Over a million .uk domains were registered in this way by the biggest Registrars. My impression is that though the Registrants of the .co.uk names were named as the 'Registrants' of the matching .uk names, in fact these million+ names were registered by the large Registrars, without the consent of the named 'Registrant'.
Namesco jettisoned huge numbers in January/February this year - but Fasthosts and 1&1 have a vast number of .uk names in limbo. They have from early June to early September to try to persuade the 'ghost' Registrants to actually claim these domains.
Technically the right of .co.uk name holders to claim their .uk equivalents expired a year ago, because that was the laid down protocol which would make these names available to the public in 2019.
The biggest three Nominet registrars are GoDaddy, 1&1, and Namesco.
These three registrars control more UK domains than all the other 2400 Nominet Members put together. This makes these large registrars valued customers. In my view, the smaller registrars and others with smaller business with the UK's DNS need as much representation on Nominet's Board as possible to balance that commercial dominance and its influence.
The UK namespace is a vital part of the UK's infrastructure, relied upon by millions, including schools, the NHS, charities, communities and individuals. Policy obviously needs to be driven with this national responsibility in mind, along with very real issues of commercial viability, security against emerging external threats, detecting abuse of the namespace, and fraud.
It is obvious that the UK's DNS does not exist only for the sake of Nominet or a small number of very large Registrars. That's why I think there need to be checks and balances, and actions like the one I detailed above are worth asking questions about. I want Nominet to succeed and flourish, but it needs to be 'classy'. When people allegedly circumvent the rules to obtain unfair access to domains, then either the Registry must enforce the rules, or if that is not possible then the rules have to be changed.
In my opinion, tight rules and protocols are really important. I think if a process has been agreed (such as the 5 year limit for claiming your .uk) then that process and undertaking (that the public could have access to fairly use the domains after that date) would have been better being upheld.
As it is, over a million names have been kept in limbo and, although Nominet's registrar rules state that names must not be registered without the Registrant agreeing to the terms and conditions first, the mass-registrations by the big registrars seemed to me to circumvent that requirement for registration, and they just went ahead and registered this vast number of domains in most cases with zero consent by the people being named as so-called 'Registrants'.
I don't think that was classy.
I am not trying to be all negative - I want the UK namespace to succeed. To do so, it needs to be fair, reliable, secure, and it must operate with integrity. Nominet faces very real challenges. I affirm some of the good use of tech it's supported recently (like the Samaritan's Self-Help App). I think it's a shame if any 'laissez-faire' element slips in to enforcement of, or adherence to, its rules and policies. That would not be good for brand and reputation.
Anyone with a modicum of emotional intelligence would realise this was an own-goal. Companies need feel-good stories, not ones that achieve very little but stir up negative media coverage.
