Aug 3, 2006 : Ipwalk Reports More .eu Anomalies

📅 August 3, 2006 - Internet researcher Ipwalk (http://www.ipwalk.com) reported this week that it had identified several new anomalies in .eu domain registrations similar to some of the discrepancies that led to the suspension of tens of thousands of domains in recent weeks.


The registry managing the .eu top-level domain EURid (eurid.eu) recently suspended 74,000 .eu domain names and sued 400 registrars, alleging breach of contract through registration abuse using fronts located in Cyrpus.

In light of these events, Ipwalk examined the number of .eu domain names per country relative to population size in an effort to find other anomalies. Malta, Luxembourg, Gibraltar, Cyprus and the Netherlands are at the top when counting .eu domain names per citizen. Malta has almost twice as many .eu domain names per citizen as Luxembourg in second place, more than five times as many as Germany, and almost seven times as many as the United Kingdom.

An unusually large number of .eu domain names per citizen, says Ipwalk, could indicate that other possible fronts for registration abuse, like the Cypriot companies sued by EURid, operate in these countries.

Ipwalk included generic top-level domain numbers in its research as well, to have a comparison point. Malta has more than four times as many .eu domain names as generic TLDs, while Cyprus has twice as many .eu domains. The ratio is notable since .eu domain names have only been available for a short while.