All Posts Tagged With: "ccTLD"
Are .Info the Most Dangerous Domains?
Today while browsing through my feeds I ran across a post over at Yahoo about a report identifying the most dangerous web domains.
Obviously it got my attention right away. After reading it, it looks like McAfee has pegged the most dangerous TLD as the .info domain, with .hk (Hong Kong) and .cn (China) leading the way for the ccTLDs.
Of all “.hk” sites McAfee tested, it flagged 19.2 percent as dangerous or potentially dangerous to visitors; it flagged 11.8 percent of “.cn” sites and 11.7 percent of “.info” sites that way.
A little more than 5 percent of the sites under the “.com” domain — the world’s most popular — were identified as dangerous.
More spammers, malicious code writers and other cybercriminals can establish an online presence when domain name registry businesses cut requirements for registering a site in order to boost their profit and profile. The report doesn’t identify domain name registration companies McAfee believes are responsible for those lapses.
Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of companies are in the business of registering domain names; some are large and well known, while others are small and less reputable, offering their services on the cheap and with flimsy or no background checks to lure in more customers.
The fact that Internet scam artists gravitate to domain name services with lower fees and fewer requirements isn’t new.
I find this very interesting, but also very unsurprising. My guess would be the low cost involved with registering an info domain is responsible for it being the most used domain for evil purposes. A few weeks ago Google accidentally removed all info domains from their index for about half a day. An accident or a test of some sort? 
Compliation of Domain Suffixes
Even to a veteran domainer it can sometimes be difficult to know exactly how many country-code top level domains (ccTLD’s) there are out there.
If you are a new domainer and are looking at investing in ccTLD’s, there are some things you need to look into. Here are two things I look at before investing in a ccTLD:
- How well has the country adopted their country code? – There are a few ccTLD’s that have really gone over well with their country, while many others no one really uses. For example, a lot of people invested in China’s country code when it was released and it didn’t take very well there. India is one that seems to be doing well.
- How much does this ccTLD cost to register/renew? I’ve read about some costing as much as $500.00 a year to register/renew, so you’ll want to factor this into your decision on whether to invest or not.
I’ve also thrown together a list of domain suffixes for your reference and the country they are associated with. More ccTLD are becoming available every year (.me due out soon), so I will do my best to keep this list updated:
Number of Domains Registered
While doing some county code top-level domain research yesterday, I was doing some investigating to see what countries have adopted their country codes. Having this information can help figure out which ccTLD is best to invest in. After finding a fairly current list, I figured why not share it here!
Domain Amount Registered Country
.com 71.619.962 Global Generic
.de 11.673.388 Germany
.net 10.623.637 Global Generic
.cn 9.001.993 China
.uk 6.486.829 United Kingdom
.org 6.373.837 Global Generic
.info 4.948.539 Global Generic
.eu 2.715.101 European Union
.nl 2.695.568 Netherlands
.biz 1.903.406 Global Generic
.it 1.456.787 Italy
.us 1.375.779 United States
.br 1.230.870 Brazil
.ch 1.056.751 Switzerland
.ru 1.030.951 Russia
.au 1.007.458 Australia
.jp 988.886 Japan
.fr 988.421 France
.ca 943.341 Canada
.kr 930.485 Korea
.dk 864.845 Denmark
.es 805.327 Spain
.mobi 799.551 Global Generic
.pl 762.503 Poland
.be 736.499 Belgium
.at 722.193 Austria
.se 702.199 Sweden
.cz 370.642 Czech
.no 361.118 Norway
.nz 314.053 New Zealand
.mx 231.047 Mexico
.pt 184.650 Portugal
.fi 165.252 Finland
.hk 152.405 Hong Kong
.tr 146.083 Turkey
.sk 140.319 Slovakia
.ie 91.353 Ireland
.lt 65.944 Lithuania
It looks like Germany and China have really adopted their ccTLD well. How much of your portfolio is invested in ccTLD’s?
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