14 DAY TRIAL // Russian authorities have responded to critics as being a safe heaven for hackers and introduced stricter measures to registering .RU domain names. The increased security measures will force persons and entrepreneurs to submit copies of their passport or their state certificate if they're a legal entity.
These changes were approved in October 2009 by the Coordination Center for TLD RU, Russia's .RU administrator, and will be mandatory starting with April 1, 2010. Russia is the second big spamming country after China to introduce such measures.
Authorities are confident that these new registration rules will severely limit illegal activities, cutting down the number of attacks from Russia's Internet infrastructure.
In comparison, China's similar limitations were launched in December 2009 and were greeted with praise from the community. Even if it’s early for offering a conclusive opinion on its success, the limitations provide other benefits.
The Chinese and Russian registration processes, besides complicating and lengthening the registration process, acquire real data about the registrant that can be used to identify them in a legal standpoint. Using this data, law enforcement agencies can detect, track down and shut down illegal activities faster and much more efficiently than before.
The official papers introduced in the registration process will create a legal tie between the registrant and the operations they run on their server behind the domain. It will be a lot easier for police officers and investigators to indict wrong-doers.
The success of this project is due to the FBI (USA) and SOCA (UK), which have been actively lobbying for years at ICANN and national domain name operators for stricter rules regarding registering domain names. After China and Russia, other spamming offenders like Ukraine (.UA), Vietnam (.VN), Indonesia (.ID) and Nigeria (.NG) are now in the spotlight for tightening up their registration rules.