Custodial ownership

Custodial ownership occurs when a third party holds and manages assets on behalf of the actual owner, who relies on the custodian's policies and systems to access their assets. Traditional domain ownership is largely custodial—registrars control the domain records, renewal processes, and transfer mechanisms. Even though you "own" the domain, you depend on the registrar's platform and policies to manage it. Tokenized domains shift toward self-custody, where you directly control the ownership token in your own wallet. While some aspects (like DNS management) may still involve custodial services, the core ownership becomes self-sovereign and independent of any single service provider's policies or continued operation.