New policy to lead the industry in the effective deterrence of abuses like phishing and spam by improving detection and enforcement actions.

Afilias, a provider of registry services, today announced a new registration policy that makes the nature of domain name abuses clear for registrants and registrars, and furthers the power of the registry to take quick and appropriate action regarding .INFO, unrestricted generic top-level domain (TLD) used for abusive behavior. The company says that this policy will go into effect on 6 November 2008.

It explains that under the policy, abusive use has been more clearly defined and includes, but is not limited to: phishing, e-mail spam and other types of spam, the willful distribution of malware, the use of botnets and fast-flux hosting, distribution of child pornography, illegal access to other computers or networks, and other illegal or fraudulent actions. The company states that domains that are being abused will be reported to the sponsoring registrar, and Afilias has the option of removing them from the DNS and reporting the abuser to law enforcement. It is committed to working closely with its registrars, legal authorities, security professionals, and others to rid the Internet of the scourge of domain abuse, claims the company.

''This policy is the result of over a year of dedicated work by Afilias to understand and curtail the abusive use of domain names, and to design effective deterrents," said Ram Mohan, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Afilias. ''.INFO's tremendous overall popularity has attracted criminals online, as do many other domains, so we are taking further firm action to protect users by improving detection and enforcement actions.''

''This is a positive step forward demonstrating how registries can take positive actions to increase protection against security threats such as spam, phishing and malware,'' said Steven Crocker, Chair of ICANN's Security and Stability Advisory Committee. ''We applaud Afilias' efforts to deter such abusive practices.''