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Identification string in the Internet
This article is about domain names in the Internet. For other uses, see
Domain (disambiguation)
An annotated example of a domain name
In the
Internet
, a
domain name
is a
string
that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority, or control. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as
websites
email
services, and more. Domain names are used in various networking contexts and for application-specific naming and addressing purposes. In general, a domain name identifies a
network domain
or an
Internet Protocol
(IP) resource, such as a personal computer used to access the Internet, or a server computer.
Domain names are formed by the rules and procedures of the
Domain Name System
(DNS). Any name registered in the DNS is a domain name. Domain names are organized in subordinate levels (
subdomains
) of the
DNS root
domain, which is nameless. The first-level set of domain names are the
top-level domains
(TLDs), including the
generic top-level domains
(gTLDs), such as the prominent domains
com
info
net
edu
, and
org
, and the
country code top-level domains
(ccTLDs). Below these top-level domains in the DNS hierarchy are the second-level and third-level domain names that are typically open for reservation by end-users who wish to connect local area networks to the Internet, create other publicly accessible Internet resources or run websites, such as "wikipedia.org".
The registration of a second- or third-level domain name is usually administered by a
domain name registrar
who sell its services to the public.
fully qualified domain name
(FQDN) is a domain name that is completely specified with all labels in the hierarchy of the DNS, having no parts omitted. Traditionally a FQDN ends in a dot (
) to denote the top of the DNS tree.
Labels in the Domain Name System are
case-insensitive
, and may therefore be written in any desired capitalization method, but most commonly domain names are written in lowercase in technical contexts.
: §6
hostname
is a domain name that has at least one associated
IP address
Purpose
Domain names serve to identify Internet resources, such as computers, networks, and services, with a text-based label that is easier to memorize than the numerical addresses used in the Internet protocols. A domain name may represent entire collections of such resources or individual instances. Individual Internet host computers use domain names as host identifiers, also called
hostnames
. The term
hostname
is also used for the leaf labels in the domain name system, usually without further subordinate domain name space. Hostnames appear as a component in
Uniform Resource Locators
(URLs) for Internet resources such as
websites
(e.g., en.wikipedia.org).
Domain names are also used as simple identification labels to indicate ownership or control of a resource. Such examples are the realm identifiers used in the
Session Initiation Protocol
(SIP), the
Domain Keys
used to verify DNS domains in
e-mail
systems, and in many other
Uniform Resource Identifiers
(URIs).
An important function of domain names is to provide easily recognizable and memorizable names to numerically
addressed
Internet resources. This abstraction allows any resource to be moved to a different physical location in the address topology of the network, globally or locally in an
intranet
. Such a move usually requires changing the IP address of a resource and the corresponding translation of this IP address to and from its domain name.
Domain names are used to establish a unique identity. Organizations can choose a domain name that corresponds to their name, helping Internet users to reach them easily.
A generic domain is a name that defines a general category, rather than a specific or personal instance, for example, the name of an industry, rather than a company name. Some examples of generic names are
books.com
music.com
, and
travel.info
. Companies have created brands based on generic names, and such generic domain names may be valuable.
Domain names are often simply referred to as
domains
and domain name registrants are frequently referred to as
domain owners
, although domain name registration with a registrar does not confer any legal ownership of the domain name, only an exclusive right of use for a particular duration of time. The use of domain names in commerce may subject them to
trademark law
History
Main article:
List of the oldest currently registered Internet domain names
The practice of using a simple memorable abstraction of a host's numerical address on a computer network dates back to the
ARPANET
era, before the advent of today's commercial Internet. In the early network, each computer on the network retrieved the hosts file (
host.txt
) from a computer at SRI (now
SRI International
),
which mapped computer hostnames to numerical addresses. The rapid growth of the network made it impossible to maintain a centrally organized hostname registry and in 1983 the Domain Name System was introduced on the ARPANET and published by the
Internet Engineering Task Force
as RFC 882
and RFC 883.
The following table shows the first five
.com
domains with the dates of their registration:
Domain name
Registration date
symbolics.com
15 March 1985
bbn.com
24 April 1985
think.com
24 May 1985
mcc.com
11 July 1985
dec.com
30 September 1985
and the first five
.edu
domains:
Domain name
Registration date
berkeley.edu
24 April 1985
cmu.edu
24 April 1985
purdue.edu
24 April 1985
rice.edu
24 April 1985
ucla.edu
24 April 1985
Domain name space
The hierarchical domain name system, organized into zones, each served by domain name servers
Today, the
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN) manages the top-level development and architecture of the Internet domain name space. It authorizes
domain name registrars
, through which domain names may be registered and reassigned.
The hierarchy of labels in a fully qualified domain name
The domain name space consists of a
tree
of domain names. Each node in the tree holds information associated with the domain name. The tree sub-divides into
zones
beginning at the
DNS root zone
Domain name syntax
A domain name consists of one or more parts, technically called
labels
, that are conventionally concatenated, and delimited by dots, such as
example.com
The right-most label conveys the
top-level domain
; for example, the domain name
www.example.com
belongs to the top-level domain
com
The hierarchy of domains descends from the right to the left label in the name; each label to the left specifies a subdivision, or
subdomain
of the domain to the right. For example: the label
example
specifies a node
example.com
as a subdomain of the
com
domain, and
www
is a label to create
www.example.com
, a subdomain of
example.com
. Each label may contain from 1 to 63
octets
. The empty label is reserved for the root node and when fully qualified is expressed as the empty label terminated by a
dot
. The full domain name may not exceed a total length of 253 ASCII characters in its textual representation.
10
hostname
is a domain name that has at least one associated IP address. For example, the domain names
www.example.com
and
example.com
are also hostnames, whereas the
com
domain is not. However, other top-level domains, particularly
country code top-level domains
, may indeed have an IP address, and if so, they are also hostnames.
Hostnames impose restrictions on the characters allowed in the corresponding domain name. A valid hostname is also a valid domain name, but a valid domain name may not necessarily be valid as a hostname.
Top-level domains
When the Domain Name System was devised in the 1980s, the domain name space was divided into two main groups of domains.
11
The
country code top-level domains
(ccTLD) were primarily based on the two-character territory codes of
ISO-3166
country abbreviations. In addition, a group of seven
generic top-level domains
(gTLD) was implemented which represented a set of categories of names and multi-organizations.
12
These were the domains
gov
edu
com
mil
org
net
, and
int
. These two types of
top-level domains
(TLDs) are the highest level of domain names of the Internet. Top-level domains form the
DNS root zone
of the hierarchical
Domain Name System
. Every domain name ends with a top-level domain label.
During the growth of the Internet, it became desirable to create additional generic top-level domains. As of October 2009, 21 generic top-level domains and 250 two-letter country-code top-level domains existed.
13
In addition, the
ARPA
domain serves technical purposes in the infrastructure of the Domain Name System.
During the 32nd International Public ICANN Meeting in Paris in 2008,
14
ICANN started a new process of TLD naming policy to take a "significant step forward on the introduction of new generic top-level domains." This program envisions the availability of many new or already proposed domains, as well as a new application and implementation process.
15
Observers believed that the new rules could result in hundreds of new top-level domains to be registered.
16
In 2012, the program commenced, and received 1930 applications.
17
By 2016, the milestone of 1000 live gTLD was reached.
The
Internet Assigned Numbers Authority
(IANA) maintains an annotated list of top-level domains in the
DNS root zone
database.
18
For special purposes, such as network testing, documentation, and other applications, IANA also reserves a set of special-use domain names.
19
This list contains domain names such as
example
local
localhost
, and
test
. Other top-level domain names containing trade marks are registered for corporate use. Cases include brands such as
BMW
Google
, and
Canon
20
Second-level and lower level domains
Below the top-level domains in the domain name hierarchy are the
second-level domain
(SLD) names. These are the names directly to the left of .com, .net, and the other top-level domains. As an example, in the domain
example.co.uk
co
is the second-level domain.
Next are third-level domains, which are written immediately to the left of a second-level domain. There can be fourth- and fifth-level domains, and so on, with virtually no limitation. Each label is separated by a
full stop
(dot). An example of an operational domain name with four levels of domain labels is
sos.state.oh.us
. 'sos' is said to be a sub-domain of 'state.oh.us', and 'state' a sub-domain of 'oh.us', etc. In general,
subdomains
are domains subordinate to their parent domain. An example of very deep levels of subdomain ordering are the
IPv6
reverse resolution
DNS zones
, e.g., 1.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.ip6.arpa, which is the reverse DNS resolution domain name for the IP address of a
loopback
interface, or the
localhost
name.
Second-level (or lower-level, depending on the established parent hierarchy) domain names are often created based on the name of a company (e.g.,
bbc
.co.uk), product or service (e.g.
hotmail
.com). Below these levels, the next domain name component has been used to designate a particular host server. Therefore,
ftp.example.com
might be an FTP server,
www.example.com
would be a
World Wide Web
server, and
mail.example.com
could be an email server, each intended to perform only the implied function. Modern technology allows multiple physical servers with either different (cf.
load balancing
) or even identical addresses (cf.
anycast
) to serve a single hostname or domain name, or multiple domain names to be served by a single computer. The latter is very popular in
Web hosting service
centers, where service providers host the websites of many organizations on just a few servers.
The hierarchical
DNS labels
or components of domain names are separated in a fully qualified name by the
full stop
(dot,
).
Internationalized domain names
Main article:
Internationalized domain name
The character set allowed in the Domain Name System is based on
ASCII
and does not allow the representation of names and words of many languages in their native scripts or alphabets.
ICANN
approved the
Internationalized domain name
(IDNA) system, which maps
Unicode
strings used in application user interfaces into the valid DNS character set by an encoding called
Punycode
. For example, københavn.eu is mapped to xn--kbenhavn-54a.eu. Many
registries
have adopted IDNA.
Domain name registration
DNS history
The first commercial Internet domain name, in the TLD
com
, was registered on 15 March 1985 in the name
symbolics.com
by Symbolics Inc., a computer systems firm in Massachusetts.
21
22
By 1992, fewer than 15,000
com
domains had been registered.
In the first quarter of 2015, 294 million domain names had been registered.
23
A large fraction of them are in the
com
TLD, which as of December 21, 2014, had 115.6 million domain names,
24
including 11.9 million online business and e-commerce sites, 4.3 million entertainment sites, 3.1 million finance related sites, and 1.8 million sports sites.
25
As of July 15, 2012, the
com
TLD had more registrations than all of the ccTLDs combined.
26
As of December 31, 2023,
[update]
359.8 million domain names had been registered.
27
Administration
The right to use a domain name is delegated by
domain name registrars
, which are accredited by the
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN), the organization charged with overseeing the name and number systems of the Internet. In addition to ICANN, each top-level domain (TLD) is maintained and serviced technically by an administrative organization operating a registry. A registry is responsible for maintaining the database of names registered within the TLD it administers. The registry receives registration information from each domain name registrar authorized to assign names in the corresponding TLD and publishes the information using a special service, the
WHOIS
protocol and its successor
Registration Data Access Protocol
(RDAP).
Registries and registrars usually charge an annual fee for the service of delegating a domain name to a user and providing a default set of name servers. Often, this transaction is termed a sale or lease of the domain name, and the registrant may sometimes be called an "owner", but no such legal relationship is actually associated with the transaction, only the exclusive right to use the domain name. More correctly, authorized users are known as "registrants" or as "domain holders".
ICANN publishes the complete list of TLD registries and domain name registrars. Registrant information associated with domain names is maintained in an online database accessible with the WHOIS protocol. For most of the 250
country code top-level domains
(ccTLDs), the domain registries maintain the WHOIS or RDAP (Registrant, name servers, expiration dates, etc.) information.
Some domain name registries, often called
network information centers
(NIC), also function as registrars to end-users. The major generic top-level domain registries, such as for the
com
net
org
info
domains and others, use a registry-registrar model consisting of hundreds of domain name registrars (see lists at ICANN
28
or VeriSign).
29
In this method of management, the registry only manages the domain name database and the relationship with the registrars. The
registrants
(users of a domain name) are customers of the registrar, in some cases through additional layers of resellers.
There are also a few other
alternative DNS root
providers that try to compete or complement ICANN's role of domain name administration, however, most of them failed to receive wide recognition, and thus domain names offered by those alternative roots cannot be used universally on most other internet-connecting machines without additional dedicated configurations.
Technical requirements and process
In the process of registering a domain name and maintaining authority over the new name space created, registrars use several key pieces of information connected with a domain:
Administrative contact
. A registrant usually designates an administrative contact to manage the domain name. The administrative contact usually has the highest level of control over a domain. Management functions delegated to the administrative contacts may include management of all business information, such as name of record, postal address, and contact information of the official registrant of the domain and the obligation to conform to the requirements of the domain registry in order to retain the right to use a domain name. Furthermore, the administrative contact installs additional contact information for technical and billing functions.
Technical contact
. The technical contact manages the name servers of a domain name. The functions of a technical contact include assuring conformance of the configurations of the domain name with the requirements of the domain registry, maintaining the domain zone records, and providing continuous functionality of the name servers (that leads to the accessibility of the domain name).
Billing contact
. The party responsible for receiving billing invoices from the
domain name registrar
and paying applicable fees.
Name servers
. Most registrars provide two or more name servers as part of the registration service. However, a registrant may specify its own
authoritative name servers
to host a domain's resource records. The registrar's policies govern the number of servers and the type of server information required. Some providers require a hostname and the corresponding IP address or just the hostname, which must be resolvable either in the new domain, or exist elsewhere. Based on traditional requirements, typically a minimum of two servers is required.
30
A domain name consists of one or more labels, each of which is formed from the set of ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens (a–z, A–Z, 0–9, -), but not starting or ending with a hyphen. The labels are case-insensitive; for example, 'label' is equivalent to 'Label' or 'LABEL'. In the textual representation of a domain name, the labels are separated by a
full stop
(period).
Business models
Domain names are often seen in analogy to
real estate
in that domain names are foundations on which a website can be built, and the highest
quality
domain names, like sought-after real estate, tend to carry significant value, usually due to their online brand-building potential, use in advertising,
search engine optimization
, and many other criteria.
A few companies have offered low-cost, below-cost, or even free domain registration with a variety of models adopted to recoup the costs to the provider. These usually require that domains be hosted on their website within a framework or portal that includes advertising wrapped around the domain holder's content, revenue from which allows the provider to recoup the costs. Domain registrations were free of charge when the DNS was new. A domain holder may provide an infinite number of
subdomains
in their domain. For example, the owner of example.org could provide subdomains such as foo.example.org and foo.bar.example.org to interested parties.
Many desirable domain names are already assigned and users must search for other acceptable names, using Web-based search features, or
WHOIS
RDAP
, and
dig
operating system tools. Many registrars have implemented
domain name suggestion
tools which search domain name databases and suggest available alternative domain names related to keywords provided by the user.
Resale of domain names
Main article:
List of most expensive domain names
The business of resale of registered domain names is known as the
domain aftermarket
. Various factors influence the perceived value or market value of a domain name. Most of the high-prize domain sales are carried out privately.
31
Also, it is called confidential domain acquiring or anonymous domain acquiring.
32
Domain name confusion
Intercapping
is often used to emphasize the meaning of a domain name, because DNS names are not case-sensitive. Some names may be misinterpreted in certain uses of capitalization. For example:
Who Represents
, a database of artists and agents, chose
whorepresents.com
33
which can be misread. In such situations, the proper meaning may be clarified by placement of hyphens when registering a domain name. For instance,
Experts Exchange
, a programmers' discussion site, used
expertsexchange.com
, but changed its domain name to
experts-exchange.com
34
Uses in website hosting
The domain name is a component of a
uniform resource locator
(URL) used to access
websites
, for example:
URL: http://www.example.net/index.html
Top-level domain: net
Second-level domain: example
Hostname: www
A domain name may point to multiple
IP addresses
to provide server redundancy for the services offered, a feature that is used to manage the traffic of large, popular websites.
Web hosting services
, on the other hand, run servers that are typically assigned only one or a few addresses while serving websites for many domains, a technique referred to as
virtual web hosting
. Such IP address overloading requires that each request identifies the domain name being referenced, for instance by using the
HTTP request header field
Host:
, or
Server Name Indication
Abuse and regulation
Critics often claim abuse of administrative power over domain names. Particularly noteworthy was the VeriSign
Site Finder
system which redirected all unregistered .com and .net domains to a VeriSign webpage. For example, at a public meeting with
VeriSign
to air technical concerns about
Site Finder
35
numerous people, active in the
IETF
and other technical bodies, explained how they were surprised by VeriSign's changing the fundamental behavior of a major component of Internet infrastructure, not having obtained the customary consensus. Site Finder, at first, assumed every Internet query was for a website, and it monetized queries for incorrect domain names, taking the user to VeriSign's search site. Other applications, such as many implementations of email, treat a lack of response to a domain name query as an indication that the domain does not exist, and that the message can be treated as undeliverable. The original VeriSign implementation broke this assumption for mail, because it would always resolve an erroneous domain name to that of Site Finder. While VeriSign later changed Site Finder's behaviour with regard to email, there was still widespread protest about VeriSign's action being more in its financial interest than in the interest of the Internet infrastructure component for which VeriSign was the steward.
Despite widespread criticism, VeriSign only reluctantly removed it after the
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN) threatened to revoke its contract to administer the root name servers. ICANN published the extensive set of letters exchanged, committee reports, and ICANN decisions.
36
There is also significant disquiet regarding the United States Government's political influence over ICANN. This was a significant issue in the attempt to create a
.xxx
top-level domain
and sparked greater interest in
alternative DNS roots
that would be beyond the control of any single country.
37
Additionally, there are numerous accusations of
domain name front running
, whereby registrars, when given WHOIS or RDAP queries, automatically register the domain name for themselves. Network Solutions has been accused of this.
38
Truth in Domain Names Act
In the United States, the
Truth in Domain Names Act
of 2003, in combination with the
PROTECT Act of 2003
, forbids the use of a misleading domain name with the intention of attracting Internet users into visiting
Internet pornography
sites.
The Truth in Domain Names Act follows the more general
Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act
passed in 1999 aimed at preventing
typosquatting
and deceptive use of names and trademarks in domain names.
Seizures
Seizure notices
absolutepoker.com
channelsurfing.net
libertyreserve.com
In the early 21st century, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) pursued the
seizure
of domain names, based on the legal theory that domain names constitute property used to engage in criminal activity, and thus are subject to
forfeiture
. For example, in the seizure of the domain name of a gambling website, the DOJ referenced
18 U.S.C.
§ 981
and
18 U.S.C.
§ 1955(d)
39
[1]
In 2013 the US government seized
Liberty Reserve
, citing
18 U.S.C.
§ 982(a)(1)
40
The U.S. Congress passed the
Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act
in 2010. Consumer Electronics Association vice president Michael Petricone was worried that seizure was a
blunt instrument
that could harm legitimate businesses.
41
42
After a joint operation on February 15, 2011, the DOJ and the Department of Homeland Security claimed to have seized ten domains of websites involved in advertising and distributing child pornography, but also mistakenly seized the domain name of a large DNS provider, temporarily replacing 84,000 websites with seizure notices.
43
In the
United Kingdom
, the
Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit
(PIPCU) has been attempting to seize domain names from registrars without court orders.
44
Suspensions
PIPCU and other UK law enforcement organisations make domain suspension requests to
Nominet
which they process on the basis of breach of terms and conditions. Around 16,000 domains are suspended annually, and about 80% of the requests originate from PIPCU.
45
Property rights
Because of the economic value it represents, the
European Court of Human Rights
has ruled that the exclusive right to a domain name is protected as property under article 1 of Protocol 1 to the
European Convention on Human Rights
46
IDN variants
ICANN
Business Constituency (BC) has spent decades trying to make IDN variants work at the second level, and in the last several years at the top level. Domain name variants are domain names recognized in different character encodings, like a single domain presented in
traditional Chinese
and
simplified Chinese
. It is an
Internationalization and localization
problem. Under Domain Name Variants, the different encodings of the domain name (in simplified and traditional Chinese) would resolve to the same host.
47
48
According to
John Levine
, an expert on Internet related topics, "Unfortunately, variants don't work. The problem isn't putting them in the DNS, it's that once they're in the DNS, they don't work anywhere else."
47
Fictitious domain name
fictitious domain name
is a domain name used in a work of fiction or popular culture to refer to a domain that does not actually exist, often with invalid or unofficial
top-level domains
such as "
.web
", a usage exactly analogous to the dummy
555 telephone number prefix
used in film and other media. The canonical fictitious domain name is "
example.com
", specifically set aside by IANA for such use,
49
along with the
.example
TLD.
Domain names used in works of fiction have often been registered in the DNS, either by their creators or by
cybersquatters
attempting to profit from it. This phenomenon prompted
NBC
to purchase the domain name
Hornymanatee.com
after talk-show host
Conan O'Brien
spoke the name while ad-libbing on
his show
. O'Brien subsequently created a website based on the concept and used it as a
running gag
on the show.
50
Companies whose works have used fictitious domain names have also employed firms such as
MarkMonitor
to park fictional domain names in order to prevent misuse by third parties.
51
Misspelled domain names
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Misspelled domain names, also known as
typosquatting
or
URL hijacking
, are domain names that are intentionally or unintentionally misspelled versions of popular or well-known domain names. The goal of misspelled domain names is to capitalize on internet users who accidentally type in a misspelled domain name, and are then redirected to a different website.
Misspelled domain names are often used for malicious purposes, such as
phishing
scams or distributing
malware
. In some cases, the owners of misspelled domain names may also attempt to sell the domain names to the owners of the legitimate domain names, or to individuals or organizations who are interested in capitalizing on the traffic generated by internet users who accidentally type in the misspelled domain names.
To avoid being caught by a misspelled domain name, internet users should be careful to type in domain names correctly, and should avoid clicking on links that appear suspicious or unfamiliar. Additionally, individuals and organizations who own popular or well-known domain names should consider registering common misspellings of their domain names in order to prevent others from using them for malicious purposes.
Domain name spoofing
The term
Domain name spoofing
(or simply though less accurately,
Domain spoofing
) is used generically to describe one or more of a class of
phishing
attacks that depend on falsifying or misrepresenting an internet domain name.
52
53
These are designed to persuade unsuspecting users into visiting a web site other than that intended, or opening an email that is not in reality from the address shown (or apparently shown).
54
Although website and email spoofing attacks are more widely known, any service that relies on
domain name resolution
may be compromised.
Types
There are a number of better-known types of domain spoofing:
Typosquatting
, also called "URL hijacking", a "sting site", or a "fake URL", is a form of
cybersquatting
, and possibly
brandjacking
which relies on mistakes such as
typos
made by Internet users when inputting a
website address
into a
web browser
or composing an
email address
. Should a user accidentally enter an incorrect domain name, they may be led to any URL (including an alternative website owned by a cybersquatter).
55
The typosquatter's
URL
will usually be one of five kinds, all
similar to
the victim site address:
A common misspelling, or foreign language spelling, of the intended site
A misspelling based on a typographical error
A plural of a singular domain name
A different
top-level domain
: (i.e. .com instead of .org)
An abuse of the
Country Code Top-Level Domain
(ccTLD) (.cm, .co, or .om instead of .com)
IDN homograph attack
. This type of attack depends on registering a domain name that is similar to the 'target' domain, differing from it only because its spelling includes one or more characters that come from a different alphabet but look the same to the naked eye. For example, the
Cyrillic
Latin
, and
Greek
alphabets each have their own letter
, each of which has its own binary
code point
Turkish
has a
dotless letter i
) that may not be perceived as different from the ASCII letter
. Most web browsers warn of 'mixed alphabet' domain names,
56
57
58
59
Other services, such as email applications, may not provide the same protection. Reputable
top level domain
and
country code domain
registrars will not accept applications to register a deceptive name but this policy cannot be presumed to be infallible.
DNS spoofing
– Cyberattack using corrupt DNS data
Website spoofing
– Creating a website, as a hoax, with the intention of misleading readers
Email spoofing
– Creating email spam or phishing messages with a forged sender identity or address
Risk mitigation
Domain Name System Security Extensions
– Suite of IETF specifications
Sender Policy Framework
– Simple email-validation system designed to detect email spoofing
DMARC
– System to prevent email fraud ("Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance")
DomainKeys Identified Mail
– Email authentication method designed to associate a domain with a message stream
Public key certificate
– Data proving ownership of a public key (SSL certificate)
Legitimate technologies that may be subverted
URL redirection
– Technique for making a Web page available under more than one URL address
Domain fronting
– Technique for Internet censorship circumvention
See also
Domain hack
Domain hijacking
Domain name registrar
Domain name speculation
Domain name warehousing
Domain registration
Domain tasting
Geodomain
List of Internet top-level domains
Reverse domain hijacking
Reverse domain name notation
External links
Look up
homograph
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Domain name space
(domain bias in web search) a research by Microsoft
Top Level Domain Bias in Search Engine Indexing and Rankings
Icann New gTLD Program Factsheet - October 2009
(PDF)
IANA Two letter Country Code TLD
ICANN
- Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
Internic.net
, public information regarding Internet domain name registration services
Internet Domain Names: Background and Policy Issues
Congressional Research Service
RFC
1034
– "
DOMAIN NAMES - CONCEPTS AND FACILITIES,
30
Internet Standard 13.
RFC
1035
– "
DOMAIN NAMES - IMPLEMENTATION AND SPECIFICATION,
10
Internet Standard 13.
UDRP
, Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy
Special use domain names
References
Stevens, W. Richard
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TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 1: The Protocols
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R. Arends; R. Austein; M. Larson; D. Massey; S. Rose (March 2005).
Resource Records for the DNS Security Extensions
. Network Working Group.
doi
10.17487/RFC4034
RFC
4034
Proposed Standard.
Updated by
RFC
6014
and
6840
. Obsoletes
RFC
3755
3008
3445
3090
2535
3757
3845
3655
and
3658
. Updates
RFC
3597
2181
2136
3225
3007
1035
3226
2308
and
1034
Low, Jerry.
"Why are generic domains so expensive?"
TheRealJerryLow.com
Archived
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27 September
2018
J. Klensin
(February 2003).
Role of the Domain Name System (DNS)
. Network Working Group.
doi
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RFC
3467
Informational.
Cricket Liu, Paul Albitz (2006).
DNS and BIND
(5th ed.).
O'Reilly
. p. 3.
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P. Mockapetris
(November 1983).
Domain Names - Concepts and Facilities
. Network Working Group.
doi
10.17487/RFC0882
RFC
882
Obsolete.
Obsoleted by
RFC
1034
and
1035
. Updated by
RFC
973
P. Mockapetris
(November 1983).
Domain Names - Implementation and Specification
. Network Working Group.
doi
10.17487/RFC0883
RFC
883
Obsolete.
Obsoleted by
RFC
1034
and
1035
. Updated by
RFC
973
"The first ever 20 domain names registered"
ComputerWeekly.com
Archived
from the original on 2020-08-08
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Rooksby, Jacob H. (2015).
"Defining Domain: Higher Education's Battles for Cyberspace"
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P. Mockapetris
(November 1987).
DOMAIN NAMES - IMPLEMENTATION AND SPECIFICATION
. Network Working Group.
doi
10.17487/RFC1035
. STD 13.
RFC
1035
Internet Standard 13.
Obsoletes
RFC
882
883
and
973
. Updated by
RFC
1101
1183
1348
1876
1982
1995
1996
2065
2136
2137
2181
2308
2535
2673
2845
3425
3658
4033
4034
4035
4343
5936
5966
6604
7766
8482
8490
and
8767
"Introduction to Top-Level Domains (gTLDs)"
. Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
Archived
from the original on 2009-06-15
. Retrieved
2009-06-26
J. Postel
J. Reynolds
(October 1984).
Domain requirements
. Network Working Group.
doi
10.17487/RFC0920
RFC
920
Status Unknown.
"New gTLD Program"
Archived
2011-11-25 at the
Wayback Machine
, ICANN, October 2009
"32nd International Public ICANN Meeting"
. ICANN. 2008-06-22.
Archived
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"New gTLS Program"
. ICANN.
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Archived
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, CircleID, 26 June 2008.
"About the Program - ICANN New gTLDs"
. ICANN.
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"Root Zone Database"
. IANA.
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S. Cheshire
; M. Krochmal (February 2013).
Special-Use Domain Names
Internet Engineering Task Force
doi
10.17487/RFC6761
ISSN
2070-1721
RFC
6761
Proposed Standard.
Updates
RFC
1918
and
2606
"Executive Summary - dot brand observatory"
. observatory.domains. Archived from
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on 2016-11-10
. Retrieved
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Schupak, Amanda (2015-03-13).
"It's been 30 years since the first ".com"
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Abell, John C. (2010-03-15).
"March 15, 1985: Dot-Com Revolution Starts With a Whimper"
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Internet Grows to 294 Million Domain Names in the First Quarter of 2015
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"Thirty years of .COM domains - and the numbers are up"
. Geekzone. Mar 13, 2015.
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"Domain domination: The
com
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. Royal.pingdom.com. Archived from
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"DNIB Quarterly Report Q4 2023"
Domain Name Industry Brief (DNIB)
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"ICANN-Accredited Registrars"
. ICANN.
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"Choose A Top Domain Registrar Of Your Choice Using Our Search Tool"
. Verisign.
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P. Mockapetris
(November 1987).
DOMAIN NAMES - CONCEPTS AND FACILITIES
. Network Working Group.
doi
10.17487/RFC1034
. STD 13.
RFC
1034
Internet Standard 13.
Obsoletes
RFC
882
883
and
973
. Updated by
RFC
1101
1183
1348
1876
1982
2065
2181
2308
2535
4033
4034
4035
4343
4592
5936
8020
8482
and
8767
Arif, Sengoren (1 October 2024).
"Confidentially domain acquiring"
Lauinger, Jan; Ernstberger, Jens; Steinhorst, Sebastian (1 October 2024).
"Anonymous Domain Ownership"
2023 IEEE International Conference on Blockchain and Cryptocurrency (ICBC)
. pp.
1–
3.
doi
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ISBN
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Courtney, Curzi (14 October 2014).
"WhoRepresents helps brands connect with celebrity influencers"
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Archived
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Ki, Mae Heussner (2 June 2010).
'Slurls': Most Outrageous Website URLs"
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2019
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(2003-10-03).
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. CNET News
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2007-09-22
{{
cite web
}}
: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (
link
"Verisign's Wildcard Service Deployment"
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Mueller, M (March 2004).
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"website laten maken"
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2016
Gabriel, Jeffrey (18 June 2020).
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Jerome, Sarah (6 April 2011).
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"Whatever Happened to "Due Process" ?"
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ECHR 18 September 2007, no. 25379/04, 21688/05, 21722/05, 21770/05,
Paeffgen v Germany
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(April 21, 2019).
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. Retrieved
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2020
D. Eastlake; A. Panitz (June 1999).
Reserved Top Level DNS Names
. Network Working Group.
doi
10.17487/RFC2606
. BCP 32.
RFC
2606
Best Current Practice 32.
Updated by
RFC
6761
So This Manatee Walks Into the Internet
Archived
2017-01-23 at the
Wayback Machine
",
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, December 12, 2006. Retrieved April 12, 2008.
Allemann, Andrew (2019-11-05).
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Finextra
. 9 January 2020.
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"Domain spoofing"
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"Mass Spoofing Campaign Abuses Walmart Brand"
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Opera Security
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. Mozilla.
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