At ZARC, we take the security of the .za namespace seriously. We use a combination of advanced technology and strict policies to keep the internet’s address book—the domain name system—safe, stable, and resilient for all South Africans.
Protecting your domain is a team effort. While we handle the behind-the-scenes infrastructure, your chosen registrar (the company you bought your domain from) manages your account. Here is how we work together to keep your online identity secure.
The “Gold Standard”: Registry Lock
For domains that are critical to your business—like your main website or payment page—standard passwords aren’t enough.
What it is: Registry Lock is our highest level of protection. It ensures that even if a hacker steals your registrar login details, they cannot transfer, delete, or change your domain.
How it works: Any critical change request is automatically rejected by our system until we verify it manually with you via a phone call or secure email.
Who needs it: Any business or individual running a website where downtime or hijacking would cost money or damage reputations (e.g., .co.za or .org.za sites).
Ensuring Data is Real: DNSSEC
Think of DNSSEC as a seal of authenticity for your website. It prevents hackers from intercepting your visitors and sending them to a fake, malicious copy of your site.
What it does: It adds a cryptographic signature to your domain’s address, allowing internet service providers to verify that the website a user is visiting is the genuine one.
Why it matters: It stops “spoofing” attacks, ensuring your customers always reach you.
Daily Security: Policies and Controls
We also enforce rules and systems to keep the .za space clean and secure.
Locks at different levels: We use status codes (like a digital lock) on domains. Some are managed by your registrar as a first line of defense, while others are set by us to block unauthorized changes at the registry level.
Stopping bad actors: We actively monitor for and block registrations that show signs of fraud, phishing, or other malicious activity to protect internet users.
Securing access: Internally, we strictly control who can access our systems. We use tools like password managers, firewalls, and conduct regular security scans and penetration tests to ensure our own infrastructure is hardened against attack.
What You Can Do: Your Role in Security
We provide the foundation, but security is a shared responsibility. Here is how you can protect your domain:
Turn on Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA): This is the single most effective thing you can do. Ensure your registrar account requires a second factor (like an SMS code or authenticator app) in addition to your password.
Watch for Alerts: Pay attention to emails or notifications from your registrar about changes to your domain. If you didn’t make the change, act immediately.
Ask about Registry Lock: If your domain is vital to your operations, ask your registrar if they support enabling ZARC’s Registry Lock feature.
By working together—ZARC, registrars, and domain owners—we keep the .za internet space secure for everyone.
