What is auDA?

auDA — .au Domain Administration — is the not-for-profit body that administers Australia’s .au domain namespace, endorsed by the Australian Government to do so. It:

• Sets the licensing rules every .au domain holder agrees to (including who is eligible to hold a .com.au).
• Accredits the registrars allowed to sell .au names.
• Runs the official WHOIS lookup for checking any .au domain’s registrar and status.
• Signs the .au zone itself so that DNSSEC chains of trust can extend down to individual domains.

For a small business, auDA matters in 2 practical moments: verifying that a registrar is genuinely accredited before handing it your domain, and as the rule-setter whose expiry and eligibility policies decide what happens if your registration lapses or is challenged. If a domain question starts with “who actually decides…”, for .au the answer is usually auDA.