On September 30, the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation hosted a ceremony to cancel the postcard marking the 30th anniversary of the .RU ccTLD.
The ceremony, timed to mark the annual Internet Day celebrated in Russia on September 30, was attended by officials responsible for the IT sector.
Special postcards that have been issued for .RU’s anniversary year include three types of illustrations that reflect the role the ccTLD plays in the life of the country and its citizens: ensuring the security and availability of state and municipal services, as well as online platforms popular among Russian users. A special souvenir stamp was made to cancel the .RU Domain: 30 Years of Safe Space on the Russian Internet postcard.
Taking part in the ceremony were Rifat Sabitov, Chair of the Commission for the Development of the Information Community, Mass Media and Mass Communications of the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation; Eldar Gaifutdinov, Deputy Head of the Directorate for the Development of ICT and Communication Infrastructure of the Presidential Executive Office of the Russian Federation; Dmitry Reutsky, Director of the Integral Research Institute; Yevgeny Kuskevich, Head of the Registry of the.SU top-level domain; and Sergei Grebennikov, Director of the Russian Association for Electronic Communications. The ceremony was hosted by Andrey Vorobyev, Director of the Coordination Center for TLD .RU/.РФ.
In his remarks, Rifat Sabitov noted that commemorative postcards were only issued to mark events of national significance, with the 30th anniversary of the .RU ccTLD being one of them. Yevgeny Kuskevich stressed that .RU has become a symbol of Russia that makes our country recognized across the globe.
“ccTLDs are essential for ensuring Russia’s technological sovereignty, and we are working jointly to further develop Runet and make it safe and accessible for all users,” Eldar Gaifutdinov said.
“Thirty years is a long time, and .RU has already established its historical traditions, including for combating illegal activity on the internet, which have now grown into a large-scale social movement. With rules and behavior norms on the internet already established, we see a growing environment of mutual trust,” Dmitry Reutsky said.
Sergei Grebennikov added that it is necessary to preserve trust in the ccTLD and make even more active efforts to carry out educational activities in the ccTLD zones.
“Domains are the foundation for many backbone internet services, and the further development of the country’s digital economy largely depends on them,” he concluded.
“This is not the first time we are holding a cancellation ceremony: in 2015, a Five Million Domain Names in .RU card was issued to mark the registration of the 5,000,000th domain name in the .RU zone; and in 2019, a postage stamp was created in honor of .RU’s 25th anniversary. This has become a good tradition, and we are now issuing a new postcard to mark the 30th anniversary of .RU, highlighting the domain’s role in the life of the society and development of the digital economy. I believe that the new postcard, like other postal signs, will be a good addition to the collections of Museum of Communications and stamp enthusiasts. The postcard symbolizes the continuity between traditional and new means of communication, between mail and the internet, and reminds us that modern technologies were created by many generations of communications specialists, engineers, programmers, and IT specialists: thousands and hundreds of thousands of professionals who continue to develop our communications industry today,”, CCTLD Director Andrey Vorobyev said.
On December 16, 2015, a ceremony was held to cancel the Five Million Domain Names in .RU postcard that was issued in a print run of 7,000 copies and dedicated to the 5,000,000th domain name in the .RU domain zone. On April 5, 2019, a stamp was issued to mark the 25th anniversary of the Russian ccTLD .RU, with 135,000 stamps entering postal circulation.
Today, .RU is one of the largest domains in the world, with over 5.8 million domain names. It is top fifth among all the ccTLDs, with about 150,000 new domains registered every month. In 2024, .RU grew by 10.3 percent to become the absolute growth leader among all the ccTLDs.
