ICANN Weighs Policy Shift to Target Entire Abuse Domain Portfolios, Not Just Single Domains

Since April 2024, ICANN's Registrar Accreditation Agreement has required registrars to investigate and mitigate only the specific domain named in an abuse complaint, resulting in over 25,000 domains actioned across nearly 530 investigations. Critics argue this one-domain-at-a-time model fails to address coordinated abuse campaigns, which typically operate across portfolios of dozens or hundreds of domains registered through shared accounts or identities. ICANN's DNS Abuse Small Team identified this accountability gap as a top priority in late 2025, noting that mitigating a single domain leaves the broader operation intact. In response, a working group established under a GNSO Council charter adopted in January 2026 is developing a proposal called Associated Domain Checks, which would require registrars to evaluate other domains linked to a confirmed abuser via defined signals. As of mid-2026, the group remains divided on key questions, including what threshold should trigger such checks and whether they must occur before or after the initial domain is mitigated.