An additional unique string identifier, other than the character name, associated with an encoded character in the standard.

• Character name aliases are assigned when there is a serious clerical defect with a character name, such that the character name itself may be misleading regarding the identity of the character. A character name alias constitutes an alternate identifier for the character.
• Character name aliases are also assigned to provide string identifiers for control codes and to recognize widely used alternative names and abbreviations for control codes, format characters and other special-use characters.
• Character name aliases are unique within the common namespace shared by character names, character name aliases, and named character sequences.
• More than one character name alias may be assigned to a given Unicode character. For example, the control code U+000D is given a character name alias for its ISO 6429 control function as carriage return, but is also given a character name alias for its widely used abbreviation “CR”.
• Character name aliases are a formal, normative part of the standard and should be distinguished from the informative, editorial aliases provided in the code charts.