History of the zone
How «.ру» became «.рус»
The road from Cyrillic «.ру» on shop signs to a domain in the Internet root took six years. Here is the short version.
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before 2008
Cyrillic «.ру»
A Cyrillic «.ру» zone appears on the Russian Internet, operating outside the ICANN root and developed by the Russian-language Internet Center. Thousands of addresses are registered, and «.ру» becomes the familiar spelling on signs and in ads.
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2008
A letter to ICANN
On 28 April, Alexei Sozonov and Sergey Sharikov write to ICANN's President: Cyrillic «.ру» should be Russia's domain. The objection is visual similarity: lowercase «ру» looks almost identical to Paraguay's .py.
Scanned letter, PDF → -
2008–2010
ICANN's decision
.РФ becomes Russia's national Cyrillic domain. «.ру» never enters the root: a string must not be confusable with any existing domain.
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2011
Three letters instead of two
On 20 June, Webnames, the Russian-language Internet Center and Ukraine's UANIC and Technical Internet Center write to ICANN's leadership about a joint initiative: a language domain .РУС for the whole Russian-speaking world. The third letter makes it unlike any other domain.
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2011–2012
Support from six countries
The initiative is endorsed by registries and communities in Russia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Ukraine and Canada.
Endorsement letters → -
2012
Application 1-1957-68557
Rusnames applies for .РУС in ICANN's New gTLD Program, one of almost two thousand applications. It passes Initial Evaluation.
Public portion of the application at ICANN → -
2013
Commitments
The registry makes Public Interest Commitments: accredited registrars only, action against illegal content, accurate WHOIS.
PICs, PDF → -
2014
Delegation
On 3 July, .РУС enters the DNS root. Cyrillic addresses ending in .рус start working worldwide.
IANA database record → -
today
18,000 addresses
The zone has over 18,000 domains and thousands of live websites, from bakeries and car services to libraries and sports clubs.
Websites on .РУС →