New .secure Internet Domain On Tap

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://www.darkreading.com/authentication/167901072/security/security-management/240000187/new-i-secure-i-internet-domain-on-tap.html

By Kelly Jackson Higgins
Dark Reading
May 10, 2012

A new top-level domain (TLD) in the works for the Internet will bake 
security in from the outset: The .secure domain will require fully 
encrypted HTTPS sessions and a comprehensive vetting process for 
websites and their operators. If the new domain takes off, it could 
shift the way Web domains are secured.

It's basically a "safe neighborhood" on the Net, its creators say, and 
is one of the first next-generation TLDs to emerge from the new Internet 
Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) program that opens up 
the TLDs beyond the 21 existing global domains that include .com, .org, 
.net, and .edu. Artemis Internet Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of NCC 
Group plc, has applied with ICANN for the new .secure domain in the 
competition for thousands of new TLDs aimed at better classifying 
companies and people by industry, interest, or location.

"'Effortless security' is our tagline," says Alex Stamos, CTO at 
Artemis. "Right now, when you go to .com, you have to look for five 
different visual clues to figure out what's going on" security-wise, 
Stamos says. "If you type .secure, you're telling the server or 
organization that you want to communicate with that you want to be safe 
and expect them to be as safe as possible. All of that security stuff is 
taken care of for you."

Stamos expects financial institutions and other security-sensitive 
businesses to adopt the new domain for their pages that handle 
transactions, for example, or sensitive data. "We're not trying to tell 
people to throw away your .com. You can create a namespace where you can 
do more secure things, so if you are a bank that runs hundreds of 
websites and have some website for users who do billion-dollar 
transactions," that site could go to the .secure domain, he says.

[...]


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