What are Domain auctions?

Hundreds or even thousands of domains that have not been renewed are deleted every day. This happens because the original holder did not renew them and they are therefore released for re-registration. The most attractive deleted domains were often fought over, which, due to technical and administrative limitations on access to the registry, could only take place among a handful of interested parties. For this reason, CZ.NIC decided to open the market of deleted domains to everyone and offer the released domains at auction.

Any person from the Czech Republic or any other EU country with a sufficiently verified identity can access the auctions. For natural persons residing in the Czech Republic, it is a MojeID account linked to public administration services with a minimum level of “substantial”. For legal entities, it is a validated MojeID account. For natural persons from other EU Member States, an electronic identity with a minimum level of assurance of “substantial” according to the eIDAS Regulation is required. The same conditions apply to all bidders. The object of the auction is the priority right to register the domain, not the domain itself. List of registrars supporting direct registration of a domain with priority right can be found here. The domain must be registered to the contact identifier that won the auction.

For the maximum protection of eligible domain holders, but also for increased assurance of future bidders, the auction is preceded by a protection period, after which the deleted domain is listed in the public list. This period follows the original life cycle of the domain at its end, after the protection period has expired and the domain is no longer functional. All deleted domains will enter the auction, unless prevented by a Czech court order.