You know how you’ve been allowed to register Australian domain names for the past 26 years, as long as you have an Australian presence (like an ABN) and a “close and substantial connection” to a company name, business name, personal name… or… “match a synonym of a service, goods, event, activity or premises“?
Well, THOSE DAYS ARE OVER, because that last line in auDA Licensing Policy has just been green-lit to be removed.
Today, the auDA Board just adopted to remove that part of the .au Licensing Rules (previously known as the ‘close and substantial connection’ test) which had been in place since the early days of the ‘.com.au’ domain extension, but was consolidated into the licensing policies in about 2017.
The deletion of this clause effectively limits a registrant to registering a ‘.com.au’ domain name that matches its name, business name or trade mark.
Let that sink in.
Effectively, if you don’t have a business name or trade mark, you can’t register or buy expired domain names anymore.
Soon, auDA will give you a deadline of when these new Licensing Rules will kick in. And basically, if you don’t own the matching business name or trade mark, you won’t be allowed to renew your domain name and it will be deleted and go to the public auctions.
Who is the auDA Board?
- Marina Go, Sandra Davey, Peter Elford, Brett Fenton, Sarv Girn, Sandra Hook, Claire Rogers, Thu-Trang Tran, Mike Trovato, Tina Wyer.
And these people just green-lit this decision because of the recommendations of these 4 people; Matt Healy (Chair), Selvi Kannan, Ian Kelly, and Ross Creelman, who made up the majority of the au Licensing Rules Review Panel 2025.
How this level of utter stupidity got through this many people, is beyond words. My domain name bat-phone has never run this hot before from so many people confused about auDA’s actions. Even Blind Freddy can see now, at this moment in time, that it’s always been the modus operandi ever since the Direct .au concept was thought up. Make it almost impossible for domain investors to own the “.com.au” and give domainers and entrepreneurs the crappy Direct .au extension instead (as the Direct .au is more open to registrations with just an “Australian presence” required).
What auDA collectively don’t fully understand, at this moment in time, is what they have just done to the trust and value of Australian domain names, forever.
Over the next few months, we will be publicly displaying the full extent of this nightmare auDA have created for thousands of regular Australian companies and businesses.
This time, auDA have REALLY DONE IT.
The auDA Board are clearly out of touch and blind-sighted to have let this occur.
If you haven’t yet joined our mail list, now might be a good time to join.
Story developing…
SACK AUDA
I have invested in many strong .com.au names that genuinely match my businesses. I’ve put time, effort and money into building value around those names.
To potentially see that investment undermined by a change in eligibility rules is deeply concerning from a business perspective.
Australians made these investments under the rules that existed at the time. Changing those rules risks moving the goalposts for businesses that have legitimately placed value in their names.
Spot on, Erwin.
Imagine not a single auDA Board Member thinking “Some businesses have been paying $20 a year for 26 years for each of their domain names, maybe we should be careful with changing the eligibility rules and pulling the rug from beneath them?”
Instead, they appear to have had tunnel-vision to go after ‘domainers’, based on their silly maths of “auDA data shows that 3,386 registrants hold more than 50 Domain Name Licences across com.au, net.au and .au direct, out of 1,702,174 registrants in those namespaces. Together, those registrants hold 582,895 domain names.”
There are other maths equations we will bring to light over the coming weeks, that the auDA Board didn’t even bother to consider.
What the auDA Board have just done will become more shameful as the weeks drag on.
A couple of board members voted against the proposed change, unfortunately the majority didn’t, citing “Clearer and more transparent allocation rules would support trust and confidence in com.au and net.au for the benefit of the Australian community”.
To be honest, most of the Australian community wouldn’t have a clue about the previous, current, or proposed licensing rules for .au domain names.
Tightening the rules for registering .com.au domains will simply push people toward .au – a far less compelling substitute for what Australians overwhelmingly regard as the most trusted extension, .com.au. So much for supporting trust and confidence.
It’s such a backward move by auDA, adding more costs and red-tape to a huge number of Australian businesses.
auDAs real position
They want to go back 20 years to the eligibility requirements of matching business names, trademarks for .com.au and ,net.au
Total Insanity.
auDA says:
“The use of artificial intelligence has also lowered the barrier to establishing a pay-per-click or monetised website for the purpose of achieving allocation.
The majority considered that greater reliance on sub-clauses (a) to (e) would provide a consumer protection uplift and better support integrity, transparency, trust and confidence in the com.au and net.au namespaces.”
This is total bullshit from auDA. The Majority of submissions didn’t say this ever.
(f) will be grandfathered for existing registrants
otherwise auDA will get sued
auDA Registrars will lose a lot of money from this auDA Maladministration of the .au namespace and policy blunders.
Registrars will have to now again like 23 years ago have to update 1 million registrant eligibility fields with the exact correct details. That field is the one which willbe crucially exposed as in breach of the new policy.
By deleting the clause auDA are going backwards 30 years to massive previous issues and costs.
Domain pricing dropped because red tape compliance did fior everyone.
Now auDA is creating those unneeded costly requirements again for everyone.
The hit to Registrars will be massive. They dont want to spend hours on auDA created technical & eligibility issues for individual domains. That’s how they lose money and profit.
The ongoing hit to Registrants, Individuals, Businesses will be huge.
No wonder why they also push .com as being an easier option for everyone.
auDA have really made a huge mistake again.
The costings of this auDA mess are hundreds of millions a year.
$60 per business name
$900 per trademark
Staff resources, admin and wasted time for more useless avoidable redtape.
Lost Registrar, Parking income. Companies like GoDaddy will see an immediate hit to their GoDaddy Cash Parking PPC program
Auda also not cope with the massive influx of new complaints, appeals, class actions, NCAT proceedings, Renewed Commonwealth oversight of them.
BRUCE TONKIN AUDA CEO SPEAK UP. STOP THE AUDA .AU NAMESPACE TRAIN WRECK.
So these changes are being introduced to reduce fraud/scams with .com.au domains, yet there are no new restrictions being placed on .au? The contradiction here is deafening.
I believe business names can be up to 200 characters in length.
“Match means that the Domain Name being applied for is identical to one, some or all of words or numbers used in the Person’s Legal Name, Business Name or Australian Trade Mark.”
“The Domain Name must use the words or numbers in the same order” […] “and must not include any additional words or numbers”.
If you wanted to ensure your eligibility for holding these domains:
super.com.au
stupid.com.au
example.com.au
random.com.au
word.com.au
is.com.au
tractor.com.au
…you could simply register this single business name: Super stupid example random word is tractor
For domains containing more than one word, just make sure the order of the words matches the order in the business name.
Ludicrously long business names coming soon.
That was 30 years ago….
auDA is going backwards
Erhan Karabardak was one of the minority panelists on the .au Policy Advisory Panel who opposed deleting subparagraph (f) of clause 2.4.4(2) of the .au Licensing Rules.
What subparagraph (f) does now: it lets you qualify for a .com.au or .net.au domain name that matches, or is a synonym of, a service you provide, goods you sell, an event you run or sponsor, an activity you teach or facilitate, or premises you operate.
Who relies on subparagraph (f)?
Deleting subparagraph (f) removes the pathway that covers a service the registrant provides or goods the registrant sells. The following examples illustrate the kinds of registrants who rely on it (names are illustrative only):
1. Jane’s Bakery who sells Apple Pies and Custard Tarts registers applepies.com.au and custardtarts.com.au using subparagraph (f);
2. John’s Mortgage Broking provides mortgage brokering services in Sydney and Bondi and he registers mortgagebrokersydney.com.au and bondimortgagebroker.com.au using subparagraph (f);
3. Fabulous Clothing and sells hoodies and socks so they register hoodies.com.au and socks.com.au using subparagraph (f);
4. Melbourne Primary School runs an annual school fete to raise funds for the school and benefit its students and registers the domain name MPSFete2026.com.au using subparagraph (f);
5. East Subiaco Football Club’s home ground is called the EJ Winderberg Oval so they register EJWinderberg.com.au using subparagraph (f).
Read Erhan’s full post here – https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/auda-remove-close-substantial-connection-test-comau-netau-karabardak-wpfjc/