The top-level domain (TLD) .ST is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for São Tomé and Príncipe, a small island nation located in the Gulf of Guinea in West Africa. The administration of this domain is carried out by the Tecnisys company, as recorded by the IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) who is responsible for the global coordination of the DNS Root, IP addressing, and other Internet protocol resources.
The .ST domain has been active since 1997 and there are no limitations on who can register these types of domains. It is an open ccTLD, meaning it’s available for people from all around the world without requirement of presence or business in São Tomé and Príncipe. Therefore, it has been used for a number of different purposes worldwide beyond representing geographical or national identity.
Interestingly, various creative uses of .ST domains have been found given that ‘ST’ can stand for many things in different contexts. For example, “ST” is commonly used in Sweden to refer to Stockholm, the country’s capital, and as such, many businesses and websites within Stockholm use this TLD to imply a sort of local pride or association. The gaming company Electronic Art used ‘battlefield.st’ for their game Battlefield. Likewise, ShortURL provides a free URL redirection service by using ‘yourname.st’ format.
In addition, it has also been used for various domain hacks, where the TLD forms part of a word or phrase. For instance, the domain “pa.st” was used by the Pastebin website to create a URL that is a play on the word “past.” Industry-specific domain names like ‘broadca.st’ by a streaming service and ‘podca.st’ for podcast resources are some examples to note.
To protect brands and trademarks, there are also services in place to register, renew, transfer, or modify .ST domains, and to deal with any disputes that may arise from the use of these domains. Various domain registrars such as Marcaria, EuroDNS, and 101Domain offer these services ensuring the rights and reputations of businesses and individuals are safeguarded effectively.
Both the ‘.ST Domain’ web page (‘https://www.nic.st/’) by the Tecnisys and the ‘.ST Domain’ web page by the IANA (‘https://data.iana.org/TLD/tlds-alpha-by-domain.txts’) served as the main sources for this response. Additionally, specific information about how the .ST domain has been used in Sweden and for domain hacks was sourced from ‘The Domain Name Registrar with the Best Customer Service | Namecheap.com’ and ‘101domain – Domain Names – Website Services – Brand and Corporate Solutions – Domain Management & Security’.
