Over three years after Google http://paid $25 million to gain the exclusive rights to the “.app” top-level domain, the company is at last making .app domains available to register starting today and running through May 7, at 9 AM PDT via Google’s Early Access Program. The following day, May 8, the domains will go on sale for the general public, including through other registrars.
The new top-level domain (TLD) is an obvious choice for app developers and others in the tech industry, as it serves as an easy-to-remember alternative to .com domains – where inventory has long been running low for popular words.
In addition to the expected demand, Google is requiring HTTPS for all. app websites. This built-in security protects against ad malware, tracking injection by internet service providers, and safeguards against spying on open Wi-Fi networks, the company explains.
Google has been an advocate of pushing the web towards HTTPS adoption, noting last fall http://that 64 percent of traffic through its Chrome browser on Android was protected, up from 42 percent the year before. Chrome traffic on Mac was up to 75 percent, and on Windows up to 66 percent at the same time. The increases were due to a number of actions on Google’s part, including its http://decision to flag all websites using HTTP to transmit private information as “insecure.”
This year, http://Google said it would mark all pages without HTTPS encryption as insecure starting in July with the launch of Chrome 68.
Given its plans, it makes sense that Google’s new domain addition would also include HTTPS protection built-in.
Still, it’s something of a milestone, Google notes.
“Because .app will be the first TLD with enforced security made available for general registration, it’s helping move the web to an http://HTTPS-everywhere future in a big way,” the company writes in its http://announcementof the new TLD.
RE: Google is launching .app domains, the first TLDs secured with built-in HTTPS
I read about this a long while ago, i thought it was pretty neat but now that it is happening its actually really awesome. I didnt think google was going to do it but ayyy they lived up to what they said so good for google.
