[only now reviewing this thread...]
Stephane Bortzmeyer <bortzmeyer(_at_)nic(_dot_)fr> writes:
On Tue, May 21, 2013 at 10:26:39AM +1000,
Mark Andrews <marka(_at_)isc(_dot_)org> wrote
a message of 52 lines which said:
I'm not sure what the solution should be but regular audits of
delegated nameservers by infrastructure operator and removal of
delegations after a grace period
Let's not reinvent the wheel: I suggest to first study the experience
of the TLD which did exactly that. .fr had mandatory technical tests
of the name servers almost from its inception, until december
2012. The tool used for the tests was Zonecheck
<http://www.zonecheck.fr/>
Although these tests certainly contributed to the good technical
quality of the name servers, they were removed both for commercial
reasons (a registry has to make money to pay its employees) and
because it was easier to have the same rules for ccTLDs and gTLDs (and
ICANN forbids these technical tests in gTLDs).
First I've heard that "ICANN forbids these technical tests in gTLDs",
and I doubt it's true. Just exactly what tests are you referring to?
It would also help if you could point to the actual policies or
contract language in the registry or registrar contracts that speak to
these restrictions you refer to.
Thomas