How To Evaluate Websites: Web Domains

Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is the organization that oversees domain names on the Internet.

To narrow your search, you might want to limit the domains you search in. These are the most common:

•  .com (generic, top-level domain)
•  .edu (educational institutions)
•  .gov (U.S. government agencies or entities)
•  .org (top-level domain, usually non-profit organizations and individuals)
•  .int (international organizations)
•  .mil (U.S. military organizations)
• .net (network infrastructure machines and organizations)
• .biz (usually intended for businesses)
• .info (unrestricted domain)

You can limit your search to specific domains by using the Advanced Search feature on Google.

1) Click on the 'Advanced Search' link on Google's main search page.

2) Type your search term in the search box labeled 'all these words' - for example, type in "Bush tax cuts" with quotation marks around your phrase

3) In the search box labeled 'Search within a site or domain', you can type in the specific domain you'd like to search in - for example type in .gov

4) Click on the 'Advanced Search' button

5) In the image below, you can see the results we have from this search. Notice that all of the search results point you to a website at a .gov domain.