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The Universal Acceptance Steering Group (UASG) is calling for event proposals for the second annual Universal Acceptance (UA) Day to be held on 28 March 2024. Organized by the volunteer-led UASG and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), UA Day 2024 will build on the success of 2023’s inaugural UA Day by encouraging UA adoption among local, regional, and global communities and stakeholders. UA Day 2024 will consist of a mix of virtual and in-person sessions, to be organized between 1 March and 30 May 2024, aimed at increasing awareness of UA and its benefits, with an emphasis on technical training sessions to help organizations become UA-ready.

The inaugural UA Day in 2023 saw over 9,400 participants take part in over 50 events across 40 different countries/territories. UA Day 2023 marked the first time a diverse set of technical and language communities, companies, governments, and Domain Name System (DNS) industry stakeholders mobilized to champion UA and a multilingual Internet on a global scale. Universal Acceptance is included in ICANN’s strategic plan and CEO goals. Several of the organization’s Board members, executives, and staff participated in the inaugural event, demonstrating the importance of UA to enabling a digitally inclusive and multilingual Internet.

UA is a technical requirement that ensures all domain names and email addresses can be used by all Internet-enabled applications, devices, and systems. The Domain Name System (DNS) has expanded significantly since 2009, with more than 1,200 active generic top-level domains (gTLDs), including Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) and IDN country code top-level domains (ccTLDs). These TLDs may be longer than three characters and are available in different scripts. But while the DNS has changed, the checks used by many software applications to validate and process domain names and email addresses have not updated. Many systems don’t recognize or appropriately process new domain names, and not all online portals are primed for the opening of a user account with one of these new email addresses. Organizations that are UA-ready therefore enjoy a host of benefits, including improved digital inclusivity, increased business opportunities, and greater social relevance in a multilingual world.

“As billions of Internet users come online from all corners of the globe, it is more important than ever that organizations support all valid domain names and email addresses, including those in a language and script of people’s choice,” said UASG Chair Anil Kumar Jain. “UA Day 2023 was attended by more than 9,400 participants from across 40 countries, which tells us that there is great enthusiasm for UA-related resources and solutions. Our hope is that UA Day 2024 will build on that success to promote UA globally.”

If you are interested in organizing a UA Day event, please complete and submit the UA Day Event Proposal Form by 15 December 2023. Event proposals are encouraged from all relevant organizations, including (but not limited to): ICANN Regional At-Large Organizations, At-Large Structures, Supporting Organizations and Advisory Committees, governments, international organizations, technology organizations and companies, open-source communities, standards bodies, email service providers, software and technology developers, web hosting platforms, academia, DNS industry, and language communities.

To receive support, the UA Day event proposals must be submitted through the UA Day Event Proposal Form. Eligible events should focus around one of the following types of sessions:

  • UA Awareness: Provide the benefits of being UA-ready, basic technical concepts related to UA and next steps for becoming UA-ready.
  • UA Technical Training: Provide in-depth training on becoming EAI-ready for email system administrators and on becoming UA-ready for software developers.
  • UA Academic Curricula: Conduct curricular development sessions with faculty members and experts to integrate IDN and UA-related topics in existing technical curricula.
  • UA Adoption: Conduct a UA adoption exercise and share challenges and solutions to become UA-ready, documenting your experience.
  • UA Regional Strategy: Discuss appropriate mechanisms for promoting UA adoption at the regional level.

All UA Day 2024 event proposals will be reviewed by the UASG. Based on UASG recommendations, ICANN will provide limited support for UA Day events. A full UA Day event calendar will be published in the coming months at https://universalacceptance.day. In case of any questions, email UAProgram@icann.org. To learn more about UA Day and how you can help build an #Internet4All, visit https://universalacceptance.day and interact with the UASG on social media (X, Facebook, and LinkedIn). The UASG and UA Day are supported and funded by ICANN.

About the UASG

The UASG is a community-led initiative that was formed in 2015 and funded by ICANN. It consists of representatives from more than 120 companies, governments, and community groups. The UASG works to raise awareness of the importance of UA globally, provide free resources to organizations to help them become UA-ready, and measure the progress of UA adoption. To learn more, visit https://uasg.tech/.

About ICANN

ICANN’s mission is to help ensure a stable, secure, and unified global Internet. To reach another person on the Internet, you need to type an address – a name or a number – into your computer or other device. That address must be unique so computers know where to find each other. ICANN helps coordinate and support these unique identifiers across the world. ICANN was formed in 1998 as a nonprofit public benefit corporation with a community of participants from all over the world. To learn more about UA related work by ICANN, visit https://www.icann.org/ua.