“The .au direct names are general purpose – they’re open to anyone with a verified connection to Australia who wants to create or manage an online presence for themselves or their organisation,” auDA said.
“To be eligible for a .au direct name, you must have a verifiable Australian presence, which includes being a citizen or permanent resident, or being an organisation registered in Australia.”
A domain name ending in the .au namespace (com.au, .net.au, .org.au, .edu.au etc.) indicates the business, organisation or individual using it has a connection to Australia.
There are also specific rules around whether businesses can register domains in the .au namespace.
“You will be able to register new names via any participating .au accredited registrar in accordance with the .au Licensing Rules, as long as you are eligible to register the domain name,” auDA said.
“Exact matches will be put on Priority Hold for the Priority Application Period to prevent them from being registered by others and to enable existing registrants the first opportunity to register (Priority Status) the exact match of their existing domain names.
“You’ll be able to apply for the exact match .au direct domain name via a participating .au accredited registrar.”
“In some cases, there also may be more than one applicant for the same .au direct domain name as there are different registrants that hold the same domain name licence in different namespaces. In these cases, the .au direct exact match will be allocated according to our Priority Allocation Process.”