The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) is the subject of substantial controversy in the United States, and the domain name industry is squarely in the middle of the debate. Many DNS service providers and technology developers in the industry oppose SOPA, Afilias among them. Here's why.

The Internet is slowly beginning to adopt the new DNSSEC domain names standard, but significant challenges remain. That was the main takeaway from a four-hour workshop on the technology held during the recent ICANN 41 public meeting in Singapore, which heard from many domain registries, registrars and other infrastructure providers.

I recently wrote about the encouraging level of DNSSEC adoption among top-level domain name registries, and noted that adoption at the second level and in applications is an important next step for adding more security to the DNS. The root and approximately 20 percent of the top level domains are now signed; it is time for registrars and recursive DNS servers operated by the ISPs to occupy center stage.

Less than nine months after the DNS root was signed, the rollout of DNSSEC across the Internet's top-level domains is approaching the tipping point.

SAN FRANCISCO – Feb. 10, 2011 – Afilias Limited, a global provider of Internet domain name registry and Domain Name System (DNS) services, today announced that it has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Crowell & Moring LLP. Under this MoU, Afilias and Crowell & Moring will extend their current working relationship into supporting new top-level domains (TLDs).

Internationalized domain names (IDNs) have been available to Internet users for many years, but this year the first fully non-Latin IDN domains have become enabled by ICANN and country-code top-level domain registries. The recent success of the launch of Russia's .рф (.rf) ccTLD shows that there is an enormous demand for domain names in Internet users' native languages.

DNSSEC is being rolled out quickly in top-level domain registries around the world, but there's still some way to go to encourage other Internet stakeholders to adopt the new security technology. That was one of the key takeaways from a day-long, comprehensive session on Domain Name System Security Extensions implementation worldwide, held during ICANN's public meeting in Cartagena, Colombia, last week.

The introduction of new top-level domains (new TLDs) to the Internet moved a step closer Friday, when the ICANN Board laid out its plan for the final stages of approving the new gTLD program. In a lengthy resolution, passed unanimously at the conclusion of a week of consultations in Cartagena, Colombia, the Board sought to draw a line under some policies where it believes the community has reached agreement, while highlighting others where further discussions are needed before the doors are opened to applications next year.

Brings added security to three more countries around the world

DUBLIN, IRELAND - 18 November 2010 - Afilias, a global provider of Internet infrastructure services, today announced that it has enabled Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) for .GI, the country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) for Gibraltar, .MN for Mongolia, and .SC for the Seychelles.

Deployment of Domain Name System Security Extensions Enhances global security for India

NEW DELHI – 9 November 2010 – Afilias, a global provider of Internet infrastructure services, today announced that it has enabled Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) for the .IN country code top-level domain (TLD) for the country of India, improving global security for this domain which houses over 700,000 .IN domains. .IN was officially signed on November 4, 2010 and its Delegation Signer (DS) records are expected to be entered into the DNS Root by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) shortly, allowing the .IN zone to be validated using DNSSEC.

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