Do you have your blockchain domain?

With the growing popularity of the decentralized web (aka Web3), there’s also a fast growing interest in secure domains.

You may be asking yourself: “What the heck are those?”

I totally understand…and don’t worry, we’ll get into it! First thing’s first, though—why do you care? Well, along with the rest of the NFT space, Ethereum Name Server domains are becoming hot.

Brands are starting to pick up .eth domains while they still can. Budweiser bought beer.eth for $96,000. Plus, there are more uses for Web3 domains than DNS domains, which are pretty much only used as website addresses. Not to mention, there are some money-making opportunities with things like domain arbitrage and the recent ENS airdrop that gave out thousands of dollars worth of crypto to ENS users. Are you starting to feel the FOMO yet?

What are Web3 secure domains?

Maybe you’ve never tried to set up your own website, so you don’t know how DNS domains currently work on Web2 (i.e. the internet that we mostly use today). You can thank your lucky stars if that’s the case and you’ve never had to mess with buying, registering, and linking a domain to your website. If you want to read more about Web3, the decentralized web, do that here.

Before we get started – and we don’t have to get too technical in this article – it’s helpful to note that:

1. Just about any website you access on the internet today is hosted on a centralized server;
2. Uses a DNS domain name that’s managed by a registry like GoDaddy or Namecheap; and
3. That registry is accredited by a nonprofit called ICANN.

Decentralized, secure domains are a bit different.

What are decentralized domains used for?

Ethereum Name Server domains run, of course, on the Ethereum blockchain. They are minted as NFTs, which you can then essentially lease for an annual fee that varies depending on the length of the domain name. Once your ENS domain is on the blockchain, it cannot be blocked or censored, unlike a Web2 domain, which can be taken down by a registry if you do something they don’t like.

Sometimes entire domains are blocked to user access by governments like China or even a school or workplace—blockchain domains cannot be blocked. 

There are also new ways that these decentralized, secure domains can be used. For example, the most common use case right now is linking them to a crypto wallet. Instead of copying and pasting a long string of letters and numbers (which you’re liable to enter incorrectly), you could send Bitcoin to Vitalik Buterin at vitalik.eth.

One of the hopes and goals of Web3 domains is that they will eventually be used for secure identity across the entire internet. Instead of logging into every centralized website or app with a separate username and password, you could just use your Web3 domain name. Because it’s both unique and verifiable, you wouldn’t need a username and password.

It is also possible to use ENS domains to point to your website. The infrastructure for Web3 is different from the current web and is still being built out. But using IFPS, a decentralized web hosting system, you can then point a secure domain to files that have been uploaded to it.

Currently, people accessing your website will either need to use a supported browser like Opera or Brave, a plug-in, or change some security settings in browsers like Chrome and Firefox. But these use cases are getting updated and easier to use every day. There are also more use cases that can be envisioned and created—it just takes a little imagination paired with some technical know-how.