.YU: How Yugoslavia’s Domain Zone Disappeared

A country can disappear from the political map. Its country-code domain can disappear too.

The story of .yu, the former country-code top-level domain of Yugoslavia, is one of the clearest examples.

1989 — .YU is born

The .yu domain was delegated in 1989 for Yugoslavia. After the breakup of the country in the 1990s, the domain continued to exist and was eventually administered from Belgrade.

2003–2006 — the country changes again

In 2003, Yugoslavia became the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro.

That union itself dissolved in 2006, creating two independent countries: Serbia and Montenegro.

Their new country codes became RS and ME — and consequently the Internet received .rs and .me.

2007 — .YU receives an expiration date

On 11 September 2007, ICANN approved the transition from .yu to .rs and .me and decided that .yu should ultimately be removed.

Existing .yu holders were given a transition period and, in Serbia, corresponding .rs domains were reserved for them during the migration.

2008–2009 — domain owners migrate

The .rs domain officially launched on 10 March 2008.

For six months, existing .yu registrants received priority rights to corresponding .rs names. According to RNIDS, 19,372 companies used this opportunity.

Unused .yu registrations were gradually removed, while the remaining holders were given additional time to move their websites, email addresses and other services.

30 March 2010 — .YU goes offline

At noon on 30 March 2010, RNIDS switched off the remaining .yu domains.

Around 4,000 .yu domains still existed at the end of the transition. From that moment, they were no longer reachable normally on the Internet.

1 April 2010 — .YU disappears from the DNS root

The final technical step came two days later.

On 1 April 2010, the .yu delegation was removed from the global DNS root zone.

The domain extension that had existed for more than twenty years was gone.

For domain owners, the lesson is simple: a ccTLD is connected not only to a website or a business, but ultimately to the continued existence and recognition of the country code behind it.

“The old order changeth, yielding place to new.”

— Alfred, Lord Tennyson