was sold by DKUUG to Tele Danmark (now TDC) at the price of 20 million DKK. Acknowledging the possible conflict of interest of a company (Tele Denmark) behind both a commercial ISP (DKnet A/S, now a stock company) and also in control of the .dk domain management (DK Hostmaster), a group of tele- and internet companies, 28 in all, including TeliaSonera, Global One, Deutsche Telekom, IBM, assembled five days after the purchase in order to gain control of the DK Hostmaster function. Tele Danmark initially refused, and the group together formed the organisation Foreningen af Internetleverandører (FIL), and threatened to go directly to IANA to counter what they saw as a bona fide Tele Danmark monopoly. Tele Denmark agreed and FIL became the authority registered by IANA for the .dk domain, while the nominal and practical administration remained the responsibility of DKnet A/S. In June 1996 they signed a one-year contract about the practice and rules concerning the .dk domain, which would later be renewed for another year. Race for the .dk domain On January 15, 1997, at 15:00, FIL loosened the restrictions for registering a .dk domain name. Where one had previously needed a valid reason to register one, all restrictions were now removed, creating an unprecedented run on .dk domain names. By the end of 1996 there were only 6.500 registered .dk domains, by February 1, 1997, this had more than doubled and at the end of 1997 there were 41.000 registered .dk domains. This in turn created a series of legal actions, which would last well into the 2000s, not only against FIL's own members, who were accused of using inside knowledge to register large amount of "good" domain names quickly, but also against individuals who were accused of cyber squatting. In December 1997 Tele Danmark announced that from the beginning of 1998 they would start collecting a yearly fee (of 340 DKK excluding VAT) for every registered domain name via DK Hostmaster. This caused a stir in FIL's members, as they had not been informed. While there had been talks about some sort of fee to DK Hostmaster to cover its expenses, no review of DK Hostmaster's actual budget was available since it was financially all but a part of Tele Danmark. This was therefore seen by FIL as abuse of power and profit making via the supposedly non-profit DK Hostmaster organization. It was later revealed