Transferring an active domain name entails switching the company that provides the domain name registration service, so after the transfer, you will have to manage things like renewal payments or DNS record updates through the new registrar company. The transfer process is standard with most universal and country-specific domain name extensions. Some country-code extensions are more specific and involve different procedures, but in the general case transferring a domain name involves several necessary procedures and one of them is unlocking the domain. The lock is a security option, which is being adopted by more and more domain registry operators. It’s a default feature supported by all generic Top-Level Domains. If a domain name is locked, it won’t be possible to start a transfer procedure, so no one can even attempt to take your domain. The lock can be annulled only through the account where the domain name is registered and all new domain names that support this functionality are locked by default the moment they are registered.