Yahoo domain description

What is a Yahoo domain ?

A Domain Yahoo Name is very similar to an address forwarding service.The Domain is the address people type in their web browser to get to your web site.The Domain Yahoo Name then points to the "real" address that contains your web site.


How do I choose a domain name?

Your Yahoo domain name is your address on the Web. It's the vehicle that helps friends, associates or customers find you or your business online. When you pick your Yahoo domain name, keep the following tips in mind: Yahoo Domain names can only use letters, numbers, and hyphens ("-"). Spaces and other symbols, like underscores, are not allowed, and domains cannot begin or end with a hyphen. Yahoo Domain names are not case sensitive. They can be between 2 and 63 total characters, not including the domain extension.


Find a Yahoo domain?

Below, you can find keyword to find Yahoo domain

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What, Why, and HowWhat's in a Yahoo domain name?

What, Why, and HowWhat's in a Yahoo domain name?

Yahoo Domain Name Basics: What, Why, and How What's in a Yahoo domain name?

A lot more than you might think. Your domain name can be your first impression, your face to the outside world, and your new marketing plan. Learn more about what domain names are, why you should take the time to choose a good one for yourself, and how to go about it.What is a domain name?A domain name is an address for the Internet. It helps people find your web site. Just as homes and businesses have street addresses, all web sites have domain names. The Yahoo! domain name is yahoo.com.A domain name is made up of two parts, typically preceded by www. Let's use yahoo.com as an example: The first part, yahoo, is a unique name that represents the web site.The second part, com, is the extension, and stands for "commercial." There are many extensions available, though .com, .net, .biz, .info, and .us are the most popular extensions in the United States.Why is a good domain name important?A good domain name helps you in numerous ways.For Businesses Add your domain name to your business card, email signature, and other advertisements. Build credibility: Show your customers that you have an established business.Improve your marketing: Provide customers an easy way to remember and contact you.Protect your brand: Secure the domain name that best represents your business name — and keep it out of the hands of your competitors.For Consumers Describe your site as best you can with your domain name. For example, a pair of amateur magicians might use their stage names, some combination of words including magic, or the name of their most famous trick.How do I choose a domain name? Keep these tips in mind as you select your domain name.Your domain name should reflect your business name or the topic your site will cover.It should be a unique and concise name that is easy to say, remember, and spell.You can use only letters, numbers, and hyphens in your domain name. Spaces or other symbols are not allowed. If your first choice isn't available, try rearranging the word order, adding hyphens, or using abbreviations or locations to come up with a unique alternative.Once you have a domain name, you need a web site! Luckily, you came to the right place. It's easy to add Yahoo! services that help you build a full web site or open an online store. LearnIs Yahoo selling domains for $9.95 or $4.98? That may depend on how and when you navigate to its domain sales page, as Yahoo offers periodic promotions to build interest in its web hosting offerings. On Tuesday, the yahoo.com home page featured domains for $4.98, while ads appearing on Google.com for Yahoo domains were also offering the $4.98 rate. Meanwhile, the smallbusiness.yahoo.com page was listing .com domains for $9.95 a year. "Yahoo's standard domain price is $9.95, which is offered on our web site and channel wide 24x7," said Yahoo spokesperson Kelley Podboy.

Yahoo! Domains Service Agreement

Yahoo! Domains Service Agreement

1. ACCEPTANCE OF TERMS

The Yahoo! Domains service (the "Service"), owned and operated by Yahoo! Inc., is provided to you under the most recent version of the Yahoo! Terms of Service (“TOS”), located at http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/, the Yahoo! Mail General Guidelines, and any other Yahoo!'s applicable policies and guidelines ("Guidelines") (all together, the "Terms") as well as this Service Agreement (together the "Agreement"). For clarity, Yahoo! Domains is a "Service" as defined in the Yahoo! Terms of Service. Yahoo! may update and change the Agreement from time to time. You can always find the most recent version of this Service Agreement at http://order.sbs.yahoo.com/sbs/tos/domain_tos.html and the most recent version of the Yahoo! Terms of Service at the URL indicated above.

By Completing The Domain Name (I.E., Web Address) Registration process, You agree to be bound by the agreement so please read all the terms carefully. Any person or entity acting on your behalf shall also be bound by these terms and you agree to be responsible for such person's or entity's actions.


2. THE SERVICE

Subject to the terms of the Agreement, Yahoo! will provide the Service which includes assisting you in acquiring a domain name (i.e., web address) as well as providing you access to certain Yahoo! Software ("Software") to facilitate your use of the Service.

Please note: Nothing in the agreement obligate YAHOO! to list or link to your DOMAIN NAME or provide WEBSITE HOSTING SERVICES in connection with YOUR DOMAIN NAME beyond that provided within the service.

You may obtain full-featured website hosting services from Yahoo! Web Hosting at http://webhosting.yahoo.com/. If you are a domains customer and have chosen to activate the email services bundled with the Domain product, you may store up to 10MB of email and attached files (“Stored Data”) on the system. In the event that more than 10MB of Stored Data is in your account on the system, Yahoo! may in its sole discretion and without notice to you, (i) delete any data in excess of 10MB that is in your account on the system, and (ii) interrupt the sending and receipt of emails through your account.


3. YOUR AGREEMENT WITH INTERNET NAMES WORLDWIDE

If You register a new domain name in conjunction with the Service, the following terms also apply: Yahoo! has chosen Internet Names Worldwide (a division of Melbourne IT Limited), or "INWW," an ICANN accredited registrar for .com, .net, .org, .biz, .info and .us domain names, to provide domain name registration services. You hereby authorize Yahoo! to acquire your selected domain name from INWW. In order to receive a domain name, you must agree to INWW's terms and conditions located at http://domains.yahoo.com/inwwagree.html for .com, .net, .org, .biz and .info domain names (“INWW gTLD Terms and Conditions”) and http://domains.yahoo.com/inwwagree_us.html for .us domain names (“INWW .us Terms and Conditions”), as may be amended. You understand that you are creating a separate contractual relationship between you and INWW, and that you, and not Yahoo!, are responsible for all fees, liability, and obligations in connection with that relationship. Yahoo may elect to pay INWW such fees, and in that case You will pay Yahoo for those payments. You agree that your obligations to indemnify under "Indemnity" in the Yahoo! Terms of Service includes any claim or demand associated with your domain name, any domain name pre-registration services provided through the Service, or the INWW terms and conditions. You will be listed as the registrant and administrative contact in connection with your domain name, unless you choose another registrant and administrative contact. If you choose a registrant and administrative contact other than yourself, such person(s) must enter into an agreement directly with the INWW and, additionally, will be bound by this Agreement in addition to yourself. You hereby authorize Yahoo! to list itself as the billing contact, technical contact and name server in connection with your domain name and to take any actions Yahoo! deems appropriate in those capacities. However, upon termination of the Service (either because your account expires or is cancelled by you or by Yahoo! for the reasons described in Section 8 entitled Termination below), Yahoo! may immediately cease acting in those capacities and reserves the right to transfer your account to INWW for collection of past-due amounts. In the event of such transfer, you authorize INWW to serve as the billing contact, technical contact and name server in connection with your domain name, and to take any actions the INWW deems appropriate in those capacities. Upon termination of the Service, Yahoo! will not be responsible to forward any notices, emails or other correspondence to you or to take any other actions in connection with your domain name. You will be solely responsible for all ongoing fees, as well as removing Yahoo! as the billing, technical contact and name servers in connection with your domain name, unless Yahoo! notifies you otherwise.


4. FEES AND BILLING

To pay for the Service, you must have a Yahoo! ID. You must also have a Yahoo! Wallet which will save your credit card, billing and shipping information and other information. If you do not yet have a Yahoo! ID or Yahoo! Wallet, you will be prompted to complete the registration process. The fees for the Service are set out at http://domains.yahoo.com/services?.src=$.src. All such fees are payable in U.S. dollars to Yahoo!, are non-refundable and non-creditable, and will automatically be charged to your Yahoo! Wallet credit card. Fees will be charged yearly, unless you purchase email services in conjunction with your domain name, in which case fees will be charged monthly. Yahoo! may alter its fees, but will provide you prior notice if those alterations will affect you. Yahoo! will automatically bill your credit card for annual service fees until you submit an online cancellation notice via your Web Console, located at http://console.domains.yahoo.com. If your credit card is invalid or you are otherwise past due in your payments for any reason, the Service may be terminated and removed from Yahoo!’s servers and all the information contained therein deleted permanently. Billing will occur annually on your account start date. If you purchase email services in conjunction with your domain name, fees will be billed monthly rather than annually until cancellation notice is received. You will be charged for any extra fee features or add-ons that you subscribe to or use during each applicable billing cycle. All payments for the Service are non-refundable. If you have questions or concerns related to your bill for the Service, please contact domains-billing@yahoo-inc.com.


5. AUTOMATIC RENEWAL

Unless Yahoo! provides notice otherwise, this Service and Agreement will automatically be renewed and you will be billed as described in Section 4. If Yahoo! initially registers your domain name on your behalf, Yahoo! will automatically renew your domain name on an annual basis prior to the expiration of your domain name's initial registration period. In order to ensure that domains are renewed in a timely manner without an interruption of service, each domain billed through Yahoo will be renewed 15 days prior to each annual anniversary (multi-year domains will be renewed 15 days prior to the end of the last year). Timely payment will extend your service and domain registration term for a full year from the anniversary date. Your domain name will automatically be renewed with the registrar after the annual fee is successfully billed to the credit card stored in your Yahoo! Wallet.


6. Transferring to Yahoo!'s registrar of record

For Domains in which Yahoo! is acting as the billing contact, Yahoo! may at any time request in writing that You transfer the domain name registered for the Service to a new registrar of record, under the terms and conditions of that registrar of record. If You do not agree to this request within 30 days, You agree that Yahoo! will continue to provide the Service to You, but may, in its sole discretion, either: (i) require You to pay an additional fee to Yahoo! for the Service in order to renew and maintain Your domain name with the prior registrar of record; or (ii) require You to be responsible for all fees, including any renewal fees, directly with the prior registrar of record, in which case You authorize Yahoo! to cease to pay for the domain name fees as part of the Service, and change the billing contact details for the domain name from Yahoo! to You by providing Your applicable Account Information to the prior registrar of record.


7. Using a pre-existing domain name

If you have previously registered a domain name with another provider and want to use it with the Service, You must request that the existing registrar change the name servers for the domain name as designated by Yahoo!, on Your behalf. PLEASE NOTE: The existing registrar will continue to be the registrar for that DOMAIN NAME and you will continue to be responsible for all ongoing fees for that DOMAIN NAME with your existing provider, including renewal fees. The fees payable to YAHOO! for the service do not include registration or renewal fees owed by you to your existing provider.


8. VERIFYING YOUR DOMAIN NAME INFORMATION

In compliance with ICANN regulation and the terms and conditions of the Registrar of Record, as applicable ("Required Information") and in order to minimize the risk of fraud, Yahoo! may at any time request You to verify any information required to be supplied by a registrant. If You fail to respond to any such request or fail to verify any Required Information to Yahoo!'s reasonable satisfaction, within 15 days of any such request from Yahoo!, Yahoo! may, in its sole discretion, immediately terminate Your Service and remove any of Your materials, including Your domain name, from Yahoo! servers.


9. INDEMNITY

You agree to indemnify and hold Yahoo, and its subsidiaries, affiliates, officers, agents, co-branders or other partners, and employees, harmless from any claim or demand, including reasonable attorneys' fees, made by any third party due to or arising out of Content you submit, post, transmit or make available through the Service, your use of the Service, your connection to the Service, your violation of the Agreement or your violation of any laws, regulations or rights of another.


10. TERMINATION OR TRANSFER OF DOMAIN NAME

You may terminate your Service at any time by completing the online cancellation form located at http://console.domains.yahoo.com. Please note, you will not be entitled to a refund of any fees, either initial or renewal fees, you have paid to Yahoo! in the event you terminate your Service. Also, please note that canceling the Service will not terminate other services you have purchased in conjunction with the domain name, and that you will still be responsible for any fees for such services. Because several features are bundled in the Domains Product Service, transferring your domain away from Yahoo!, whether by modifying the name servers (redelegation) or transferring management of the domain registration to another provider, does not automatically terminate the other features in the Service you have purchased, and you will continue to be billed for the Service. To terminate your Service, complete the online cancellation form located at http://console.domains.yahoo.com. In addition in order to comply with ICANN regulations, your domain name may not be transferred to another registrar within the first 60 days after your domain name is registered. Yahoo! may also choose to restrict domain name transfers to another reseller of Melbourne IT or transfers to Melbourne IT directly within the first 60 days after a domain is registered. Yahoo! may, but has no duty to, immediately terminate your Service and remove any of your materials, including your domain name, from Yahoo! servers if Yahoo! receives notice that you have disputed the Service charges with your credit card company or if your credit card has been declined or for any other non-payment of Service fees. In addition, if Yahoo! receives notice that you have disputed the domain name Service charges with your credit card company, your credit card charge has been declined or that there has been any other non-payment of domain name Service fees, Yahoo may, in its sole discretion, immediately transfer the relevant domain name from the registrant of the domain name to Yahoo! You acknowledge that where Yahoo! transfers such domain name to Yahoo! under this clause, Yahoo! will hold all rights of the registered domain name holder in respect of that domain name , including the right to sell the domain name to a third party (where this was a right held by the original registrant in respect of the relevant domain name). In addition, Yahoo! may, but has no duty to, immediately terminate your Service and remove any of your materials, including your domain name, from Yahoo! servers if Yahoo!, in its sole discretion, concludes that you have engaged in illegal activities, in activities or sales that may damage the rights of Yahoo! or others, or have violated or threatened to violate the terms of the Agreement or any other agreement you may have with Yahoo!. Any termination under this paragraph will take effect immediately. In the event that Yahoo! terminates your Service in connection with this paragraph, you will not be entitled to a refund of any fees you have paid to Yahoo!. In addition, Yahoo! may terminate your Service at its convenience. However, in the event that Yahoo! elects to terminate your Service at its convenience, as your only remedy, Yahoo! will refund to you a pro-rata amount of fees which you have pre-paid.


11. MAINTENANCE AND SUPPORT

You can obtain assistance with technical difficulties that may arise in connection with your utilization of the Software or the Service by requesting assistance by email to domains-support@yahoo-inc.com. Yahoo! reserves the right to establish limitations on the extent of such support, and the hours at which it is available.

You are responsible for obtaining and maintaining all telephone, computer hardware and other equipment needed for its access to and use of the Software and the Service and you will be responsible for all charges related thereto.

Yahoo Domains $9.95

Yahoo Domains $9.95

Wow, 9.95 that is great for a domain name! Coming from the experience of being a search engine marketer, its even hard for me to get prices like that even at wholesale. Recently we were reviewing Yahoos packages and had seen that they have a lot of good tools that I always had overlooked because of what we already have in house, but from what we understand the domains are part a full service solution for small businesses.Like the others they carry all sorts of domain extensions which is good as the internet is running out of dot com names.

The domain extensions that are available are The most popular domain .com, ,net, .org, .biz, .info, .us. Whats nice is if you already have a domain name, you can still transfer it to Yahoo.Transferring a name into Yahoo shouldnt be so difficult, I believe the support staff would be able to walk you through the process.The last time I had worked with Yahoo domain, I performed a transfer out of a company called Melbourne IT and there customer assistance was great with helping me along with my questions and concerns. A quick email and I was on my way.One of the important things to remember when working with a web site address is integrating it into your online marketing campaign. Now I havent read over the complete article, but Yahoo has some good articles on selecting the better domain name for the website. If you are interested in a good read, just click on the Yahoo add below.Domain name registration terms from 1-5 yearsEasy-to-use control panel with DNS managementDomain forwarding so you can point to an existing siteEmail forwarding to a free Yahoo! email address

Note: If you are serious about a web business, always register your domain for the maximum term. You would really be in a sore spot if you forgot about reregistering it a year from now. Go Ahead and sign up for the 5 Year discounted registration.

Yahoo! Domains: $4.98 for a Year

Yahoo! Domains: $4.98 for a Year

Recently I was in the market for and affordable and reliable domain name registrar. Something cheap but worthwhile. I was looking around and noticed that yahoo was doing a promotion and offering domain name registration at a very good price. $ 4.98. How can you beat that?

After looking things over a bit I then registered my new domain name through Yahoo. The truth was that the entire process could not have been easier. My domain was ready to go right away. I could not believe how smoothly things went.


Here are the good points regarding Yahoo Domain Registration:

Yahoo! Domains: $4.98 for a Year Yahoo! is running a deal where you can get a .com, .net, .org, .biz, .info, or .us for $4.98 a year. Yahoo!Domains include 24/7 support, web page and forwarding. The second best deal on the net was $8.95 from GoDaddy. The catch is: you can only sign-up for one domain and the offer is only available during the web browser session (when you click the special link at the end of this post) and ends if the you do not complete or interrupt the current order process. Go here for this deal.

For the most part this is a great service they are offering. "According to PC Magazine "domain registration through Yahoo! Small Business is the easiest."Yahoo! Domains Features$4.98 /year

- The most popular domain name extensions(.com, ,net, .org, .biz, .info, .us)
- 24-hour toll-free customer support
- Domain name registration terms from 1-5 years
- Easy-to-use control panel with DNS management
- Domain forwarding so you can point to an existing site
- Email forwarding to a free Yahoo! email address
- Bonus starter web page to post online until you are ready for a web site


Domain name registration

To create a web site or custom email address, you first need a domain name. A domain name, such as widget-designs.com, functions as your address on the Internet, just as 1234 Main Street serves as the address for your home.

Most people choose a domain name that reflects their business or organization name or personal interests. You should try to come up with a unique and concise name that is easy to say, remember, and spell. But don't worry, we have tools that will inspire your creativity or suggest names if you're stuck.

When you register a domain name, you can choose from an assortment of web address extensions, including .com, .net, .org, .info, .biz and .us. You can purchase just one, or return to purchase the rest later to protect your domain name from competitors.

Yahoo! Domains allows you to register a domain name for up to 5 years and offers all of the major domain name extensions at affordable prices. Here is a complete list of available extensions and their requirements.

DomainKeys: Proving and Protecting Email Sender Identity


DomainKeys: Proving and Protecting Email Sender Identity

Email spoofing - the forging of another person's or company's email address to get users to trust and open a message - is one of the biggest challenges facing both the Internet community and anti-spam technologists today. Without sender authentication, verification, and traceability, email providers can never know for certain if a message is legitimate or forged and will therefore have to continually make educated guesses on behalf of their users on what to deliver, what to block, and what to quarantine, in the pursuit of the best possible user experience.

DomainKeys is a technology proposal that can bring black and white back to this decision process by giving email providers a mechanism for verifying both the domain of each email sender and the integrity of the messages sent (i.e,. that they were not altered during transit). And, once the domain can be verified, it can be compared to the domain used by the sender in the From: field of the message to detect forgeries. If it's a forgery, then it's spam or fraud, and it can be dropped without impact to the user. If it's not a forgery, then the domain is known, and a persistent reputation profile can be established for that sending domain that can be tied into anti-spam policy systems, shared between service providers, and even exposed to the user.

For well-known companies that commonly send transactional email to consumers, such as banks, utilities, and ecommerce services, the benefits of verification are more profound, as it can help them protect their users from "phishing attacks" - the fraudulent solicitation for account information, such as credit card numbers and passwords, by impersonating the domain and email content of a company to which users have entrusted the storage of these data. For these companies, protecting their users from fraud emails translates directly into user protection, user satisfaction, reduced customer care costs, and brand protection.

For consumers, such as Yahoo! Mail users or a grandparent accessing email through a small mid-western ISP, industry support for sender authentication technologies will mean that they can start trusting email again, and it can resume its role as one of the most powerful communication tools of our times.


Standardization and License Terms

DKIM is the result of the ongoing commitment from numerous industry players to develop an open-standard e-mail authentication specification, and industry collaboration has played a critical role in the process. Industry leaders who played a valuable role in furthering the development of the DKIM specification include, Alt-N Technologies, AOL, Brandenburg Internetworking, Cisco, EarthLink, IBM, Microsoft, PGP Corporation, Sendmail, StrongMail Systems, Tumbleweed, VeriSign and Yahoo!. The participation of these companies has been instrumental in creating this single, signature-based e-mail authentication proposal. The authoring companies will continue to work with these organizations and the IETF on the standardization of the DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) specification so that industry-wide agreement on the best method for validating the identification of email senders can be reached. DomainKeys Identified Mail has begun advancing through the IETF Internet standards process to be ultimately approved as an IETF Internet Standard.

For historical reference, Yahoo! has submitted the DomainKeys framework as an Internet-Draft entitled "draft-delany-domainkeys-base-03.txt. Yahoo!'s DomainKeys Intellectual Property may be licensed under either of the following terms:

- Yahoo! DomainKeys Patent License Agreement
- GNU General Public License version 2.0 (and no other version)

Yahoo!'s DomainKeys Intellectual Property includes the following patent(s) and patent application(s).

A: U.S. Patent Number 6,986,049, issued January 10, 2006
B: U.S. Patent Application Serial Number 10/805,181, filed March 19, 2004
C: PCT Application PCT/US2004/007883, filed March 15, 2004
D: PCT Application PCT/US2005/008656, filed March 15, 2005

In accordance with RFC2026, Yahoo! has also submitted the above license statement to the IETF as an IPR Disclosure. Have license feedback?

Reference Implementation

In addition to the Internet-Draft, Yahoo! has developed a reference implementation for DomainKeys that can be plugged into Message Transfer Agents (MTAs), such as qmail. A version of this software has been released and is available at http://domainkeys.sourceforge.net/. Sendmail has developed a DomainKey implementation for their popular MTA (both the commercial and freeware versions). In fact, Sendmail, Inc. has released an open source implementation of the Yahoo! DomainKeys specification for testing on the Internet and is actively seeking participants and feedback for this Pilot Program.
How DomainKeys Works


How DomainKeys Works

How it Works - Sending ServersThere are two steps to signing an email with DomainKeys:
Set up: The domain owner (typically the team running the email systems within a company or service provider) generates a public/private key pair to use for signing all outgoing messages (multiple key pairs are allowed). The public key is published in DNS, and the private key is made available to their DomainKey-enabled outbound email servers. This is step "A" in the diagram to the right.

Signing: When each email is sent by an authorized end-user within the domain, the DomainKey-enabled email system automatically uses the stored private key to generate a digital signature of the message. This signature is then pre-pended as a header to the email, and the email is sent on to the target recipient's mail server. This is step "B" in the diagram to the right.
How it Works - Receiving ServersThere are three steps to verifying a signed email:
Preparing: The DomainKeys-enabled receiving email system extracts the signature and claimed From: domain from the email headers and fetches the public key from DNS for the claimed From: domain. This is step "C" in the diagram to the right.

Verifying: The public key from DNS is then used by the receiving mail system to verify that the signature was generated by the matching private key. This proves that the email was truly sent by, and with the permission of, the claimed sending From: domain and that its headers and content weren't altered during transfer.

Delivering: The receiving email system applies local policies based on the results of the signature test. If the domain is verified and other anti-spam tests don't catch it, the email can be delivered to the user's inbox. If the signature fails to verify, or there isn't one, the email can be dropped, flagged, or quarantined. This is step "D" in the diagram on the right. In general, Yahoo! expects that DomainKeys will be verified by the receiving email servers. However, end-user mail clients could also be modified to verify signatures and take action on the results.




How will this help stop spam?

Several ways. First, it can allow receiving companies to drop or quarantine unsigned email that comes from domains that are known to always sign their emails with DomainKeys, thus impacting spam and phishing attacks. Second, the ability to verify sender domain will allow email service providers to begin to build reputation databases that can be shared with the community and also applied to spam policy. For example, one ISP could share their "spam vs. legit email ratio" for the domain www.example.com with other ISPs that may not yet have built up information about the credibility and "spamminess" of email coming from www.example.com. Last, by eliminating forged From: addresses, we can bring server-level traceability back to email (not user-level - we believe that should be a policy of the provider and the choice of the user). Spammers don't want to be traced, so they will be forced to only spam companies that aren't using verification solutions.


How will this help stop fraud/phishing attacks?

Companies that are susceptible to phishing attacks can sign all of their outgoing emails with DomainKeys and then tell the world this policy so that email service providers can watch and drop any messages that claim to come from their domain that are unsigned. For example, if the company www.example.com signs all of its outgoing email with DomainKeys, Yahoo! can add a filter to its SpamGuard system that drops any unsigned or improperly signed messages claiming to come from the domain www.example.com, thus protecting tens of millions of example.com's customers or prospective customers from these phishing attacks.


Won't spammers just sign their messages with DomainKeys?

Hopefully! If they do, they'll make it easier for the Internet community to isolate and drop/quarantine their messages using the methods described above in "How will this help stop spam?" Eliminating the uncertainty of "did this email really come from the domain example.com?" will facilitate a whole range of anti-spam solutions.


What does DomainKeys verify?

DomainKeys examines the From: and Sender: headers' domain to protect the user and deliver the best possible user experience. Desktop mail clients like Microsoft Outlook show these headers in their user interfaces. If the user establishes their trust based on the these domains, then so should any system built to verify whether that trust is warranted.


Why sign the entire message?

DomainKeys signs the entire message to allow the receiving server to also verify that the message wasn't tampered with or altered in transit. By signing the headers and the body, DomainKeys makes it impossible to reuse parts of a message from a trusted source to fool users into believing the email is from that source.


Does DomainKeys encrypt each message?

DomainKeys does not encrypt the actual message - it only pre-pends a "digital signature" as a header.


What public/private key technology is used for DomainKeys?

DomainKeys currently uses an RSA public/private key method. The key length is decided by the domain owner.


Who issues the public/private key pairs required by DomainKeys?

The domain owner, or an agent or service provider acting on their behalf, should generate the key pairs that are used for their DomainKeys-enabled mail system.


Does DomainKeys require signing of the public key by a Certificate Authority (CA)?

DomainKeys does not require a CA. Much like a trusted Notary Public, Certificate Authorities are used in public/private key systems to sign, or "endorse," public keys so that the external users of public keys can know that the public keys they receive are truly owned by the people who sent them. Since DomainKeys leverages DNS as the public key distribution system, and since only a domain owner can publish to their DNS, external users of DomainKeys know that the public key they pull is truly for that domain. The CA is not needed to verify the owner of the public key - the presence in that domain's DNS is the verification. However, it is possible that Certificate Authorities may become a valuable addition to the DomainKeys solution to add an even greater level of security and trust.


How are DomainKeys revoked?

DomainKeys allows for multiple public keys to be published in DNS at the same time. This allows companies to use different key pairs for the various mail servers they run and also to easily revoke, replace, or expire keys at their convenience. Thus, the domain owner may revoke a public key and shift to signing with a new pair at any time.


Why not just use S/MIME?

S/MIME was developed for user-to-user message signing and encryption and by design should be independent of the sending and receiving servers. We believe that DomainKeys should be a natural server-to-server complement to S/MIME and not a replacement. Additionally, since S/MIME is used by many security-conscious industries, we need to ensure that the two technologies can work together without breaking each other. Finally, S/MIME is not yet supported by many of the email services, client software, and server software used across the Internet, and in Yahoo!'s opinion, that standardization effort would be much more difficult than the standardization of DomainKeys.


How does DomainKeys work with mailing lists?

Mailing lists that do not change the content or re-arrange or append headers will be DomainKey compatible with no changes required. Mailing lists that change the message and headers should re-sign the message with their own private key and claim authorship of the message.


Who implements DomainKeys?

DomainKeys will typically be implemented/enabled by the team within a company, ISP, or email service provider that deploys and runs the incoming and outgoing mail servers. Some companies may have service providers that handle their email. As MTA vendors add support for DomainKeys to their products, the implementation of DomainKeys will become simpler.



Which mail transfer agents (MTAs) support DomainKeys?

Sendmail has released a milter implementation for both the commercial and freeware versions of their MTA. A Qmail patch, an Exim version as well as a qpsmtpd plugin are also available. CERN, the creators of the WWW has released a C# library for use in MS Exchange 2003. Port 25's PowerMTA, Etype.net's acSMTP, ActivSoftware's XMServer, OmniTI's Ecelerity, StrongMail, Alt-N Technology's MDaemon MTA for Windows, Postfix, Communigate Pro, IronPort, and Merak Mail all have DomainKey versions of their software. Finally, Yahoo! has released an open source reference implementation for DomainKeys that can be plugged into other MTAs.

How do I deploy DomainKeys?

After installing a DomainKey aware MTA, there are several key distribution options from which to choose. Once chosen, the public key portion should be published to your domain's _domainkey subdomain's TXT record, and the private key inserted into your MTA. You can test your DNS record policy and selector, and there are several autoresponding email addresses to test your implementations.


I don't use my domain's SMTP server to send email. How do I use DomainKeys?

DomainKeys relies on the domain administrator to authorize the use of the domain in an email. If you can not use the domain's authorized SMTP server because of port 25 blocking, you have a number of options.

- You should encourage your domain to accept submission services on port 587. Your domain administrator should try to control authorization of the domain. Giving users a path to submit mail will help do this. Yahoo! Mail recently began offering a submission server on port 587.

- You may be able to convince the domain administrator to grant you a user specific key. With a DomainKey, it should be possible to sign your messages using your mail client or any submission server. In fact, you could ask your submission service if you could give them a private key to use to sign your domain's mail.

- You could consider using other headers to convey your identity. For instance, the Reply-to: header allows a recipient's mail client to choose an address to which replies should be sent. The Sender: header defines the address that injects the message into the SMTP stream. You might consider sending your message From: your domain, with the Sender: header set to the address of your submission service. Be aware however, that this strategy may be viewed suspiciously by anti-spam filters, as it may become a tactic for spammers and phishers.

- Finally, you could choose to send unauthenticated mail. While this will not be a good long term strategy, it will certainly take quite a while before the vast majority of Internet email is authenticated. If you choose this path, you should carefully monitor the amount of authenticated mail over time to ensure that this strategy does not impact the deliverability of your email.


How can I send you feedback?

Yahoo! welcomes your feedback on DomainKeys. You agree that Yahoo! shall own and have the right to use, without attribution or compensation to you, all feedback received by Yahoo!, in any form, to improve or modify DomainKeys or otherwise. Please use this email form to submit your comments. Note that due to the volume of emails we receive, it is unlikely that we'll be able to respond to your individual emails.
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