GOpenCDR terms

What GOpenCDR is

GOpenCDR, the Gelhaus Open Community Domain Registry, is an alternative namespace that works alongside the normal internet. Its top-level domains live in a root of their own, signed with DNSSEC and operated by Gelhaus Solutions as Tier 0. Each TLD is run by a TLD registry, and resolvers called mirrors serve the namespace to whoever wants it. Names in it resolve for anyone whose resolver follows GOpenCDR. They do not resolve through the IANA root the rest of the internet uses, and nothing here changes that.

These terms cover your account and every name you register or manage through GOpenCDR. They sit under the general terms of service, which carry the liability limits, the governing law and everything else that is not particular to GOpenCDR, and they are read together with the acceptable use policy, which you accept with them. What we process about you is in the privacy notice. The provider is Gelhaus Solutions, whose details are in the legal notice.

The documents, and which one wins

GOpenCDR has a document for each role: these terms and the acceptable use policy for everyone with an account, the mirror operator terms for mirrors, and signed agreements for TLD operators, registrars and enterprise customers. Where two of them speak to the same point, the one written for the role in question wins on that point, and an agreement signed by both sides wins over anything published here. In the order the general terms set out, all of them together are the terms for this particular product.

A document signed by one role binds nobody else. A registrant is not a party to the TLD operator agreement, and cannot be held to anything in it.

Your account

Registering a name needs an account with a verified email address. That address is the only personal data a registration requires: GOpenCDR's floor is an account and a verified email, and a TLD may ask for more only where its own published policy says so.

Keep your password, your passkeys and your API keys to yourself. You are responsible for keeping them safe and for what you do with your account. If you suspect somebody else has access, tell us at once so that we can lock it. Root and TLD roles must sign in with a passkey.

When you accept these terms, the portal records which versions of these terms, the acceptable use policy and the general terms you accepted, by their identifiers in the document archive.

You may close your account at any time. Closing it ends every registration it holds, as described under "When a registration ends" below.

A registration is a right to use a name, not property

Registering a name gives you the right to use it in its TLD for as long as the registration is kept up and these terms are kept. It does not make the name your property. It is not a trademark right, and it gives you no claim against anybody who uses the same string elsewhere, including in the IANA namespace.

The right belongs to your account. It moves to another account only through a transfer carried out on your instruction, and only where the TLD allows transfers.

Free names stay registered while you confirm them

Names in community TLDs are free. To keep them, confirm your email address once every 12 months. One confirmation covers every name the account holds: the mail carries a link, and one click is enough.

If the confirmation does not arrive in time:

1. Grace, 30 days. The names keep resolving. Confirming restores everything as it was.
2. Redemption, 30 days. The names are taken out of their zones and stop resolving, but they stay registered to you. Confirming restores them.
3. Deletion. When redemption ends, the registrations end and the names become available to others.

We write to your address before each step. A TLD may lengthen these periods but not shorten them. A TLD that charges for names says so in its own policy, and its renewal rules apply there instead of these.

The test TLD

gelhaus is GOpenCDR's test TLD, and different rules apply in it:

• Registration is by invitation only. An invitation can be revoked until it is used.
• Nothing in it is a promise. Names, zones and the data in them may be changed, reset or removed at any time, all at once if need be, and the TLD may be closed. Every such step is recorded in the transparency log, and holders of names in it are told by email, without notice in advance.
• The root trust anchor is published as a test anchor. It may be replaced at short notice, and every replacement is announced as the DNSSEC practice statement describes.
• No service level applies, as for any early access under the general terms.

IANA always wins

GOpenCDR adds names only where the IANA namespace has none. That rule is enforced at every layer, and it takes precedence over your registration.

Withdrawal. If a name, or a whole TLD, comes to exist in the IANA root, GOpenCDR withdraws it everywhere within one hour of the IANA delegation and blocks it for good. A withdrawn name cannot be registered again, by anybody.

Sunset. If one of our TLD strings enters ICANN's application pipeline, the TLD goes into sunset within 7 days. Registrations in it close, every registrant is told, renewals are capped at the expected delegation date, and tooling to move elsewhere is offered. The migration window lasts until ICANN delegates the string. If the application is withdrawn or rejected, the sunset is lifted and the TLD carries on.

In a TLD whose string also exists in the IANA root, the rule applies name by name: resolvers ask IANA first, and a name that exists there always hides the same name here.

None of this is a breach of these terms, and none of it gives rise to a claim against us or against the TLD operator.

What may be restricted, and how it is decided

This section is also the information Art. 14 of the Digital Services Act requires.

What can happen to a registration. A name can be put on hold, which takes it out of its zone so that it stops resolving; it can be locked against changes or transfer; it can be suspended; or it can be deleted.

On what grounds. DNS abuse as the acceptable use policy defines it, a binding order of a court or a competent authority, a breach of these terms, and a decision under the name dispute policy. We do not judge content or speech at the DNS layer. A name is not restricted because of what a website under it says, unless a court or an authority orders it.

Who decides, and how. The TLD acts first. For a hosted TLD, the root abuse desk acts on the name itself if the TLD operator has not acted within the time the acceptable use policy sets; for a self-hosted TLD, it escalates against the TLD. A person takes every decision to restrict a name on the grounds above. Automated checks, such as a blocklist match or a failed probe, find candidates and never decide on their own. Two things run automatically because they follow from rules rather than from a judgement: the steps after an unconfirmed address, on the dates above, and withdrawal when IANA wins.

What you are told. You get a statement of reasons: what was done, why, whether it followed a report or our own findings, and how to challenge it. Where the law forbids telling you, or where telling you first would defeat an urgent measure against active abuse, you are told as soon as that no longer applies.

How to challenge it. Reply to the notice, or write to the address in the legal notice, within six months. A person who did not take the original decision reviews it and answers with reasons. The courts remain open to you whatever the outcome.

Points of contact. For authorities, and for anyone using GOpenCDR, the single point of contact under Arts. 11 and 12 DSA is egelhaus@ennogelhaus.de, in English or German.

When a registration ends

A registration ends when you delete it, when you close your account, when redemption runs out, through withdrawal or sunset, or through a decision under the section above. The name then leaves its zone and, unless it was withdrawn or blocked, becomes available to others. What we keep about it afterwards, and for how long, is in the privacy notice.

What is public

Some things are public by design, and it is worth knowing which before you register:

• The zones. Your name, its nameservers and its DS records are published in the TLD zone, and every resolver that follows GOpenCDR serves them.
• Registration data is public through RDAP, except the parts that concern you, which are redacted. The registration data disclosure policy says who may see them and how.
• The transparency log is an append-only public record of root changes, key events, policy changes and abuse actions. It names domain names and TLD strings, and the account identifiers of people who hold root roles and of whoever proposed or decided a change it records. It never holds an email address, a name or an IP address. An entry in it cannot be removed, because removing one would break every checkpoint signed after it.

Changes to these terms

These terms may change through the process the general terms set out: a material change is announced to your address at least six weeks before it takes effect, and you may object to it. Every version is kept in the document archive, so the version you accepted stays readable.

Everything else

Warranty, service levels and the limits of our liability are as set out in the general terms of service, which govern GOpenCDR and are not restated here. GOpenCDR is provided free of charge, and for what is given away, liability is limited to intent and gross negligence (Section 521 BGB).