Time to Talk .CA, Eh!

As HEXONET’s primary foriegn office is based in Vancouver, Canada, we thought we would take the opportunity to share some insight on CIRA and the .CA ccTLD (country-code Top-Level Domain).

Overview:

• The .CA registry is operated by CIRA (Canadian Internet Registration Authority),  a not-for-profit corporation
• The .CA registry was created in 1987 by volunteers at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver.
• The registry was officially transferred to the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) on December 1, 2000.
• .CA domain names are reserved for Canadian persons, organizations and entities that meet CIRA's Canadian Presence Requirements
• Whois privacy is enabled by default for domains registered to individuals (WHOIS privacy can be disabled through CIRA's provided web portal).  Registrations by corporate entities are shown.
• There are now 1,457,488 .CA domains registered.

Trends & Future Outlook:

• In 2009, 27 per cent of all domain registrations in Canada where .CA, second only to .COM.
• The .CA registry has enjoyed considerable growth, in spite of the recent global economic woes, and between 2007 and 2009, .CA registrations grew by 16 per cent, significantly higher than the six per cent annual global growth rate of generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs). (Source: CIRA)
• The aftermarket for .CA domains continues to grow every year. For example, this summer, Poker.ca sold for $400,000.
• Some of the world’s largest domainers including Kevin Ham, Garry Chernoff and Frank Schilling hail from Vancouver.  The popular T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Domain Conference and Expo was recently held in Vancouver
• 2009 marked the launch of the DOAC (Domain Owners Association of Canada).  The the mission of the Domain Owners Association of Canada (DOAC) is to provide a collective voice for individuals and corporations in the Canadian domain industry including domain owners, registrars, domain parking providers, lawyers, advertising agencies and the media.
• CIRA has committed to the full deployment of DNSSEC, the security extensions for DNS, and has been conducting extensive research and analysis into the technical and operational impact of signing the .CA zone file. The roll-out is anticipated in the later part of 2011.

What Do you Think?
Currently, .CA domains names are reserved for Canadian persons, organizations and entities that meet CIRA’s Canadian Presence Requirements. With many large ccTLDs abolishing this requirement in recent years, do you think that CIRA should also remove these restrictions?  This week's DomainNameWire features a guest article written my prominent domain name attorney Zak Muscovitch.  The article outlines his argument as to why the .CA ccTLD needs to be liberalized. We would like to hear your comments regarding this topic.