Bern, 28.06.2023 – From the first half of 2024, private individuals will also be able to acquire a .swiss domain name provided they are Swiss or live in Switzerland. To this end, the Federal Council adopted a revision of the Internet Domains Ordinance (OID) on 2 June 2023. It has now tasked the Federal Office of Communications OFCOM, as the registry for the .swiss domain, to prepare for this extension.
In 2020, Best of Swiss Web will celebrate its 20th anniversary. In honour of the milestone, the institution will be presenting a special award that shines the spotlight on the ‘Swissness’ of the web projects submitted. The award is being organised together with partner dot.swiss. Designed as a stylised buoy, the trophy will be presented to the website with a .swiss domain ending that best epitomises the Swiss values of quality, innovation and reliability. (more…)
The 11 January launch of the second phase of registration of .swiss internet addresses extends the range of possible domain names and potential candidates. It also opens up the possibility for umbrella organisations or sector representatives to submit a dossier in order to obtain a generic address, such as hotel.swiss or watch.swiss, which will then be put at the disposal of the sector as a whole. The first phase has already enabled some 7000 .swiss internet addresses to be assigned.
Public or private businesses and organisations can now apply to acquire a .swiss internet address. During the initial phase launched on 7 September 2015, applications can relate only to trademarks registered in accordance with an ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) process, names associated with public bodies and distinctive signs protected in Switzerland. At a press conference this morning, federal councillor Doris Leuthard, the head of DETEC, stressed the importance to the Swiss economy of the availability of this new “shop window” abroad.
Relevant news and all important facts and background information are now conveniently available on a single portal: The new www.dot.swiss webpage offers interested parties a wealth of information about the new .swiss domain name. This includes deadlines, conditions for registering a domain name and the application procedure. A newsletter which keeps interested parties constantly informed of the next steps to take – for instance the start of the application procedure – is available and people can sign up for it on the webpage.
Management of the “.swiss” domain names will be regulated in the Ordinance on Internet Domains (ODI), the text of which has been approved by the Federal Council on 5th November 2014. These new provisions will enter into force on 1st January 2015.
