.tk

Overview

• .tk is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) assigned to Tokelau, a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific.
• Introduced and approved in 1997, the TLD has been operated on behalf of Tokelau by Teletok (Telecommunication Tokelau Corporation) with registry services provided under the Dot TK brand (historically run by BV Dot TK and outsourced to Freenom).
• The .tk space became notable for offering large numbers of free second-level registrations, which resulted in substantial global registration counts and many sites unrelated to Tokelau.

History

• IANA approved the establishment of .tk in 1997 (implemented 7 November 1997).
• A commercial model for large-scale free registrations was developed through an arrangement that involved a Dutch entrepreneur and the Tokelauan authorities; Teletok was formed to manage local interests and revenues.
• Dot TK/Freenom operated a free-registration model that grew the zone to tens of millions of names (a 2016 Nominet map reported ~31,311,498 registered .tk domains).
• Abuse and enforcement issues over time led to legal and contractual actions:
  • Meta filed a lawsuit against Freenom in March 2023 and new Freenom .tk registrations were halted.
  • ICANN terminated Freenom's registrar accreditation in November 2023 for failure to cure breaches.
  • Freenom announced it would exit the domain registry and registrar business in February 2024 and settled the Meta lawsuit under undisclosed terms.
  • By early March 2024, a large portion of Freenom-operated domains (mostly .tk, .cf, .gq) — roughly 12.6 million — were reported inaccessible; the outage had downstream effects on DNS service providers.

Usage and Audience

• Typical registrants have included individuals, small businesses, bloggers and those seeking low-cost or free domain names.
• Many .tk registrations have no connection to Tokelau; usage has ranged across personal pages, blogs, URL shortening, and various commercial or experimental sites.
• Dot TK offered optional services such as HTML-frame forwarding, DNS hosting (own or third-party), email forwarding (up to 250 addresses per user login), and a site-networking feature called TiKinet (TiKilinks) to interlink participating sites.
• Paid registrations are used to secure trademarked or premium names that are not available for free.

Registration Rules

• Registrations are taken directly at the second level (example: example.tk).
• Free registrations were available but subject to operational content restrictions and usage rules; paid registrations are also available.
• Notable operational rules and policies for free domains:
  • Content categories prohibited for free domains include racism/violent intolerance, adult/pornographic material, illicit drugs, weapons/terrorism-supporting content, gambling, viruses/spyware, domain parking/placeholder pages, and non-public or non-existing pages.
  • Free domains must maintain regular visitor traffic; if the redirect target or hosted content becomes unavailable, the domain can be taken offline or replaced with an advertisement page without prior notice.
  • Free domains that violate policy are subject to immediate replacement by an advertisement landing page.
• Paid domains:
  • Paid registrations are used for trademark and other premium names; paid domains have dispute resolution under the UDRP (for paid domains only).
  • Historical pricing examples (as reported): paid domains costing US$19.90 for the first two years; premium names (for example, fewer than four characters) commanded significantly higher prices (reported premiums above US$1,000).

SEO and Brand Impact

• The free-registration model resulted in extremely high registration volume but also a significant association with abuse (phishing, spam, malware) in industry reports, which has damaged the perceived trustworthiness of the .tk namespace.
• Security vendors and groups have repeatedly flagged .tk among TLDs with elevated abuse or phishing activity in various studies and reports, contributing to a reputation problem for the extension.
• That reputation has had operational and commercial consequences: registries, registrars, and platforms have taken actions (legal, contractual, or technical) that affected availability and registration flows.

Notable Cases or Examples

• Dot TK network features and services: TiKinet (interlinked sites via TiKilinks) and the TweaK URL shortening/renaming service launched in 2010 for social platforms.
• High-volume ranking: a 2016 world map by Nominet reported .tk as the most-registered ccTLD by count at that time.
• Abuse and enforcement actions:
  • Multiple security reports and studies flagged .tk for disproportionate levels of phishing and other malicious uses.
  • Meta Platforms sued Freenom in March 2023 alleging cybersquatting and trademark infringement; Freenom halted new .tk registrations and later announced exit from the domain business (Feb 2024).
  • ICANN terminated Freenom's accreditation in November 2023 for unresolved breaches.
  • A large-scale inaccessibility event in early March 2024 affected millions of Freenom-managed domains (including many .tk names) and impacted third-party DNS hosts.

Registry and Sponsorship

• Registry operations have been branded as Dot TK and historically involved BV Dot TK and Freenom for registry and registrar services; Teletok (Telecommunication Tokelau Corporation) is the local sponsor representing Tokelau's interests.

% IANA WHOIS server
% for more information on IANA, visit http://www.iana.org
% This query returned 1 object

domain:       TK

organisation: Telecommunication Tokelau Corporation (Teletok)
address:      Fenuafala
address:      Fakaofo
address:      Tokelau

contact:      administrative
name:         CEO Teletok
organisation: Telecommunication Tokelau Corporation (Teletok)
address:      Fenuafala
address:      Fakaofo
address:      Tokelau
phone:        +690 3101
e-mail:       tealofi.enosa@gmail.com

contact:      technical
name:         Joost Zuurbier
organisation: BV Dot TK
address:      Danzigerkade 23D
address:      Amsterdam NH 1013 AP
address:      Netherlands (the)
phone:        +31 20 531 5725
fax-no:       +31 20 531 5721
e-mail:       joost.zuurbier@dot.tk

nserver:      A.NS.TK 194.0.38.1 2001:678:50:0:0:0:0:1
nserver:      B.NS.TK 194.0.39.1 2001:678:54:0:0:0:0:1
nserver:      C.NS.TK 194.0.40.1 2001:678:58:0:0:0:0:1
nserver:      D.NS.TK 194.0.41.1 2001:678:5c:0:0:0:0:1

whois:        whois.dot.tk

status:       ACTIVE
remarks:      Registration information: http://www.dot.tk

created:      1997-11-07
changed:      2019-02-12
source:       IANA