New Domain Deal Fails to Appease

February 2006

ICANN said this week that it had revised its agreement with VeriSign, which gave the company control over the .com registry until 2012.

The agreement, originally reached in 2005, was met with strong opposition from the Internet community, including Web hosts such as 1&1 Internet. Critics, who called the agreement tantamount to a permanent monopoly, were likely a major factor in ICANN choosing to rework the deal.

The renegotiated deal would eliminate a transaction fee charged to companies for every sale of a .com domain, limit VeriSign's ability to raise prices, require VeriSign to pay ICANN a direct contribution and impose controls over VeriSign's ability to influence the .com business model.