News archive

Deletion of .ee domains without re-registration from their register will not be postponed

On Tuesday, 14 December 2010, the joint workgroup of the Estonian Internet Foundation and registrars convened to discuss issues connected with the imminent end of the period of re-registration of domains with the Estonian national ending .ee, aimed at improving their register. It was decided unanimously that there is no reason to extend the period.

“The end of the domain re-registration period is upon us and the goal of the joint workgroup of the Estonian Internet Foundation and registrars was to determine the related issues and find possible solutions. This domain re-registration procedure is such that the registrars take the brunt of serving re-registration applicants and we are very interested in the registrars’ opinions,” said Kristo Kraanat, chairman of the workgroup and coordinator for registrars at the Estonian Internet Foundation. 

“Having analysed the service provider’s opinions concerning the dynamics of the re-registration process, we reached the conclusion that there are currently some 35,000–40,000 .ee domains in use. Most of those remaining have not been in use for some time due to various reasons, for instance there are domains registered for time-limited advertising campaigns, some domains became useless for other reasons, etc. As in the past these domains were paid for from the state budget, the mentality of their owners was sadly that of negligence and the register thus contains a large number of abandoned domains. This re-registration initiative will improve the register by determining such domains and making them vacant,” added Kristo Kraanat. 

“Nonetheless, we expect the end of the re-registration period to be more hectic than usual. The registrars have confirmed that they are prepared to handle the extra work. Deadline extension would not solve any problems so the dates set earlier remain in force,” he added.

Kristo Kraanat: “On behalf of the whole workgroup I would like to reiterate that the re-registration period will soon end, so anyone interested in re-registering their domain and not having done so already should delay no more. If you fail to re-register your domain before the deadline, it will be subject to the deletion proceeding and it will first stop working and then it will become vacant. All the associated e-mail addresses, web pages and other services will, of course, also cease functioning after the commencement of deletion.” 

The joint workgroup of the Estonian Internet Foundation and registrars consisted of representatives of these large service providers: Zone Media OÜ, Elion Ettevõtted AS, Elkdata OÜ, Webnest OÜ and Spin TEK AS.

Re-registration of.ee domains registered prior to 5 July 2010 ends on 5 January 2011. Domains that are not re-registered by this deadline shall be subject to deletion. During that the domain names will be blocked, which means that all associated web pages and e-mail addresses will no longer be available. 
After deletion the domain names will become vacant and available for new registration on a first-come, first-served basis.