27 Registration Life Cycle

Prototypical answer:

The registration lifecycle for a non-reserved and available .frl domain is as follows:


Stage 0: Domain available
In this phase the domain is available for registration. The whois of the domain name shows the status ‘free’. Domain names not showing this status cannot be requested for registration via the EPP service. When a domain name is listed as ‘reserved’, the party that has a rightful claim to the domain name can contact the support department to get the domain name. The support department will use an independent party to check the rights of the registrant, and issue a unique code that the registrant can forward to its preferred registrar to register the domain name.

Stage 1a: Domain is registered but not delegated
An ICANN accredited registrar has requested this domain name for registration, and has provided adequate contact information, however has not provided nameserver (host) information. The domain name is listed in the whois as ‘inactive’, that means registered, but not delegated into the DNS.
Registration of domain names may be done for periods of 1 to 10 years. The expiration date in the whois information will show the date and time the domain name will expire or will have to be renewed.

Stage 1b: Domain is registered and delegated
When the ICANN accredited registrar provides nameserver information with the registration of a domain name, or when the registrar uses the domain-change command to alter the domain with nameserver information, the domain name will be listed as registered and active. The whois information will show the status ‘ok’ for this domain name. This status means that the domain name is active on the internet.

Stage 1c: Domain is renewed
ICANN accredited registrar will have the choice to autorenew domains, or to manually renew every domain name. After autorenew or manual renewal, the domain name has the same internal status as with stage 1a or 1b. The expiration date in the whois information will show the date and time that the domain name will be up for renewal. Renewals may be done for periods of 1 to 10 years. For any domain name that has autorenew not enabled, renewal messages will be sent via EPP or on the registry website to the registrar of record.

Stage 2a: Domain is not renewed: quarantine
The FRL registry will not make use of RGP (Registry Grace Periods). When a domain name is not renewed, and the registrar has not made use of the option for autorenew, the domain name will be cancelled and go into quarantine. This is a period of 40 days in which the original registrar of record can reclaim the domain name. The whois information will show the status ‘quarantine’ and the date and time the quarantine period ends. The domain is removed from delegation to the nameservers, so it will not resolve any more.

Stage 2b: Domain name is cancelled: quarantine
When the registrar of record decides to actively cancel the domain name, the domain name will go into quarantine before the normal expiration date. The whois information will show the status ‘quarantine’ and the date and time the quarantine period ends. The domain is removed from delegation to the nameservers, so it will not resolve any more.

Stage 3: Domain is restored from quarantine
The domain name that is restored from quarantine goes back to the active status (stage 1). The domain goes back into delegation immediately after restore. The registrar can use an EPP extension to automatically restore the domain name. The expiration date is set to the original expiration date of the domain name before it was quarantined. There is no possibility to restore a domain name for multiple years, if the registrar wants to add years after a restore he has to use the renew command after restoring the domain name.


Stage 0: Domain name is available again
After the end of the quarantine period, the domain name is released and available for registration to any ICANN-accredited registrar that has a contract with the registry.

Stage A1: The domain name is locked by the registrar
The registrar of record can choose to lock a domain name for transfers. The domain name will get the status ‘clientTransferProhibited’. The whois information will also show this status. Any domain name with this status cannot be transferred to another registrar. Any transfer request will be denied with the message ‘domain is locked for transfer’

Stage A2: The domain name is locked by the registry.
The registry can also decide to lock domain names for various reasons. The statuses the registry can impose on a domain name are: serverDeleteProhibited, serverRenewProhibited, serverTransferProhibited, serverUpdateProhibited, or a combination of these states. In these states, certain actions (delete, renew, transfer, update) cannot be performed by the registrar, until the lock has been lifted. When a lock is put on a domain name, or when it is lifted, is to be decided by the registry or its personnel. These statuses will be visible on the whois information of the domain name.

Stage B1: The domain name is transferred to another registrant
The registrar of record can decide to change the registrant information on a domain name or to specify an new registrant contact for a domain name. The validation for these actions lies with the registrar, no rules will be imposed to validate if the transfer to another registrant is properly authorized. The responsibility for performing correct transfers lies entirely by the registrar of record. The registry will accept no liability for incorrectly validated changes of registrant. There is no special status information in the whois for domains that have been transferred to another registrant. The whois will simply show the updated information.

Stage B2: The domain name is transferred to another registrar
The registry software does not support host or contact transfer commands, but it does support domain transfer commands. Each domain transfer must be submitted with valid authorization information of that domain name. The authorization code of a domain name can only be requested by the registrar of record. In special cases, when the registrar of record does not respond to authcode requests, the registry can decide to hand the authcode directly to the registrant, provided that the identity of the registrant and the claims to the domain name are validated beyond any doubt.

When a correct transfer request is submitted with correct authcode information, the domain name will be transferred immediately to the new registrar. The new and the old registrar will receive information about the transfer via EPP or via the registry website. There is no special status information in the whois for domains that have been transferred to another registrant. The whois will simply show the updated information.
Transfers not legitimate for any reason can be undone by the registry.
The registrars in question will have to send mail to the registrants and admin contacts to inform them of the transfer. Since transfers are processed immedeately, they can only be undone or cancelled by registry personnel.



SRS services

The EPP server and website of the FRL registry will work in conjunction with each other to make these stages happen. Any ICANN-accredited registrar can make a contract with the registry to register .frl domain names. After the contracts have been signed, the registrar has 2 choices to start registering domain names:
1. Via EPP: The registrar can use our RFC57xx compliant EPP service. The EPP service has 2 extensions, programmed compliant with RFC3735 (guidelines for extending the EPP protocol): One extension is available to get more information on the EPP poll command, the other extension provides quarantine undeletes.
2. Via the website of the registry. This website makes use of the EPP service for modification to EPP objects. The website is not allowed to make modifications to host, contact or domain objects directly in the database, but will always make these modifications via EPP. This way the authentication and proper handling of modifications is ensured, also if actions are done via the registry website. The website also shows the poll messages of EPP and a history of transactions for any object in the administration.
For any registrar, the client support of the FRL registry can be reached over e-mail or by telephone. Client support will also help registrants of domain names with their questions.


Resource plan for registration support
The resource indentifiers used in this document are detailed in the text of question 46

Resourcing in the initial phase
R.1 System Engineer Setup infrastructure 1 day

Resourcing in the maintaining phase
R.5 Support personnel Answer queries from registrars and registrants and solve problems 30 days⁄year

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