Verisign blasts ICANN for rushed generic top-level domain name rollout

Remember those new generic top-level domain (gTLD) names that ICANN has been talking about for years now? That system, once in place, would allow not only sites like yourname.com, but yourname.yourname.

Companies have been bidding huge amounts of cash for the right to own these names, with American publishers lambasting Amazon’s efforts to control the .book domain name.

Verisign now says it’s nowhere near ready to launch the "New gTLDs"—and as one of the key masters to two of the world’s root servers, that’s a problem. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday, Verisign placed the blame for the delay squarely at the feet of ICANN, the global organization entrusted with domain name management.

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“Without a well constructed and well-reasoned process model, and at the scale of changes foreseen with the addition of the unprecedented rate of the new gTLDs being added, the entire DNS hierarchy faces the potential for issues at or near the root of the DNS tree, and the fallout from such a change could affect all delegations,” Verisign wrote in its 8-K filing.

Verisign goes on to argue that ICANN has been moving far too quickly.

“It actually appears as though there is little to no time allotted for operators to adequately prepare, and the lack of stable fundamental specifications and test plans within days of publicly stated testing times illustrates a clear disconnect between aspirational timelines with the New gTLD program and operational realities with which various stakeholders are constrained,” the company added.

ICANN did not immediately respond to Ars’ request for comment.

Verisign outlined a number of things that ICANN is supposed to have in place before the new system can go live, including “Pre-Delegation Testing,” a “Trademark Clearing House (TMCH),” and a “Emergency Back End Registry Operator (EBERO),” among others. “While ICANN issued a [request for information] in July 2012 and developed a short list in December 2012, there are currently no signed/tested EBERO providers, to our knowledge,” Verisign added.

UPDATE 1:35pm CT: ICANN President and CEO Fadi Chehadé sent this statement to Ars: "Security of the DNS has always been paramount for ICANN . Every issue raised by Verisign in this report has been discussed within the ICANN community during the development of the new gTLD program over the past eight years. The programme is operationally on track and I anticipate no delays."