HOW To Do Things Gadgets Edition

CADNA Supports ICANN's Initiative to Examine gTLD WHOIS Policy and Hopes for Results

CADNA Supports ICANN's Initiative to Examine gTLD WHOIS Policy and Hopes for
Results




WASHINGTON, Oct. 30 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Coalition Against Domain
Name Abuse (CADNA) supports ICANN's initiative to examine gTLD WHOIS policy.
CADNA's Top Ten List from September 22, 2009, identified WHOIS reform as a
priority action for ICANN.

(Logo:  http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20070724/DCTU006LOGO)

It is important that all domain names have full and accurate registrant and
contact information to enable the identification and prosecution of bad
actors. CADNA urges ICANN to ensure that registrars require their customers to
display accurate WHOIS records in order to promote accountability in the
space.

"Addressing numerous issues corrupting the domain name space should be a top
concern for ICANN," said Josh Bourne, President of CADNA.

On October 23, ICANN requested proposals from independent researchers to
examine the accuracy of reported WHOIS information. WHOIS databases are
maintained by the registrars of record for all domains and hold identifying
information such as the registrant of the domain and the registrant's physical
and email addresses. To date, ICANN has not done enough to ensure that
registrars and their customers display current and accurate WHOIS. As a
result, mal-intending domain name owners have been able to operate anonymously
and evade apprehension.

Congressional and White House concerns about cybersecurity make ICANN's
decision to review WHOIS timely. A poorly operated WHOIS program is a threat
to national security. CADNA urges both Congress and the White House to further
explore the critical importance of an accurate WHOIS program to national
security as they begin to draft legislation and hold hearings in the coming
months.

A stable and transparent Internet is not possible without WHOIS reform.
CADNA's list of issues that ICANN must address in order to ensure a safe,
secure Internet for users worldwide can be found on CADNA's Web site.

The Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse (CADNA) is a 501(c)(6) non-profit
organization dedicated to ending the systemic domain name abuses that plague
the Internet today. For more information, please visit www.cadna.org.


SOURCE  Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse

Yvette Wojciechowski of CADNA, +1-202-223-9355, press@cadna.org

ICANN Approves Non-Latin Languages for Internet Domains During a six-day conference in Seoul, Internet regulator Icann approved a plan to allow domain names to be written in non-Latin characters such as Chinese, Hebrew, Arabic or Russian.

Since the beginning of the World Wide Web, only the 26 Roman characters A-Z, numbers and the dash sign could be used in a website name. Under the new rules, which are projected to go into effect by mid-2010, domain names can now choose from among 100,000 different characters.

"Of the 1.6 billion internet users today worldwide, more than half use languages that have scripts that are not Latin-based," said Icann president and CEO Rod Beckstrom.

In the first stage of the plan, the local alphabet will be used only in national top-level domains—such as .sk for Slovakia or .ru for Russia. Later stages of the plan will internationalize the major domains like .com, .net and .org as well.

Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) will present the “biggest technical change to the Internet,” Icann Chairman Peter Dengate Thrush said in a statement. Starting November 16, countries can apply for a new top-level domain based on their own character set.

While countries like China and Thailand have previously introduced systems that allow users to enter domain names in their own languages, they did not have international approval.

Seeing the need for a new internationally approved domain name system, Icann went forward with the plan just one month after gaining autonomy from the U.S. government.

However, this revolutionary plan has met with mixed reactions from the Internet community. Many have worries of new security concerns, since the internationalization system might be used for possible phishing attacks.

For example, potential victims may receive an address for a fake website, whose name will be visually undistinguishable from the legal site, with just one letter taken from another character set.

Other complaints come from business owners from non-English speaking countries that may now need to register at least two domain addresses—one with the special characters, and another without.

How long can a domain name be? Theoretically, any one component of a domain name can be up to 256 characters long. Officially, many registries including the .com, .net and .org registries limit domain names to less than 63 characters. To be practical, however, domain names should be much shorter than this if users are ever expected to want to type them... or even discuss them in email. Many registrars will not sell domain names anywhere near that long.

Are postsecondary institutions located outside the United States eligible for names in the .edu domain? As specified by the Department of Commerce, only postsecondary "US institutions" that are institutionally accredited by one of the agencies on the U.S. Department of Education’s list of Nationally Recognized Accrediting Agencies may apply for new names in the .edu domain. We thus require applicants to be located within the United States (including US territories and possessions); or to be licensed, chartered, or incorporated within the United States (including US territories and possessions); or to be otherwise officially recognized by a US state or federal government agency (including US territories and possessions).

If you are not located within the United States but believe you meet one of the other qualifications as a US institution AND are institutionally accredited by one of the Nationally Recognized Accrediting Agencies we recognize, please contact edu@educause.edu.

What are the eligibility requirements for obtaining a name in the .edu domain? Eligibility for a .edu domain name is limited to U.S. postsecondary institutions that are institutionally accredited, i.e., the entire institution and not just particular programs, by agencies on the U.S. Department of Education’s list of Nationally Recognized Accrediting Agencies. These include both "Regional Institutional Accrediting Agencies" and "National Institutional and Specialized Accrediting Bodies" recognized by the U.S. Department of Education.

Note that institutional accreditation is required for .edu eligibility; program accreditation is not sufficient. Not all agencies accredit institutions. Some accredit only institutions, some accredit only programs, and others accredit both institutions and programs.

It is also important to note that, while every effort is made to keep the EDUCAUSE list up-to-date, the U.S. Department of Education's list of Nationally Recognized Accrediting Agencies and State Agencies are the only official comprehensive lists of agencies.

How do I register a .edu domain name? edu domain name registration is limited to fully accredited postsecondary institutions of higher learning, such as four-year colleges. .edu domain registration is for the most part limited to schools located in the United States. .edu domain name registration is handled exclusively by EDUCAUSE, a nonprofit organization working to promote the intelligent use of information technology in education.

Can I register a .com domain name for free? No, you can't register and host .com domain names without paying for them. That's because of the way the Internet's domain name service (DNS) is designed.

The average person's computer looks up a name by consulting their ISP's DNS server, which consults the "root" DNS servers. And the root DNS servers only recognize the well-known domains such as .com, .edu and .gov, along with the many two-letter national domains like .us, .uk, .br, .eu and .tv.

The only way to get into the domain name databases recognized by the root DNS servers is by registering your site with a domain name registrar that participates in ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. You can find a list of accredited registrars on the ICANN site. Every company that sells .com domain names is either on that list, or reselling the product of a company that is on that list.

Participation in ICANN requires deep financial pockets. So registrars must charge their customers for domain name registration. Some do offer domain names at a steep discount, often in hopes that you will buy additional services.

A few companies do offer "free" .com domain name registration... but only if you pay to host your website with them. At the end of the day, while these companies may be offering good service at a reasonable price, it's not really free.

It is also possible to register domain names under many of the the various two-letter national domains. However, website visitors do not take such sites seriously unless they are located in or have a clear relationship to the country in question, and registration usually is no cheaper than in .com. Which, as I've mentioned, can cost as little as $9/year.

How do I get a hostname for my home computer? To host a website at home, or host BitTorrent downloads at home, you need a way for others to find your computer on the Internet.

Right now, your computer at home -- or, more likely, your connection sharing device, such as a wireless router -- probably has a dynamic IP address. That means that other users can only refer to your computer by a cryptic address that doesn't mean much to human beings, such as 10.250.17.234. And if your IP address is dynamic, it changes every time you reconnect to your DSL or cable modem provider.

Even if your IP address is static, you still need a way for users to access your site by name, instead of by number... unless you're willing to put up with a URL like http://10.250.17.234/. And you might change ISPs. So I recommend following this article's recommendations anyway. If a URL like that doesn't bother you, and you're sure you won't change ISPs and that you have a static IP address, You may skip this step. If you don't know which you have, you probably have a dynamic IP address.

So how can we give out a reliable address to folks who want to connect to our website or BitTorrent tracker... for free? Easily: we'll use a dynamic DNS service, such as DynDNS. DynDNS offers free dynamic and static DNS services.

I use DynDNS as an example here, but you should also consider similar services offered by www.no-ip.com.

Visit the DynDNS site, or that of a similar free DNS service, and set up a dynamic IP DNS account for yourself. DynDNS offers DNS subdomain names in several domains with rather entertaining names. For instance, you might pick exampleguy.is-a-geek.com.

"Hey, DynDNS isn't really free!"

Yes, it is. Read carefully. As of this writing, the correct procedure on their site is to click on "Dynamic DNS" under "services." You will then be invited to use their "free dynamic DNS services."

Sure, DynDNS does offer other services that cost money. You might even want them. That's up to you.

What if you want to use your own domain name, instead of is-a-geek.com or another domain offered by DynDNS? In a nutshell: it's tougher, and it's usually not quite free, but you can do it! For the sake of readability, I've separated my answer to that question into a separate article. Check out How do I host a real domain name at home? for complete details.

You have a dynamic DNS account now... but so far, you're still stuck logging in to DynDNS every time your IP address changes! How can you fix that? By installing the DynDNS Updater software, which stays resident on your computer and automatically updates your IP address in the DNS records, so that yourname.is-a-geek.com follows you everywhere you go. Even if you change from cable modem to DSL or vice versa, your dynamic DNS will still be updated to point to the right place. Neat, huh?

In my tests the Dynamic Update software showed an IP address only valid on my local network in a little popup "tooltip" window -- but my "real" public IP address was set correctly on the dyndns server. So don't panic.

You can get the DNS updating software from the DynDNS Update Clients page. Installation is a snap, with just two confusing pages in the setup wizard: "Hostname Group" and "Hostname Information."

If you have just one hostname, it's hard to see why either of these is useful. Fortunately, all you need to do on the "Hostname Group" screen is make up a name for your "group" of hostnames. exampleguy will do fine. And when you reach the "Hostname Information" screen, just be sure to check the box next to your one and only hostname before clicking "Next." Also be sure to enable automatic update -- that's the whole point!

Got a Mac or a Linux system? You can still have automatic DynDNS updates! Try the "third party clients" link at the bottom of the DynDNS Update Clients page.

Now you have your very own hostname on the Internet... for free! For most people, the next step is to assign a static local IP address to your computer so that you have a fixed address on your home network to forward web or BitTorrent traffic to.

Should I host my own web server? Hosting it yourself takes lots of time, saves very little money, and often provides very unreliable service. If you want a professional-quality, high-reliability connection for hosting purposes, you can expect to spend as much as several hundred dollars per month... if you want a reliable site that stays up 24 hours, 7 days a week, and provides professional quality speed to your visitors.

You might not be able to do it with your particular cable or DSL ISP. Some ISPs forbid this and will shut servers down, or they may simply block port 80... which doesn't prevent web hosting

completely, but requires your site to have an unusual-looking URL with a port number.

Cable modem upload speed is usually between 128 and 384kbps, which means that you cannot serve content to others anywhere near as fast as you can download content yourself. DSL providers are more friendly to servers, but they also typically have limited upload speeds, and in many cases will not guarantee high-quality performance for servers run over DSL. The gold-plated option, a "T1" line, costs $600/month from the most affordable providers such as Speakeasy.Net.

Compare the price of any good, reputable hosting company as found on webhostingratings.com. For less than the money you will spend to host it yourself, you can have your own independently rebootable box with full scripting and Unix shell privileges, and multiple redundant Internet connections much faster than a T1 line. And for much less than that -- $10 a month or less -- you can can get more basic hosting packages

Hosting it yourself takes lots of time, saves very little money, and often provides very unreliable service. If you want a professional-quality, high-reliability connection for hosting purposes, you can expect to spend as much as several hundred dollars per month... if you want a reliable site that stays up 24 hours, 7 days a week, and provides professional quality speed to your visitors.

You might not be able to do it with your particular cable or DSL ISP. Some ISPs forbid this and will shut servers down, or they may simply block port 80... which doesn't prevent web hosting

completely, but requires your site to have an unusual-looking URL with a port number.

There are four situations where do-it-yourself hosting sometimes makes sense:

Hosting companies will not tolerate your content. This is a rare situation. Even adult oriented sites that are not welcomed by some mainstream hosting companies have a choice of hosting providers that will gladly work with them.
You are willing to pay the price for an extremely fast, professional grade connection at home or in your office, you would like to offset that price by using the connection to host your website, and you don't mind being your own system administrator. This usually turns out not to be worth it. I've been there!
You just want to learn how it all works. This is a great reason.
You really, really, really want to. This is also a great reason.

Guide to Host Your website at home, 1

Upgrading to Windows XP Service Pack 2

Microsoft has fixed problems in Windows XP that create issues for Apache. Use Windows Update to upgrade your Windows XP system to service pack 2. You have probably already done this. If not, you need to do it in any case to fix many important security problems that have nothing to do with Apache!

Not sure if you have service pack 2? Do this: click on "Start," right-click on "My Computer," select "Properties" and look at the information presented under "System." You should see "Service Pack 2." If not, visit Microsoft's Windows Update site, using Interet Explorer, not Firefox... just this once! The Windows Update site uses special Active X controls to update your computer. Normally I don't encourage the use of Active X, but for upgrading Microsoft's own operating system from Microsoft's own website using Microsoft's own browser, it's OK!

Downloading Apache

Visit the Apache HTTP Server Project home page. In the column at left, locate "Download!" and click on "from a mirror." The download page will appear. Scroll down until you locate the link to download the "Win32 Binary (MSI Installer)" distribution of Apache, not the "Win32 Source." That's raw source code for programmers - probably not what you want!

Click on the link for the "Win32 Binary (MSI Installer)" and wait for your browser to save the file to disk.

Installing Apache

Once the download is complete, you're ready to install the software. Double-click on the file you just downloaded on your desktop (for Firefox) or in your downloads folder (for Internet Explorer) to launch the installation program. The "Installation Wizard" window will appear.

First you'll see the "Welcome to the Installation Wizard" page. Click "Next" to continue.

Next, you'll see the Apache license agreement. The Apache license allows you to share the software freely, including the source code. Select "I accept the terms in the license agreement" and click "Next."

The "Read This First" page appears. Currently this page doesn't offer much specific information for Windows users of Apache. Click "Next."

The "Server Information" page should now appear. Be sure to enter the correct information:

1. For "Network Domain," if you registered a hostname such as myname.is-a-geek.com with DynDNS, enter is-a-geek.com.

2. For "Server Name," enter your full hostname, such as myname.is-a-geek.com.

3. For "Administrator's Email Address," enter a real email address for you that actually works. Users will see this when things go wrong. Bear in mind that spammers might discover this address, so use an address that is already publicly known if possible.

4. For "Install Apache HTTP Server 2.0 programs and shortcuts for..." select "for All Users, on Port 80, as a Service." This ensures that the software is always running, no matter who is sitting down at your computer. And a website that is not always running is not very useful! So pick this option and click "Next."

The "Setup Type" page appears next. Select "Typical" and click "Next" to move on.

You'll see the "Destination Folder" page. By default, Apache installs in the folder C:\Program Files\Apache Group, creating a sub-folder called C:\Program Files\Apache Group\htdocs to keep your web pages in. These are good choices, so click "Next." Don't click "Change..." unless you know exactly what you're doing.

Finally, the "Ready to Install the Program" page appears. Click "Install" to kick off the installation process. The Apache server software will be copied into place and the Apache service will start up in the background. Along the way, a few Windows Command Prompt windows will flash up briefly. This is normal and you should let these windows do their thing and go away on their own!

If you do receive error messages, the most frequent cause is that Internet Information Server or another web server is already installed and "listening" on port 80, the standard HTTP port. Disable the other web server software and reinstall Apache.

The "Installation Wizard Completed" page should appear. Congratulations, you have a web server! Click on "Finish" to complete the process.

Internet Information Server Quick-Start Guide

You need either Apache or Internet Information Server (IIS). You do not want both.

Microsoft's Internet Information Server is a solid choice, and it is included free with Windows XP Professional. If you don't have XP Professional, or one of the server-oriented versions of Windows like Windows Server 2003, then IIS is not an option for you.

Installing Internet Information Server

1. Make sure you have Windows XP Professional! Click "Start," then right-click "My Computer." Choose "Properties" from the menu that appears. The "General" tab will appear. Under "System:" you should see "Microsoft Windows XP Professional." If you see Windows XP Home, Windows ME, Windows 98 or Windows 95, you will not be able to use IIS. Follow the Apache Quick-Start Guide instead.

2. We're ready to install the IIS software. Select "Start," then "Control Panel," then "Add/Remove Programs." Select "Add/Remove Windows Components" from the left-hand column.

A list of available Windows features appears. Check the box for "Internet Information Services (IIS)" and click "Next." If prompted, insert your Windows XP installation CD.

That's all it takes! Installing IIS is very simple because it is a standard component of Windows XP Professional.

Step Seven: Test Your Website From Your Own Computer

Is the website working? Let's find out! The first test is to access your site from your own computer. On the same computer that is running the web server software, access the URL http://localhost/. You should see an example home page provided with your Apache or IIS web server software. If not, review the appropriate quick start guide above and figure out which step you skipped! If you received errors during installation, you need to resolve them before your website will work.

Step Eight: Make Your Own Home Page

You have a web server, but right now the "content" on the site is just the default home page that came with the server software. Time to fix that!

All you have to do is move your own web pages to the appropriate folder. If you followed the Apache quick-start guide, your web pages belong in this folder:

C:\Program Files\Apache Group\htdocs

If you followed the IIS quick-start guide, your web pages belong here:

C:\Inetpub\wwwroot

First, remove the files that are already in those folders. It's not smart to leave "default" files lying around. What if a security problem was found with one of these common files? Then your website would be vulnerable.

Next, copy your own web pages and images into the folder. The "home page" of your site should be called index.html (not index.htm). Both Apache and IIS are smart enough to know that when a user visits http://yourname.is-a-geek.com/, they should act as if the user asked for http://yourname.is-a-geek.com/index.html and do the right thing.

Step Nine: Test Your Website From The Outside World

We did a lot of work here to give our computer a hostname on the Internet and forward web traffic through the router and firewall. Did we do it right? Only one way to be sure! Access your website from a computer that is not on your home Internet connection, or have a friend try it. For example, if you registered the name myname.is-a-geek.com with DynDNS, your website's address is http://myname.is-a-geek.com/. Try that address from a computer outside your home and see what happens!

If it works... great! If not, you probably made a mistake in dynamic DNS, port forwarding, firewall configuration or local static IP configuration.

"I followed all the steps and I get my router's login page instead of my home page!"

You are probably trying to access your website by name from behind your router (from one of your own PCs). With many routers, this does not work because the router automatically assumes any web connection to itself from inside your network is an attempt to log into the router's configuration interface. Test from outside your own network or have a friend do that for you. If you can access your home-hosted website from someone else's computer, you don't have a problem. If you want to access your site from a computer behind your router, you'll have to access it at its static local IP address instead of by name.

Another possible cause of this problem: you may have turned on your router's "remote router access" feature by mistake. People turn this on by accident because they think it has something to do with hosting a website at home. It doesn't. Turn it off, it is dangerous! You don't want other people accessing your router and changing configuration settings.

Congratulations! You have your own website on the Internet, hosted entirely in your own home. Just remember: your computer must remain on, and connected to the Internet, all the time. Without a web server, there's no website. That's why, if you choose to host at home, I recommend picking up an older computer off the curb, dusting it off, popping in at least 128MB of RAM and firing it up as a web server. Your own PC doesn't wear out, and if security problems are found in the web server, they are more likely to be confined to the less important computer.

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