In Split Vote, ICANN Approves VeriSign Deal

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has voted 9 to 5 to approve a deal granting VeriSign continued control of the .com top-level domain despite opposition from some registrars. However, the agreement must still be given the green light from the U.S. Commerce Department.

Under the terms of the deal, VeriSign would be permitted to raise .com registration fees by 7 percent without any justification in four of the next six years, as well as extending the "presumptive renewal" right to the registry when the agreement expires.

Currently, VeriSign charges a base fee of $6 per domain name to resellers, which then can charge what they wish to register domains for consumers.

In a letter to ICANN sent earlier this month, leaders of eight domain registration companies argued that fees should be dropping. They pointed to VeriSign's move to drop .net registration fees by 40 percent to win an extension of its ICANN agreement for that top-level domain.

The letter also questioned ICANN's agreement with VeriSign to give it the option to renew the agreement in 2012 without a competitive bidding process. The companies argue that since VeriSign manages both .com and .net, it controls 85 percent of the U.S. domain name market.

ICANN says it had little option but to forge the deal with VeriSign after it was sued by the company for putting a halt to SiteFinder. SiteFinder redirected invalid domain names to a VeriSign-hosted Web site with advertisements. The move angered network administrators and many consumers, prompting ICANN to demand that VeriSign shut it down.

As part of the agreement to continue managing the .com domain, VeriSign will drop its lawsuit.

In a statement, the Coalition for ICANN Transparency harshly criticized the vote. "Voting in favor of a bad deal doesn't change the deal's dynamics, it just confirms ICANN's refusal to listen to legitimate criticism coming from every corner of the Internet community," said CFIT spokesperson John Berard.

"Increasing prices without justification, allowing a monopoly to expand without review and giving VeriSign perpetual ownership of the .COM registry were wrong when they were first proposed and they're still wrong."

VeriSign said it was "pleased" with the outcome of the vote.