Vatican denies buying .xxx porn domain

21 December 2011 - 16:28 By Sapa-dpa
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A screen shot of Vatican.xxx
A screen shot of Vatican.xxx

The Vatican on Wednesday denied reports that it had bought the web domain vatican.xxx to prevent internet pornographers from using it.

Papal spokesman Father Federico Lombardi referred to reports that the Holy See had purchased the domain to "protect itself from improper use (of the domain) given that the suffix '.xxx' is designated for adults only sites."

"In reality the domain is listed as unavailable, hence it has effectively been bought by someone, but not the Vatican," Lombardi was quoted as saying by the ANSA news agency.

According to the media reports, colleges, museums and well known groups and institutions have rushed to grab online addresses with the .xxx domain ahead of a public sale of the addresses by the US-based ICM Registry, which oversees domains geared for adult entertainment.

Lifetime rights to a trademarked brand name followed by the .xxx suffix could have been purchased during a 30-day "sunrise period" before the ICM Registry made the domains generally available last week.

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