If the rise of phishing has taught us anything, it's that on the Internet, if a digital asset has value, there's somebody out there who wants to steal it. Whether it's a bank account password, a credit card number, a PayPal login, or even a magic sword in an online game, there's a fraudster somewhere trying to misappropriate it for his or her own nefarious purposes.
Domain names have always been a target for such criminals. Companies and individuals doing business online have few assets more valuable than their domain name. It may cost $10 or less to register one, but the domain name is the glue that connects a company to its customers; revenue and brand equity depend upon its security.
If you are a new TLD applicant, one of the key pieces of your plan is how you intend to go to market. Many applicants will be required by ICANN to use registrars, and there are many good reasons for this. Registrars understand the domain business, they are experienced domain marketers and most importantly, they have existing business relationships with many of the same registrants you will need to make your TLD successful.
Afilias is a sponsor of the 12th AfriNIC Public Policy Meeting and AfNOG.
Over the last three years, the Anti-Phishing Working Group’s semiannual Global Phishing Survey has become a widely cited source of information about the state of phishing and its place in the Internet landscape. Afilias’ Director of Domain Security, Greg Aaron, has been co-authoring these reports with Rod Rasmussen of Internet Identity, with the goal to show the community what phishers are doing and how anti-abuse measures are effective.
Afilias is a Gold Sponsor the 38th ICANN Meeting in Brussels. We will be sponsoring the DNSSEC Workshop on Wednesday from 9:00 - 13:30 in the Silver room on Level 1. Afilias is also a sponsor of the ccNSO lunch on Tuesday, June 22nd.
Due to the many groups that did not attend this month's ICANN meeting in Nairobi for various reasons, I don't think anyone expected the meeting to result in major decisions on new TLD issues we've been debating for over a year. However, that is exactly what happened.
