The 81st annual ICANN meeting was held in Istanbul from 9 to 14 November. ICANN is the organisation responsible at an international level for coordinating various technical aspects of the internet, to guarantee that it works in a safe, stable and accessible way for everybody. The team from .barcelona took part in the meeting and came back to the city with a wealth of new information and knowledge.
The future of the internet, increasingly diverse and inclusive
One of the star topics at the meeting was the importance of international domain names (IDN). This means that we will increasingly see domains with characters from other alphabets, such as the Cyrillic or Arabic alphabets, plus domains that contain characters unique to the Catalan language, such as those using .barcelona, favouring the use of our language. This is great news for cultural and linguistic diversity on the internet!
The ICANN highlighted the importance of promoting universal acceptance, where all of us as users get accustomed to using these domains in our daily life. This will make the internet even more open and accessible for everybody.
New opportunities and challenges for .barcelona
The draft for the ICANN strategic plan for 2030, to be presented in 2026, was another topic at the meeting. There was also extensive discussion about the new round of geographical Top-Level Domains (gTLD) being opened up in 2026. This new stage represents a great opportunity for new stakeholders, at the same time posing challenges in terms of management and competitiveness for new domains and existing domains alike.
As a member of the GeoTLD group, the .barcelona team are closely involved with the implementation of the directive on the resilience of essential entities (NIS2). This European directive establishes new cybersecurity requisites for essential services, such as domain registers. Our team has already started working to adapt to the new regulation and ensure that .barcelona is a domain offering maximum security and reliability for all our users.
Strengthening ties with the .barcelona community
During the annual meeting, we took the opportunity to meet with main registration companies for the domain and to strengthen our collaboration. These meetings are fundamental for ensuring the domain works well and offering a quality service to users.
What does all this mean?
These new developments allow us to look to the future with optimism. The .barcelona domain is growing and constantly evolving to adapt to the new trends of the internet. We want .barcelona to be your trusted domain, a space where you can express your digital identity and connect with the city’s community.
ICANN81 was a unique opportunity for the .barcelona domain to be at the forefront of debate on the future of the internet and be involved in defining the regulations that govern it. The meeting helped us collaborate with other stakeholders in the sector and put .barcelona on the map as a leader in managing geographical city domains.
