.dk
 |
|
| Introduced | 1987 |
|---|---|
| TLD type | Country code top-level domain |
| Status | Active |
| Registry | DK Hostmaster |
| Sponsor | Dansk Internet Forum |
| Intended use | Entities connected with  Denmark
|
| Actual use | Very popular in Denmark |
| Registration restrictions | None |
| Structure | Registrations permitted at second level |
| Documents | General conditions |
| Dispute policies | Complaints |
| Website | DK Hostmaster |
| DNSSEC | Yes |
.dk is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Denmark. The supervision of the .dk top-level domain is handled exclusively by DK Hostmaster. Any new .dk domain name has to be applied for via an approved registrator. Then the domain name applicant can ask the registrator to manage his domain name or have it managed directly by the DK Hostmaster. Registrations of domain names with the characters æ, ø, å, ö, ä, ü, and é are also allowed.
The country code top-level domain .dk was created July 14, 1987, at ARPA Network Information Center, Stanford Research Institute (SRI-NIC). The Danish UNIX User Group (DKUUG) at Datalogisk Institut, Københavns Universitet (DIKU) received management of the .dk domain on the DKnet, at that time an informal name used for the UUCP network used at DIKU and other places in Denmark. The name DKnet has been in use since at least 1985.
In mid-1988 DKnet was connected to the emerging DENet, the government-sponsored research network established in late 1987 now known as forskningsnettet, run and maintained by UNI-C.
In November 1987 DKUUG made a name agreement ("navneaftalen") with the coordinators of the three other networks then working in Denmark, a national experimental X.400 net (EAN from University of British Columbia), EARN and DECnet, concerning the .dk domain. They agreed to share it, hiding from the users which network they were connected to, and nullifying the use of pseudo-domains like .uucp or second-level domains like gov.uk, thereby creating a practice that has been enforced ever since, and also applied in other countries.
By early 1992 UNI-C via DENet (an acronym for "Danish Educational Network") serviced all the Universities in Denmark, and DIKU had no need for DKnet anymore. Thus DKUUG, with DKnet, moved to Symbion Science Park where they received their own international lines and started to lease these to companies, and modem connections to private consumers. The growing business quickly overshadowed the organization's own economy, forcing the creation of a separate company. In 1993, DKnet ApS, a genuine ISP and Denmark's first, was established as a limited liability company (ApS).
...
Wikipedia