NetRegistry, Australia's No.1 Registrar has been threatened with citation by auDA for policy breach.

auDA, the Australian Domain Name regulator, has given notice to NetRegistry that it intends to publicly cite NetRegistry for a .AU Domain Name Policy breach. NetRegistry has refused to comply with auDA's directives to delete two domain names, to highlight the arbitrary and subjective nature of their decisions and to support domain name buyers who demand the right to decide the best domain name for their businesses.

As part of the recent release of two letter domain names, NetRegistry registered the ws.net.au and bs.net.au to DomoWeb (http://www.domoweb.com). auDA has reviewed the registrations and has rejected the registrant's claim that the names are a close and substantial match to his business. The two names were for websites; the first promoting Web Services (ws.net.au) and the other promoting Business Systems (bs.net.au).

"NetRegistry disputes auDA's interpretation of their own policy rules. We feel its findings in this matter are yet again arbitrary, petty and arrogant", says Larry Bloch, CEO of NetRegistry. "We have decided to refuse to comply with auDA's request that we delete these names to highlight the abuse of our customers' rights to the names they want. To our knowledge, auDA has not received a complaint or a competing claim for these names. They are acting 100% arbitrarily", says Bloch.

NetRegistry's concern is that domain name owners invest in names they wish to use, pay good money to buy the name and have no certainty that auDA will not take the names off them without recourse to appeal.

"With decisions like this, Australia is becoming a nation where a certificate of registration for a domain name means nothing, where a domain name applied for, approved and paid for can still be taken away. This is unacceptable to any business owner."

"I hereby publicly call on auDA to reverse its decision, to reinstate the names to our customer and to put in place a suitable process to appeal their arbitrary decisions."

About NetRegistry

NetRegistry was established in 1997 and is a full service domain name, email, web hosting & e-commerce service provider, as well as providing internet marketing products like search engine submission and optimisation. Serving over 100,000 Australian businesses, the company has experienced exceptional growth by providing keenly priced products and much better service than its competitors.