.JOBS will have a Sunrise period using the Trademark Clearinghouse and ICANN approves

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) welcomes the decision by. JOBS to use the Trademark Clearinghouse database to support a sunrise registration period ahead of its planned open registration period to begin later this year.

Established in 2006, .JOBS is uniquely positioned as a TLD Registry Operator never to have held a sunrise period prior to launching its initial general registration process. The gTLD had been restricted to employment-related sites until now. Registrations had to be based on legal name of company or organization and had to be made by people within the company responsible for human resource management. That heavily restricted the growth and usage of the .jobs domain.

“Later this year and for the first time, .JOBS intends to open up the types of names that can be registered. This will allow people around the world to register whatever name they choose on a first come, first serve basis, so long as the types of registrants and types of registrations are consistent with the .JOBS Charter,” said Tom Embrescia, Chairman of .JOBS. “As an ICANN authorized solution to rights’ protections in the New gTLD Program, using the Clearinghouse to support .JOBS sunrise registrations is the best approach for the registry, as well as for brand holders before .JOBS launches open registration.”

“We appreciate and support the .JOBS decision to use the Clearinghouse to support its upcoming planned sunrise period,” said Fadi Chehadé, President and CEO of ICANN. “Here we have an opportunity with an existing TLD to learn how the Clearinghouse might impact the sunrise registration process. It will give us a critical perspective just as New gTLDs are coming online.”