‘.au’ domains are a fundamental component of Australia’s digital economy. They have been ensuring public trust and confidence in the entity they are dealing, confirming that the entity is an Australian entity and that is accountable under Australian law.

.au Domain Administration Ltd (auDA) is the authority and industry self-regulatory body for the .au domains. It was formally endorsed as the regulatory body by the Government in December 2000.

In the auDA’s 2018 Policy Paper, the Review Panel outlined a number of issues, and proposed a number of solutions to these. This post will discuss these issues and the proposed solutions.

Proposed Changes

Opening of ‘Second Level’ Domains

The au. Domain Administration Policy Review Panel is suggesting the opening of a ‘.au’ domain newspace which omits the requirement of a preceding ‘.net.’, ‘.com’ or ‘.org’.

The different levels of domain registration are as follows:

Australian domains can currently only be registered in the third and fourth levels. Changes proposed by the Review Panel involve allowing registration of domains in the ‘Second Level’.

This means that websites will no longer need to be “yourname.com.au”, but can be simply “yourname.au”.

This could mean that businesses will have to register domains in the spheres of “.au”, “.com.au” and “.com”. This will increase costs for registering domains as ‘domain squatters’ occupy various domains in order to upsell.

Availability of the new domains

Currently ‘.net’ and ‘.com’ are Third Level Domains which are reserved for Australian businesses. It is proposed by the board that the newly available domains should provide more than this ‘existing functionality’ and allow access to all Australians which meet the eligibility and allocation criteria for an existing domain.

Good-bye to ‘.net’?

A ‘net.au’ domain was initially made available for use by internet related businesses. In 2018 there is not much difference between this concept, and the availability of the ‘.com’ domain for commercial entities.

Thus, the board proposes to stop registering new ‘.net’ domains. You may ask what is going to happen to the current ‘.net’ domains. It is suggested that current ‘.net’ domains be allowed to continue till their licence ends, or to provide renewal indefinitely to current ‘.net’ domain holders.

Use of non-ASCII characters in your domain name

Another proposition put forth by the Panel is to allow certain non-ASCII characters to make-up domain names. A number of listed examples include Arabic, Cyrillic or Chinese language characters.

Given the increasing demand for Australian products and services overseas and Australia’s multiculturalism, the Panel believes this will enhance an untapped market.

Final Thoughts

The Board’s proposals appear as small changes, however these small changes can lead to great benefit to businesses if taken advantage of. These changes will not only make typing in a domain name more convenient, but will expand access to local domains, and enhance the presence of Australian businesses in the international market.

The .auDA Policy Review Panel invites written submissions, which can be emailed to ‘[email protected]’ by 4 March 2018. The .auDA is also holding a number of public forums around Australia in February. You can find the details of these public forums here.

If you would like to register your own Domain, you will require an ABN. You can register for an ABN here.

What do you think? Do you think these changes are unnecessary, or are they a great opportunity for Australia? How do you think the current standing domains should be dealt with after these changes? We would love to hear from you! Let us know your thoughts by tagging us #lawpath or @lawpath.