At today’s meeting of the Supervisory Board of the Estonian Internet Foundation the decision was passed to reduce the .EE Domain registration fee by EUR 1.2 (6.5%). The new fee of EUR 17.00 per year (just EUR 1.42 per month) shall be charged starting from 1 May 2012.
The registration fee is the fee that registrars are to pay to the Estonian Internet Foundation. The final price for the registrant is determined by the particular registrar in view of the free market competition and this price can be higher or lower than the registration fee. The fee is subject to VAT.
The starting date for the new registration fee, 1 May 2012, is connected with the end of the Domain reform in April 2011, ensuring equal treatment of all .EE Domain registrants.
“Domain registration has remained active and the increase allows us to reduce the registration fee. “The Estonian Internet Foundation is one of the most effective top-level Domain administration institutions in the European Union,” commented Marek-Andres Kauts, Chairman of the Management Board of the Estonian Internet Foundation, on the decision of the Supervisory Board.
“The .EE Domain infrastructure is part of the larger infrastructure of critical information. The reduced price still allows us to cover the DNSSec security application investment priorities and ensure sufficient reserves,” Kauts added.
At the meeting of the Supervisory Board the Management board presented an overview of the foundation’s activities in 2011 and introduced the draft strategy for 2012-2014. The draft strategy stipulates that the largest investment will be made in the DNSSec security application to expand its functionality. DNSSec is a digital signature-based solution aimed at preventing interception of Domain queries. Such queries can be intercepted and re-directed for different nefarious reasons, including password theft. A total of approximately EUR 600,000 will be invested in the DNSSec development process over a period of three years. The budget for 2012 is EUR 1.4 mln. and the reserve sum is EUR 910,000.
The draft strategy also includes provisions for system replication, replacement of domain name servers and launch of the international Anycast server network to expedite queries. To implement the aforementioned goals, the Estonian Internet Foundation will continue its integration into the international Internet community: complete the ICANN re-delegation process and join CENTR. Consultations will also continue with representatives of various .EE Domain-associated parties and interest groups.