--- title: Neil Fraser: News: .name Termination | daily.dev description: Verisign proposed eliminating the entire third-level of the .name domain hierarchy to simplify administration, and ICANN approved the plan on 28 July 2026. The... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/neil-fraser-news-name-termination-apw5z1o3z twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Neil Fraser: News: .name Termination | daily.dev og:description: Verisign proposed eliminating the entire third-level of the .name domain hierarchy to simplify administration, and ICANN approved the plan on 28 July 2026. The... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/neil-fraser-news-name-termination-apw5z1o3z og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/APw5z1o3Z.png og:image:alt: Neil Fraser: News: .name Termination og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Neil Fraser: News: .name Termination **[Lobsters](https://daily.dev/sources/lobsters)** · 3 min read · 1 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Verisign proposed eliminating the entire third-level of the .name domain hierarchy to simplify administration, and ICANN approved the plan on 28 July 2026. The author, who registered neil.fraser.name nearly 25 years ago for his website, email, and IoT services, explains that this will delete his site, break his email, and brick connected devices despite having paid through 2040. Worse, once third-level domains are terminated, the freed second-level domain (fraser.name) could be registered by anyone, letting them hijack accounts, impersonate his email-based authentication, and seize control of linked IoT devices. Around 22,000 domain holders are affected. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What is happening to .name third-level domains like neil.fraser.name? Verisign proposed destroying the entire third level of the .name domain hierarchy to simplify administration, and ICANN approved the action on 28 July 2026. As a result, third-level .name domains such as neil.fraser.name will stop working around February 2027, even if registered and paid for through 2040, affecting roughly 22,000 domain holders. _Anyone relying on a niche domain structure can follow fallout like this on daily.dev before it breaks their own setup._ ### Why is the termination of .name third-level domains dangerous for security, not just inconvenient? Once third-level .name domains are terminated, their corresponding second-level domains become available for anyone to register. Someone who registers a domain like fraser.name could recreate a former third-level address such as neil.fraser.name and hijack accounts, commit code under the original owner's identity, or seize control of IoT devices tied to that email address. _daily.dev helps developers track domain and identity security risks like account hijacking through abandoned addresses._ ### How is a .name third-level domain different from shady third-level domains like *.uk.co? Unlike operators such as the *.uk.co reseller who bought a country-code domain and resells third-level subdomains without proper records, .name was designed exclusively as a third-level system with full whois records for every registration, comparable to *.ny.us or *.co.uk. It was originally run by Global Name Registry, not Verisign, before Verisign later acquired that registry. _daily.dev keeps developers informed on domain registry changes that affect long-term infrastructure choices._ ## Community take How the wider developer community reacted, aggregated from 2 discussions and 291 comments across lobsters, hackernews (as of 2026-09-08). **TL;DR:** Developers are largely appalled that Verisign and ICANN would terminate .name third-level domains with no transition period, calling it reckless and warning that freed second-level domains could later be hijacked; a large side-thread separately dissects the technical oddity of .name's domain hierarchy and public-suffix-list gaps. **Sentiment:** 5% positive · 25% mixed · 70% skeptical **The pushback** - Terminating registrations with no migration window for existing users is seen as irresponsible given how much depends on them (email, logins, IoT). - Freeing up second-level domains after 3LD termination creates a serious hijacking/impersonation risk for former owners. - The request form submitted to ICANN is criticized as lazy and dismissive, suggesting the approval was a rubber-stamp. - The .name TLD's second/third-level structure is flagged as poorly isolated from a browser cookie/security-boundary perspective, since it's missing from the Public Suffix List. **By community** - lobsters (skeptical): Commenters are largely outraged at Verisign and ICANN, calling the move irresponsible and hoping for legal or organizational intervention, with some side discussion on domain-based identity risks generally. - hackernews (mixed): Discussion splits between strong criticism of Verisign/ICANN's handling and a long technical detour arguing the .name TLD structure was flawed from the start, with some skepticism toward the author's reliance on a niche TLD. **Hottest debate:** Whether the .name domain hierarchy was fundamentally broken/insecure from the start (making this outcome unsurprising) versus Verisign and ICANN being squarely to blame for an irresponsible, no-notice termination. **Open questions** - Will .name's freed second-level domains be reserved for some period to prevent squatting, or opened immediately? - Could another organization take over management of the affected second-level domains to avoid disruption? - Is legal challenge against ICANN's approval feasible? **Highlights** > This is nightmare fuel. Instead of selling the registry responsibility to someone who would care for it and profit from it, Verisign chose to murder it. And ICANN actively aided Verisign in doing this, proving (if there were any remaining doubt) who ICANN actually serves. Strange, and sickening. > — [cpurdy on lobsters · 18 points](https://lobste.rs/s/6tsncg/name_termination#c_v0pq8r) > Wow, even if there was a legitimate reason for the termination of all these domains, I can't imagine not giving at least a few years for registrants to update their...well, everything. It's just irresponsible to close a namespace on such short notice. I wonder if some organization could offer ICANN to take over management for all those existing second-level `.name` domains to avoid disruption of service. > — [bdn on lobsters · 10 points](https://lobste.rs/s/6tsncg/name_termination#c_e9uxqi) > At the beginning of the existence of the .name TLD you couldn't do that, you were forced to register firstname.lastname.name and provide an ID to justify registering this specific domain. With it you got an email redirection from firstname@lastname.name to the address of your choice. At some point this feature was discontinued (I assume when VeriSign took control of the .name TLD), a bit after it was decided (again by VeriSign) to allow registering first level .name domain. My main email address stopped working from one day to another without me being warned in any way. When this happened I've emailed VeriSign and my registrar at the time, and tried several time since then, to be able to register the first level domain I'm the only one using, but they categorically refuse, despite recognizing that a single subdomain has ever been registered. They kept saying that I could just let the domain expire, wait for the grace period, and register it once it's liberated, hoping that no one does it before me, and without any solution for the downtime in the mean time… And now this… fuck VeriSign -_- > — [p4bl0 on hackernews · 2 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49552699) > Whether disallowing renewals or terminating them tomorrow, there's still the same core problems, only the date of the offense changes: (1) seizing people's names that they've established, breaking innumerable things including email and server hostnames, and (2) the possible resale of the 2LD fraser.com to a third party who will be free to do malicious things like reading OP's email, redirecting his traffic, or extorting him, to sell continued access at any price demanded. > — [xp84 on hackernews](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49554502) **Source threads** - [lobsters](https://lobste.rs/s/6tsncg/name_termination) · 152 points · 19 comments - [hackernews](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49550772) · 262 points · 272 comments ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [GoDaddy warns India's fake-site crackdown could backfire](https://daily.dev/posts/godaddy-warns-india-s-fake-site-crackdown-could-backfire-4zl5rhn1r) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#security](https://daily.dev/tags/security), [#dns](https://daily.dev/tags/dns) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/neil-fraser-news-name-termination-apw5z1o3z) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Neil Fraser: News: .name Termination","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/neil-fraser-news-name-termination-apw5z1o3z","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/neil-fraser-news-name-termination-apw5z1o3z"},"datePublished":"2026-09-03T15:34:47.441Z","dateModified":"2026-09-08T08:22:12.976Z","description":"Verisign proposed eliminating the entire third-level of the .name domain hierarchy to simplify administration, and ICANN approved the plan on 28 July 2026. 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