NSW govt to fight town cybersquatters
“Australians should be concerned that the domain names of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide were--and remain--captured by commercial interests,” NSW Information Technology Minister Kim Yeadon said.
The “One City One Site” proposal developed by the NSW government is seeking to stop commercial operators from owning domain names such as "Sydney".
The proposal outlines that commercial operators may use a geographic name only if it has a prefix that identifies it as a business.
Currently, geographic names are not available to the local communities they are named after, according to Yeadon.
“Under One City One Site, geographical domain names of Australian states, territories, cities and towns would not be licensed to individuals or individual businesses,” Yeadon said.
The proposal will seek the support of all Australian governments and will be presented to the national domain name authority, auDA, for review.