ICANN is targeting 22 May as the intended reopening date for the TLD Application System. ICANN anticipates the system remaining open for five business days and close on 30 May. This takes account of the 28 May Memorial Day holiday in the United States.
ICANN took TAS offline on 12 April days before it was scheduled to close following a technical glitch that may have allowed some users to see some file names and user names of other users. To date ICANN has seen no evidence that any TAS user intentionally did anything wrong in order to be able to see other users’ information.
In the latest announcement by Akram Atallah, ICANN’s COO, it is noted the large majority of users are unaffected by the glitch. But ICANN will continue to review the extensive database of system logs and system traffic, and any new and relevant information that emerges from this analysis will be shared with applicants in a timely way.
Even as late as yesterday, 7 May 2012, ICANN’s packet-level research uncovered a new set of instances (in addition to those previously announced) where another applicant might have viewed a set of system-generated file names. It is possible that further analysis will also show that some of the parties that we have notified were not affected, but notice was provided out of an abundance of caution.
It is expected there will be over 2300 applications for TLDs by the time applications close. While no date has been given for when applications will be revealed, given ICANN’s original timeframe of 18 days from applications close to the « big reveal », it would be expected that the TLDs applied for will be revealed sometime around 18 June or shortly thereafter. And given the ICANN meeting in Prague commences on 24 June, it could even happen then.
Source: domainnews.com