Why was the top level domain .co.uk used instead of .uk?

How to safely register a .no or .no.com top-level domain, or any other country code TLD?

• How to safely register a .no or .no.com top-level domain, or any other country code TLD? It looks like in order to register a .no.com top-level domain, you need to be incorporated in Norway. I have found several registrars who are incorporated in Norway that offer to register a domain on my behalf. My questions are: how can I prevent them from a) stealing my domain outright, or b) waiting until my domain expires then not allow me to renew it and keep it? Are there any known trustworthy registrars for .no and .no.com domains? How should I go about verifying the integrity of these foreign companies in future cases? (Also, are there any forums where I can ask questions like this? I use superuser.com for most computer issues, but they do not answer non-hardware/software questions)

• Answer:

  It's possible to register a Norwegian branch office of a company registered just about anywhere in the world (http://www.norid.no/regelverk/vedlegg-e.en.html or NUF). In that case, you would own the domain, nobody else. Regarding http://www.norid.no/regelverk/index.en.html: The contact information for http://www.norid.no/domenenavnbaser/whois/index.php3?charset=UTF-8&query=hotmail.no&sok=s%C3%83%C2%B8k (the Norwegian website for Hotmail.com) is to a law firm in Oslo. If you want to go this route, it seems it will cost NOK 2500 to http://translate.google.com/translate?js=y&prev=_t&hl=no&ie=UTF-8&layout=1&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nufselskap.org%2Fnuf-selskap-hjelp.php&sl=no&tl=en your NUF company in the Norwegian business register + potential additional costs every year for paperwork to keep your company in the register. (The Google translation of the linked webpage is not 100% perfect...) I have found several registrars who are incorporated in Norway that offer to register a domain on my behalf. This is actually against the current rules from NORID, and you might risk (at least in theory) that NORID decides to delete your registration of the domain name and offer it to the public. The largest registrars in Norway, such as Active24, do not offer this service. .no.com is not a Norwegian TLD, it's a part of .com. The domain http://www.who.is/whois/no.com/ is owned by Network Solutions. (Btw, unlike the Norwegian .no domain, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.is is now open for everybody in the world, without restrictions. Example: the domain http://www.who.is/whois/who.is/ is owned by an American company.)