Emma Okonji
The latest figures released by the Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NiRA), the organisation in charge of managing Nigeria’s country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD), which is the .ng domain name for Nigeria, showed an improvement in the registration, renewal and restoration.
The figures, which THISDAY obtained from the official website of NiRA, showed a slight increase in Nigeria’s domain name registration, renewal and restoration from 178,079 in January 2022 to 178,755 in February 2022.
THISDAY had last month, exclusively reported a drop in .ng domain name registration and renewal, which NiRA attributed to the adverse effect of COVID-19 that paralysed businesses 2021.
According to NiRA: “In 2020, Nigeria experienced an increase in the number of registration for country code Top Level Domain Name (ccTLD) but in 2021, the number of registration dropped because of the effect of COVID-19 pandemic. The drop in domain name registration in 2021 was not peculiar to the Nigerian market because it was a global issue caused by the effect of COVID-19.”
Giving reasons for the slight increase in domain name registration and renewal in the month of February 2022, the President of NiRA, Mr. Mohammed Rudman, told THISDAY, that all those who hitherto could not use and could not renew their domain name registration last year, have started renewing this year as the effect of the pandemic has started subsiding. “The effect of COVID-19 pandemic is subsiding and nations are beginning to relax some restriction measures about COVID-19, as businesses have started picking up gradually. I am certain that the number of .ng domain name registration and renewal will further improve in the coming months as more businesses resume full scale operations,” Rudman said.
From the recent figures released by NiRA and obtained by THISDAY, the total number of active domain names for the second level domain names, increased slightly from 53,999 in January 2022, to 56,191 in February 2022.
According to the figures, in February 2022, the total number of registration of .ng domain names was 5,327, while the total number of renewal of .ng domain names was 4,312. The total number of restoration within the same period was 132, while the numbers of active domain names for 3rd and 2nd level domain names were 122,564 and 56,191 respectively, bringing the total number of domain names registration, renewal and restoration in February 2022, to 178,755, which is an improvement from the 178,079 that was recorded in January 2022.
The .ng domain name is Nigeria’s identity in the cyberspace. While the Nigerian cyberspace identity ends with .ng, the cyberspace identity for the United States of America ends with .com, Canada with .ca and United Kingdom with .uk. These cyberspace identities are used on the super-highway internet.
Addressing the importance of internet to any nation, Rudman said one of the major advantages of the internet is that it could quickly link people from all over the world. “You can be in New York and communicate with friends in London, shop at a Tokyo-based online business or conduct research at a German-based learning facility. In the digital age, the world has suddenly become much smaller. Communicating, connecting, and sharing with individuals from all over the world has never been easier,” Rudman said.
He however stressed the need for domain name owners to begin web hosting of their domain names in Nigeria, instead of the usual practice of hosting web-based internet data and traffic outside of the country.
“People might be wondering why a local web host is preferable. After all, web hosting companies effectively provide the same service, as their counterparts outside the country. I will like to remind domain owners that there are unique benefits to using a local web hosting company,” Rudman added.
Highlighting the importance of local web hosting, Rudman said: “One of the most notable advantages of having website hosted on a server in a local region is that it will enable the website load faster. Although the disparity in loading times between a local server and one located halfway around the world is mostly a fraction of a second, it could have a massive effect on how consumers engage with your site.”
In the area of support, Rudman said domain name owners would receive more support from local web hosting than those hosted outside of the country.
“Even with top-ranking companies in the world, things can go wrong with web hosting. Servers could go down or even crash for a variety of reasons, causing a lot of issues with how data is delivered. A local hosting company will almost always provide a more prompt and personalised solution. Customer service personnel located on other continents for example, could delay access to the solution required, due to time zone differences,” Rudman said.
