Historical background of DENIC

Historical background of DENIC eG

The history of the Top Level Domain .de begins on 5 November 1986 when .de is registered in the IANA database. Initially, .de is administered by the US-American network operator CSNET.

In 1988, upon agreement with the academic users of the German Internet community, the Informatikrechner-Betriebsgruppe (IRB) of Dortmund University initiates that administration of .de is transferred to the University of Dortmund. This is where the history of DENIC begins: The IRB starts its name server service at Dortmund University and the allocation of IPv4 blocks (now IPv6). In international usage, such a service is known as a Network Information Center, abbreviated NIC. Country code Top Level Domains are usually designated with the two-character abbreviations of the ISO 3166-1 list list. The code for Germany is DE. Thus, the name DENIC is born. When Dortmund University takes over the administration of the TLD from CSNET, already six .de domains are registered: dbp.de. rmi.de, telenet.de, uka.de, uni-dortmund.de, uni-paderborn.de.

At the beginning, the administration of domains is carried out relatively informally. The names and associated computer addresses are entered into a list, which grows at a quickening pace. It soon becomes apparent that this volunteer driven system must be based on a larger, more extensive foundation. In August 1993, this foundation is established through the initiative of the then existing three German Internet Service Providers (DFN, EUNET and Xlink): the "Interessenverbund Deutsches Network Information Center (IV-DENIC)" is formed, who puts out to tender the operation of the nationwide name server service. The data center of the University of Karlsruhe prevails with its proposal, and takes over the administration and registration of the .de domains in January 1994 for an initial period of three years. At that time, the number of domains is approximately 1,000.  By mid 1996, the number has climbed to 20,000. The number of providers and Internet users also continues to increase. Once again it is time for reorganisation.

Starting shot for DENIC is fired in 1996

In December 1996, the assembly of by then 37 German Internet service providers decides to found a cooperative for the purpose of administering the German domains and providing the necessary infrastructure. This is the birth of DENIC. In July 1997, DENIC sets up its head office in Frankfurt, whereas, for the time being, the technical operations remain in Karlsruhe. Since January 1999, all activities are concentrated in the Main metropolis of Frankfurt.

The rapid growth of the Internet as a mass medium is documented not only by the number of registered domains, but also by the increasing number of DENIC staff. When things began in Karlsruhe, there were only two employees. Today, about 120 people handle the over thirteen million domains and make certain that the domain database, the name servers for the .de zone and the other DENIC services are operational all around the clock. At the same time, infrastructure is continuously expanded and enhanced.

Milestones

December 1996	Founding of DENIC as a Cooperative. Meanwhile, the Internet association IV-DENIC has 36 members.
July 1997	Business operation starts at the new head office in Frankfurt. Technical operations still remain in Karlsruhe.
April 1998	Concentration of all of DENIC's activities in Frankfurt.
October 1999	1 million .de domains registered.
July 2000	The number of DENIC members reaches 100.
November 2001	5 million .de domains registered.
September 2002	Start of the ENUM trial operation for the German telephone number space under .9.4.e164.arpa.
December 2002	6 million .de domains registered.
November 2003	The number of DENIC members reaches 200.
January 2004	7 million .de domains registered.
January 2004	Together with the Internet association eco, DENIC sponsors the first root server in Germany, an exact copy of the K-root server in London, operated by RIPE NCC.
March 2004	DENIC allows IDNs containing umlauts and accents to be registered for the first time.
October 2004	8 million .de domains registered – 249,000 of these IDNs.
August 2005	9 million .de domains registered – 273,000 of these IDNs.
January 2006	Start of the productive phase of ENUM.
June 2006	10 million .de domains registered – 298,000 of these IDNs.
July 2007	Registration of the 11.111.111th .de domain.
September 2007	DENIC officially starts operation of the first of two new productive data centers which shall be used for future administration of .de domains.
April 2008	12 million .de domains registered – 417,000 of these IDNs.
September 2008 DENIC makes available the Domaincheck, a new information service for querying the status of .de and German ENUM domains (under .9.4.e164.apra).
March 2009	DENIC joins the country code Names Supporting Organization of ICANN.
July 2009	DENIC, the Association of the German Internet Economy eco e.V. and the Federal Agency for Security in Information Technology (BSI) launch the DNSSEC testbed for Germany.
August 2009	13 million .de domains registered – 463,000 of these IDNs.
October 2009	Launch of one- and two-character domains and domains composed exclusively of numerals
February 2010	DENIC switches to the password-based AuthInfo procedure for provider changes.