.bi

.bi is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Burundi. It is administered by Centre National de l’Informatique (CNI) or, in English, the National Center of Information Technology.

Delegation History

The .bi ccTLD was first delegated in October 1996 to Fabien Kayijuka as administrative contact and Frédéric Grégoire as technical contact. Kayijuka was associated with the Connectivite au reseau Internet of Bujumbura (IBPT), Burundi. At the time of the initial delegation in 1996, Frédéric Grégoire was associated with Connectivite au reseau Internet (IZPT), an ISP located in Kinshasa, Zaire (now Democratic Republic of the Congo), which at the time operated the (.zr) Zaire ccTLD. Because Burundi was then dependent on infrastructure in Zaire for Internet connectivity, technical support for the .bi ccTLD was initially handled by Grégoire of IZPT.

In 1998, the role of administrative contact was transferred to Victor Ciza of Centre National de L'Informatique (CNI).

On 6 September 2001, Ciza submitted a request to the IANA to change (among other items) the technical contact from Frédéric Grégoire to Felix Ndayirukiye, associated with CBINET s.a., a subsidiary of CNI providing Internet services in Burundi. The request also sought to amend the listed sponsoring organization to read only Centre National de l'Informatique (CNI). Thus, the effect of the requests was to shift away from out-of-country operation of the .bi ccTLD and to an in-country technical contact and sponsoring organization. The existing technical contact, Grégoire, agreed to these changes, as did Ciza.

Consultations were conducted within Burundi regarding this change, which indicated significant support for moving the operation of the .bi ccTLD into Burundi, and for the continued operation of the ccTLD by CNI. In view of the proposed shift in the delegated authority over the .bi domain, discussions ensued regarding establishing more formal accountability regarding the delegation. By early 2002, CNI and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers had successfully negotiated a memorandum of understanding under which the informal arrangements under which Ciza and Grégoire had been delegated responsibility for the .bi domain would be replaced with a formally documented delegation of the .bi ccTLD to CNI. After the Ministry of Communication of the Republic of Burundi endorsed the redelegation to CNI and the entry of the memorandum of understanding in March 2002, the memorandum was entered as of 16 May 2002. .bi was redelegated in July, 2002.h

Rules and Regulations

The domain name space is served on a first in first out basis. .bi Registry considers itself to have a rather liberal policy about domain names as soon as the domain name is in relation with the business name or one of its marks. Their general principle is that a domain must reflect the truth.

The foreign entities are not obliged to keep a DNS or an administrative contact in the country. Except those qualified by BI Registry as restricted or undesirable, any domain name related to the business may be assigned to these entities.

A restricted domain is one of these : gov, net, edu, ac, com, co, int, mil, gouv or any other name related to government or public company use. One can contact the registrar in order to create such a domain; however that it will be assigned only if sponsored by an official authority. It is also discouraged registration of second level domains for generic names such as bank, name, nom, art or a geographic notion as it also misleads people.

An undesirable name is defined as being vulgar, misleading people or being rejected by BI Registry at its own discretion. It is also applicable for domain registration of well known brands/trademarks registered by third parties without the consent of the owner of the brands/trademark. The domain will be deleted immediately at the owner’s request.

The registrar also strongly discourages the use of suffixes of their country for misleading people.

The domain name must have a minimum of three characters. Applications for one or two characters domain may be considered with prior arrangement.

Country code top-level domain

Internet Service Provider

Internet Assigned Numbers Authority