The .TK ccTLD, one of the three TLDs with the most malicious domain registrations and whose domains are mostly given away for free, has rocketed into first place among ccTLDs with 16.7 million active registrations according to the latest CENTR DomainWire report. 

The tiny Pacific island of Tokelau, with a population of 1353 according to the CIA Factbook, is, along with .COM and .INFO, responsible for 82 percent of malicious domain registrations, says a phishing survey released by the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) released in April.

With the mostly free domains, at the end of April 2013 the CENTR DomainWire reports there were 1.3 million more .TK registrations than .DE (Germany) with 15.4m then .UK (United Kingdom) with 10.5m.

Following this was .CN (China) with 7.5m, then .NL (Netherlands - 5.2m), .RU (Russian Federation - 4.5m), .EU (European Union - 3.7m), .BR (Brazil - 3.2m), .AR (Argentina - 2.9m) and .AU and .FR (Australia and France - 2.6m).

Of course, they are all dwarfed by .COM with 108.8 million registrations according to Registrar Stats.

Of the top ccTLDs by registration numbers, .CN had the highest growth rate in the last six months, growing by 82.7 percent, followed by .TK that grew by 54.7 percent, .IN (India - 14.3%), .RU (12.5%) and .FR (6.4%).

Other highlights of the DomainWire report were:

there were 64.2 million ccTLD registrations in Europe

the average renewal rate across European ccTLDs was 79 percent

the Portuguese ccTLD .PT had the highest 12 month net growth of 27 percent

the most common use of a domain name was for commercial reasons for 61 percent of European ccTLD registrations

the average number of characters in a European domain name was 10.7 characters

28 out of 42 ccTLDs (67 %) in the region offer IDNs in their zone with a further 3 planning to implement (Cyprus, Belgium and Slovakia)

high numbers of IDNs can be found in the Russian .IDN TLD (.PФ ) with just under 800,000 followed by .de with over 600,000.