Oct, 2007 : On Its Way: One of the Biggest Changes to the Internet

MARINA DEL REY, Calif.: The Internet Corporation for AssignedNames and Numbers will launch an evaluation of Internationalized Domain Namesnext week that will allow Internet users to test top-level domains in 11 languages.

"This evaluation represents ICANN's most important step so far towards thefull implementation of Internationalized Domain Names. This will be one ofthe biggest changes to the Internet since it was created," said Dr Paul Twomey,ICANN's President and CEO. "ICANN needs the assistance of users and applicationdevelopers to make this evaluation a success. When the evaluation pages comeonline next week, we need everyone to get in there and see how the addressesdisplay and see how links to IDNs work in their programs. In short, we needthem to get in and push it to its limits."

The evaluation is made possible by today's insertion into the root of the11 versions of .test, which means they are alongside other top-level domainslike .net, .com, .info, .uk, and .de at the core of the Internet.

Next Monday, 15 October 2007, Internet users around the globe will be ableto access wiki pages with the domain name example.test in 11 test languages- Arabic, Persian, Chinese (simplified and traditional), Russian, Hindi,Greek, Korean, Yiddish, Japanese and Tamil.

The wikis will allow Internet users to establish their own subpages withtheir own names in their own language. The evaluation is being done in the11 languages of the Internet communities that have shown the most interestin moving IDNs from concept to reality.

The full introduction of IDNs willmean that people can write the whole of a domain name in the characters usedto write their own language. Presently you can only use these charactersbefore the dot, so .com, .net, .org and the like can only be written in charactersfrom basic Latin. IDNs will change this so that literally tens of thousandsof characters will be available to the world.

"Right now only the ASCII charactersa through z are available for use in top level labels - the part of the addressafter the dot," Dr Twomey added. "Users will be able to have their name intheir language for their Internet when full IDN implementation makes availabletens of thousands of characters from the languages of world."

More information on the IDN program is available at: http://icann.org/topics/idn/

Links to the wikis will be available on ICANN's website starting 15 October2007.

About ICANN:

ICANN is responsible for the global coordination of the Internet's systemof unique identifiers like domain names (like .org, .museum and country codeslike .uk) and the addresses used in a variety of Internet protocols that helpcomputers reach each other over the Internet. Careful management of these resourcesis vital to the Internet's operation, so ICANN's global stakeholders meet regularlyto develop policies that ensure the Internet's ongoing security and stability.ICANN is an internationally organized, public benefit non-profit company. Formore information please visit: www.icann.org.

MediaContacts:

Jason Keenan
Media Adviser, ICANN (USA)
Ph: +1 310 382 4004
E: jason.keenan@icann.org

International: Andrew Robertson
Edelman (London)
Ph: +44 7921 588 770
E: andrew.robertson@edelman.com