What is a site certification and how does a city seek it?
3-1-2001 Site certification means that an independent third-party has “certified” that the site is owned by who it appears to be owned by. Anyone can register a site; one does not have to “prove” identity when purchasing a domain name, especially for .com, .net and .org sites. Getting a .gov site is more difficult. But, many “real” city web sites are registered as a .com, .net, or .org. In our research we have found several city sites that appear to be official city sites. The site may display “City of XYZ Web site.” But something seems a little odd; they may not offer the services we are expecting or something else–and we find out through researching who owns the site URL (www. city xyz.com) that it is owned by a person or a non-governmental organization–not the city. Most of the time these sites are put up by people who are advertising the city and who have no intentions of fooling the public or taking someone’s money–but that may not be true in the future. Public Technology, Inc.
