Transferring an existing domain name entails switching the registrar company that handles the registration service, so after the transfer, you’ll have to manage things like renewal payments or DNS modifications through the new registrar company. The transfer procedure itself is standard with most universal and country-specific domain extensions. Certain country-code extensions are more specific and involve different procedures, but in the general case transferring a domain name entails a few necessary steps and one of them is unlocking the domain. The lock is a safety option, which is being adopted by more and more domain name registry operators. It’s a standard feature supported by all gTLDs. If a domain name is locked, it will be impossible to initiate a transfer procedure, so nobody can even attempt to snatch your domain. The domain lock can be annulled only through the account where the domain is registered and all new domain names that support this option are locked by default the moment they are registered.