Verisign

“Routing on the internet depends on the Border Gateway Protocol (“BGP”), which is a protocol that relies on networks within the internet infrastructure acting in a trustworthy manner when sharing information about destinations for connectivity and the routing of internet traffic. As a trust-based protocol, BGP has a number of vulnerabilities that may lead to outages or disrupt our services, including as a result of “route hijacks” that involve accidental or malicious rerouting of internet traffic, or “route leaks” that involve the malicious or unintentional propagation of routing information beyond the intended scope of the originator, receiver, and/or one of the networks along the route’s path.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Table of Contents We could encounter system interruptions or system failures resulting from activities beyond our direct control that could materially harm our business. We depend on the uninterrupted operation of our various systems, secure data centers, points of presence around the world and other computer and communication networks. Our systems and operations are vulnerable to damage or interruption from power loss, war, transmission cable cuts and other telecommunications failures, damage or interruption caused by fire, earthquake, and other natural disasters, intentional acts of vandalism, terrorist attacks, unintentional mistakes, or errors.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“A failure in the operation or update of the root zone servers that we operate, the root zone file, the Root Zone Management System, the TLD name servers, the TLD zone files that we operate, or other network functions, could result in, among other problems, (1) a DNS resolution or other service outage or degradation, (2) the deletion of one or more gTLDs or ccTLDs from the internet, (3) the deletion of one or more second-level domain names from the internet, or (4) a misdirection of one or more domain names to different servers. A failure in the operation or update of the supporting cryptographic and other operational infrastructure that we maintain could result in similar consequences. Any of these problems or outages could create potential material liability and exposure from litigation and investigations, could result in a failure to meet our service level agreements, and could decrease customer satisfaction, harming our business.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“These connections depend upon the secure and efficient operation of internet service providers, internet exchange point operators, and internet backbone service providers. Such providers have encountered periodic operational problems or experienced outages in the past beyond our scope of control and may continue to encounter problems and outages or may choose to discontinue their service. If the providers that our connections depend upon do not protect, maintain, improve, and reinvest in their networks or present inconsistent, incorrect, or invalid data regarding routing information or DNS responses through their networks, our business could be harmed.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“We also perform the Root Zone Maintainer function under an agreement with ICANN for the core of the internet’s DNS and operate two of the thirteen root zone servers that contain authoritative data for the top of the DNS hierarchy. Our global constellation of DNS servers provides internet protocol (“IP”) address information in response to queries, enabling the use of browsers, email systems, and other systems on the internet.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Technologies relating to online presence, including social media, AI, mobile devices, apps, and search engines, have evolved and continue to evolve, changing the internet practices and behaviors of consumers and businesses. These ongoing changes can negatively impact the demand for our domain names.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Technology changes to web browser or internet search technologies could reduce demand for domain names. Similarly, if internet users’ preferences or practices shift away from recognizing and relying on web addresses or if internet users were to significantly decrease the use of web browsers in favor of applications to locate and access content, demand for domain names in the gTLDs we operate could be negatively impacted.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“In addition, we own and maintain our shared registration system that allows registrars to enter new second-level domain names into Verisign-operated central directories and to submit modifications, transfers, re-registrations, and deletions for existing second-level domain names (“Shared Registration System”).”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“We also perform the Root Zone Maintainer function under an agreement with ICANN for the core of the internet’s DNS and operate two of the thirteen root zone servers that contain authoritative data for the top of the DNS hierarchy. Our global constellation of DNS servers provides internet protocol (“IP”) address information in response to queries, enabling the use of browsers, email systems, and other systems on the internet.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Demand for domain names could be negatively impacted to the extent end-users establish their online identities using social media (such as Facebook, Instagram or TikTok) or transact business on e-commerce platforms (such as Amazon, Etsy 5 Table of Contents and Taobao) instead of registering domain names. Furthermore, demand for domain names could also be negatively impacted by the activities of providers of web and mobile applications that allow end-users to locate and access content.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Alternative namespaces, new technologies and the expansion of existing technologies, including Artificial Intelligence (“AI”), may increase competitive pressure.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“For example, recent advances in AI-based tools have made, and will continue to make, cyber-attacks more sophisticated, harder to defend, and easier and faster to launch. These tools allow for rapid exploitation of vulnerabilities, which hinders our ability to defend against such exploitation.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“In addition, competing technologies developed by others or the emergence of new technologies such as AI or new industry standards may adversely affect our competitive position or render our services or technologies noncompetitive or obsolete.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Technologies relating to online presence, including social media, AI, mobile devices, apps, and search engines, have evolved and continue to evolve, changing the internet practices and behaviors of consumers and businesses. These ongoing changes can negatively impact the demand for our domain names.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Technology changes to web browser or internet search technologies could reduce demand for domain names. Similarly, if internet users’ preferences or practices shift away from recognizing and relying on web addresses or if internet users were to significantly decrease the use of web browsers in favor of applications to locate and access content, demand for domain names in the gTLDs we operate could be negatively impacted.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“The use of AI technology by third parties may increase our exposure to cybersecurity and data protection risks. For example, recent advances in AI technology and tools have made, and will continue to make, cyber-attacks more sophisticated, harder to defend, and easier and faster to launch. These tools permit rapid exploitation of vulnerabilities, which hinders our ability to defend against such exploitation.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Additionally, the rapid increase in demand for compute and network hardware, including servers, chips, memory and other technology, caused by new demand from AI companies, is increasing our costs for some of these goods and could increase our capital and operating costs.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Cybersecurity and Technology Risk Factors Attempted security breaches, including from the exploitation of vulnerabilities, cyber-attacks and Distributed Denial of Service (“DDoS”) attacks against our systems and services increase our costs, expose us to potentially material liability, and could materially harm our business and reputation. As an operator of critical internet infrastructure, we experience a high rate of cyber-attacks and attempted security breaches targeting our systems and services, including the most sophisticated forms of attacks, such as advanced persistent threat attacks, exploitation of zero-day vulnerabilities, ransomware attacks, and social engineering attacks.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“For example, recent advances in AI-based tools have made, and will continue to make, cyber-attacks more sophisticated, harder to defend, and easier and faster to launch. These tools allow for rapid exploitation of vulnerabilities, which hinders our ability to defend against such exploitation.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Security vulnerabilities in our systems and our vendors’ systems, including vulnerabilities in third party software and hardware, pose a material risk to our operations. We use externally-developed technology, systems, and services, including both hardware and software, for a variety of purposes, including compute, storage, encryption and authentication, back-office support, and other functions.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Our networks have been, and likely will continue to be, subject to DDoS attacks. Recent industry experience has demonstrated that DDoS attacks continue to grow in size and sophistication, due in part to advances in AI-based tools, and have the ability to widely disrupt internet services.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Table of Contents We could encounter system interruptions or system failures resulting from activities beyond our direct control that could materially harm our business. We depend on the uninterrupted operation of our various systems, secure data centers, points of presence around the world and other computer and communication networks. Our systems and operations are vulnerable to damage or interruption from power loss, war, transmission cable cuts and other telecommunications failures, damage or interruption caused by fire, earthquake, and other natural disasters, intentional acts of vandalism, terrorist attacks, unintentional mistakes, or errors.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“A failure in the operation or update of the root zone servers that we operate, the root zone file, the Root Zone Management System, the TLD name servers, the TLD zone files that we operate, or other network functions, could result in, among other problems, (1) a DNS resolution or other service outage or degradation, (2) the deletion of one or more gTLDs or ccTLDs from the internet, (3) the deletion of one or more second-level domain names from the internet, or (4) a misdirection of one or more domain names to different servers. A failure in the operation or update of the supporting cryptographic and other operational infrastructure that we maintain could result in similar consequences. Any of these problems or outages could create potential material liability and exposure from litigation and investigations, could result in a failure to meet our service level agreements, and could decrease customer satisfaction, harming our business.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“We retain certain customer and employee information in our data centers and various domain name registration systems. Any physical or electronic break-in or other security breach or compromise of the information stored at our data centers or domain name registration systems may jeopardize the security of information we retain or that is retained in the computer systems and networks of our customers. In such an event, we could face material liability and exposure from litigation and investigations, fail to meet service level agreements, or be at risk of losing various security and standards-based compliance certifications needed for operation of our businesses, and customers could be reluctant to use our services.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“The use of AI technology by third parties may increase our exposure to cybersecurity and data protection risks. For example, recent advances in AI technology and tools have made, and will continue to make, cyber-attacks more sophisticated, harder to defend, and easier and faster to launch. These tools permit rapid exploitation of vulnerabilities, which hinders our ability to defend against such exploitation.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“In addition, laws and regulations, including those designed to restrict who can register and who can distribute domain names or to require registrants to provide additional documentation to register domain names, have, and may in the future, impose significant additional costs on our business and subject us to additional liabilities or could prevent us from operating in certain jurisdictions. For example, the government of China has indicated that it will issue, and has issued, new regulations, and it has begun to enforce existing regulations differently, including by directing certain implementation models for registry services, that impose additional costs on, and risks to, our provision of registry services in China. These regulations are impacting the demand for domain name registrations in China.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“These regulations require registries, including us, and China-based registrars, to obtain a government-issued license for each gTLD or ccTLD operating in China. Any failure to obtain or renew the required licenses, or to comply with any license requirements or any updates thereto, or any failure to comply with these regulations or directives, by us or our China-based registrars, could result in significant harm to our business in China including the suspension of some or all of our registry services in China.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“For example, demand for our services substantially declined in China during 2023 and 2024 as a result of various factors including Chinese regulatory mandates that made it more difficult to register a domain name or establish an online presence using a domain name.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Most of the computing infrastructure for our Shared Registration System is located at, and most of our customer information is stored in, data centers we own or lease. These data centers, which are concentrated in the same geographic region, are vulnerable to damage or interruption, including from natural disasters, such as fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, and floods, power loss, hardware or system failures, physical or electronic break-ins, human error or interference.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Additionally, the rapid increase in demand for compute and network hardware, including servers, chips, memory and other technology, caused by new demand from AI companies, is increasing our costs for some of these goods and could increase our capital and operating costs.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“For example, demand for our services substantially declined in China during 2023 and 2024 as a result of various factors including Chinese regulatory mandates that made it more difficult to register a domain name or establish an online presence using a domain name.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Demand for domain names could be negatively impacted to the extent end-users establish their online identities using social media (such as Facebook, Instagram or TikTok) or transact business on e-commerce platforms (such as Amazon, Etsy 5 Table of Contents and Taobao) instead of registering domain names. Furthermore, demand for domain names could also be negatively impacted by the activities of providers of web and mobile applications that allow end-users to locate and access content.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Some registrars and registrants seek to generate revenues by registering domain names specifically for website advertising. Changes in the way these registrars and registrants are compensated (including changes in methodologies and metrics) by advertisers and advertisement placement networks, such as Google, Baidu and Bing, have adversely affected, and may continue to adversely affect the market for domain names used for this purpose, which has resulted in, and may continue to 17 Table of Contents result in, a decrease in demand and/or the renewal rate for such domain names. In addition, if spending on online advertising and marketing is reduced, this may result in a further decline in the demand for domain names used for this purpose.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“The .com Registry Agreement permits an increase to the Maximum Price (as defined in the .com Registry Agreement) of .com domain name registrations by up to 7% over the previous year in each of the final four years of each six-year period.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Factors such as inflation, interest rates, currency fluctuations, trade barriers, tariffs, war, civil unrest, and other political and economic developments and their impact on global economic conditions have in the past and may in the future negatively impact our business. These factors may have varying impacts on different geographic regions.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Some registrars and registrants seek to generate revenues by registering domain names specifically for website advertising. Changes in the way these registrars and registrants are compensated (including changes in methodologies and metrics) by advertisers and advertisement placement networks, such as Google, Baidu and Bing, have adversely affected, and may continue to adversely affect the market for domain names used for this purpose, which has resulted in, and may continue to 17 Table of Contents result in, a decrease in demand and/or the renewal rate for such domain names. In addition, if spending on online advertising and marketing is reduced, this may result in a further decline in the demand for domain names used for this purpose.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Factors such as inflation, interest rates, currency fluctuations, trade barriers, tariffs, war, civil unrest, and other political and economic developments and their impact on global economic conditions have in the past and may in the future negatively impact our business. These factors may have varying impacts on different geographic regions.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Factors such as inflation, interest rates, currency fluctuations, trade barriers, tariffs, war, civil unrest, and other political and economic developments and their impact on global economic conditions have in the past and may in the future negatively impact our business. These factors may have varying impacts on different geographic regions.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“As of December 31, 2025, we had 928 employees, of which 926 were full-time. 859 employees (representing approximately 93% of our total workforce) were based in the U.S., and 69 employees (representing approximately 7% of our total workforce) were based outside the U.S.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“Additionally, the rapid increase in demand for compute and network hardware, including servers, chips, memory and other technology, caused by new demand from AI companies, is increasing our costs for some of these goods and could increase our capital and operating costs.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“If we fail to expand our services into developing and emerging economies in international locations, our business may not grow. We seek to serve new, developing, and emerging economies in international locations to grow our business. These economies are rapidly evolving and may not grow or even if they do grow, our services may not be widely used or accepted there.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“A significant portion of our revenues is derived from customers outside the U.S. Our business operations in international locations have required, and will continue to require, significant management attention and resources.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself

“A significant portion of our revenues is derived from customers outside the U.S. Our business operations in international locations have required, and will continue to require, significant management attention and resources.”

Annual report 2025A · The company itself