.cm

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Top-level domain .cm
introduction April 29, 1995
category country-specific
Registry CAMTEL
Award unrestricted
number NA million

.cm is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) of Cameroon . It has existed since April 29, 1995 and is operationally managed by Cameroon Telecommunications (CAMTEL) with headquarters in Yaoundé .

history

At the beginning, .cm domains were only used by Cameroon's authorities and not publicly issued. In November 2008, the competent opened Network Information Center and led by .com.cm , .net.cm and .co.cm three second-level domains that could be used by foreign individuals and businesses. In the summer of 2009, the top-level domain should then also be released on the second level. However, the opening was delayed due to technical problems until the end of 2008, also because particularly valuable domains were to be auctioned for a higher price.

abuse

In June 2007 it became known that .cm domains are frequently called up by mistake due to their similarity to .com and that a US company wants to redirect addresses to a website with advertising . According to official information, only about 400 domains under .cm were registered at this time. The registry expressly assured that the regular operation of the top-level domain would not be affected by advertising. For this reason, after the restart in August 2009, experts expressly warned against systematic misuse of .cm domains and recommended that they be registered as so-called typo domains analogous to existing .com addresses as a precaution .

In 2009, the security specialist McAfee classified the ending as the most dangerous top-level domain worldwide. Accordingly, over half of all .cm domains tested spread malware .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Registered .cm domains. In: Domains.info. Archived from the original on September 27, 2015 ; accessed on May 4, 2015 (current .cm domain number).
  2. Delegation Record for .CM. Internet Assigned Numbers Authority , accessed August 16, 2013 .
  3. Florian Hitzelberger: News from .fr, .mobi and .cm. In: domain-right. October 7, 2008, accessed on August 16, 2013 : "Cameroon is starting a fresh start with its country ending .cm: As Netcom Sarl, the new official registry, announced, domains below the three levels can be accessed from November 15, 2008 at 10:00 UTC. com.cm, .net.cm and .co.cm are registered. "
  4. Florian Hitzelberger: News from .cm, .ar and .nyc. In: domain-right. June 9, 2009, accessed on August 16, 2013 : “From Cameroon, the registry NETCOM.cm, which is responsible according to its own information, reports that the top level domain .cm will be released for registration this summer. (...) .cm derives its main meaning from typing errors by Internet users who accidentally enter .cm instead of .com in the address line of the browser. "
  5. Florian Hitzelberger: News from .cm, .biz and .sic. In: domain-right. September 16, 2009, accessed on August 16, 2013 : “The live start of the country program .cm (Cameroon) has been further delayed. (...) The reason is that the .CM TLD server to which CoCCA is to move its data would require further tests, as they would not yet work reliably enough. "
  6. Florian Hitzelberger: News from .se and .cm. In: domain-right. June 12, 2007, accessed on August 16, 2013 : “The entrepreneur Kevin Ham from Canada has therefore tried to generate income from this traffic and concluded a deal with the Cameroon government: if you make a mistake and end up on a .cm domain that is not registered is automatically forwarded to a parking page and receives advertising there. "
  7. Daniel Dingeldey: Lawyers warn of .cm cybersquatting. In: domain-right. August 4, 2009, accessed on August 16, 2013 : “With the marketing of the ending .cm, country ending for Cameroon, and the end of the sunrise period on July 14, 2009, a new race between licensees and cybersquatters begins. Lawyers warn of illegal registrations. "
  8. Florian Hitzelberger: New world map of the most dangerous TLDs. In: domain-right. December 14, 2009, accessed on August 16, 2013 : “After an investigation of more than 27 million domain names, McAfee comes to the conclusion that content that can be reached via a domain with the ending .cm for Cameroon goes to the most dangerous belong; of around 82,000 domains tested, over 57,000 proved to be risky. With this, .cm replaces the ending .hk (Hong Kong), which was still considered the most dangerous in 2008. "