6 million new websites were registered in October-December 2012: VeriSign

VeriSign published its quarterly Domain Name Industry Brief which states that more than 6 million domain names were added to the Internet in the fourth quarter of 2012, bringing the total number of registered domain names to more than 252 million worldwide as of December 31, 2012.

As of December 31, 2012, the base of registered names in .com equaled 106.2 million names, while .net equaled 14.9 million names.

VeriSign says the increase of more than six million domain names globally equates to a growth rate of 2.5 percent over the third quarter of 2012, and marks the eighth straight quarter with greater than 2 percent growth. Worldwide registrations have grown by 26.6 million – or 11.8 percent – year over year.

Worldwide registrations grew by 26.6 million, or 11.8%, year over year in 2012.