syn·site

BIOT has its own laws and
Administration, which is led by a Commissioner, with the support of an Administrator, both of whom
are based in London.

Paul Kane is chief executive of the British technology firm CommunityDNS and is one of seven people entrusted with a credit card like key to restart portions of the World Wide Web or internet which are secured with DNSSEC, after a catastrophic event such as a major security breach or terrorist attack. If such a situation arises, five keyholders will travel to the United States to meet up and restart the DNSSEC system.

None of this history is visible from .io, which was assigned to Internet Computer Bureau Ltd, a small company based in Bournemouth, UK, in 1997. Before 1998, the domain name system was administered by Jon Postel at the University of Southern California, and its decisions were not a matter of public record (see the story of .scot for more on the history of DNS). ICB Director Paul Kane is also a DNSSEC “keyholder”, one of seven people around the world entrusted with ensuring the security of the domain name system, who meet in California every few months to reissue the cryptographic codes which keep the web running. (Read James Ball’s article on the keyholders at the Guardian).

Paul Kane has previously described domain names as “national assets” and ICB has been at the forefront of the privatisation of these assets, being the registrar for .ac and .sh, the ccTLDs for the British territories of Ascension Island and St Helena in the South Atlantic, as well as .tm, the ccTLD for the oppressive, autocratic nation of Turkmenistan. Responding to questions from Gigaom in 2014, Kane claimed that “profits are distributed to the authorities for them to operate services as they see fit” and that “Each of the overseas territories has an account and the funds are deposited there because obviously the territories have expenses that they incur and it’s offsetting that.”

None of this history is visible from .io, which was assigned to Internet Computer Bureau Ltd, a small company based in Bournemouth, UK, in 1997. Before 1998, the domain name system was administered by Jon Postel at the University of Southern California, and its decisions were not a matter of public record (see the story of .scot for more on the history of DNS). ICB Director Paul Kane is also a DNSSEC “keyholder”, one of seven people around the world entrusted with ensuring the security of the domain name system, who meet in California every few months to reissue the cryptographic codes which keep the web running. (Read James Ball’s article on the keyholders at the Guardian).

Paul Kane has previously described domain names as “national assets” and ICB has been at the forefront of the privatisation of these assets, being the registrar for .ac and .sh, the ccTLDs for the British territories of Ascension Island and St Helena in the South Atlantic, as well as .tm, the ccTLD for the oppressive, autocratic nation of Turkmenistan. Responding to questions from Gigaom in 2014, Kane claimed that “profits are distributed to the authorities for them to operate services as they see fit” and that “Each of the overseas territories has an account and the funds are deposited there because obviously the territories have expenses that they incur and it’s offsetting that.”

I can confirm that the FCO does hold information relevant to your requests.
As your requests relate to same or similar information we are aggregating them for the purposes of Regulation 5 of the Limits and Fees Regulations 2004 and Section 12 of FOIA. Section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act makes provision for public authorities to refuse requests for information where the cost of dealing with them would exceed the appropriate
limit. The limit has been specified in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004. For central government the appropriate limit is set at £600. This represents the estimated cost of one or more persons spending 3 ½ working days in determining whether the Department holds the information, and locating, retrieving and extracting it. Your requests as presently formulated are widely-framed and I estimate that it will take more than 3 ½ working days to locate, retrieve and extract this information. In these circumstances we are not obliged under the Act to comply with your requests.

Fishing: Fishing is a popular activity in Diego Garcia. Whether it is trolling for Yellowfin Tuna and Wahoo to bottom fishing for Grouper Sea Bass or Red Snapper, to a relaxing day of casting from the shore, you’ll probably not find a better place to fish in the world.

.IO
"Innovation. Online."
"Powering the Next Generation"

"Footprint of Freedom"
"One Island, One Team, One Mission"
"Best Kept Secret in the Navy"

The mission of the U.S. Navy Support Facility Diego Garcia is “To provide logistic support to operational forces forward deployed to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf AORs in support of national policy objectives.” NAVSUPPFAC Diego Garcia occupies a critical part on the “tip of the spear” for U.S. military forces by supporting a multitude of unique and challenging mission requirements. Our motto and mission focus is “ONE ISLAND, ONE TEAM, ONE MISSION.”

As of late, the ccTLD .io has become a center of money laundering and crypto currency criminal activity potentially involving tens of millions of pounds. The interest of the FCO and Internet Computer Bureau in avoiding public scrutiny of their relationship and/or potential embarassment does not outweigh the public interest.

.IO
"Innovation. Online."
"Powering the Next Generation"

"Footprint of Freedom"
"One Island, One Team, One Mission"
"Best Kept Secret in the Navy"

The mission of the U.S. Navy Support Facility Diego Garcia is “To provide logistic support to operational forces forward deployed to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf AORs in support of national policy objectives.” NAVSUPPFAC Diego Garcia occupies a critical part on the “tip of the spear” for U.S. military forces by supporting a multitude of unique and challenging mission requirements. Our motto and mission focus is “ONE ISLAND, ONE TEAM, ONE MISSION.”

"Islands of Shame: The Secret History of the U.S. Military Base on Diego Garcia", by David Vine

.io is a place, but you can’t go there, unless you’re serving in the military, sailing your own yacht, or in chains. The only way the rest of us can reach it is through the internet. sure.io is the telecommunications provider to Diego Garcia, and their network is the only accessible one on the islands: the only .io server registered in BIOT itself. The only thing that can touch it is a traceroute, a log of the waypoints along a data path:

British Representative
British Indian Ocean Territory
Fax: +44(0)20 7008 1589
Tel: +44(0)20 7008 2961 or 2890

Address:
British Indian Ocean Territory Administration
King Charles street
London SW1A2AH

Concerns over the current level of protection afforded
to the Chagos Islands were also high, so on 1 April 2010 the UK established a no-take MPA
around the Chagos Islands, twice the size of Great Britain, prohibiting the extraction of any
living resources within the area. The designation of the MPA coincided nicely with the 2010
General Elections, and was hailed as a ‘demonstration of the UK government’s commitment
to environmental stewardship’, and praised by many groups including the Chagos Conservation Trust, Marine Conservation Society and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.
However, the success of such a large no-take MPA relies solely on the fact that the Chagos Islands are uninhabited and free from human interference. The lack of a permanent community living on the Islands is not a natural phenomenon. Rather, the islands are uninhabited due to the removal of the Chagossians in the recent past.

What are the registration requirements for .IO domains?
There are no restrictions in buying .IO domains.
What does .IO stand for?
.IO represents the official domain extension or the internet country code top level domain (ccTLD) of British Indian Ocean Territory. NIC.IO is the authorized body for carrying out its registry and administration. The domain is currently being treated by Google as a generic top level domain since webmasters and internet users don’t consider it as a country code domain.

Aside from Indian Ocean, IO is also used as an acronym for other words. Other popular meanings of IO include: input/output (computing), interest only (accounting), information online (internet), information operation (military), instant offense (police), India Office (government) and investor optimum (stocks).
Why register a .IO domain?
British Indian Ocean Territory is a territory of the United Kingdom located between Indonesia and Tanzania. Commercial fishing is the primary source of revenues amounting to one million US dollars per annum. Agricultural or industrial activities do not exist. Construction projects for defense facilities are carried out by contractual workers from the Philippines and Mauritius. Currently, there are less than 5000 civilians and military personnel living in the islands.

Although BIOT is not a tourist destination and is also not a place for making investments, there are plenty of reasons why .IO is a profitable domain suffix for your website.
It is ideal for companies wanting to register a domain name that is already taken in .COM or is being sold at a hefty price. The keyword that you want to use for your website name is likely still available in .IO.
Although IO is a ccTLD, Google does not treat it like one because majority of websites using this country code are not relevant to Indian Ocean. If your company is not exactly targeting consumers in IO (the population there is very low), IO domain is a good substitute for generic TLDS like .COM, .NET or .ORG.
IO is good for domain hacking. There are other popular meanings of IO aside from Indian Ocean. If your business is engaged in any of those possible IO definitions, you may take advantage of that.
Using IO for global targeting is ideal. In contrast to other ccTLDs which are useful for local targeting, IO domain suffix does not have any effect on local search results. Using this country code does not mean that most of your traffic will come from British Indian Ocean. This is good if your goal is to generate traffic from all over the world and not just from a specific location.
IO is ideal for companies engaged in technology, software or computing. For some reason, webmasters and internet users associate IO to IT (information technology) probably because most websites using this domain extension are related to file or media converter.

BIOT has its own laws and
Administration, which is led by a Commissioner, with the support of an Administrator, both of whom
are based in London.

BIOT has its own laws and Administration, which is led by a Commissioner, with the support of an Administrator, both of whom are based in London.

.io is a place, but you can’t go there, unless you’re serving in the military, sailing your own yacht, or in chains. The only way the rest of us can reach it is through the internet. sure.io is the telecommunications provider to Diego Garcia, and their network is the only accessible one on the islands: the only .io server registered in BIOT itself. The only thing that can touch it is a traceroute, a log of the waypoints along a data path:

Mr Tyrie: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs which Government Department or Office keeps a list of flights which passed through Diego Garcia from January 2002 to January 2009. [203500]

Mark Simmonds: Records on flight departures and arrivals on Diego Garcia are held by the British Indian Ocean Territory immigration authorities. Daily occurrence logs, which record the flights landing and taking off, cover the period since 2003. Though there are some limited records from 2002, I understand they are incomplete due to water damage.

BIOT has its own laws and Administration, which is led by a Commissioner, with the support of an Administrator, both of whom are based in London.

The current registrar of the .io zone is the Internet Computer Bureau and was assigned to it in 1997. The Internet Computer Bureau is a small company operating out of Bournemouth, UK. All .io registrations are ultimately done with the authority of the ICB.

Despite the fact that the .io extension was initially made for the BIOT, the only website actually registered in BIOT with this extension is sure.com, the only network provider in the area. A simple traceroute will show the list of IP addresses leading there. Most of the websites listed with the .io extension happen to be technology startups or blogs of one kind or another. From Bitcoin blogs to SaaS websites, to device manufacturers, .io has become the home for tech.

I can confirm that the FCO does hold information relevant to your requests.
As your requests relate to same or similar information we are aggregating them for the purposes of Regulation 5 of the Limits and Fees Regulations 2004 and Section 12 of FOIA. Section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act makes provision for public authorities to refuse requests for information where the cost of dealing with them would exceed the appropriate
limit. The limit has been specified in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004. For central government the appropriate limit is set at £600. This represents the estimated cost of one or more persons spending 3 ½ working days in determining whether the Department holds the information, and locating, retrieving and extracting it. Your requests as presently formulated are widely-framed and I estimate that it will take more than 3 ½ working days to locate, retrieve and extract this information. In these circumstances we are not obliged under the Act to comply with your requests.

The Chagos Marine Protected Area, located in the central Indian Ocean in the British Indian Ocean Territory of the United Kingdom, is one of the world's largest marine protected areas, and one of the largest protected areas of any type (land or sea) on Earth. It was established by the British government on 1 April 2010 as a massive, contiguous, no-take marine reserve, it encompasses 640,000 square kilometres (250,000 sq mi) of ocean waters, including roughly 70 small islands and seven atolls of the Chagos Archipelago.

What are the registration requirements for .IO domains?
There are no restrictions in buying .IO domains.
What does .IO stand for?
.IO represents the official domain extension or the internet country code top level domain (ccTLD) of British Indian Ocean Territory. NIC.IO is the authorized body for carrying out its registry and administration. The domain is currently being treated by Google as a generic top level domain since webmasters and internet users don’t consider it as a country code domain.

Aside from Indian Ocean, IO is also used as an acronym for other words. Other popular meanings of IO include: input/output (computing), interest only (accounting), information online (internet), information operation (military), instant offense (police), India Office (government) and investor optimum (stocks).
Why register a .IO domain?
British Indian Ocean Territory is a territory of the United Kingdom located between Indonesia and Tanzania. Commercial fishing is the primary source of revenues amounting to one million US dollars per annum. Agricultural or industrial activities do not exist. Construction projects for defense facilities are carried out by contractual workers from the Philippines and Mauritius. Currently, there are less than 5000 civilians and military personnel living in the islands.

Although BIOT is not a tourist destination and is also not a place for making investments, there are plenty of reasons why .IO is a profitable domain suffix for your website.
It is ideal for companies wanting to register a domain name that is already taken in .COM or is being sold at a hefty price. The keyword that you want to use for your website name is likely still available in .IO.
Although IO is a ccTLD, Google does not treat it like one because majority of websites using this country code are not relevant to Indian Ocean. If your company is not exactly targeting consumers in IO (the population there is very low), IO domain is a good substitute for generic TLDS like .COM, .NET or .ORG.
IO is good for domain hacking. There are other popular meanings of IO aside from Indian Ocean. If your business is engaged in any of those possible IO definitions, you may take advantage of that.
Using IO for global targeting is ideal. In contrast to other ccTLDs which are useful for local targeting, IO domain suffix does not have any effect on local search results. Using this country code does not mean that most of your traffic will come from British Indian Ocean. This is good if your goal is to generate traffic from all over the world and not just from a specific location.
IO is ideal for companies engaged in technology, software or computing. For some reason, webmasters and internet users associate IO to IT (information technology) probably because most websites using this domain extension are related to file or media converter.

Concerns over the current level of protection afforded
to the Chagos Islands were also high, so on 1 April 2010 the UK established a no-take MPA
around the Chagos Islands, twice the size of Great Britain, prohibiting the extraction of any
living resources within the area. The designation of the MPA coincided nicely with the 2010
General Elections, and was hailed as a ‘demonstration of the UK government’s commitment
to environmental stewardship’, and praised by many groups including the Chagos Conservation Trust, Marine Conservation Society and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.
However, the success of such a large no-take MPA relies solely on the fact that the Chagos Islands are uninhabited and free from human interference. The lack of a permanent community living on the Islands is not a natural phenomenon. Rather, the islands are uninhabited due to the removal of the Chagossians in the recent past.

Mr Tyrie: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs which Government Department or Office keeps a list of flights which passed through Diego Garcia from January 2002 to January 2009. [203500]

Mark Simmonds: Records on flight departures and arrivals on Diego Garcia are held by the British Indian Ocean Territory immigration authorities. Daily occurrence logs, which record the flights landing and taking off, cover the period since 2003. Though there are some limited records from 2002, I understand they are incomplete due to water damage.

"Islands of Shame: The Secret History of the U.S. Military Base on Diego Garcia", by David Vine

As of late, the ccTLD .io has become a center of money laundering and crypto currency criminal activity potentially involving tens of millions of pounds. The interest of the FCO and Internet Computer Bureau in avoiding public scrutiny of their relationship and/or potential embarassment does not outweigh the public interest.

Fishing: Fishing is a popular activity in Diego Garcia. Whether it is trolling for Yellowfin Tuna and Wahoo to bottom fishing for Grouper Sea Bass or Red Snapper, to a relaxing day of casting from the shore, you’ll probably not find a better place to fish in the world.

The current registrar of the .io zone is the Internet Computer Bureau and was assigned to it in 1997. The Internet Computer Bureau is a small company operating out of Bournemouth, UK. All .io registrations are ultimately done with the authority of the ICB.

Despite the fact that the .io extension was initially made for the BIOT, the only website actually registered in BIOT with this extension is sure.com, the only network provider in the area. A simple traceroute will show the list of IP addresses leading there. Most of the websites listed with the .io extension happen to be technology startups or blogs of one kind or another. From Bitcoin blogs to SaaS websites, to device manufacturers, .io has become the home for tech.

British Representative
British Indian Ocean Territory
Fax: +44(0)20 7008 1589
Tel: +44(0)20 7008 2961 or 2890

Address:
British Indian Ocean Territory Administration
King Charles street
London SW1A2AH

Paul Kane is chief executive of the British technology firm CommunityDNS and is one of seven people entrusted with a credit card like key to restart portions of the World Wide Web or internet which are secured with DNSSEC, after a catastrophic event such as a major security breach or terrorist attack. If such a situation arises, five keyholders will travel to the United States to meet up and restart the DNSSEC system.

The Chagos Marine Protected Area, located in the central Indian Ocean in the British Indian Ocean Territory of the United Kingdom, is one of the world's largest marine protected areas, and one of the largest protected areas of any type (land or sea) on Earth. It was established by the British government on 1 April 2010 as a massive, contiguous, no-take marine reserve, it encompasses 640,000 square kilometres (250,000 sq mi) of ocean waters, including roughly 70 small islands and seven atolls of the Chagos Archipelago.