Bulgaria to appeal ICANN IDN rejection

Bulgaria’s IT minister has announced plans to appeal the rejection of the .бг IDN, which ICANN refused to allow into the DNS in May because of its similarity to the .br ccTLD.

The minister stated in a TV interview that he believes .бг is the best name for Bulgaria and that other Cyrillic abbreviations would not work. According to the minister, there is still a possibility that ICANN might approve the name.

Personally, I don’t think .бг looks enough like .br to warrant a rejection, although they could look more or less similar depending on what system font you use. Users will just need to become more aware of similar-looking IDNs as the new domain extensions become more common.

Bulgaria to apply for two IDNs

Bulgaria has announced that it will likely apply for two IDNs with ICANN: .бг and .бгр. The move to apply for two extensions instead of one is the result of an online poll commissioned by the country’s Transport Ministry.

Both IDNs received around a third of the votes, though .бг came out on top. However, Bulgaria is concerned .бг could be rejected by ICANN because of its similarity to Brazil’s .br domain, so it is also applying for .бгp just in case.

Bulgaria is not a newcomer to IDN technology. It was one of the first countries to allow Cyrillic registrations on the .bg domain.

Source | The Sofia Echo