Domain Name Commission Ended My Website

August 21, 2025

By AHNZ

In the space of 2 days, and as many emails, Internet New Zealand went from “Kia ora” to “you have failed, you are suspended.”

Anarchist History of New Zealand has been running as a free website since 2018 and had just been renewed for the 2025/2026 year at the expense of many American dollars. Especially so as I opted to also keep going with the anarkiwi.org domain that the Anarkiwi founders first set up.

After 24 hours of being removed from the .nz DNS zone Anarkiwi is presently working once again as of 8.52am but for how long?

About an hour prior to this I wrote the following letter of complaint seeking an apology and to be reinstated. No reply has come but the site is back.

The web, in New Zealand, is much like the old Crown farm lease system. The farmer would now own his sheep station but would lease it from the government with a right to renew. It is the dream of many free Kiwis to freehold their own property and sometimes they managed it but we’re a ways off from being able to do that on our cyber farms. Web domain names are under the control of Internet New Zealand Incorporated through their company the Domain Name Commission Ltd.

Apparently they have taken a sudden interest in quality control that did not matter these past 7 years. Is it that my phone number expired since then? What’s their issue? Whatever it is the importance is so great that 2 working days are enough for them to decide to shut down the entire site and they did. As I point out in the email below this is against their own rules.

Sometimes I go offline for days, as is my right. Perhaps I’ll go tramping for a week and there is no way to check my email or take phone calls even if I wanted to. Maybe you do too. Yet Internet New Zealand and their Domain Name Verification Team could use that to take away any website you have. Why? Apparently for the Kafkaesque fetish of keeping their registry book in perfect order. Everyone’s names and addresses and phone numbers made pristine and checked against their government ID cards. THIS is what matters more, the Key Performance Indicators. And if organic and interesting websites like my history blog get in the way of that then they must be deleted.

As yet there has been no reply to my email and this site may go again at any time. It is an act of censorship. Not, I think, because of objectionable content. Rather, this has been, and may be again at any time, the censorship of a zealous and anonymous functionary who is paid to impose order on the web even if he has to kill it to do so. How many times do rulers need to re-learn the lesson of King Midas who turned everything and everyone he loved to gold but in doing so left it dead and sterile?

Email to Internet NZ

Hello,
I created anarkiwi.co.nz in 2018 to host my culture and heritage blog called Anarchist History of New Zealand which has now been made defunct.

The most recent renewal for 12 months was completed last week. At the end of the same week (Friday 15/8) ‘Jacob’ from the Domain Name Verification Team warned that anarkiwi “may be suspended.”

When I attended to this message I took it for spam as I had no formal relationship with Jacob’s organisation or knowledge of its existence or authority at that time.

In less than 2 business days (Tuesday 19/8) I received a second email from ‘Jacob’ stating, fait accompli, that anarkiwi.co.nz was to be suspended and sold off on a first-come, first-served basis without further notice.

Yesterday (Wednesday 20/8) the first part of this happened, demonstrating that this is indeed not spam and Jacob might be a real person or at least an admin bot controlled by a real person somewhere.

Anarchist History of New Zealand (AHNZ) is a popular website visited many times a day from all around the world. It is linked with social media accounts (Facebook, Youtube,..) along with subdomains and email addresses. There are free books and library archives hosted here along with timelines and custom scripts for history research. Many conversations and email correspondences take place every day and usually with a view to help New Zealanders find out more about their families or their local history. The primary idea is to offer a Libertarian view of our history in contrast with the one our government requires and sponsors.

Perhaps the website has been culled because of this content? Is it censorship? Complaints on objectionable material? You can see an archived snapshot here.
https://web.archive.org/web/20250709144241/https://ahnz.anarkiwi.co.nz/

Or, perhaps my act of renewing anarkiwi for a 7th year exactly the same way it always has been is the problem. Is there a new rule or new enforcement? Unknown.

While this is figured out please reverse the suspension of anarkiwi.co.nz

In the meantime the suspension has caused a cascade of damage to the network of scripts, emails, pages, workflow etc. that the domain depends upon. It also costs reputational damage as years of work are now dead links which external websites and search engines will be severing. There is also damage to my family, household, plants and animals which have dependent systems based on the domain address. No life support or accessibility devices were put at risk on this occasion but that is down to luck rather than any checks made by Jacob before pulling the plug.

My leading suspicion is that a ‘Domain Name Verification Team’ both has emailed me and shut down my site without any human oversight at all. I think it is part of the dead internet and was set in motion simply by my domain name renewal. I would like a human to deal with in this matter.

My complaint is that according to .nz Rules Version 3.1 (rule 12.2.15.a) DNCL must not suspend or cancel a .nz domain name without attempting to contact the domain name holder.

Only one attempt was made at contact and this was followed by a suspension notice and the police action that came with it.

[see attached: a warning email followed by a suspension email]

Nor do I think that ‘Jacob’ abides by other rules such as the principles of natural justice (rule 12.2.5) while investigating or enforcing.

2 Working days is too short’a time to be evicted from one’s home on the internet with minimal warning and no detail.

Kindly put anarkiwi.co.nz back on theDNS register immediately so that my website and associated email services can resume operation.

I will then be able to discuss with Jacob’s Verification Team in good faith all of the details he wants to investigate. The indication is that government documentation such as passport, driver license, etc are now required in order to host a .nz website.

If so then let someone put that case. It is heavy-handed and perverse to immediately threaten and confiscate as a first course of action. Much damage has been done, probably not only to AHNZ but any number of ‘bulk jobs’ being processed this way rather than with empathy and individual attention. It seems that the Verification Team are content to mow down New Zealand’s internet landscape simply for the sake of keeping his registry ledger database look clean and tidy. Please be mindful of Goodhart’s Law: When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure. In other words, a rich living part of the New Zealand internet has been wiped out with little or no thought except for how it registers according to someone’s KPI in a Wellington office building.

I would like to hear back that the eviction order of anarkiwi.co.nz has been rescinded with immediate effect and with an apology for the oversight.

Thanks,
Rick Giles,
formerly of anarkiwi.co.nz

—

First Notice

The initial notice is a request for a registrant to confirm their registration details. If these are confirmed, we may ask a registrant to provide supporting documentation.

Second Notice

This is to act as a reminder for the registrant to confirm their details or to provide additional supporting documentation.

Suspension Notice

If we haven’t received the supporting documentation requested or the contact details haven’t been confirmed we will advise a registrant that their domain name will be suspended.

• dnc.org.nz

From off to on again. Did my email make a difference?

whois anarkiwi.co.nz
Domain Name: anarkiwi.co.nz
Registrar URL: https://publicdomainregistry.com/
Updated Date: 2025-08-19T21:12:22Z
Creation Date: 2018-08-12T21:55:28Z
Original Created: 2018-08-12T21:55:28Z
Registrar: PDR Limited
Domain Status: serverDeleteProhibited https://icann.org/epp#serverDeleteProhibited
Domain Status: serverHold https://icann.org/epp#serverHold
Domain Status: serverRenewProhibited https://icann.org/epp#serverRenewProhibited
Domain Status: serverTransferProhibited https://icann.org/epp#serverTransferProhibited
Domain Status: serverUpdateProhibited https://icann.org/epp#serverUpdateProhibited
Name Server: ns1.md-112.webhostbox.net
Name Server: ns2.md-112.webhostbox.net
DNSSEC: unsigned
URL of the Domain Name Commission Limited Inaccuracy Complaint Form: https://dnc.org.nz/enquiry-form/
>>> Last update of WHOIS database: 2025-08-20T17:01:31Z <<<

% Terms of Use
%
% By submitting a WHOIS query you are entering into an agreement with Domain
% Name Commission Ltd on the following terms and conditions, and subject to
% all relevant .nz Policies and procedures as found at https://dnc.org.nz/.
%
% It is prohibited to:
% – Send high volume WHOIS queries with the effect of downloading part of or
% all of the .nz Register or collecting register data or records;
% – Access the .nz Register in bulk through the WHOIS service (ie. where a
% user is able to access WHOIS data other than by sending individual queries
% to the database);
% – Use WHOIS data to allow, enable, or otherwise support mass unsolicited
% commercial advertising, or mass solicitations to registrants or to
% undertake market research via direct mail, electronic mail, SMS, telephone
% or any other medium;
% – Use WHOIS data in contravention of any applicable data and privacy laws,
% including the Unsolicited Electronic Messages Act 2007;
% – Store or compile WHOIS data to build up a secondary register of
% information;
% – Publish historical or non-current versions of WHOIS data; and
% – Publish any WHOIS data in bulk.
%
% Copyright Domain Name Commission Limited (a company wholly-owned by Internet
% New Zealand Incorporated) which may enforce its rights against any person or
% entity that undertakes any prohibited activity without its written
% permission.
%
% The WHOIS service is provided by Internet New Zealand Incorporated.
%
% Additional information may be available at https://www.dnc.org.nz

Running the command again hours later…

whois anarkiwi.co.nz
Domain Name: anarkiwi.co.nz
Registrar URL: https://publicdomainregistry.com/
Updated Date: 2025-08-20T20:52:27Z
Creation Date: 2018-08-12T21:55:28Z
Original Created: 2018-08-12T21:55:28Z
Registrar: PDR Limited
Domain Status: ok https://icann.org/epp#ok
Name Server: ns1.md-112.webhostbox.net
Name Server: ns2.md-112.webhostbox.net
DNSSEC: unsigned
URL of the Domain Name Commission Limited Inaccuracy Complaint Form: https://dnc.org.nz/enquiry-form/
>>> Last update of WHOIS database: 2025-08-20T23:15:22Z <<<

% Terms of Use
%
% By submitting a WHOIS query you are entering into an agreement with Domain
% Name Commission Ltd on the following terms and conditions, and subject to
% all relevant .nz Policies and procedures as found at https://dnc.org.nz/.
%
% It is prohibited to:
% – Send high volume WHOIS queries with the effect of downloading part of or
% all of the .nz Register or collecting register data or records;
% – Access the .nz Register in bulk through the WHOIS service (ie. where a
% user is able to access WHOIS data other than by sending individual queries
% to the database);
% – Use WHOIS data to allow, enable, or otherwise support mass unsolicited
% commercial advertising, or mass solicitations to registrants or to
% undertake market research via direct mail, electronic mail, SMS, telephone
% or any other medium;
% – Use WHOIS data in contravention of any applicable data and privacy laws,
% including the Unsolicited Electronic Messages Act 2007;
% – Store or compile WHOIS data to build up a secondary register of
% information;
% – Publish historical or non-current versions of WHOIS data; and
% – Publish any WHOIS data in bulk.
%
% Copyright Domain Name Commission Limited (a company wholly-owned by Internet
% New Zealand Incorporated) which may enforce its rights against any person or
% entity that undertakes any prohibited activity without its written
% permission.
%
% The WHOIS service is provided by Internet New Zealand Incorporated.
%
% Additional information may be available at https://www.dnc.org.nz

<– Response from Internet NZ.

One Sonya Trompette…

Sounds like they don’t want to be a part of this…

Reply:
Thanks for confirming that.

As indicated, I have lodged a complaint with your organisation over the actions of the Domain Name Verification Team that is ultimately answerable to you (Internet NZ.)

A clear case of their breaking their own rule code, I hope you agree.

Your subsidiary has lost its way. The idea is to help look after the internet with good rules not destroy the internet and look after the rule book above all else. This is reckless and rogue bureaucracy.

It won’t do to go around deleting people’s domain names just because they don’t reply to an email with 2 days. I watched Country Calendar last night in which the cows were being milked by robot. For all you know my domain name is controlling the health of my animals, my watering system, my smart lights, my wheelchair, my payroll, my banking, the login controlling my power and food and rent etc.

“About 180,000 chickens on a farm that reportedly supplies Tegel chicken died of suffocation on the weekend after a power cut.” – NZ Herald (2019)

You will please let me know that you are taking this seriously and action is being progressed toward disciplinary action at your end.

Thanks,
Rick

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