ICANN receives application to make .lan a real top-level domain
New gTLD Application for .lan
Coffee Danger, LLC has applied to ICANN for the .lan gTLD, according to a new application details page. The string .lan has long been used informally for local network addressing, but this filing would put it into the global DNS. The application is active and in pre-evaluation processing, with no comment period yet.
Application Status: Active
- mzajc
Posting because OpenWRT, possibly others as well, assign .lan names to devices on the LAN by default. People who make use of this might want to follow the application, and, if it goes through, either change the name or make sure queries can't get incorrectly get sent to upstream resolvers.
Regarding that last point, I've had issues with dnsmasq in the past where it was remotely resolving domains even when they were configured to resolve locally. For .lan domains, this could be disastrous because I often send plaintext traffic to them. I did submit a fix/workaround[0], but it's still something to look out for. If anyone knows more about this issue or other ways queries could leak, please share!
- alwa
This seems like a good time to educate myself about the application (and objection) process.
The bureaucracy seems precision-engineered to stultify, but apparently the public have 104 days after “String Confirmation Day” (17th Nov; capitalization theirs) to lodge objections, assuming the “GAC” doesn’t beat them to it…
https://newgtldprogram.icann.org/en/application-rounds/round...
…of course there’s a “filing fee,” priced in “hours of a panel of lawyers’ time,” to lodge such an objection…
https://newgtldprogram-2026-agb.icann.org/en/8-module-4-comm...
…welp, hope somebody more organized (and better-funded) than I can organize an objection. Much as I feel like I’m giving up my right to gripe by assuming somebody else will come along to do the weeding.
- Faelian2
It's a shame that ICANN did get so greedy and put everyone at risk.
Having internal domain names owned by some guy on the internet has already compromised multiple corporate networks. See the talk from this guy:
https://www.romhack.io/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Internal-D...
- sidneythekidney
I guess https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc6762#appendix-G should be updated
- dwedge
This being on the front page at the same time as the coffee machine sending 1TB of data, and the icann application being submitted by Coffee Danger LLC is just beautiful
- vekntksijdhric
This is a security issue for many devices. What could possibly go wrong overriding a tld used for internal networking....
- sybercecurity
Full collection of proposed new gTLDs: https://newgtldprogram-aps.icann.org/statistics
Also see a .bldg application, which also might conflict with some legacy naming schemes.
- yegle
> RFC 8375 defines the intranet domain as .home.arpa, but ICANN in 2024 says it should use .internal instead. Is ICANN not choosing .lan or .home because these two domains might still fetch a good price?
My tweet on Sep 26, 2026