.bn
.bn is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Brunei Darussalam. It is managed by the Authority for Info-communications Technology Industry of Brunei Darussalam (AITI).[1]
Delegation History
The .bn top-level domain was first delegated in 1994 to Jabatan Telekom Brunei, the telecommunications operator at the time serving under the Ministry of Communications at the time.
In 2006, a restructure of JBT formed the Telekom Brunei Berhad (TelBru) and the Authority for info-communications Technology Industry (AITI) of Brunei Darussalam.. In this restructure, TelBru was named a successor company to JBT. The purpose was to segregate the service provider and the regulatory function. The .bn TLD managers then requested an update to the IANA Root Zone Database to update the sponsoring organization name to Telekom Brunei Berhad (TelBru).
Under the Constitution of Brunei Darussalam (Order under section 83(3)), the Authority for Info-communications Technology Industry of Brunei Darussalam (AITI) has the power to “promote the use of the Internet and electronic commerce and to establish regulatory frameworks for that purpose”. Under the Second Schedule of the AITI Order 2001, AITI has the power “to authorize or regulate the registration, administration and management of domain names in Brunei Darussalam”.
TelBru, together with AITI, have been serving as the service provider and regulatory authority for .bn since 2006. In 2012, AITI developed the overall policies, frameworks and guidelines to enhance the management of .bn domain names in Brunei Darussalam. These policies were then put through a public consultation in September 2012 and were well received by the local community. Subsequently in 2013, AITI created a new private entity “Burnei Darussalam Network Information Centre Sdn Bhd (BNNIC)” to act as the proposed new registry for .bn. BNNIC and AITI then called for an open tender to design and build a robust technical and transfer plan to manage .bn.
Following the completion of technical and transfer plans, BNNIC commenced a request to ICANN for the redelegation of the .bn top-level domain on 24 May 2014, which was conceded.[2]
Rules
The Registration process is declared open with in effect for fresh registrations or renewals in case of bonafide local residents only. Standard documentary requirements shall apply.
BNNIC may allow Registration applications on behalf of the international non-residents later at its own discretion.[3]
Restrictions and Reservations
Considering non-permitted and / or reserved domain names, the following key points may be noted:
- any expressions resembling words such as "Brunei", "Brunei Government" or "Sultan" or indicative of such Official or Royal names;
- any expression resembling the name of sovereign country or territory;
- any expression containing technical expressions such as “bnnic”, “nic”, “www”, “http”, “https”, “http-www”, generic top-level domains (gTLDs) suffixes such as .com; .info etc.;
- any expression which is obscene, scandalous, indecent, contrary to law or morality;
- any expression containing words that are religiously-sensitive, contrary to public interest or order, national harmony or any other social objectives.[3]
Second-level Domains
The eligibility shall also be governed through the nature of activities or purpose. The following sub-domains are currently open for registration:
- .com.bn for companies and business;
- .net.bn for network providers;
- .edu.bn for educational institutions
- .org.bn for non-profit organizations
- .gov.bn for use on behalf of Government of Brunei Darussalam.[3]
Characters
- Only appropriate combinations of roman alphabets (a to z, no case sensitive) and numerals (0 to 9) are currently acceptable;
- the hyphen (-) could also be used provided it does not appear at first, second, third or fourth position;
- each such combination may not exceed 63 characters (excluding count of .bn characters).[3]