Unified Domain Blocking Service Protecting Brands Online | GlobalBlock
Leona Chen-Birkner
APTLD90 brought the Asia Pacific domain name community to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia last month, with ccTLD registries, technical operators, policy specialists and other members of the regional internet community coming together to discuss the challenges shaping the future of the domain name system.
The Brand Safety Alliance was pleased to return to APTLD, and I was grateful to joint he program to share our work on proactive abuse prevention.
Across the meeting, one shift stood out: conversations about registry growth are increasingly becoming conversations about trust.
Here are some of the themes we took away from APTLD90.
For registries, growth will always matter. But across several presentations at APTLD90, registration volume was only part of the picture.
Registries including .vn, and GlobalBlock partners .id and .mn explored what sustainable growth looks like in a changing digital environment. Their focus extended beyond the number of domains under management to whether those domains are being used, whether registrants see ongoing value in them and whether users can trust the namespaces they visit.
Unsurprisingly, AI featured prominently throughout the meeting. But the discussion went well beyond how AI might affect domain sales or search traffic.
Several presentations explored a more fundamental question: what happens to domains when machines increasingly navigate the internet on our behalf?
As AI agents sit between users and websites, people may see domain names less frequently. Yet the need to establish identity, authenticity and authority matters. In fact, it may become more important when a machine is making those judgments for us.
There is no settled answer yet. But the underlying challenge is becoming clearer: the role of the DNS may evolve as AI does, and trust will remain central to its value.
That focus on trust was also evident in discussions of DNS abuse. The scale and speed of abuse are putting pressure on traditional processes built around identifying individual domains, investigating them and taking action after registration.
Presentations on malicious-domain detection, registry abuse management and wider ecosystem disruption all explored ways to intervene earlier. Taken together, these discussions reinforce the role domain blocking can play in building trust and shifting abuse prevention upstream, helping prevent certain high-risk registrations before they can be used for harm.
Growth, security, AI, digital identity and abuse prevention can look like separate challenges. But increasingly, they converge on the same question: how do we maintain trust in the domain ecosystem as the way people and machines use the internet changes?
For the BSA, that makes collaboration across the domain community increasingly important. Our work focuses on bringing registries, brands and industry partners together to develop practical approaches to reducing abuse while supporting healthy, trusted namespaces.
We look forward to sharing more insights from the brand protection and IP community. If you’d like to share your thoughts or get in touch, reach out to us at hello [@] brandsafetyalliance [.] co.
Tony Kirsch
When the domain name industry meets in Bali this October, it will mark a time of significant change and opportunity for the ICANN community. Following the application period for the second round of new gTLDs, ICANN will publish its full list of prospective TLDs and their applicants, likely just prior to its Annual General Meeting from October 17-22.
Jason Loyer
When the BSA team attended INTA’s TMAP meeting in Berlin last year, much of the conversation around new TLDs and AI-driven domain abuse was anticipatory. The threat was real, but for many trademark professionals, it still felt like something on the horizon.
Tony Kirsch
From the early days of the Brand Safety Alliance, response to our mission from registries, registrars and brands in the Asia Pacific region has been strong. Many registries have chosen to participate in GlobalBlock and are recognizing the benefits of stronger brand and IP defenses in improving registry health and protecting internet users by proactively stopping abuse before it occurs. In the coming months, our commitment to this community ramps up through several events in partnership with the Asia Pacific Top-Level Domain Association (APTLD). The BSA’s Leona Chen-Birkner will present a webinar to APTLD members, before giving a presentation at the upcoming APTLD90 meeting in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia in September.
Leona Chen-Birkner
A lot has changed across the registry landscape since my last trip to the Asia Pacific Top Level Domain (APTLD) conference over two years ago in Danang, Vietnam. From the increasing role that AI plays in our businesses through to the ever-expanding abuse conundrum, the threat landscape has shifted in ways that should concern every registry operator, regardless of size and region. I'm excited to reconnect with the APTLD community at two upcoming events. First, I'll be joining APTLD members for a webinar on 26 August, followed by a session at APTLD90 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia this September, where I'll be sharing how the Brand Safety Alliance and GlobalBlock are helping registries and brands tackle online abuse through collaborative global protection programs.