Domain Name Services

Highlights

VITA has been assigned the authority and responsibility for the Internet domains "state.va.us" and "virginia.gov." Any state or local entity that subscribes to VITA Telecommunications (Telco) facilities, and uses either VITA-assigned IP addresses, or has their own IP address block, can be a part of the "state.va.us" and/or "virginia.gov" domains. Examples include "tax.state.va.us," "scc.state.va.us," "dmv.state.va.us" and "vita.virginia.gov."

VITA Domain Name Service can be requested by contacting VITA's Help Desk at 866-637-8482 and registering an "incident" requesting Internet DNS assistance. State agencies are encouraged to use the "state.va.us"/"virginia.gov" domains since the registration already exists, and no fees are currently charged.

VITA does not guarantee reverse-ARPA addressing (IP to domain name) for state or local entities that have their own IP address block or that have IP addresses assigned by a private Internet service provider (ISP). Usually, whoever owns the overall address block is responsible for reverse addressing. VITA may choose to maintain a reverse table for a particular block; however, the reverse table will only be valid for local references. VITA-owned IP address blocks (providing forward/reverse addressing) include:

Both of these servers are designated as primary DNS servers and operate with mirror-image zone files. However, they operate independently of one another, for fail-over contingencies (if the CNSA Name Server is inoperative, the CNSB Name Server will be available, and vice-versa). VITA maintenance policies are specifically geared to avoid simultaneous downtime for these servers. This is in compliance with RFC # 2182 "Selection and Operation of Secondary DNS Servers." To avoid Domain Name Service interruptions, VITA strongly recommends that all state and local entities using our DNS services enter both of VITA's Domain Name Servers, represented above, in their servers and Internet access appliances.

VITA will provide Domain Name Services for state or local entities that desire another Domain Name (va.us, .com, .org,, .net, .lib), as long as the following criteria are met:

• The entity must subscribe to VITA's Telco facilities, and
• The entity must list VITA as the technical provider (DNS services) in all applications to NIC Registration services.

City and county administrations are encouraged to register under the "va.us" domain structure (for example, "co.patrick.va.us" and "ci.lexington.va.us"). Please be aware that domain name registration may incur a fee, depending upon the NIC registration service used.

If you are registering your own domain and want VITA to run Domain Name Service for you, please include the technical provider information below in your NIC Registration material:

Registration information for the va.us domain: http://www.nic.us.

Registration information for .com, .org, .net domains: http://www.networksolutions.com.

Cost

There are currently no DNS service fees charged for any state or local entity that subscribes to VITA Telecommunications (Telco) facilities.

How to order

VITA Domain Name Service can be requested by contacting VITA's Help Desk at 866-637-8482 and registering an "incident" requesting Internet DNS assistance.

Related links/resources

Review the "Virginia Government Internet Domain Naming" section of the Enterprise Architecture Standard (page 81, 5.5-7) for naming conventions and exception form.