The Russian government has finally succeeded in introducing the use of Russian Cyrillic script in web addresses. However, underneath the success is years of hard work persuading the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to allow the use of non-Latin characters in web addresses.

ICANN is the non-profit body that manages and assigns IP addresses and website domain names to the rest of the wired world. One of the most important tasks for ICANN is managing the top-level domain name system. It is a very complex system, but to put it simply, the top-level domain name is the bits that come last in all the web addresses that you and I see. So within www.example.co.uk, ‘.uk’ is the top-level domain name. The ICANN management system currently organises the top-level domain names into three distinct groups, Categories, Multi-organisations, and Countries.

For Categories, you will see domain names that end with either .com, .gov, .edu, .org, .net. Multi-organisation top level domain names are not common just yet. As for Countries, internet users would have been familiar with .uk (for UK), .au (for Australia), .jp (for Japan), .au (for Australia).

What Is New With Cyrillic Web Addresses?

Instead of only having Latin character web addresses that end with .ru for Russia, ICANN has allowed the Russian Federation to use the Cyrillic domain of ‘.РФ’. The introduction of the Cyrillic domain names will greatly increase the convenience for local Russians. According to ICANN, only 30% of the internet users are English speaking, and the Cyrillic domain names will make it easier for Russians who are not educated in Latin languages. They can simply remember website addresses because it is now written in full in their own language. ICANN primary goals are to help maintain the operational stability of the internet, to promote competition, and also to ensure the internet is a proportionate representation of the global internet community. Therefore, it is very sensible for ICANN to allow non-Latin based languages to have their say in the future development of the online world. Arabic nations were also amongst the first one to go live with Arabic script in their top level domain names in May this year. Soon, China and Thailand will follow.

Anyone can apply for registration. However, the domain names will be highly priced at the beginning and reduce gradually. The reason behind is to ensure fairer distribution of the most valuable domain names. We are expecting the registration price for the Cyrillic domain to come down to a more standard price as time goes on. It should be noted that for 2010, ICANN is prepared to allow for 500,000 Cyrillic domain names to be registered.

According to the Coordinating Centre of the Russian Internet, the Cyrillic domain is now fully operational and there are around 300 Cyrillic web addresses registered. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has envisioned the use of Cyrillic domain names after he was placed in power in 2008. He said that it is only correct that Cyrillic web addresses should be allowed for registration because there are over 300 million people in the world using Russian. It is also said that his support for the Cyrillic domain names is aimed at boosting the use of Russian because the language has been in decline after the collapse of Soviet Union. It is also another attempt to curb the global influence and dominance of the English language within the digital realm.