ABSTRACT
A user of the World Wide Web requests a web page from a server, which then has to be sent back to the user's computer. This requires both the server and the user's computer to be uniquely identifiable, to have a unique address. A web site is a series of files on a computer on the Internet that can be accessed by anyone via the Internet. It will be apparent, therefore, that in order to receive e-mail on the Internet and in order to establish a web site on the Internet a domain name is needed. The domain name system works by allowing Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and subsidiary bodies to have access to root servers, which maintain databases of addresses. In 1998, allocation of domain names was granted to the ICANN, a not-for-profit corporation incorporated in the United States, on a more formal basis than previously.
