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Proposed New DNS Resource Record Types for AI Agent Discovery

For more than three decades, domain names have served as a foundational identity layer for internet applications. Initially used to identify early network services such as TELNET, FTP, and email, they later became essential to web browsing and a growing range of online services.

From Forgotten to Exploited: How AI Changes the Dangling DNS Threat

Dangling DNS records can expose trusted corporate subdomains to takeover, while AI-assisted reconnaissance makes abandoned resources easier to find, increasing the need for continuous DNS monitoring rather than periodic audits.

Thirty-Five Years Later, Moscow Comes Looking for the Soviet Union’s Domain

Russia is imposing state identity verification on .su, the Soviet Union's surviving domain, as researchers uncover criminal infrastructure across the namespace and ICANN pursues a retirement process that could eventually remove it from the global root.

Publishing DMARC Is Not the Same as Operating It

Publishing a DMARC record is only the beginning. New data show that many domains lack enforcement or reporting, exposing a gap between adopting email authentication and operating it effectively enough to detect problems and deter impersonation.

Beyond Protocol and Policy: Why Project Jake is Reshaping the Architecture of Internet Trust

Project Jake aims to bridge the divide between internet protocols and policy, offering registries, law enforcement and rights holders a decentralised framework for accessing domain-registration data securely while navigating privacy laws and institutional gridlock.

Open-Weight AI: Open to Whom?

The push for open-weight AI promises broader access and competition, but true openness requires more than releasing model weights. Compute, infrastructure, training data, security, and control ultimately determine who can meaningfully benefit from open AI.

DNS Abuse and Criminal Infrastructure: Beyond Definitions and Blocklists

Research suggests criminals may control a striking share of newly registered gTLD domains, raising questions about whether ICANN's definitions, contractual safeguards and enforcement mechanisms are keeping pace with the industrial scale of technology-facilitated harm.

DNSSEC Doesn’t Need a Better Story - It Needs a Better Tuesday

DNSSEC adoption is stronger than headline figures suggest, yet uneven across industries. New data indicate the bigger obstacle is not reputation but operational friction, especially key rollovers, registrar coordination and automation still missing across major domains.

DNS Security Gets Fixed When Someone Notices - Not Before

A study of 309 universities, museums and sports brands finds DNS security follows visible threats rather than technical risk, leaving organisations well protected against familiar attacks while quieter weaknesses in critical infrastructure persist unnoticed.

The Web Has Become a Content Delivery Network

Cyberattacks, AI scraping and relentless bot traffic have transformed CDNs from performance tools into the Web's defensive gatekeepers, reshaping Internet architecture, governance and control as private intermediaries increasingly determine which requests reach origin servers first.

Phantom Squatting: When LLMs’ Hallucination Becomes an Attacker’s Best Friend

As AI reshapes cybersecurity, attackers are exploiting a fundamental weakness in large language models. Phantom squatting turns hallucinated domain names into trusted attack vectors, creating a new class of DNS abuse that defenders cannot solve by eliminating hallucinations alone.

Call for Participation: DNSSEC and Security Workshop at ICANN87 (21 October 2026)

ICANN is inviting proposals for its DNSSEC and Security Workshop at ICANN 87, offering experts and practitioners a platform to share insights on DNS security, routing security, browser security, and emerging Internet infrastructure challenges.

From Human Trust to Machine Cryptography: The Infrastructure Deficit in AI Interoperability

As AI agents begin collaborating across the open internet, the absence of trusted identity, authorization, and accountability frameworks threatens interoperability, making cryptographic trust infrastructure essential to building a secure and scalable agentic economy.

The 2024-2026 Root Zone KSK Rollover: Updates and Observations

Roughly a year and a half ago, Verisign and ICANN began the important, multi-year process of updating the cryptographic key that secures the authoritative DNS root zone. This work has been largely invisible to the public, but vital to the security of many everyday online activities.

Who Registers the Domain That Steals Your Data? The Registrar Accountability Gap in India’s DNS Abuse Crisis

India's DNS abuse crisis exposes a registrar accountability gap: malicious domains remain online while vulnerable users bear the cost. Concentrated abuse patterns suggest stronger oversight and faster mitigation could significantly reduce predictable harms nationwide today.

News Briefs

ICANN’s New Data Sharpens the Picture of DNS-abuse Enforcement

CENTR Warns Against Excessive Burdens in EU Cybersecurity Overhaul

Internet Censorship Grows More Sophisticated, Warns OONI Co-Founder

DNS Censorship Report Warns of Rising Domain Suspensions

ICANN Opens New gTLD Applications for First Time Since 2012, With $227K Entry Fee and 27 Scripts

NANOG 95: From Faster Fibre to Route Leaks, Operators Face Old Problems with New Tools

AWS Unveils Route 53 “Accelerated Recovery” to Bolster DNS Resilience

DNS Under Strain: Technical and Policy Challenges in Supporting the Internet of Autonomous Things

Massive AWS Outage Disrupts Global Internet, Services Restored After DNS Failure

New Paper Proposes ‘Attested DNS’ to Secure Domain Names with Trusted Hardware

14th Registration Operations Workshop Set for September 30, 2025

Chinese APT Groups Exploit Global Domains in Sweeping Cyber Campaign

The Edgemoor Research Institute and TWNIC Launch Project Jake to Advance DNS Security and Data Transparency

i2Coalition Launches ‘DNS at Risk’ Report, Warns of Rising DNS Abuse and Censorship

Malaysia Reverses Decision on Controversial DNS Redirection Policy

ICANN Reserves “.INTERNAL” Domain for Private Use

French Court Orders Google, Cloudflare, Cisco to Poison DNS in Anti-Piracy Crackdown

DNSSEC Failure Causes Massive Website Outages on Russian Internet

ICANN Proposes Exclusive TLD: .INTERNAL for Private Use

ICANN Launches $10 Million Grant Program to Boost Global Internet Growth

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Taking Back the DNS

Domain Tasting Target of US Federal Cybersquatting Lawsuit

When Registrars Look the Other Way, Drug-Dealers Get Paid

Squeegee Domains

Ask Vint Cerf: The Road Ahead for Top-Level Domains

DNIB.com Updates – Sponsor

DNIB Reports 401.6 Million Domain Name Registrations in Q2 2026

The second quarter of 2026 closed with 401.6 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs), an increase of 29.9 million domain name registrations compared to the second quarter of 2025, according to the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief Quarterly Report released Thursday at DNIB.com. more

DNIB Reports 392.5 Million Domain Name Registrations in Q1 2026

The first quarter of 2026 closed with 392.5 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs), an increase of 24.1 million domain name registrations compared to the first quarter of 2025, according to the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief Quarterly Report released Thursday at DNIB.com. more

DNIB Reports 386.9 Million Domain Name Registrations in Q4 2025

The fourth quarter of 2025 closed with 386.9 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs), an increase of 22.7 million domain name registrations compared to the fourth quarter of 2024, according to the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief Quarterly Report released Thursday at DNIB.com. more

DNIB Reports 378.5 Million Domain Name Registrations in Q3 2025

The Domain Name Industry Brief reports 378.5 million total domain name registrations in Q3 2025, marking a 16.2 million increase year over year and offering detailed insights into top TLD, ccTLD, and gTLD trends. more

DNIB Reports 371.7 Million Domain Name Registrations in Q2 2025

The second quarter of 2025 closed with 371.7 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs), an increase of 9.3 million domain name registrations compared to the second quarter of 2024, according to the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief Quarterly Report released Thursday at DNIB.com. more

Domain Name Industry Brief Reports 368.4 Million Domain Name Registrations in Q1 2025

The first quarter of 2025 closed with 368.4 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs), an increase of 4.2 million domain name registrations compared to the previous quarter, according to the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief Quarterly Report released Thursday at DNIB.com. more

Domain Name Industry Brief Reports 364.3 Million Domain Name Registrations in Q4 2024

The fourth quarter of 2024 closed with 364.3 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs), an increase of 2.0 million domain name registrations compared to the previous quarter, according to the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief Quarterly Report, released Thursday at DNIB.com. more

Industry Updates

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