several movies, television series, and video games, it may be confusing that Disney failed to receive the judgment for the related domain names when the others were granted. The issue presented by the domain holder was that Aladdin is in fact a story originating from the Arabian Nights tale and Disney only officially holds a trademark to “Aladdin’s Magic Carpet Ride.” Because of the folk origins of the story of Aladdin, Disney was unable to demonstrate that the domain names were similar to a trademark they possessed. The holder was also able to show that they did not maliciously use the domain names in general, resulting in the three domains associated with Aladdin being left in the hands of the current holder.

Xbox gamers have long been awaiting the release of a new game console. Actually, gamers have been speculating on it for more than a year now. Still, there is no response from Microsoft, leaving everyone waiting expectantly.

That may be about to change. Microsoft could soon offer a response to the recent Sony announcement of the soon to be released Playstation 4. Sony made a beautiful demonstration of their new game console at the well-publicized PlayStation meeting. Since then, game lovers have been a bit surprised at the lack of response by Microsoft. Now, there may be news! Microsoft has offered a slight hint as to a new Xbox release. Just recently, a company called U.S. Techs, a Microsoft associate responsible for the Microsoft E3 events, registered a new domain called XboxEvent.com.

This registration offers an ever-so-slight indication of a future Xbox console announcement. But on the other hand, it may also just be a huge consumer prank.

What Does This Mean?

Well, if gamers and Microsoft followers are correct, the naming of this domain is the antecedent to Microsoft’s announcement of a new Xbox on the horizon. Naming it the Xbox Event in response to the PlayStation meeting, would be a very simple, yet brilliant idea. This might be an extremely simplistic marketing response to PlayStation, but also one that could also be very effective.

What Else Do We Know?

Other than this possibly important domain name registration, Microsoft is remaining close mouthed. No one knows anything concrete about a new Xbox console, and Microsoft isn’t letting on about their plans. This leaves us speculating as to the meaning of this domain name registration and whether it is an indication of a release or not. Still, those attending the PlayStation event did come away believing Microsoft would soon make an Xbox announcement, maybe even as early as April.

Bottom Line

If the experts are correct in their assessment we should expect the teaser announcements to begin in a few weeks, or at the very latest in a month or two. If the gaming experts have got it all wrong, it may be longer than that. Right now though, the predictions are that there is a new Xbox in the making.

The true address of a website is its Internet Protocol (IP) number. This is a string of digits; four numeral-only blocks in IP 4 addresses but six blocks of hexadecimal numbers (base-16 numbers that use letters as well as numerals) in the newer IP 6 numbers. It would be impossible to remember such long, complex numbers for every single site; that’s why text-based names were devices. A domain name is the human-readable address that’s assigned to each IP number.

The Early Days
When the Internet first began, domain names as we now known them didn’t really exist. Although alphabetical names were introduced with the first incarnation of the Internet – ARPANET – they weren’t the familiar .com or .net names used on the web today. For the most part, only Government departments, major libraries and institutes of higher education were connected to the embryonic Internet; users were scientists, engineers and other highly-skilled people. Very few ordinary people even knew about the Internet.

Standardization and Expansion
As the various protocols used for electronic communication were standardized, it became easier for people to use the Internet without extensive training and study. As the number of websites grew from a tiny handful, new ways of naming and categorizing them needed to be devised.

The First Top Level Domains
In 1985, the first TLDs or top level domains were introduced: .com, .edu, .gov, .mil, .net and.org. The first ever .com registered was Symbolics.com, which was bought by Symbolics Computing. The domain is still live even though the company no longer owns it; today, it’s an Internet history site. More followed but in 1985 there were only five commercial websites.

New TLDs
As the Internet grew, more countries became involved. To cope with the influx of new registrations and to help distinguish between sites from different nations, new TLDs were introduced. These included national domains such as .co.uk for UK websites.

The Present Day
Today, the Internet has expanded far beyond anything that 1985′s users could possibly have imagined. More and more domain names have been registered; while it’s hard to give an exact figure, some sources put the number of registered domains at over 225 million.

The Future
We’re written about the future of domains a few times lately but things will greatly change when the new TLDs featuring professional and industry related extensions. If a lawyer were to create a new website today, with the hopes of getting a .com domain, they would have a difficult time finding one; however, in the near future with .lawyer becoming available, it wouldn’t be as hard.

Accents are marks that change the pronunciation of certain letters in Canadian French and other languages, such as é. The special characters that use these marks have often been excluded from web addresses, sometimes due to technical difficulties in supporting them or because of other concerns. Nations where accented letters are in use have found that this creates problems for them. One such nation is Canada.

A multilingual society, Canada has a large Canadian French-speaking population who have resented and protested their inability to register domain names in French using correctly-accented spellings.

History

Historically, it has not been possible to register a domain with Canada’s own “.ca” extension using correctly-spelled Canadian French words. This was because the Canadian Internet Registration Authority did not permit the use of accented letters. Site owners either had to use English words, accept inaccurate spellings or register their sites elsewhere, meaning that they could not have a “.ca” URL. This frustrated many Canadian French speakers, who pointed out that other nations’ registration authorities support special characters. For example, Russian URLs can include Cyrillic letters.

Changes

In early 2012, it was announced that the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) had begun the consultation process that would enable sites to use accents in their names. In January 2013, CIRA stated that the consultation was complete and that letters with accents would now be allowed in “.ca” site names.

Characters

In all, 16 new characters have been added to the Canadian Internet Registration Authority’s set of allowable characters. This means that domain names such as “préside.ca” will now be possible. For the first time, site names in correct French will be available.

Existing Domain Names

In light of the change, those who already have domain names registered with CIRA may wish to amend those names to include French spellings. CIRA has announced that registrants can do so for free. Those who are happy with the existing spelling of their site names will not be obliged to change them, however.

Conclusion

As English has ceased to be the dominant language of the web, the need to accommodate special characters and other linguistic variations has become more pronounced. The move by CIRA to include these 16 extra characters is typical of a general shift towards more flexible domain registration practices that take into account the wide variety of different languages and alphabets employed by today’s Internet users.

Better start practicing your French accent…

The expansion of domain name registration is likely to change the Internet forever, we’ve talked about it a lot lately, once ICANN finalizes the gTLDs program. It will provide new opportunities for domain resellers and buyers. However, they should also consider the potential risks involved in this new system.

“The likely benefits of these top-level domains—ranging from new branding and marketing opportunities to enhanced security—are substantial, as are the costs and potential risk,” according to Mark Monitor, a California-based company offering Internet brand protection and software services.

“Most notably, the potential for brand abuse will expand significantly, resulting in increased defensive domain registrations. This shift in the way information is found by users has the potential to fundamentally change the way business is conducted on the Internet.”

Here are some of the benefits of the new gTLDs program:

• Entrepreneurship

Business owners can establish their brand names with ICANN’s new gTLDs program. ICANN received a total of 1,390 new gTLD applications during the registration process in various niches.

“Create your own business model and establish accessibility policies for your TLD. If your customers want tighter security, make your TLD a high-security zone,” according to ICANN’s press release.

• Innovative Marketing Opportunity

Entrepreneurs can leverage in the new gTLDs for brand awareness and customization. Dot Auto LLC recently launched AutoDomainia.com, a pre-registration and awareness solution, introducing its proposed gTLD as an alternative to dot-com for the automotive industry (e.g. Joes.auto, Mikes.auto).

“.AUTO will assist businesses in creating user-friendly access to automotive products, services and information instantaneously through accurate search engine classifications,” said PR News Wire.

• Engage Community

“Create a rallying point for supporters of your cause, community or culture to unite with a community-based TLD,” said ICANN.

The new gTLDs program provides unity for non-profit organizations in various communities. This will be easier for individuals to find other individuals with the same interests (e.g. dot-builders, dot-contractors, etc.).

On the other hand, there are also possible risks involved when the new gTLDs program is implemented, which includes the following:

• Brand Abuse

“Any temporary confusion within user ranks is likely to be exploited by brand abusers,” said Market Monitor.

Both profit and non-profit organizations see the potential risk of brand abuse on the Internet. Although there’s a freedom to choose any domain name extension, other groups took stand against strings deemed offensive in their culture (e.g. dot-gay, dot-sex, dot-tattoo, dot-wine, dot-vodka, dot-sucks, dot-virgin).

“The creation of a gTLD string which promotes homosexuality will be offensive to these societies and cultures. We respectfully request that ICANN refuse the application for this gTLD,” said Saudi Arabia CITC (Communications and Information Technology Commission).

“It’s important to remember that abuse found in currently existing TLDs can and most likely will continue—and the addition of potentially hundreds of new gTLDs with non-stringent eligibility requirements will create new locations for domainers, squatters, phishers and others to exploit.”

• Losing a Key TLD

“Applications will be considered initially in rounds. Thus, if an applicant is awarded a gTLD in round one, then that gTLD will not be available later on,” according to Market Monitor.

ICANN recently issued early warnings over controversial top-level domains. There are people from other countries opposing a certain string that is considered as a name of a certain geographical region, such as dot-patagonia, which should not be assigned to a private organization.

“This particular aspect of the application process may pose a risk to brand owners, especially if other parties apply for and can demonstrate a right to a particular gTLD string.”

• Competition

“Your applied-for TLD could compete with a same or similar string(s), and indirectly with all TLDs, both generic and country code. If approved, your new TLD could encounter competition from unexpected sectors,” said Market Monitor.