Prague, 19 May 2009 – As a Presiding Country of the European Union, the Czech Republic participates in the expansion of the DNSSEC security technology. This is also documented by the implementation of this technology for the domain symbolising our current position in the European Union; as from today, DNSSEC protects the Internet domain eu2009.cz.
“The domain name system (DNS) is the cornerstone of the troublefree functioning of the Internet. The DNSSEC technology is able to protect the system against attacks and tampering with the data stored in DNS. Therefore, we appreciate that the technology protects also the domain of the Czech Presidency of the Council of the European Union eu2009.cz,” said Veronika Cvejnová, Chief Editor of the Presidency Portal. “The Czech Republic was one of the first countries that have implemented the DNSSEC technology for the purpose of the protection of its national domain. In terms of the discussion concerning the matter at the international level, it is also important that Sweden, taking over the Presidency of the European Union from the Czech Republic, was the first country in the world to use DNSSEC for the protection of the Swedish top level domain. It is then probable that the representatives of the Scandinavian country will continue promoting DNSSEC among other countries. The third European country using DNSSEC is Bulgaria.”
“As of today, the Office of the Government of the Czech Republic joins other organisations and companies that have already used the technology in the Czech Republic,” said Ondřej Filip, CEO of CZ.NIC. “At this moment, the implementation of DNSSEC for the eu2009.cz domain is especially symbolic. In terms of future, it is important that also other entities providing their customers with the Internet services with sensitive and important data and information also implement DNSSEC. Such group of entities includes, without limitation, the media, banking institutions, Internet stores, and public authorities.”
The security technology DNSSEC prevents the misuse of the data stored in DNS. As a result of tampering with the data stored in the system, visitors of websites and users of various Internet services face the risk of e.g. the theft of passwords and credit cards numbers, eavesdropping and misuse of the Internet communication, dissemination of untrue information, and obtaining the sensitive data concerning Internet users.
The CZ.NIC association, the administrator the top level domain .CZ, launched the commercial operation of DNSSEC last September. At present, DNSSEC protects 815 domains in the Czech Republic. As far as end users are concerned, it is important that this technology is supported not only by the providers of the Internet services but also by their providers of the network connection. The users should urge them to implement DNSSEC. Whether users are protected when accessing the Internet or not can be established by means of a test at www.dnssec.cz.

About the DNSSEC technology

DNSSEC is the extension of the DNS system, which increases the security of domain names. The principle of DNS is the translation of human-friendly Internet addresses, such as for example www.nic.cz or www.dobradomena.cz, into numerical addresses which can be understood by computers and through which displaying web pages, sending e-mails, Internet telephony and other common Internet services can be provided. DNSSEC increases security while using DNS through preventing forged, altered or incomplete domain name data. CZ.NIC association, as the administrator of the .CZ and ENUM domain registries, has implemented this security technology for the holders of these domains and for the users of the Czech Internet in September 2008. More information can be found at www.dnssec.cz.