Fresh expired domain rules go into effect in August

Rules mandate practices to protect domain name registrants.

The fresh “Expired Registration Recovery Policy” (ERRP) goes into effect August 31.

This policy sets guidelines for how registrars treat expired domain names and how they must notify clients that their domains are expiring.

Most notably, the rules will require expiration notices be sent at particular intervals and mandate that DNS resolution be interrupted following expiration.

Domain registrars will be required to send an expiration notice regarding one month ahead of expiration and another one a week ahead of expiration. A notice is also generally required five days following expiration.

Registrars must also interrupt the DNS of an expired domain for a specific timeframe. This is common practice today — a registrar will change the nameservers to point to a parked page with a notice regarding how to renew the domain. This disruption quickly gets the attention of the registrant if they didn’t know their domain was expiring.

ERRP also requires a 30 day redemption grace period on non-sponsored gTLDs and requires registrars to publish pricing and information regarding recovering a domain during this period.

The fresh rules include some suggest best practices. One is that registrars keep a client email address on file that is not connected to the registered URL so that email can still be received when the DNS is disrupted.