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Verisign Gets Out of the Registrar Biz, Keeps .com Registry 238

Posted by michael from the overpriced-cruddy-service dept.
Perianwyr Stormcrow writes "Verisign shot off a message today saying that they're selling off Network Solutions to Pivotal Private Equity (a firm specializing in picking up and turning around 'under-performing' businesses.) Perhaps Sitefinder was an attempt at maximizing shareholder value for the sale."
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Verisign Gets Out of the Registrar Biz, Keeps .com Registry More

Verisign Gets Out of the Registrar Biz, Keeps .com Registry

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  • Umm, do we sing "Ding Dong the wicked witch is dead"... or just panic? I am quite perturbed.

    Hooray for the pyram^H^H^H^H^H^H stock market for allowing such wierdness and flagrant disregard for sound business practices become modus operandi in the tech industry.

    • Re:Hmmm... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by dzym ( 544085 )
      Umm, do we sing "Ding Dong the wicked witch is dead"... or just panic?
      Panic. Now there are no monopoly issues with them reimplementing SiteFinder. Less things to sue them over to get them to stop the next time they decide to fuck over the Internet "for fun and profit."
  • How does it get out of the registrar business but keep .com? Doesn't that mean it's still in the registrar business?
    • I think they're no longer dealing with customers... only with domain name resellers.

    • Re:Gets out but stays in? (Score:4, Informative)

      by markhb ( 11721 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @11:37AM (#7229814) Journal
      There are two parts: the registrar business of signing up domain names (the same as what places like register.com do), which is what is being sold, and the registry business, which is the maintenance of the central .com database and the root server(s). They're keeping the registry side, so the submitter's comment about Siteminder is in error... they still have that side of the operation.

    • Re:Gets out but stays in? (Score:3, Informative)

      by turg ( 19864 ) *
      There are two separate roles that Versign has/had here.
      1. They are the registry operator who run the core database of domain names for various TLDs, including .com and .net. They do this on behalf of ICANN and the US Dept of Commerce (in the case of .com and .net). This also means they run the root DNS for those TLDs. This is the position that allowed them to create their SiteFinder "service." The registry operator gets information about the domains from registrars.
      2. In addition, they are one of the many comp
      • I fail to see how they can ethically keep sitefinder going now that they aren't in the business of registering domains. Will it give you a menu of the umpty-trillion registrars out there now?

        Sitefinder is pretty much bound to die, I think.
        • You're accusing Verisign of having Ethics?

          Verisign execs realized some time ago that the business of selling domain names wasn't nearly the goldmine they thought it would be, especially when they were forced to relinquish their monopoly on the business and open it up to competitors.

          It's very simple. Verisign has no interest in providing services. They want money. If they can get more money by restricting those services to a select few, they can and will attempt to do so.
  • Note the 15% equity stake, means they still have vested interest in sitefinder either way

  • Eh. (Score:1, Funny)

    by Gunsmithy ( 554829 )
    Verisign, I barely knew ye.

    And for that, I'm glad.
  • Of corporate greed deliberately damaging the public good.

    I need remedial lessons. Someone please tell me again why capitalism is good.
    • Someone please tell me again why capitalism is good.

      Capitalism isn't good. It's just the least bad of the available options tried thus far.
      • It gives trashmen dreams. Such a thing cannot be underestimated.
        • Dreams which, when it's discovered are almost impossible to accomplish due to rampant corruption and nepotism, turn to depression and/or anger.
          • And that depression and anger can be harnessed into a force for change. All good.

          • Re:Capitalism is fucking great (Score:4, Insightful)

            by cK-Gunslinger ( 443452 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @12:11PM (#7230157) Journal
            Ever heard of "From Rags to Riches" stories? Not all of them are made up or trumped up on the evening news. Societies/economies based on human's own motivation and drive are not bad.

            Your key phrase was "almost impossible." Many a fortune has been made on beating those odds. Don't be such a cynic. Not everyone gives up so easily.
            • >Ever heard of "From Rags to Riches" stories?

              For every true rags to riches story, there's a fucton more rags + herculean effort = still rags stories.

              There's a guy around here who gives success motivation talks, he's pretty popular on a local level. But I just think it's hilarious, because here's this young, tall, white guy who dresses well and has good teeth, who seems to sincerely believe the source of his success comes from his attitude. It hasn't occurred to him that he had most of the ingredients
              • There's a guy around here who gives success motivation talks, he's pretty popular on a local level.

                Does he live in a van down by the river?

                here's this young, tall, white guy who dresses well and has good teeth,

                Oh... nevermind.
            • Totally off-topic, but I think his point was that almost impossible is pretty shitty. I would assume, with personal experience (for what little it's worth) backing this up, that people born to poor families are not, on average, any less intelligent or capable than people born to rich families. Given that, the frequency of "rags to riches" stories over the entire population may be higher than that of an aristocracy, but is still lower than I would expect from a true meritocracy.

              Societies/economies based

              • Yeah, I guess I should have qualified my response with the fact that I am a white male from a "real" lower-middle-class family (as opposed to Jack Valenti's "$150k/year middle class) in the south. It shouldn't, but I'm sure it has had some effect on things. I went to public college on academic scholarships, got a decent job, etc.

                Anyway, I'm not saying that the system is perfect or even close, but yeah, it is about the best out there today. It could use a lot of improvement, but let's not knock it for th
            • Ever heard of "Win the Lottery" stories? Not all of them are made up or trumped up on the evening news. Societies/economies based on human greed and selfishness are not bad.

              ==========

        • As opposed to other, less efficient, systems that give Trashmen no hope of being anything else?

          Ya, that's better.
      • Capitalism is good because it's better to have a number of small, local processes which are honed by those who need and know them best. The local business is the process. Having the course of local business dictated by a distant command structure - whether government or megacorporate - sacrifices the intelligence and agility that come from having it under local control. That's why an OS with a bunch of small daemons and utilities performs more intelligently, dependably and economically than a megalithic one
      • You assume that what we have in the industrialized world is capitalism. It is not. It is the accumulation of capital in few hands. This is plutocracy. Real capitalism should always try put to as much capital in as many hands as possible.

        There's no reason to settle for a "least bad" option. There is a good one and it is called distributivism. [wesleyan.edu]

    • Someone please tell me again why capitalism is good.

      Capitalism is good because it allows people to gain from their work. Then again, Communism, or whatever other -isms there are, all have they're good points and all work when everyone follows the rules. This shite only starts happening when those who brake the rules are the ones who influence the handing out of punishments, or get the rules taken out completely. Case in point: whatever happened to Microsoft being broken up into smaller companies?
    • I must then remind you of the limits of your definitions. Capitalism by itself doesn't exist. It exists in a sea of Human currents. And we are finding out how it fares when exposed to the current of immoral and insatiable greed.

      To paraphrase Elbert Hubbard, a capitalist is a person with savings and a home. Given the disappearance of savings in America, and combined with the trend of home loans that won't be paid off over the lifetime of the loan, and you end up with very few of these defined Capitalists
  • They didn't sell the .com or .net registery aspect - they still are the registery. They just sold the customer-facing registrar business.

  • Who's doing business with Pivotal? Canopy is.

    For a second there, I hoped that the ways of Network Solutions were finally going to change.

  • Verisign seems like they're more interested in performing as a business rather than acting as a steward for the domain registry.

    A lot of people seem upset about the whole Sitefinder thing, though, which struck me as kind of wierd. IE popped up a helpful page when a domain wasn't found; what's so bad about the actual domain registrar doing it? Anyway, it seemed like a miniature thing next to some of the other problems people had with them. (Interesting thing I found out; miniature with British pronounci

    • A lot of people seem upset about the whole Sitefinder thing, though, which struck me as kind of wierd. IE popped up a helpful page when a domain wasn't found; what's so bad about the actual domain registrar doing it?

      Because it completely breaks e-mail and other services that rely on a proper response when a domain doesn't exist. For example, spam-blocking tools. They'll bounce the message if the domain in the From: line doesn't exist. With Sitefinder, it always 'exists', so the spam-blocker is less e

    • Re:It makes sense. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by oolon ( 43347 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @11:42AM (#7229856)
      Whats so bad about it? Ok off the top of my head.....

      1) I cannot turn it off.
      2) Its in English (not the native tounge of the reader).
      3) It breaks the autocomplete url functionality because every time I typo a url it is added to my history, where as they are not added when a domain is not found. Making the right sites harder and harder to find.
      4) Search engine is paid for adverts.
      5) http is not the only protocol on the planet, its just one port of many.
      6) Why does verisign have the right to the wildcard, surely this is a valuable commonity and should have been sold off to the highest bidder?

      James
      • 6) Why does verisign have the right to the wildcard, surely this is a valuable commonity and should have been sold off to the highest bidder?

        I dont think it should ever have the chance to be sold off to anyone, nor should it exist as an option period.

        It's like if the local phone company hooked all the wrong numbers into the switch admin's cousin Vinny --

        *dials wrong number*
        *answers* "Hey talk to me"
        "Hi, is this Armstrong Plumbing?"
        "UGh.. yeah I can do plumbing."
        "Ah ok. Can I make an appointment?"
        "Yeah
    • "what's so bad about the actual domain registrar doing it?"

      Again, another person who hasn't read a thing about how networks work. It is this "regular joe end user" type of opinion that Verisign had quoted when trying to say that their actions were justified. Like everyone else who has even the slightest clue about the Internets network infrastructure, I'll say that the Internet does not equal the WWW. There is more to the Internet than just browsing the web.

      If Verisign wanted to do what IE did, they coul
      • IE popped up a helpful page when a domain wasn't found; what's so bad about the actual domain registrar doing it?
      How many times does this have to be said?

      Implementing SiteFinder so it only works for the HTTP protocol is fine... implementing it in such a way that it affects every protocol on the internet is BAD and has unintended consequences. Implementing sitefinder in specific applications so that users have a choice about having it is even better is the best of all worlds.

    • It actually makes no sense at all.

      What a browser manufacturer does is up to them. If they want to take any error message and turn it into an advertizing opportunity, thats their choice, people will either use that browser or junk it and use a better one.

      What verisign has done is to take away the choice.

      Also, you are assuming that the web=the internet. This is absolutely not true. The internet is used for many, many more things than just browsing web pages.

      What verisgn has done is to essenially say s

    • > Verisign seems like they're more interested in
      > performing as a business rather than acting as a
      > steward for the domain registry.

      What they are selling is the business of selling domains at retail. It has nothing to do with control of .com and .net.

      > A lot of people seem upset about the whole
      > Sitefinder thing, though, which struck me as
      > kind of wierd.

      That's because you don't know how the Internet works.

      > IE popped up a helpful page when a domain wasn't
      > found...

      Then let IE

  • Key point (Score:5, Informative)

    by Lizard_King ( 149713 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @11:33AM (#7229761) Journal
    For those of you who don't RTFA, here is the key point from the release:
    When VeriSign acquired Network Solutions in 2000, it obtained two distinct businesses:

    - The customer-facing Registrar business is the world's leading provider of domain name registrations, and an industry leader in value added services such as business email, websites, hosting and other web presence services. The Registrar, which re-assumed the Network Solutions name in January of this year, constitutes the current Network Solutions business that is being sold.

    - The Registry business that is the backbone of the global .com and .net domain name infrastructure currently handles over 10 billion interactions per day, remains with VeriSign as a critical component of its business. This Registry business was recently renamed VeriSign Naming and Directory Services and is a core piece of VeriSign's Internet Services Group.

    Synopsis: selling customer facing biz, keeping registry infrastructure.
  • so they did sitefinder thingie only to get more exposure. even dumb and controversial decisions will play well with their stock price as long as they bring the press spotlight on them. just look at sco...
  • The title of the article seems to imply that Verisign was only keeping the .com registry. From what I gathered in the article, Verisign's entire registry business (.com and .net) is unaffected. Maybe the new registrar owners will institute reasonable fees - I fail to see why anyone would register through Verisign when you have places like GoDaddy that will give you a domain for less than $20 for two years. :-)
    • Possibly because outside of the gay porn industry, people don't want to explain to their boss why they're continually sending funds to a site called godaddy.com?
    • I fail to see why anyone would register through Verisign when you have places like GoDaddy that will give you a domain for less than $20 for two years.

      Well, I used one of those discount registrars for a group of addresses, and I deeply regretted the decision. It turns out the outfit split their service delivery between two separate companies, with two separate web front-ends, separate user IDs, and passwords etc. (which weren't even provided to me when I signed up). Worse, the group doing technical suppor
      • >>I fail to see why anyone would register through Verisign
        >>when you have places like GoDaddy that will give you a
        >>domain for less than $20 for two years.

        >Well, I used one of those discount registrars for a group
        >of addresses, and I deeply regretted the decision.

        There are "discount" registrars, then there's GoDaddy.

        I *had* been a committed customer with NS/Verisign for about six years, thinking that they would be more stable, reliable, etc., but when I signed up a couple new doma
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Well, I used one of those discount registrars for a group of addresses, and I deeply regretted the decision.

        I think you are just opening yourself up to a flood of "works for me" posts by acting like everyone but Verisign is utter crap, which certainly isn't true.

        Then, "whois" never worked on the domain name, just kept timing out.

        That may be unfortunate, but it's not as if your DNS address stopped resolving. Annoyance, not armageddon.

        I ultimately dropped them, and moved all of my business to Network S

      • Then, "whois" never worked on the domain name, just kept timing out

        And your problem with this is....? Unless you like receiving lots of spam sent to the contact addresses listed in the whois.
  • History may prove this to be "out of the frying pan, into the fire".

    There are worse alternatives. Let's wait and see BEFORE we break out tnhe Wild Turkey Rare Breed, mmmkay?
  • I suspect that Sitefinder and the sale of Network Solutions are related in some way. The "voluntary" suspension of Sitefinder might have been an attempt to maximize the sale price.

    More significantly, they may have anticipated the negative reaction to Sitefinder, and decided that one way to prevent people from taking out their anger on the registrar (through lost sales/renewals) would be to make the registrar a separate, "innocent" company.

    I hope that someone can stop Verisign, but like spam, I suspect

  • Note, it's not all of Network Solutions... (Score:3, Informative)

    by dedave ( 609713 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @11:36AM (#7229795)
    They're only selling half of the business.

    Quote from the press release:

    When VeriSign acquired Network Solutions in 2000, it obtained two distinct businesses:

    The customer-facing Registrar business is the world's leading provider of domain name registrations, and an industry leader in value added services such as business email, websites, hosting and other web presence services. The Registrar, which re-assumed the Network Solutions name in January of this year, constitutes the current Network Solutions business that is being sold.

    The Registry business that is the backbone of the global .com and .net domain name infrastructure currently handles over 10 billion interactions per day, remains with VeriSign as a critical component of its business. This Registry business was recently renamed VeriSign Naming and Directory Services and is a core piece of VeriSign's Internet Services Group.

    If I was a gambling man, I'd bet that this is an end-run around ICANNs contract with them to run .com/.net in an impartial manner. Go SiteFinder!
  • From the press release:
    "
    VeriSign's core infrastructure services continue to be organized around the company's two core services areas:

    Internet Services Group ....

    * Naming and Directory Services - DNS database management and resolution services for approximately 30 million digital identities, including the authoritative directory for all .com, .net, .cc, and .tv domain names. The unit also provides Digital Brand Management Services and DNS Assurance services for large enterprises with complex domain n
  • If you look at the news release, Verisign is being paid US$100 million (in cash plus debt). They bought NSI in March 200 for $21 billion (in stock).

    The most intersting thing is that Verisign may actually be profiting from this deal!!!

    The $21 billion is stock priced at around $200 each (according to my guess from Yahoo stock chart), so they gave out 10 million shares. Currently VRSN shares are about $15, so they are getting 2/3 of the purchase price back. But they are only selling the "public facing" side

  • probably good (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jqh1 ( 212455 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @11:39AM (#7229830) Homepage
    Did you ever deal with NSI or Verisign customer service? I did on several occassions and couldn't help getting the "I'd like to help you, but don't piss me off or I'll turn off the Internet" kind of feeling from the reps.

    The business Verisign kept is, of course, absolutely critical, and people operating under the brand and direction of Verisign have irritated me beyond reason in the past. So, reasonably or otherwise, I don't like the thought of that company continuing to run the backbone. Still, it works most of the time, and now I won't ever have to call them to find out why my DNS designations haven't been updated yet.

    So I *do* like the idea of separating the retail front from the back room folks. It's always smacked of government sponsored monopoly to have the two together -- maybe the new NSI will actually be a pleasure to work with (and I'll win the lottery and the Cubs will take the series).

    • Did you ever deal with NSI or Verisign customer service? I did on several occassions and couldn't help getting the "I'd like to help you, but don't piss me off or I'll turn off the Internet" kind of feeling from the reps.

      Not only that, but, like many others I recently complained about SiteFinder and several other issues (constant reminders that my domains are about to expire even though I've got years to go). The automated replies mostly just ignored the issues and referred to their FAQ, but the personal
    • Did you ever deal with NSI or Verisign customer service?

      I dealt with Verisign customer service some years back, and the memory still makes me giggle, although that's probably to keep from crying.

      I was trying to identify a problem with our server certificates after a format change, and I was using telnet and various other normal engineering tools to figure out what was wrong. Some way into our chat which was making curiously slow progress, the Verisign customer service person asked me "What is telnet?".
    • It's always smacked of government sponsored monopoly to have the two together

      This is the internet we are talking about... It's incredibly difficult to monopolize it. The only reason that Verisign has control, is that they do the job decently, and haven't pissed off enough people to get interest in alternative DNS roots going.

      Don't like verisign? Change /etc/resolv.conf to point to someone else.

  • No More sex.com (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by PetoskeyGuy ( 648788 )
    I can see their wanting to get out of this service and I'm all for it. They have had crappy security, and attemp zero liability similar to an EULA. Give us some money and we'll try to do what you want, but if not tough shit.

    I'm sure running the servers is the easy part.
    • What I don't understand is why Sex.com is still using Network Solutions as a registrar considering all the problems that they have had. If I was that guy, I would have moved it to another registrar.
  • Its underperforming because everyone hates them and wants to move their business somewhere else, now versign get to sit back a just take a cut of every .com/.net reg, while doing very little, though I do admit I prefer the idea of having a neutral registry. I just don't trust verisign and never will again.

    James
  • Those guys are a bunch of damned morons. I've actually lost a domain to a forged transfer request. These people are completely inept. No love lost here.
  • So does this mean that VeriSign will have to pay NSI for every unregistered domain if/when VeriSign puts the wildcard back in?

  • Does this mean that information will be correct? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by www.sorehands.com ( 142825 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @11:59AM (#7230022) Homepage
    Does this change means that Network solutions will actually enforce 3.7.7.2 of the ICANN rules that states that the domain must be cancelled if the information is intentionally false? Or will we still have to explain that a phone number of 1111111111 is not a valid telephone number or that 123 Fake street is not a real address?

    Will Icann actually get off their ass and sanction Network solutions for allowing this type of registration?

    • I'd rather have a system by which people can contact me, know authoritatively that the domain is owned by me, but know nothing else. A database that just spews up text and phone numbers is not acceptable anymore.
    • Domainsbyproxy.com (a godaddy.com service, iirc) provides this type of protection. I've been registering my domains with it lately, and they put up all their information on the registration, giving you an email forwarding address (yourdomain.com@domainsbyproxy.com) for someone to contact you...

    • Why the hell should I give my real name and street address to register a domain name?

      I'm allowed an unlisted telephone number. And even if my number is listed, it's reasonably difficult to do a reverse lookup from phone # to physical address. The information is available to law enforcement holding the required legal documents.

      For domains, why should this information be public and easily harvested in bulk?
    • Will Icann actually get off their ass and sanction Network solutions for allowing this type of registration?

      What -- so the moment you register a domain your email, telephone, and mailbox get flooded with spam? Or so the lurker who doesn't like the political views posted on said domain knows where to find the owner? Thanks, but no thanks. Keep it "broken."

      =========

  • It might be appropiate to equate Verisign with an mlm but didn't amway sometime get "bought out" by another company, quickstar. Actually the same corporate slime is in charge but with a different less recognizable name. With verisign still holding a large equity stake I think that is what is happening here.

  • Well I guess their latest advertising scheme where they intercepted all bad url requests worked out well for them.

  • To most of us in the know, it just doesn't matter. We've all transferred our DNS reg to real companies, that play in the free market and that actually want to keep customers through good service instead of spam and sleeze.

    I moved my last 3 domains to joker.com 2 weeks ago in response to the Verislime sitefinder stupidness.

  • This business is really tiny (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @12:43PM (#7230494) Homepage
    The amusing thing, of course, is that running the registry back end is really just running a modest sized database and some DNS servers. The registry doesn't have to deal with end users, just other registrars, and that's all automated. If everything is working right, the DNS servers don't even get hit that often.

    It's only a "billion dollar business" because it's a monopoly and because it's been heavily hyped.

    • Keeping in mind ALL the definitions of the word...

      ``It's only a "billion dollar business" because it's a monopoly and because it's been heavily hyped.''

      Well, what do you think they mean by "the value of trust"?

      I guess they figured "the value of monopoly" was too obvious. :)
    • The amusing thing, of course, is that running the registry back end is really just running a modest sized database and some DNS servers.
      And they make $6 per database entry per year. It's hard to imagine that their operational costs amount to more than 1% of that.
  • they kept the infrastructure aspect of netsol's old original business model. what they did in the past, they could do again if they wished.
  • Can ICANN and Commerce pull the registry from VeriSign and give it to someone else? Just curoius.
  • I'm sure they are only doing it to help us, poor users.
    Yep, that must be it. Isn't that the only thing they do ? Users first, profits last ?
    Don't you just love all this selflessness we get theses days from these big, monopolistic corps ?

  • Perhaps Sitefinder was an attempt at maximizing shareholder value for the sale.

    Sitefinder worked by inserting a wildcard record in the .com and .net registries. If Versign spins off their registrar services, that won't include Sitefinder because the registry (which Versign is keeping) does not and can not provide registrars (the part Verisign is spinning off) with the ability to insert wildcards in the registry.

    Sitefinder was an abuse of the registry side of the business. Since the registry business

  • Verisign saw the writing on the wall and realized that, in spite of numerous manipulative tactics, Network Solutions won't be able to justify $35 domain renewals for much longer. They've sucked that market for as much as they can but now that they have well established competition in that portion of the business, the cachet of their brand name no longer justifies 500% markups. Instead they'll keep the portion in which they still have a monopoly.

    Presumably Pivotal Private Equity thinks they can revamp Netw

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