On December 1, 2016, ICANN will enforce a new transfer policy that modifies the process of changing domain ownership from one registrant to another. The implementation of the policy will be imposed on all registrars.
When is it going into effect?
The new transfer policy is scheduled to become effective on December 1, 2016.
How will it impact your business?
Once the policy is in effect, the impact on resellers and their end users will be visible. It can be summarised as follows:
- It will no longer be possible to change the registrant of a domain name with a simple domain modification request.
- Any changes to first name, last name, organisation or email address fields for the owner of any gTLD domain name will now start a trade process.
- The process involves obtaining explicit confirmation from current and new registrants before a change can be completed.
- After a change of registrant has been completed, previous and new registrant will receive a confirmation notice informing them that the change has completed
- After a change of registrant has been completed, the domain is by default locked for transfers to a new registrar for the following 60 days
What is a Designated Agent in the context of this policy?
The Transfer Policy allows Registrants to delegate giving their consent to a Change of Registrant to a third-party on their behalf. The policy defines such third-party as a Designated Agent (DA):
1.2 “Designated Agent” means an individual or entity that the Prior Registrant or New Registrant explicitly authorizes to approve a Change of Registrant on its behalf.
In practical terms, this means that a Registrant can give authority to a licensed party to confirm a Change of Registrant. When the licensed party is enabled to act as a Designated Agent, the Registrant will not need to receive or confirm an email in order for a change to proceed. Instead, licensed party will always auto-approve any Change of Registrant.
In order to support this option, a change to the Registration Agreement was made, which is the legal document that each and every Registrant has to accept in order to manage a domain name through us.
Wednesday, November 30, 2016
