Information for Registering .ca Domains

The .ca Opportunity

The Canadian domain landscape is changing. The .ca registry, once run by a co-operative under the University of British Columbia, has been transitioned to a new, non-profit corporation called the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA). New rules required holders of existing .ca to renew those names and allow anyone living or doing business in Canada to register an unlimited number of .ca domain names.

Any names that were not renewed by the deadline of February 1st, 2001 were released back into the available name space. This accounted for approximately 41,000 names, many of which were high profile but neglected by their previous registrant.

Registrations

On 11/08/00, CIRA began accepting new .ca registrations, under much less stringent registration restrictions. Previously, .ca registrants were only allowed one registration per individual/organization, and there were further rules restricting access to the .ca space to federally incorporated organizations.

Tucows resellers are now accepting registration requests for new .ca domain names.

Essentially, the only restrictions for new .ca registrations are that the registrant must be any of the following (extracted from CIRA Registration Rules v2.1):

  1. Canadian citizen. A Canadian citizen of the age of majority under the laws of the province or territory in Canada in which he or she resides or last resided;

  2. Permanent resident. A permanent resident as defined in the Immigration Act (Canada), R.S.C. 1985, c.I-2, as amended from time to time, who is ordinarily resident in Canada (as defined below) and of the age of majority under the laws of the province or territory in Canada in which he or she resides or last resided;

  3. Legal representative. An executor, administrator or other legal representative of a Person listed in paragraph (a) and (b) above;

  4. Corporation. A corporation under the laws of Canada or any province or territory of Canada;

  5. Trust. A trust established and subsisting under the laws of a province or territory of Canada, more than 66 2/3% of whose trustees meet one of the conditions set out in paragraphs (a) to (d) above;



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