Domain Name Registration

The right to use a domain name is delegated by domain name registrars which are accredited by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the organization charged with overseeing the name and number systems of the Internet. In addition to ICANN, each top-level domain (TLD) is maintained and serviced technically by a sponsoring organization, the TLD Registry. The registry is responsible for maintaining the database of names registered within the TLDs they administer. The registry receives registration information from each domain name registrar authorized to assign names in the corresponding TLD and publishes the information using a special service, the whois protocol.

Registrars usually charge an annual fee for the service of delegating a domain name to a user and providing a default set of name servers. Often this transaction is termed a sale or lease of the domain name, and the registrant is called an "owner", but no such legal relationship is actually associated with the transaction, only the exclusive right to use the domain name. More correctly authorized users are known as "registrants" or as "domain holders".

ICANN publishes a complete list of TLD registries and domain name registrars in the world. One can obtain information about the registrant of a domain name by looking in the WHOIS database held by many domain registries.

For most of the more than 240 country code top-level domains (ccTLDs), the domain registries hold the authoritative WHOIS (Registrant, name servers, expiration dates, etc.). For instance, DENIC, Germany NIC, holds the authoritative WHOIS to a .DE domain name. Since about 2001, most gTLD registries (.ORG, .BIZ, .INFO) have adopted this so-called "thick" registry approach, i.e. keeping the authoritative WHOIS in the central registries instead of the registrars.

For .COM and .NET domain names, a "thin" registry is used: the domain registry (e.g. VeriSign) holds a basic WHOIS (registrar and name servers, etc.). One can find the detailed WHOIS (registrant, name servers, expiry dates, etc.) at the registrars.

Some domain name registries, also called Network Information Centres (NIC), also function as registrars, and deal directly with end users. But most of the main ones, such as for .COM, .NET, .ORG, .INFO, etc., use a registry-registrar model. There are hundreds of Domain Name Registrars that actually perform the domain name registration with the end user (see lists at ICANN or VeriSign). By using this method of distribution, the registry only has to manage the relationship with the registrar, and the registrar maintains the relationship with the end users, or 'registrants' -- in some cases through additional layers of resellers.