.tk
| Top-level domain .tk | |
|---|---|
| introduction | November 7, 1997 |
| category | country-specific |
| Registry | Freenom |
| Award | unrestricted |
| number | 29.9 million |
.tk is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Tokelau , an area that is dependent on New Zealand. It was registered with the IANA on November 7, 1997 .
Registry
The domain is formally subordinate to the state telecommunications company Teletok . However, the domains below .tk are operationally managed and economically exploited by the Domain Name Registry Dot TK . The registrar's revenues account for a significant proportion of Tokelau's total gross domestic product . As a specialty, Dot TK not only assigns new domains via accredited registrars, but also directly to end customers worldwide.
Award criteria
In contrast to most ccTLDs, domains below .tk are free, provided they are actively used. The domain registrant can either use their own name server or use a web forwarding per frame . Unused, free second-level domains can be deleted within three days without warning, and use for pornographic or other content harmful to minors, such as games of chance, is expressly prohibited. Different guidelines apply to paid domains.
Most .tk domains are registered in Russia , India and China , while in Europe and the USA the distribution is rather low. A .tk domain can be between three and 63 characters long; internationalized domain names are not supported. Registration takes an average of 24 hours.
In 2009, .tk caused confusion as the operators publicly reported 15 million registered addresses. Experts attributed the exceptionally high value to the use of the domain as a short URL service . In June 2013 the number of 16.7 million registered addresses was officially confirmed, which qualified .tk as the most popular country-specific top-level domain worldwide. At that time, experts attributed this to the partially free allocation of .tk domains. In 2015, the number of registered addresses under the .tk top-level domain rose to over 27 million, and in 2016 to over 31 million.
Attempted fraud
The top-level domain .tk is internationally known for being particularly popular with fraudsters . In the area of phishing in particular , the ending poses a particularly high risk, since, according to a study released in autumn 2012, more than half of all such attacks are carried out from .tk domains. As early as 2008, the security specialist McAfee put the address on the world map of the most dangerous top-level domains, together with that of Hong Kong ( .hk ).
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ International domain statistics. Domaintools.com, accessed May 27, 2020 (current .cn domain number).
- ↑ Delegation Record for .TK. IANA , accessed on August 11, 2012 .
- ↑ IANA Report on the Redelegation of the .TK top-level domain. (PDF) January 31, 2006, accessed August 11, 2012 (17 KB size).
- ↑ a b c Florian Hitzelberger: Free domains increases registration numbers. In: domain-right. March 22, 2012. Retrieved August 11, 2012 .
- ↑ Properties of a .tk domain. united-domains . Retrieved August 11, 2012 .
- ↑ Florian Hitzelberger: News from .uk, .china and .tk. In: domain-right. May 26, 2009, accessed February 23, 2013 .
- ↑ Florian Hitzelberger: .tk most successful ccTLD in the world? In: domain-right. June 7, 2013, accessed June 8, 2013 .
- ↑ Maximilian Kluge: The most popular country domains in the world. (No longer available online.) In: Domains.info. October 29, 2014, archived from the original on January 9, 2015 ; accessed on January 14, 2015 .
- ↑ Registered .tk domains. (No longer available online.) In: Domains.info. Archived from the original on November 12, 2014 ; accessed on January 14, 2015 (current .tk domain number).
- ↑ Mapping the online world , Nominet, accessed March 12, 2016.
- ↑ Brand domains uninteresting for phishing. In: united-domains blog. October 26, 2012, accessed November 20, 2012 .
- ↑ Florian Hitzelberger: New world map of the most dangerous TLDs. In: domain-right. June 16, 2008, accessed November 20, 2012 .