September sees the end of .yu domain names

From September, all .yu domains will stop working, regardless of their renewal date, Google has warned.

In its Webmaster Central blog, the search engine company said businesses and individuals should remember that this means all content hosted on a .yu domain will no longer appear online.

This could impact on search engine optimisation because search engines could find it difficult to retrieve information hosted on no longer existing .yu domains.

Now is the ideal time for content to be moved on to a different domain while people and enterprises still have control of their .yu address, Google advised.

The blog noted that organisations should start moving "a single directory or subdomain and testing the results before completing the move. Remember that you will not be able to keep a 301 redirection on your old domain after September 30, so start your test early".

Speaking to ABC News, Paul Levins, from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, said the organisation's international conference will discuss the expansion of web addresses to include domain names such as .Sydney.

Written by Debra Henry-Hastings