ZARC

SECOND LEVEL DOMAIN DISCUSSIONS “EXCEPTIONALLY ILL-TIMED”, SAYS SOUTH AFRICA’S CENTRAL REGISTRY

SA’s ICT (Information & Communications Technology) sector is in a state of flux with important documents currently before Parliament that include the ICT Sector Commission & Tribunal Bill which critically aims to give effect to the Integrated ICT Policy White Paper.

 

This makes last month’s publishing by domain name sector regulator, .ZADNA (.ZA Domain Name Authority), of a discussion document regarding the proposed registration of domain names at the second level of .ZA especially ill-timed.

 

That’s according to the ZA Registry Consortium (ZARC) Pty Ltd which says any rushed discussions around the complex domain name industry threaten the highly-effective central registry model endorsed by the late Communications Minister, Dr Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri, and which has emerged as a local centre of excellence responsible for over 1.2 million .ZA domain name registrations.

 

“We support in principle the ability to register new domain names immediately below the top level domain. However, we cannot support the bad timing of a good idea,” says the CEO of ZARC Pty Ltd, Lucky Masilela. In addition, ZARC is not convinced that the current ease of registering and provisioning .ZA domains will continue under the proposed changes.

 

“Perhaps the standout feature of the discussion document put out by our .ZADNA colleagues is that is appears to ignore the domain name sector inputs to the White Paper. It appears to pronounce the outcomes of the Bill which is just not the right way of conducting ourselves,” adds Mr Masilela.

 

SLRs have not historically been available within the overarching .ZA domain. Instead, domain name applicants have been able to register domain names at the third level in second level domains (SLDs) such as ac.za, co.za, gov.za, org.za and net.za. As mentioned above, well over 1.2 million names have been registered according to this model to date, making South Africa’s .ZA domain an African leader.

 

ZARC is responsible for the technical and administrative wellbeing of the entire South African presence on the web and is on its way to achieving a quarter century of pioneering achievements within the sector. It is a previous winner of the Best African Registry category awarded by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and was recently awarded the rights to administer the entire African continent’s presence on the worldwide web in the form of the .africa geographic Top Level Domain (gTLD).

 

Aside from poor timing, the .ZADNA discussion document also appears to put forward interfering with the administration of the .capetown, .durban and .joburg gTLDs which will not go down well with the delegator of these domains, ICANN, which will see any moves in this direction as a gross violation of the gTLD delegation terms and conditions.

 

.ZADNA’s discussion document can be accessed here: https://www.zadna.org.za/news/request-for-submissions-introducing-za-second-level-registrations/#.

 

ENDS

 

Last update: 23-02-2023 08:07:42