Glossary

ccTLD

This stands for Country Code Top-Level Domain, which are TLDs operating on behalf of countries and consist of domains such as .uk but also the IDN variants. [WikiPedia]

A Domain Name Registry is an organization responsible for the production of an authoritative DNS zone file in the public DNS. These are typically organizations running gTLDs and ccTLDs but may also be registries below a TLD.

EPP

The Extensible Provisioning Protocol is an IETF standard used by domain registrars to register domain names into domain registries. EPP is the required means of provisioning domains in gTLDs and is used in some ccTLDs. EPP is used by a few INRs but none of the RIRs. [WikiPedia]

gTLD

This stands for Generic Top-Level Domain, which is a type of TLD operating under contract with ICANN. [WikiPedia]

IANA

The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority is responsible for the allocation of Autonomous System Numbers and IP addresses to the RIRs from the pools of these resources created by the IETF, managing the root DNS zones, and managing the registries of protocol elements for the IETF and other organizations.

ICANN

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers a multi-stakeholder coordination body for ccTLDs, gTLDs, and RIRs.

IETF

The Internet Engineering Task Force, or IETF, is one of the main standards setting organizations for Internet standards and is the Standards Developing Organization (SDO) which defined RDAP.

INR (disambiguation)

Internet Number Resource

An Internet Number Resource is either an IP network (bounded by a start and end IP address and sometimes expressed using CIDR) or an Autonomous System Number (ASN).

Internet Number Registry

“Internet Number Registry”, see Internet Number Resource Registry.

INRR

An Internet Number Resource Registry is a registry assigning IP addresses and Autonomous System numbers (ASNs) to other organizations within a defined service area. INRRs are composed of RIRs but also Local Internet Registries (LIRs) and National Internet Registries (NIRs).

jCard

jCard is the JSON version of the vCard standard, which defines the details of a contact. It is standardized in RFC 7095.

LIR

A “Local Internet Regitry”, sometimes known as an Internet Service Provider (ISP), receives number resources from another INR for re-allocation to customers.

NIR

A “National Internet Registry” is an INR that receives Internet number resources from an RIR for redistribution in a specific country or economy.

NRO

The Number Resource Organization is a coordination group for the RIRs.

RDAP

The Registration Data Access Protocol is the name of the set of specifications for accessing data from Internet resource registries.

REGEXT

REGEXT, or the Registration Protocols Extensions, working group is a long-running activity of the IETF chartered with standardizing extensions to the Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP), RDAP, and other data formats necessary for handling data between Internet resource registries (e.g. RIRs, domain registries) and their clients.

RIR

Regional Internet Registries are the organizations receiving IP addresses and Autonomous System numbers (ASNs), collectively called Internet number resources, from IANA and distributed to others in their respective regions. RIRs are described in RFC 7020. [WikiPedia]

A Guide to the Registration Data Access Protocol (RDAP)