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NEWS RELEASE

20 Years of DENIC eG – A Key Pillar of the Free and Secure Internet in Germany

Independent and Not-For-Profit | One of the World's Largest Domain Registries

For 30 years, precisely since 5 November 1986, Germany's country code TLD .de 
has been online. On 17 December, DENIC, the organisation behind .de, now
makes the twin jubilee complete, celebrating its 20th anniversary.
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Dear Sir or Madam, dear Member,

2016 is a twin-jubilee year for DENIC, the registry operator of Germany’s Top 
Level Domains .de: Since 5 November 1986 – thus for 30 years – Germany's
country code TLD .de been online. On 17 December, the organisation behind .de 
– the DENIC Cooperative – celebrates its 20th anniversary and makes the
twin jubilee complete.

The history of domain administration in Germany – and thus the history of 
DENIC, which stands for Deutsches (German) Network Information Center – is a
success story. Organised as a cooperative, DENIC today comprises more than 
320 companies from the German and the international Internet industry.
Within 20 years, more than 16 million domains were registered under .de. This 
makes DENIC one of the top 3 TLD operators in the world.

Two geographically distant data centers in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, and 
Amsterdam, Netherlands, and multiple redundant name servers at the most
important Internet exchanges in the world, all designed for automatic 
administration using virtualization technologies, ensure that .de domains can 
be
reached around the clock from any place in the world within a fraction of a 
second. All this adds up to a reliable and secure infrastructure
characterised by high-level performance and availability that is constantly 
enhanced and improved in accordance with the latest standards.

The structure of DENIC as an independent cooperative operating as a 
private-sector not-for-profit organisation is in line with the democratic 
idea of
the Internet that aims to serve the interests of all stakeholders. So, the 
globally unique business model of self-regulatory TLD management provided
by a cooperative has long proven successful in Germany. 20 years of 
expertise, reliability and integrity have gained DENIC great respect both
nationally and internationally as one of the leading TLD operators worldwide, 
all along with much trust of political stakeholders and institutions, in
Germany.

Web Offers Under .de? No Connection Without DENIC!

Offering the name service for .de, DENIC operates a basic resource that is 
mandatory to allow the easy use of the German Internet, by linking domains
to the content of websites or to other Internet-based services, like e-mail. 
Next to managing the electronic register of all .de domains, DENIC
performs this key task for the use and benefit of the whole German Internet 
Community – in a neutral and independent, competent, responsible,
non-discriminating way, acting in accordance with the internationally 
recognized standards for the operation of TLD registries (RFC 1591).

The requirements to be met with regard to security on the Internet are ever 
increasing. As a result, expectations of the wider public regarding the
reliability of technical infrastructure providers like DENIC are growing 
constantly. DENIC is meeting this challenge by a systematic holistic
approach: Consistently using the latest IT infrastructure architectures and 
applying intelligent cryptographic techniques and authentication methods
as well as a risk management system that is in compliance with the relevant 
standards, DENIC continuously improves the security level of all its
services – and this is confirmed through the successful certification of 
DENIC's Information Security and Business Continuity Management Systems in
accordance with the internationally acknowledged standards ISO/IEC 27001:2013 
ISMS and ISO 22301:2012 BCM.

The DENIC Members – Representing the Diverse Interests of All Internet User 
Groups

During its 20 years of existence, the registry of .de has developed 
continuously – by increasing its membership by the factor ten, by constantly
getting more international, and last but not least by also becoming a 
political player. From the very start until today, DENIC's success is largely
based on the Cooperative's strong rooting in the German Internet community. 
The by now more than 320 member companies from the digital economy
represent a broad cross-section of the diverging interests of all Internet 
user groups, from the large-scale provider of standardised end-customer
solutions to the specialist offering customised package solutions with 
elaborated security features. Nearly two thirds have been DENIC members for
more than ten years.

That the country code .de is of great relevance not only to individuals, 
enterprises and institutions resident in Germany but far beyond the German
borders, was recognised by specialist providers outside Germany as early as 
2003, when multinational companies started to register other domain
extensions as a complement to their local domains. Today, the 54 European and 
20 international DENIC members account for roughly one quarter of the
Cooperative's membership. Administering more than 650,000 of all.de domains, 
they literally make the concept of the Internet as a global village
tangible.

Coming of Age Long Ago

Emerging from the 36 academic and commercial members forming the interest 
group "Interessenverband Deutsches (German) Network Information Center
(IV-DENIC)", which had initially been set up by three German pioneer ISPs in 
1993, the DENIC Cooperative founded on 17 December 1996 was joined by
another ten Internet service providers until the end of that year.

During the previous ten years, the management and DNS service for .de were 
provided by academia, at the start even from the USA. Only in 1988, a
German institution, the University of Dortmund, took over the management of 
the then first six .de domains (dbp.de, rmi.de, telenet.de, uka.de,
uni-dortmund.de and uni-paderborn.de) from the US-based science computer 
network CSNET. In 1994, this task was transferred to the data center of
Karlsruhe University. In the meantime, domains under management (DUM) had 
leaped to roughly 1,000. Karlsruhe University remained responsible for all
aspects of the technical administration of .de until 1998. Only then, all 
services of the Top Level Domain were bundled in Frankfurt am Main, where
the DENIC Cooperative had started its business as a neutral service provider 
at the beginning of 1997. At that time, domains under management had
reached medium five-digit dimensions. Still today, DENIC is based in 
Frankfurt, where some 100 staff are dealing with all dedicated registry 
operation
issues.

Complementary Service Offers: A Plus of Security for the Domain Industry and 
the Internet User

Thanks to its robust infrastructure and the comparably liberal registration 
conditions in Germany, .de soon gained the leading position among the
country code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs) and continually strengthened this 
position until the end of 2015, when .cn (China) became the largest
country-targeted TLD because Chinese investors had started to use domain 
names for speculation purposes on a growing scale.

In response to the changing market environment as of the 2010s, when domain 
growth slowly began to level off, DENIC soon started to extend its
expertise beyond the management of the .de zone to complementary fields of 
action that benefit also other players in the domain industry: At present
DENIC runs managed DNS services for nine country code registries with over 6M 
combined DUM. Thus, they take advantage of the worldwide availability
and high computing performance of DENIC's name servers and achieve a broader, 
more resilient footprint for their own business.

Since autumn this year, DENIC also offers a new service to assist registrars 
and registries in complying with European data protection regulations to
securely store copies of the domain data administered by them with an 
independent third party in order to ensure that management of the related
domains can be continued even in case of a disruption. Eight customers are 
already using DENIC's new Data Escrow Service on a test basis.

Commitment Beyond .de

Initially an institution with a mere technical focus, the Cooperative has 
long also become a respected voice in ICT and Internet policy related
discussions. In permanent contact with other national and international 
institutions, organisations and associations of the Internet ecosystem, DENIC
advocates and promotes the preservation of the open, free and secure 
Internet, by being actively involved in the central coordination body for
Internet infrastructure ICANN, the body responsible for the development of 
technical Internet standards IETF, the open forum of European operators of
IP networks and network infrastructure RIPE NCC, the German national CERT 
Association of Computer Emergency Response Teams, in the regionals
assocations of national Top Level Domain Registries CENTR, APTLD and LACTLD 
as well as in global and regional forums that deal with the multiple
facets of Internet Governance (such as IGF, IGF-D, EuroDIG, NETmundial).

DENIC's mission to act in line with the democratic idea of the Internet, is 
also reflected in its involvement in the European Summer School on
Internet Governance (EURO-SSIG), which is held by experts from universities 
and companies of the Internet industry. For 10 years, DENIC has invested
as the academy's main sponsor in excellent training for the leaders of 
tomorrow. Until today, roughly 300 alumni from more than 80 countries have 
been
prepared by this programme for the political, legal, economic, socio-cultural 
and technological future challenges of global Internet governance.

WWW as an Economic Factor

According to the 2016 Digital Economy Monitoring Report published by the 
German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy in October this year,
the domestic Internet sector as a key industry by now generates an annual 111 
billion Euros, equivalent to about 3.7 percent of the German gross
domestic product. It has thus become – not only due to another 9 percent 
growth rate in 2015 – a more important economic factor than the energy
industry or agriculture.

Consequently, the work performed by DENIC every day is constantly gaining in 
importance: not only for this essential technology and key business
sector, but also for the economy, the working world and the society as a 
whole going digital – a vital factor for tomorrow’s competitiveness and
innovative strength not only in Germany.


Kind regards

Stefanie Welters
Corporate Communications
--
DENIC eG | Kaiserstraße 75 - 77 | 60329 Frankfurt am Main | GERMANY
E-Mail: presse AT denic.de | Fon: +49 69 27235-274 | Fax: -235
https://www.denic.de

Angaben nach § 25a Absatz 1 GenG:
DENIC eG (Sitz: Frankfurt am Main). Vorstand: Helga Krüger, Martin 
Küchenthal, Andreas Musielak, Dr. Jörg Schweiger
Vorsitzender des Aufsichtsrats: Thomas Keller. Eingetragen unter Nr. 770 im 
Genossenschaftsregister, Amtsgericht Frankfurt am Main

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