16 No. 23708 Act No. 25,2002 GOVERNMENT GAZETTE, 2 AUGUST 2002 ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATIONS AND TRANSACTIONS ACT, 2002 “registry” means an entity licensed by the Authority to manage and administer a specific subdomain; “repository”meansthe primary register of the informationmaintained by a registry; “second level domain” means the subdomain immediately following the ccTLD; “SMMEs” meansSmall,Medium and MicroEnterprisescontemplated in the Schedules to the Small Business Development Act, 1996 (Act No. 102 of 1996); “subdomain” means any subdivision of the .za domain name space which begins at the second level domain; “TCP/IP” means the Transmission Control Protocol Internet Protocol used by an information system to connect to the Internet; “TLD” means a top level domain of the domain name system; “third party”, in relation to a service provider, means a subscriber to the service provider’s services or any other user of the service provider’s services or a user of information systems; “transaction”meansa transaction of eitheracommercial or non-commercial nature, and includes the provision of information and e-government services; “universalaccess”means access byall citizens of the Republic to Internet connectivity and electronic transactions; “WAP”means Wireless ApplicationProtocol, an open international standard developed by the Wireless Application Protocol Forum Limited, a company incorporated in terms of the laws of the United Kingdom, for applications that use wireless communication and includes Internet access from a mobile phone; “web page” means a data message on the World Wide Web; “web site” means any location on the Internet containing a home page or web page; “World Wide Web” means an information browsing framework that allows a user to locate and accessinformationstored on aremotecomputer and to follow references from one computer to related information on another computer; and “.za domain name space” means the .za ccTLD assigned to the Republic according to the two-letter codes in the International Standard I S 0 3166-1. 5 10 15 20 25 30 Objects of Act 2. (1) The objects of this Act are to enable and facilitate electronic communications and transactions in the public interest, and for that purpose torecognise the-importance of the information-economy for the economic and social prosperity of the Republic; promote universal access primarily in underserviced areas; promote the undcrstanding and, acceptance of and growth in the number of electronic transactions in the Republic; remove and prevent barriers to electronic communications and transactions in the Republic; promote legal certainty and confidence in respect of electronic communications and transactions; promote technology neutrality in the application of legislation to electronic communications and transactions; promote e-government services and electronic communications and transactions with public and private bodies, institutions and citizens; ensure that electronictransactions in the Republic conform to the highest international standards: encourage investment and innovation in respect of electronic transactions in the Republic; develop a safe, secure and effective environment for the consumer. business and the Government to conduct and use electronic transactions; promote the development of electronic transactions services which are responsive to the needs of users consumers; and ensure that, in relation to the provision of electronic transactions services,the special needs of particular communities and, areas and the disabled are duly taken into account; 35 40 45 50 55