The Russian domain zone
On April 7, 1994 the Russian domain zone (.RU zone) was opened. The appropriate note was made in the international database of top-level domains.
At that time IANA company dealt with registration of top-level domains; the company worked on the base of the contract with the US Department of Defense. Today it is a function of ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) that worked on the base of the contract with the US Department of Commerce.
On December 4, 1993 key Russian Internet providers signed the agreement ‘The order of .RU top-level domain administration’. According to the agreement, administrative and technical support responsibilities for national .RU domain were to be handed over to the Russian Institute for Public Networks (RIPN).
Russian Institute for Public Networks (RIPN) was founded in 1992 by the State Committee on Science and Higher School, the Institute of Atomic Energy named by Kurchatov and Information Computer Center named by Kurchatov. In 2002 the administrative functions was handed over to the Coordination Center for TLD RU (CC for TLD RU).
At the time of .RU domain registration .SU top-level domain had already existed. Soviet .SU domain was given to the USSR on September 19, 1990. It was administrated by UNIX (Soviet UNIX User’s Group), an organization that was founded by the Institute of Atomic Energy. In 1990 registration in .SU zone was suspended. It renewed on June 27, 2003.
Registration in .RU zone is available for nonresidents but 96% of names is registered by Russian citizens.
On September 17, 2007 the first million of names was registered in .Ru domain. 13 years passed. However it took .RU domain only half a year to get over two million names. It happened on March 22, 2009.
Russian domain is the second speediest developing domain in the world after Chinese .CN domain.
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