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Registry-Registrar Agreement (RRA) Amendment

Please note that the English language version of all translated content and documents are the official versions and that translations in other languages are for informational purposes only.

Registry operators are required to notify the ICANN organization of any revisions to Registry-Registrar Agreements (RRAs), as outlined in Section 2.9(a) of the base gTLD Registry Agreement.

ICANN org has designed a process based on the Registry-Registrar Agreement (RRA) Amendment Procedure that allows registry operators to notify ICANN org of proposed amendments to RRAs. The process described below includes guidance on required documentation and how notifications will be processed.

ICANN org has developed a separate process for registry operators to submit amendments to RRAs to include the approved language for the Temporary Specification for gTLD Registration Data (Model Terms). Amendments that incorporate the Model Terms should be submitted as a separate notification and will follow a simplified review and approval process. See the Registry-Registrar Agreement (RRA) Amendment Procedure to be used with Temporary Specification for gTLD Registration Data for more information.

Resources

RRA Amendment Process

Below are general instructions for submitting RRA Amendment requests. See the Registry-Registrar Agreement (RRA) Amendment Procedure for more information.

Although not required, ICANN org recommends you schedule a consultation call to review your proposed amendments and address any questions you have about the process. To schedule the consultation, open a General Inquiry case in the Naming Services portal.

  • Submit RRA Amendment Request - to initiate this process, open a Registry-Registrar (RRA) Amendment case via the Naming Services portal. You will be required to submit two documents to ICANN org for review:

    • Redline of the existing RRA indicating the proposed changes
    • Cover letter describing the purpose of the proposed changes

    Once submitted, ICANN org will review your documents for completeness.

  • Materiality Determination (expected duration: 15 calendar days) - ICANN org will determine whether the changes requested are immaterial, potentially material, and/or material as referenced in Section 2.9 of the Registry Agreement. If the changes are deemed material or potentially material, ICANN org will proceed with a Comprehensive Review as described below. If the changes are deemed immaterial, you will bypass the Comprehensive Review and ICANN org will notify you of the final process steps.
  • Comprehensive Review: Registrar Stakeholder Group and ICANN org Review (expected duration: ordinarily will not exceed 21 days) - If the proposed changes are material or potentially material, ICANN org will forward the redlined version of the proposed RRA changes and cover letter to the Registrar Stakeholder Group (RrSG) for review. ICANN org will conduct its internal review in parallel. During the review period, if any concerns are raised by the RrSG or ICANN org, ICANN org will arrange a consultation between the registry operator and the RrSG, if applicable, to address and resolve the concerns.
  • Final Determination - ICANN org will approve or reject the proposed changes. If ICANN org approves the proposed changes, it is expected that the requesting registry operator will forward the amended RRAs to the registrars. If ICANN org rejects the proposed changes, ICANN org will inform the requesting registry operator and provide a rationale for the rejection.
Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."