We’re all about transparency, privacy, and the free and open Internet. Here, you’ll find legal policies related to the various top-level domains (TLDs or domain extensions) that we offer, as well as our advocacy work related to Internet governance, which is informed by 20+ years’ experience as a registrar.
Legal Policies
Please see Exhibit A of our Registration Agreement for the full terms and conditions to which Registrants of gTLDs are bound. This document includes links to additional registry policies specific to particular TLDs.
To better understand your rights and responsibilities as a registrant or domain owner, please review the relevant ICANN Policies.
To better understand your rights and responsibilities as a registrant or domain owner, please review the relevant ICANN Policies.
Each country code TLD (ccTLD) is operated by an independent Registry that sets policies to govern the registration and use of that particular ccTLD. Consequently, each ccTLD is governed by a unique set of policies.
Please see Exhibit A of our Registration Agreement for the full terms and conditions to which Registrants are bound. The Registrant is responsible for monitoring the Registry’s site on a regular basis. If you do not wish to be bound by a revision or modification to any Registry policy, your sole remedy is to cancel your domain name registration. The cancellation process differs between Registries. You may contact your Domain Provider [link to FYDP page] or refer to the appropriate Registry page to determine the cancellation procedure for your ccTLD name.
Select a ccTLD to view the Registry policy page:
.AU
.AT
.BE
.BR
.CA (CIRA Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy, Registrant Agreement)
.CC
.CO
.CN
.DE (Domain Terms and Conditions, Domain guidelines)
.DK
.ES
.EU
.FR
.IO
.IT (Assignment and management of domain names in the ccTLD .it, Additional Policies )
.IN
.ME
.MX
.NL (General Terms and Conditions, Dispute Resolution Regulations for .NL Domain Names)
.NZ
.PL
.TV
.UK
.US
.ZA
Please see Exhibit A of our Registration Agreement for the full terms and conditions to which Registrants are bound. The Registrant is responsible for monitoring the Registry’s site on a regular basis. If you do not wish to be bound by a revision or modification to any Registry policy, your sole remedy is to cancel your domain name registration. The cancellation process differs between Registries. You may contact your Domain Provider [link to FYDP page] or refer to the appropriate Registry page to determine the cancellation procedure for your ccTLD name.
Select a ccTLD to view the Registry policy page:
.AU
.AT
.BE
.BR
.CA (CIRA Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy, Registrant Agreement)
.CC
.CO
.CN
.DE (Domain Terms and Conditions, Domain guidelines)
.DK
.ES
.EU
.FR
.IO
.IT (Assignment and management of domain names in the ccTLD .it, Additional Policies )
.IN
.ME
.MX
.NL (General Terms and Conditions, Dispute Resolution Regulations for .NL Domain Names)
.NZ
.PL
.TV
.UK
.US
.ZA
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is an internationally organized, non-profit corporation. They coordinate the management of all technical elements of the Domain Name System to ensure that users of the Internet can find all valid addresses.
The full scope of their responsibilities includes:
For more information, you can visit their website.
Registrant’s Benefits and Responsibilities
Provides complete and detailed information about your rights and responsibilities as a domain name owner, and explains the relationship between ICANN and Domain Registrars.
Registrant Educational Materials
Informative video tutorials to familiarize you with the basics of domain ownership. These tutorials offer “plain language” summaries of terms related to Registrant Rights and Responsibilities as set out in the Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA).
Whois Data Reminder Policy (WDRP)
This policy is enforced by ICANN, and requires all Registrars to annually present each Registrant with the current Whois information associated with the Registrant’s domain(s).
This information is sent to the Registrant in a WDRP message, via email. The message will contain a link to a page where the Registrant may update their Whois information, should they need to do so. If the Whois information is still up-to-date and complete, no action is required on the part of the Registrant. A lack of response on the part of Registrant is assumed to mean that the Whois info presented was accurate.
Tucows sends a WDRP messages to each Registrant 120 days before their domain’s expiry date. For domains that are registered for multiple years, this information is sent via email, 120 days before the anniversary of the domain’s initial registration date.
The full scope of their responsibilities includes:
- Internet Protocol (IP) address space allocation
- Protocol identifier assignment
- Generic (gTLD) Top-Level Domain management (.com,. org etc.)
- Country code (ccTLD) Top-Level Domain management (.ca, .us, .cn etc.)
- Management of root server system functions
For more information, you can visit their website.
Policies & Resources:
Expired Registration Recovery Policy
Sets the timeline and process guidelines for domain name expirations and redemptions, outlining the related responsibilities of Registries and Registrars, and providing requirements as to how and when Registrants are notified.Registrant’s Benefits and Responsibilities
Provides complete and detailed information about your rights and responsibilities as a domain name owner, and explains the relationship between ICANN and Domain Registrars.
Registrant Educational Materials
Informative video tutorials to familiarize you with the basics of domain ownership. These tutorials offer “plain language” summaries of terms related to Registrant Rights and Responsibilities as set out in the Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA).
Whois Data Reminder Policy (WDRP)
This policy is enforced by ICANN, and requires all Registrars to annually present each Registrant with the current Whois information associated with the Registrant’s domain(s).
This information is sent to the Registrant in a WDRP message, via email. The message will contain a link to a page where the Registrant may update their Whois information, should they need to do so. If the Whois information is still up-to-date and complete, no action is required on the part of the Registrant. A lack of response on the part of Registrant is assumed to mean that the Whois info presented was accurate.
Tucows sends a WDRP messages to each Registrant 120 days before their domain’s expiry date. For domains that are registered for multiple years, this information is sent via email, 120 days before the anniversary of the domain’s initial registration date.
Advocacy work and Internet governance
DNS AbuseDNS Abuse refers to five broad categories of harmful activity: malware, botnets, phishing, pharming, and spam (when it serves as a delivery mechanism for the other forms of DNS Abuse). is an increasingly prevalent issue. Here, we share our thoughts on what needs to be done to address it, attempt to transparently communicate our own internal processes for mitigating it, and call on our fellow registrars, registries, hosting companies, and other Internet infrastructure providers to come together to better address it. Learn More
In 2021, the Canadian Government released a “proposed approach to address harmful content online.” Here we share our critiques of this proposed approach, which include concerns about privacy rights and surveillance. Learn More