(WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — In a major step forward for the use of non-Latin-based characters for entire Internet addresses, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (www.icann.org) has completed its “Fast Track” string evaluation” of four proposed Internationalised Domain Names.
The Fast Track program for the rollout of IDNs entails three steps, preparations in country or territory, string evaluation, and string delegation. Egypt, the Russian Federation, United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia applied for country code top-level domains in their respective written languages, and they have passed the string evaluation, which tests their technical and linguistic specifications, making them free to apply for string delegation. String delegation requests are submitted to IANA (www.iana.org) root zone management, and must follow the same ICANN IANA process that is used for ASCII-based ccTLDs.
The introduction of IDNs is a significant development for regions in Asia, the Middle East, and other areas where languages that don’t use Latin script are used, helping create a more international Internet.
The IDN Fast Track process was approved by the ICANN Board at its annual meeting in Seoul, South Korea on October 30, 2009. First requests were received starting 16 November 2009, enabling countries and territories to submit requests to ICANN for IDN ccTLDs, representing their respective country or territory names in scripts other than Latin.
To meet the requirements to become an IDN, ccTLDs must be comprised of a non-Latin script, the languages used to express the IDN ccTLDs must be official in the corresponding country or territory. As well, specific technical requirements must be met as evaluated by an external DNS Stability Panel made up of DNS and IDN experts.
ICANN has currently received a total of 16 IDN ccTLD requests, representing eight languages.
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