New ICANN Rules Bring Changes on Registrants

The following extensions fall under the purview of the new RAA:

.COM .NET .ORG
.BIZ .INFO .NAME
.XXX .ASIA .PRO
.MOBI .TEL

Impact of the Changes on Registrants

As a part of the Whois Data Accuracy specification, the contact information for the Registrant contact of each gTLD domain name, will have to be verified within 15 days of:

  • A domain name being registered with unverified contact details
  • A domain name being transferred in
  • The contact information of the Registrant contact information being modified.

If the domain holder does not verify the contact information within 15 days, we will have to suspend the domain name until the verification is completed. This requirement is in effect from January 1st, 2014. Domain names registered before this date are not subject to such verification unless their contact information is modified.

Starting January 1st, 2014, the Registrant contact of a domain name receives an email notification to verify the email address. This mail will contain a link that the Registrant must click on, to complete the verification, within 15 days.

If the registrant does not complete the verification in the allotted time, the name servers of the domain name will be modified to stop its resolution and the domain will be pointed to a white-labeled holding page. This page will suggest that the domain name has been disabled because the Registrant contact information is pending verification and will instruct the Registrant to contact their service provider to make it active again.

Important aspects of this process:

  1. The verification email will be sent out as soon as the email address is associated with a domain name. Additional reminders will be sent on the 7th and 14th day, if the verification isn’t done until then.
  2. The verification email will be sent out from the Reseller’s email address. It shall be a compulsory system mail, which cannot be customized or turned off.
  3. In the 15 day verification notice period, the domain name will continue to resolve. The domain holder will not be obstructed from using their domain name in any way.
  4. Once an email address has been verified, then all subsequent registrations, transfers or contact updates that use this email address will not require any verification.
  5. Once a year, we send out a Whois Data Reminder email to the Registrant of the domain name, in accordance with ICANN guidelines. We shall monitor the delivery status of these emails – if the mail sent to a registrant email address of a domain name were to bounce back, our compliance team will review the case and take appropriate action against the domain name.