Changing the values of domain names and the need for mapping

Andrew Sullivan ajs at shinkuro.com
Fri Feb 20 20:59:14 CET 2009


On Fri, Feb 20, 2009 at 07:44:27PM +0100, Cary Karp wrote:

> The Esszett currently maps out of the IDN space, entirely, and there
> are no domain names that include them. If the Esszett becomes
> available for inclusion in domain names, any registry that opts to
> support it will be in precisely the same situation as, for example,
> the .SE registry was when it added support for the Swedish å ä ö. 

I think that's not quite right.

Today, if someone "registers" fußbal.tld, what gets registered is
fussbal.tld.  But if someone types fußbal.tld into a "resolution
context", it _also_ gets mapped, so that they get to fussbal.tld.

After IDNA2008, that will not be true, and the typer of fußbal.tld
will either get no resolution at all, or else will go to some other
site, or (if they're lucky) will be redirected to the same fussbal.tld
site.

That is certainly a change in behaviour, and one that opens the
possibility for abuse in a way that the other examples didn't (because
those other characters were not mapped to something else by protocol).

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
ajs at shinkuro.com
Shinkuro, Inc.


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