Domain names suspended due to 2013 RAA — Over 800,000

Verification requirement ensnares hundreds of thousands of domain names.

One of the requirements for domain name registrars under the 2013 Registrar Accreditation Agreement is that they must verify the contact details of registrants.

Most registrars are fulfilling this requirement by sending an email to registrants asking them to click a link to confirm. Registrars must suspend domain names if owners don’t verify their information.

We’ve had one-off examples of domain names being suspended due to this requirement. Now we have hard numbers: at least 800,000 domains have been suspended since January 1.

Speaking at the Registrar Stakeholders Group meeting with ICANN’s Board in London today, Tucows CEO Elliot Noss stated that number was collected from domain registrars that have regarding 75% of all registrations. He suspects the suspension ratio will be higher for registrars not included in the total since more of them are in parts of the world where it’s harder to verify.

Noss drew a parallel between the verification requirement (which only hurts good actors and doesn’t harm bad actors) and efforts underway to change whois. He asked ICANN’s board what problem it is trying to solve with the whois change.