BLOOMINGTON – Indiana University is buying up 11 Internet domain names using a new suffix meant for pornography sites in order to protect the school’s reputation and trademarks.

University officials say they’re spending about $2,200 to secure for 10 years the site names using the “.xxx” suffix that was approved in March by the organization overseeing the Internet address system.

“If someone were interested in using our name or our trademarks for one of these .xxx sites, it would cost us several thousand dollars to fight it legally,” Valerie Gill, the university’s director of licensing and trademarks, told The Herald-Times.

The domain names the university is securing include Indianauniversity.xxx, Hoosiers.xxx, IUPUI.xxx and others based on the initials of IU’s regional campuses.

Other universities around the country are taking similar steps before the .xxx addresses become available to the public this week.

“We’re not trying to think of every variation of Girls Gone Wild or Girls of Indiana or Hoosier Girls,” Gill said.

“The possibilities are endless, and we could be spending thousands and thousands on that. ”