ICANN Publishes Universal Acceptance Expert Working Group Guidelines
09-Sep-2026
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Source : The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)
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Visits : 75
LOS ANGELES - The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) published the Guidelines for Advancing Universal Acceptance (UA) Adoption, developed by the Universal Acceptance Expert Working Group (UA EWG), according to the official website of ICANN.
Established in August 2025 by ICANN President and CEO Kurtis Lindqvist, the UA EWG is tasked with developing guidelines to guide ICANN's work in advancing UA adoption based on the scope defined in its charter. The guidelines build on extensive collaboration among subject-matter experts and community representatives from across the ICANN community.
Following publication of the draft guidelines for Public Comment from 23 February through 13 April 2026, the UA EWG reviewed the input and updated the document where appropriate before finalizing the guidelines. The community broadly supported the direction and structure of the guidelines while providing constructive suggestions to strengthen implementation and prioritization.
UA is the principle that all valid domain names and email addresses – regardless of script, language, or character length – should be accepted, validated, stored, processed, and displayed correctly by all Internet-enabled applications, devices, and systems. Advancing UA is essential to enabling a truly multilingual Internet and supports ICANN's Strategic Plan for FY26–30 as well as the New gTLD Program: 2026 Round.
The final document provides strategic and practical guidelines for a range of stakeholders, including technology companies, standards organizations, software developers, open-source communities, the Domain Name System industry, hosting and Internet service providers, governments, intergovernmental organizations, and academia. The document also outlines a framework for measuring progress across awareness, policy support, implementation, and capacity development to help assess the effectiveness of UA adoption efforts over time.
The publication of these guidelines marks an important milestone in ICANN's ongoing work to enable UA. ICANN org will use the guidelines to inform its future UA work, share plans, and continue collaborating with the global Internet community to advance UA adoption worldwide.