ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, published a paper on the use of dotless domains. Using dotless domains would be technically possible, but several issues remain to be solved, the organization says. The idea of dotless domains arose in light of the introduction of new Top Level Domains, TLDs. Google said it would want to operate the new gTLD .search as a ‘Dotless Domain.’ There would be URLs such as http://search and email addresses such as example@search.
According to the ICANN report by Carve Systems, the idea of dotless domains can be realised. Many applications would support dotless domains, but several issues first need to be addressed. Carve Systems identified security concerns connected with strings already used in private networks. Another issue is user readiness and potential user confusion.
The study recommends that potentially dangerous strings not be used as dotless domains, that software vendors be made aware of potential risks and that further studies be conducted to analyse technical and human implications.
