NIRA registers 2,436 .ng domain names in April 2016

The President of the Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NIRA), Mr Sunday Folayan, said on Saturday that 2,436 dotng (.ng) domain names were registered in the month of April.

Folayan made this known in a statement issued in Lagos that there was a decrease of 60 .ng registered domain names in April, when compared to the 2,496 registered in March.

It said that 1,785 domain names were renewed in April, representing an increase of 152 renewals, when compared to the 1,633 renewed in the month of March.

According to the statement, the association transferred 134 domain names, showing a decrease of 417, compared to the 551 transferred in March.

“The domain name registration in April was a bit low compared to the registrations in the past three months of this year.

“The renewal rate also showed a constant increase in the past three months.

“The total number of domain names registration from January to April 2016 is 9,511 registrations and 6,062 renewals.

“It is interesting and refreshing to witness such growth. The renewal rate is encouraging as well,” the statement said.

It said that .ng (like our currency, the Naira and the +234 for country code) was the official Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), approved country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) for Nigeria.

The statement added that the availability of names was better on the .ng ccTLD than on the generic top-level domain (gTLD) like “.com” or “.org”.

It said that with the .ng, the country’s primary DNS servers were secured and locally managed with multiple cast servers located around the world.

The statement added that hosting businesses on the .ng would help to support the Nigerian economy and provide jobs for local Information Technology (IT) professionals.