ICANN Finds No Wrong Doing in Domain Front Running

eldavojohn writes "Remember the investigation ICANN did in domain name front running? Well, it turns out that there was no wrong doing going on at all. What went wrong? Domain name 'tasting', which involves a free five day trial of a domain name, was the big culprit. From the article: 'In some cases ... the committee found that a separate practice of domain name tasting may be causing problems. That refers to someone testing the financial viability of a name for up to five days and then returning it for a full refund, using a loophole in registration policies. Domain tasting can tie up millions of Internet addresses, including ones someone checks but does not buy.' If you check for availability of a website and someone sees you do it and they reserve it before you, it's fair play."

They didn't examine NetSol's practice

[wanted]

FTA:
"The report, brought before the ICANN board in New Delhi on Friday, did not examine a controversial practice by domain name seller Network Solutions LLC of grabbing names that people search for on its Web site but don't immediately register."

I wonder why -- that should be the hot topic of the meeting. NetSol is using another loophole in the ICANN process (after previously being responsible for wildcard *.com records scandal, then under Verisign name) and ICANN has other topics to talk about? WTF?

Re:Nice.

[IdeaMan]

It's not quite the way you describe.
It's like you go place a reservation on the property in your name in order to prevent some third party from getting buying it before your client does. However, by doing this you also prevent your client from using another agent to buy the property.

I'm describing the Network Solutions tactic, not anyone else. Were you saying that NS will refuse to sell it to you while they squat on it or take it over as their own? I hadn't heard of any cases of them doing that.

I still think their practice is at best highly questionable, and most likely predatory, but just wanted to make sure that their practice was being accurately represented.

Re:Nice.

[Thought1]

In either case, the proposed change to ICANN policy would stop even NS's practice, because they'd be charged the $0.20 fee for every domain name they did that with, which would add up to expensive really fast. They've stated that they would stop the practice if the ICANN implements the "no registration fee refund" policy, though their claimed reasons are that their users would be less at risk.

Re:Nice.

[suso]

This is one reason I created saferdomainsearch.com [saferdomainsearch.com]. It uses direct DNS lookups against the root name servers. No logging is done of what you search for.

Re:Nice.

[canUbeleiveIT]

Okay, so I'm a dumbass. I tried it without the "www" and it worked fine. My apologies for my error and my thanks for your selfless actions.

Re:Nice.

[hax0r_this]

Get rid of the "www."

Re:Nice.

[kimba]

1. You can not query the root name servers to identify the availability of domains like "google.com". The root name servers are only authoritative for top-level domains. You would need to query the authorities for .com, for example.

2. Domain registration != Domain availability in the DNS. It is entirely possible to register a domain and not be able to query it in the DNS. You can only use WHOIS to verify it.

Re:Not even "fair" here.

[a_nonamiss]

I don't think you're stupid, the issue is somewhat complex. The $0.20 charge is not for the consumer, it's for the registrant. The scripts would be written by folks like you and I, (or a million other nerds that read Slashdot) and they would be designed to generate lots and lots of noise so that the companies could stop using their positions of power to take advantage of the regular folks on the Internet.

Here is an experiment that I encourage you to try on your own: I just now, right now, made up the domain flipperjikk.com. Make up your own and follow along. Use long random strings of letters to make sure it's not an accident. I went to GoDaddy and did a search and the domain is available. Great! I then went to Network Solutions and searched for the same domain name, just to be sure. Yep, it's still available. Immediately, I went back to GoDaddy, and lo and behold, in the 15 seconds since I checked the first time, somebody else must have come up with the exact same domain name as I did, because flipperjikk.com appears to have now been registered, and is no longer available. And it cost Network Solutions nothing to register this, because they can just get a refund in 5 days if I decide not to register it. The insidious part is, odds are that domain may NEVER become available again, because once the 5-day period expires, some squatter will see it's expiring, someone's interested in it, and register it for themselves, using the same technique. Domains can sit in limbo for months going back and forth between different shell companies using this trial period. Nobody pays a dime (or two) for all this activity.

The script I mentioned could search the availability for random domains all day. djiuqeruoweit.com, agrhlreijilaer.com, wejhafkljherk,com, etc. The registrants would be overwhelmed with searches, and they would no longer be able to tell which domains people were actually interested in, and which ones were garbage. If they register all the searches using an automated script (which they clearly did with flipperjikk.com) it would cost them millions per day.

This $0.20 tax would in no way hurt you and I. It would just discourage the registrants from registering every domain that they think people might be slightly interested in, because now it costs them money.

Slumming

[EdIII]

Unfortunately, and I have known this for years, buying a domain name involves just a little bit of slumming. It's truly a nasty business laden with unethical people extorting money out of others.

About the best you can hope for is:

1) Get a good domain name.
2) Hope that the registrar does their job to protect anybody from stealing right out from under you.

I have always recommended to my clients to have a couple of meetings beforehand and choose several names very carefully. Take their time and think it through. When they are ready to get the domain names, I have described it as being similar to sniping auctions on eBay. Be prepared to hit "click" as fast as possible.

Basically, don't be searching for a domain name. Already have an idea and be prepared to make a decision right there on the spot. That's the only way to truly stop domain tasting.