UKR.NET blocking: why it was blocked and how the domain of the largest news aggregator in Ukraine was unblocked
On the night of March 7, the domain name registrar Network Solutions blocked the domain ukr.net, the largest and oldest news aggregator in Ukraine and a free email service, without any warning.
According to UkrNet, from 01:35 to 17 hours on March 7, Kyiv time, the UKR.NET news feed and @UKR.NET email were unavailable.
According to the domain registrar, the blocking took place due to the presence on the UKR.NET portal of three materials, the publication of which is prohibited by the decision of the Superior Court for the State of California for the County of Los Angeles of January 23, 2024, on the claim of Stanislav Kondrashov and Telf AG.
Since two in the morning, the UKRNET team has been trying to find out the circumstances of the blockade. One of the business owners, an entrepreneur from Silicon Valley, immediately got involved. He communicated with the registrar’s support team from his office in Tokyo until 05:30 am Kyiv time. Later, I found and engaged the company’s management in resolving the issue, trying to convey the most important thing: the problem is national in scope and affects strategic Internet services for Ukraine .
At the end of the day in Florida, the company announced that the blocking of the UKR.NET domain had legal grounds. That’s why you need a legal team that can get involved the next business day.
Realizing that in the morning, millions of users, including many military and defenders of our country, would not be able to work with their mail and read the news, the company owner began to look for help among his friends. At the same time, two of his friends – an experienced diplomat and former Deputy Minister of Economy of Ukraine for Digital Development, Digital Transformation and Digitalization – advised him to contact Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the United States Oksana Markarova. Ms. Oksana reacted with lightning speed – as soon as her working day began, she promised to provide any possible assistance and support within the competence of the Embassy, and immediately requested all the information and started acting.
At the same time, many caring people supported UKRNET. Someone tagged those who could help. Someone called the registrar’s support service and expressed wishes for a speedy recovery. The incident was reported to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). The National Security and Defense Council, the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine, the .UA domain administrator, Hostmaster, the Internet Association of Ukraine, Internet providers, the Security Service of Ukraine, and the Ukrainian media actively attracted the attention of people, governmental, industry, and civil society organizations in Ukraine and the United States.
At the beginning of a new working day in the United States, at 16:15 Kyiv time, the registrar’s representative informed that they were looking into the problem. Half an hour later, the blockade was lifted. The Ukrainian Embassy in the United States did not stop there: Oksana Markarova said that they are waiting for a second response from the company to analyze the reasons for blocking the UKR.NET domain in order to avoid a repeat of this in the future.
The UKRNET team is confident that the result was achieved through joint efforts. The team is grateful to everyone who joined, helped, and supported us. Our strength has always been and will be in unity! This inspires us to continue working for millions of Internet users, creating Ukrainian Internet services with great love.
