Texas, NM Universities Buy Dot-XXX Domains; Possible UTEP Sites Unclaimed

Texas Tech University officials have joined the trend of universities buy up dot-xxx website domains relating to university brands.

The move aims to keep the porn industry from snapping up those domains and associating itself with those Tech trademarks.

A University of Texas at El Paso spokeswoman said that UTEP has not purchased any XXX sites, but a spokeswoman at New Mexico State University said NMSU bought NMSU.xxx last week.

Texas Tech chief information officer Sam Segran told the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal that the university is paying about $1,100 a year to safeguard 12 domain names, which Tech has no plans to exploit.

The purchases are part of a trend of companies and universities paying to avoid inadvertently becoming associated with pornographic websites. Texas A&M University and the University of Texas at Austin also have bought up domain names that reflect their trademarks.