Who is ultimately in charge of domain names?
In the USA, the InterNIC, a division of the US Dept. of Commerce creates policy and represents the US in the ICANN – Internet Corporation for Assigned Names & Numbers – an consensus based organization dedicated to Internet governance. As ICANN says “Just as there is a single root for telephone numbers internationally, there must be a single authoritative root for the Internet, administered in the public interest.” Additionally, each Internet Service Provider maintains a Domain Name Server which announces the domain names and numbers hosted on it’s networks’ servers so all Internet users can be routed to the address they seek. These DNS servers “translate” domain names to an IP (Internet Protocol) address which is a unique identifier not unlike a phone number.
