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Please note that the English language version of all translated content and documents are the official versions and that translations in other languages are for informational purposes only.

The ICANN organization has numerous resources available to assist registry operators with the various processes for notifying ICANN of updates made to approved registry services, some of which are referenced below. Please visit this page for updates to such resources:

  • Assignment: Material Subcontracting Arrangement (MSA) - A change to a Material Subcontracting Arrangement refers to a change to any Back-End registry operator (also known as a back-end service provider or a Registry Service Provider), which is defined by the Registry Transition Process as an organization contracted by a registry operator to run one or more of the Critical Functions of a gTLD registry and includes service providers such as DNS providers.

  • Assignment: Registry Operator Change of Control - A direct or indirect change of control of a registry operator is one type of assignment identified in the Registry Agreement. This can involve a change in the registry operator or a change in the person or entity controlling the registry operator.

  • Community gTLD Change Requests - The Community gTLD Change Request procedure permits a Community gTLD registry operator to seek modifications to Specification 12 without removing the Community Registration Policies, excessively broadening or narrowing registrant eligibility and/or name selection requirements, or resulting in significant negative impact to the TLD Community.

  • Continued Operations Instrument (COI) Amendment Service - The COI ensures sufficient financial resources are in place to support the continued operation of the critical registry functions related to the TLD. Per Specification 8 of the base Registry Agreement, registry operators shall have a COI that provides for sufficient financial resources to cover the five critical registry functions in Section 6 of Specification 10, for a determined time period as defined in Section 1 of Specification 8.

  • Registry Operator Name Change - If a registry operator changes the name of their organization, and it is not the result of a change of control, the registry operator will need to notify the ICANN organization of the change using the Registry Operator Name Change service.

  • Registry-Registrar Agreement (RRA) Amendment - As outlined in Section 2.9(a) of the Registry Agreement, the registry operator is required to notify ICANN of any potential revisions to the Registry-Registrar Agreement.

    For RRA amendments related to the Temporary Specification for gTLD Registration Data, please refer to the Registry-Registrar Agreement Amendment Procedure for the Temporary Specification for gTLD Registration Data.

  • RSEP Process - the ICANN organization's process for evaluating proposed gTLD registry services or contractual modifications for security, stability, or competition issues.

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Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."