About the Internet Society 

Public Interest Registry (PIR)

About .ORG, The Public Interest Registry (PIR)

Trusted across all ages, backgrounds, and nationalities, .ORG is where people turn to find credible information, get involved, fund causes and support advocacy..ORG, The Public Interest Registry empowers the global noncommercial community to use the Internet more effectively and, concurrently, takes a leadership position among Internet stakeholders on policy and related issues. The .ORG domain is the Internet’s third largest “generic” or non-country specific top-level domain with more than 9 million domain names registered worldwide. .ORG, The Public Interest Registry, was founded by the Internet Society in 2002. It is based in Reston, Virginia, USA.

PIR - Do Well, Do Right, Do Good

The Public Interest Registry is the Internet domain registry for all .ORG Top Level Domains. PIR has a particular focus on acting in the public interest. Working together with Afilias, its business partner and back-end provider, PIR seeks to:

Do Well - PIR performs its role as a registry well, serving its registrars and the users of .ORG names with predictable, reliable, and efficient registration services and name resolution. It seeks to meet and exceed the requirements set by ICANN for registry operation and meet or exceed the expectations of its registrars and the public who use .ORG names. In this respect, PIR seeks to be an exemplary registry in its operations. PIR is a serious business entity seeking to earn the maximum surplus possible consistent with its other missions below and by doing so, provide the funding that makes the other missions possible.

Do Right - PIR has a particular focus in the Internet name space to envision, develop consensus around, and lead in the implementation of registry and namespace policies that serve the wider interests of registrants and the Internet and therefore its stability as a whole. In this respect, PIR acts in the public interest and seeks to be an exemplary registry in its policies and values.

Do Good - The .ORG namespace is the natural home of non-commercial organizations on the Internet. PIR has a special role in fostering effective and efficient use of the Internet by non-commercial organizations, and seeks to leverage the benefits non-commercial organizations can provide to society by helping them make innovative and constructive uses of the Internet. In this respect, PIR acts in the public interest and wishes to magnify the good that these non-commercial organizations can provide to society. PIR also seeks to serve the broader goals of Internet education, standards development, and Internet policy stewardship represented by the Internet Society, and uses the vast majority of its surplus to serve the public interest in the Internet in this way.