Security Services

The .UK domain name plays an important role in the UK and global economy. Our research has shown that UK consumers have a greater level of trust in .UK domain names, with 77% preferring to click on a .UK search result over a .com.

This level of trust in the security and integrity of .UK is encouraging. We are committed to delivering against this expectation and taking appropriate measures to keep .UK safe. In order to do so, we offer the following domain security services:

Domain health

Domain Health is a free service to help all .UK registrars combat cybercrime on domains managed by them. It is subject to the general provisions of the .UK Registry-Registrar Agreement.

Domain Health has been introduced to alert .UK registrars when domains they administer are implicated in spam, phishing, malware or botnet activity, and to provide registrars with practical advice as to how they can address these problems.

Once infected domains within the zone file have been identified, Domain Health will send emails alerts about the identified threats.

The sponsoring registrar of the domains is proactively alerted within the portal, keeping everything in one easy interface.

DOMAIN WATCH

Domain Watch is an anti-phishing initiative to further increase the security of the .UK zone and protect .UK end users from malicious phishing activity.

Following the introduction of Domain Health – a free service for registrars to reduce the levels of abuse in .UK – our analysis has shown that a large proportion of the technical abuse seen relates to phishing activity.

In response, we are piloting Domain Watch to quickly identify and suspend newly registered domains that are obvious phishing attempts.

The service analyses domains using AI algorithms and manual intervention to automatically suspend domains. Following suspension, registrars receive a message with a notification reason and registrants receive a direct email containing next steps.

Suspensions can be lifted if the registrant is able to confirm legitimate use.

For questions related to Domain Watch, please contact [email protected] or call +44 (0)330 236 9477.

DOMAIN LOCK

Domain Lock is a chargeable service for Nominet registrars, allowing domains in the UK namespace to be locked at the Registry level.

High-traffic .UK domains can be targets for cyber attacks such as DNS hijacking.

This is when an attacker gains unauthorised access to the DNS system and changes the registration for malicious purposes. For example, they could re-direct traffic to a different website which might display objectionable or offensive material, or be used for phishing.

Registrars can add an extra level of security against DNS hijacking with our Domain Lock tool. It’s mainly targeted towards high-traffic websites with substantial brand protection or security interests, but can be used by any .UK domain.

Domain Lock is a chargeable service to Nominet registrars allowing domain names in the UK namespace to be locked at the Registry level. A locked domain name can be locked and unlocked by a pre-authorised representative through Two-Factor Authentication (2FA).

This additional security layer provides peace of mind – changes cannot be made to a domain name or its DNS without the requester’s identity being thoroughly authenticated.

 

Interested?

Registrars can discover more about Domain Health, Watch and Lock through our Registrar Resources website.

Alternatively, if you’re a .UK website owner and are interested in exploring how these services might benefit your business, please get in touch with your registrar.