Slashdot Mirror
Verisign Sending Deceptive Domain Renewal Mail?
General_Corto writes: "Declan McCullagh's PoliTech list just forwarded a message detailing how Verisign is sending letters to people who own domains through other registrars, attempting to make them change registrar on renewal. Looking at the letter it is very unclear that you are signing up with a different registrar. Sneaky games are being played."
I'll fire off an email to verisign to chastize them. You should all do the same.
"Old man yells at systemd"
Registrars have been doing this for a while, not just Verisign.
We've had this one before. Where's the 'new' in news?
--
GCP
I got two of these emails from Verisign a week or two ago...Good thing I knew what I was doing or I might have renewed a domain that's already been paid until 2004.
© 2004 The SCO Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
"Switch to MCI/Sprint from AT&T, it's better!"
"Switch to Linux, it's better!"
You people need to get your head out of your asses when you think about "deceptive business practices." It's all a game... whoever is the most persistent and has the best business schemes, wins. Sounds kinda like Bill Gates's life story.
I received both the letter and the warning email, in this order. I wasn't stupid enough to fall for the Verisign's scheme, though.
Also I don't wanna spend time writing obscenities to them - I'm sure a lot of other people will oblige.
So basicly it's "move on, nothing to see here".
This thing doesn't even have the company name on its return address, it's just called Expiration Department.
This is just an attempt to snare unsuspecting customers aware from other registrars, apparently earning a tidy profit for Verisign (Go Daddy software complains that that Verisign charges $29.95 instead of their $8.95)
No
All this letter is, is a request to transfer and renew under Veisign without actually saying so. It's almost like receiving spam indicating you requested it without ever doing so.
It's wrong and deceptive. Just make sure you respond to the communication from the registrar you originally registered with. Being observant can save you money and hassle.
If I weren't nailed to the penis, I'd be pushing up the daisies!
Y'all remember "slamming?" That fun practice where Phone Company X would just go in and magically switch you to use their long-distance service without even mentioning it to you, and you wouldn't find out until the bill showed up?
So, this isn't all that bad... not that they wouldn't LIKE to be, but they don't get to.
Yep, taken from the Verisign homepage:
;-)
" Trust is the foundation of every human relationship "
They probably forgot the *: Only applies when you owe us money
Same game, different industry, huh. I used to see contest ballots for free cars and whatnot around.. in the fine print, though, it stated if you entered that contest that they could switch your carrier over to some unknown company. Although this isn't the same means, it seems that slamming techniques are definately not an uncommon thing in service industries.. It was probably only a matter of time until we saw stunts like this.
slashdot!=valid HTML
Just got a "renewal notice - do not discard" this morning from Interland trying to get me to add one of those useless ".biz" extensions to my main domain.
Declan McCullagh's PoliTech list just forwarded a message detailing how Verisign is sending letters to people who own domains through other registrars, attempting to make them change registrar on renewal.
In other news, Microsoft is bundling IE with Windows in order to get people to stop using Netscape.
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
All they are doing is using information from WHOIS to farm for new clients. It's spam, I didnt register with them, yet they are telling me all about how my domain is about to expire and all the wonderful options available to me to prevent this from happening. It's sad to see a someone as large as Verisign fall to such low tactics to farm new clients.
This strikes me as a similar, albeit different, tactic to what is known as "slamming" in the phone industry. It was once a common scam for the shadier long distance providers to change your carrier without your permission or consent; the practice was (I believe) outlawed in the 1996 Telcommunications Act (correct me if I'm wrong). This is slightly different because they are just being deceptive about gaining consent, but it does seem similar. Wonder if Congress will step in on this type of practice as well?
Not sure that's the best idea, but it will probably take Washington 10 years to notice this anyway and by then there won't be any players but Verisign left anyway.
I think that Verisign is spamming, but physically, damn Post Office, it's an relay server ain't it?
internet like monkeys'
They ignore email! You have to send paper (preferably hand-written or typed on an old typewriter), flood their fax machine, or travel to Washington to meet personally ... what, this is Verisign? Never mind.
They only have their name in one place on the mailing, and it's not on the mailing service. Given how Verisign advertises their business as if they're *the* Internet company, it's not surprising that people might actually see the Verisign logo and think that it's either a safety/security measure, or that they're partnered with Go Daddy to conduct the renewals processing.
Woe betide he who does not read the fine print.
On a separate note, where do you legally draw the line between deceptively stealing customers and "slamming"?
"Mod, mod, mod...and another troll bites the dust."
The letter is very deceptive. Verisign seems to only be prominently mentioned once, and the address the letter gets mailed to doesn't mention Verisign at all. This is about as shady as switching your long-distance plan by cashing a check they give you (anyone else get those?).
But, I would hope that any sane person would refuse to put down their credit card number on a piece of mail as flimsy as a business reply card. Ignorance only extends so far, right? ...right?
This
I registered several through GoDaddy, by far the best one I have ever used, and Godaddy sent me a "warning" notice that Verisign is sending out these deceptive messages, and suggesting we write to icann about them...
rooooar
For the last 2 months I've been receiving similar mail from Interland (a Verisign partner) for a domain that doesn't expire until late May. I have two sites hosted on Interland and they're sending me renewal notices for a Verisign-registered domain that I parked on Interland servers (no live site).
Initially I was keeping all of my registrations with Verisign/Internic because I felt they provided me with the best service. That's still true as long as I don't need them to do anything like send me a registration report or help me change a contact because the record got munged.
I also felt a bit more secure with Verisign because they don't seem to be going anywhere and domain registrations are long-term investments for me.
These new tactics may be the final straw. The trouble is, I don't know how reliable any of the other companies are. Any recommendations?
Slashdot comments... splitting hairs since 1997.
My PHB often comes in with letters from register.com and always says, "I didn't think we had domains with them? How did they get our domains?!" and I have to tell him that those renewal letters are just gimmicks to trick you into changing registrars.
I'm not one who is satisfied with the incompetence of Verisign, but I can't let them take the blame for coming up with this scam.
-jbn
Free Mac Mini
I really can't think of a good technical reason that I need to see the expiration date and other information off of the whois servers. Only information I really care about is the DNS servers and the admin/technical contact.
They should make the whois servers not give this information so other companies can use it as their own personal sales list.
I got the same letter from VeriSign, but it was for renewal of a domain that I do not and never have owned. The domain turned out to be registered to some company in Turkey who used register.com. I'm somewhat concerned that other people are getting the same letter for *my* domains.
Did you actually read the story? It's not a "Switch to us, we r0ckzors" thing.
The problem is that the notices look like invoices: Take a look here
People that have domain names should be somewhat cluefull, or have a consultant that is. I do think that Verisign is gonna get it's little fingies wacked over this. I hope that it's a very firm, costly wack for them.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
he is the president of the company that verisign is competing with. of course his is going to be upset. then again i work for verisign so i can't really make unbiased comments either.
But since my domain isnt registered with NSI, im going to send it back to them no postage necessary, and im going to write on it in magic marker "NO WAY IN HELL"
maybe ill add a few washers, since they pay by weight of the letter, thats what i suggest, hit em where the investors feel it.
moo.
I'm not one to normally be conspiratorial, but I think that it's not Verisign that's sending these letters, it's their competitor, GoDaddy, making it look like Verisign is to blame.
If it weren't for Verisign's bad maneuvers in the past, I would jump on that bandwagon immediately. Just a thought...
A while back, there was a slashdot article about a web site that offered a side-by-side comparison of all the various DNS registrars, so you could see which ones had the best and worst user agreements.
Does anyone have a pointer to that website?
Not sure about everyone else but I get a phone call from ATT and Sprint bi-annually to switch my long distance over to their service. Most phone calls I've received NEVER ask if you want to switch over. The simply quote the benefits of their service and then ask for your name and address. Giving your address is taken as you acceptance to switch over to their service, very underhanded. This kind of marketing is simply becoming more wide spread.
don't most domain name holders know who they registered with, when their time expires, and who their options are for renewal? isn't it normally a tekkie who handles the domain name administration for a company? if they really wanted to be sneaky, they'd send it to the administrative assistant to the VP of operations. this isn't any more sneaky than the 5-50$ check that AT$T sends in the mail where they switch your long dial phone service if you cash it.
I would not strongly disagree that "Trust is the foundation of every human relationship." (partly because I have no other candidates to replace Trust).
But, it seems I can't trust Verisign not to try to pull the wool over my eyes. I suppose I am going to have to remove the Verisign Root CA certs from my browsers now.
I must say that they are the sleaziest company I have ever dealt with. I don't think I'd have any problem finding a used car salesman with higher ethical standards than Verisign.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
I administer several domains through Verio, and we recently got similarly deceptive mail from Interland.
The problem is, this is not just registration that Interland is fighting for. They want to parlay controlling the registration into stealing the customers. If they control the registration (and by default, the DNS, from their scamming form) you have a "legitimate" business relationship with them and they can spam you to their hearts content with deals and "upgrade incentives."
Interland sucks.
So their selection/identification has some basis on actual use.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
I'd say that VeriSign is the Microsoft of registrars, but that would be an insult to Microsoft. VeriSign has screwed up billing and renewal of various domains of mine four times in the past - after the last fiasco, in which they triple-charged me for a single two-year renewal their web site told me was not processed, and which they had already told me they couldn't do because my domain had (afterwards) been transferred to eNom, it took me three months and a letter to my bank disputing the charges to get my money back. I now use eNom for all my registrations. (Yes, I know there are cheaper choices...)
However, I get the last laugh.. When the domain involved in that triple-renewal came up for renewal this year, eNom told me that VeriSign's database had the domain as having been extended for six years - it didn't a year ago when I had the mess with them - so I was all set through 2008! I wrote them to explain what happened - they thanked me for being honest and said that it was more trouble than it was worth to "correct" the situation...
I've gotten numerous letters from various registrars trying to get me to renew with them. None of them were very straightforward about the fact that they weren't my current registrar. Luckily, I know better (what's weird is that my domain is registered for the next 10 years, and some registrars still think it was expiring this year).
.com domain, I had early access to a .info or something like that. They repeatedly implied that they were just a support group calling, and not a company named "The Domain Support Group".
On a slightly related issue, I got a phone call a month or so ago from "The Domain Support Group". They tried telling me that since I owned a
Paraphrasing a bit...
Who would be the registrar for the domain?
"We would be"
And who are you?
"We're your friendly Domain Support Group"
So you're not my current registrar?
"We're the domain support group".
Are you the same company as my existing registrar?
"Uh, no."
Yeah... so, I filed a complaint with the FTC.
TO:verisales@verisign.com; websitesales@verisign.com; internetsales@verisign.com; paymentsales@verisign.com; partnerprogram@netsol.com
/bin/ladin
Re: Truth is the foundation of every human relationship.
It seems rather ironic that I find this on the front page of your website, after receiving your newest campaign letter. A nicely formed, official looking document asking me to renew my domain registration. No matter that I'm currently a register.com customer.
I am a web developer and knew entirely that I was not a verisign customer and with the email/fax crap that NSol puts people through, I never would be. But unfortunately not all of my customers are so knowledgeable. Your letter was deliberately deceptive and was done in extremely poor taste. Remember that in the business world a negative action will be relayed much more often than a positive one, and you have just started a lot of bashing through word of mouth.
_______________
Benny Butler
Nexus ITG
251-340-8345
www.nexusitg.com
chmod a+x
Do not meddle in the affairs of sysadmins, for they are subtle, and quick to anger.
The weeks prior to my renewal date were...disturbing...because of the increased level of spam and snail-mail junk mail.
Except the concept of Deception is always called by deceptive expressions such as "thinking outside of the box", "pushing boundaries", etc... I bet someone at Verisign got a bonus for this, because surely hundreds of people have fallen for the ruse.
I'm not preaching any alternative economic system here; I'm just asking you to not be so shocked that a company is deceiving people to become customers. It comes with the territory.
"What is the sound of one belly slapping?"
They have access to Whois, they know which accounts are ready to expire, so they send out a renewal notice attempting to get you to switch. I know I registered via godaddy, I can see the Verisign logo, andyone who is "fooled" by this deserves what they get.
Now if they sent this out under the premise that they (verisign) were godaddy THEN this would be a valid complaint.
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
I have a client who is trying to transfer a few domains away from Verisign/NetSol, but the transfers fail and no one at Verisign can tell us why. The domains are in good standing, more than 30 days from expiration, and yet they keep denying the transfer requests.
It seems that there's something weird about the domains in their records which is causing this failure, but getting someone to actually figure it out is basically impossible.
If you have your domain with Verisign, transfer it elsewhere if you can!
Okay, is it just me or does anyone else find this just a little funny (in a sick, unethical way)? I mean, sure it's wrong of Verisign to try and trick people into doing business with them. On the other hand, if people/companies have such poor records management that they don't even notice it then they've got bigger problems than Verisign
Do what I do...
Send them some crap back in the business reply mail. They have to pay for it. I sent them a credit card app from Capital One.
I do this for all mail with businness reply envelopes.
I think OpenSRS is attempting to address the "going away" issue.
-- Hallie
These letters from Verisign/Netsol border on fraud.
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
This is total bullshit. I just got one of these in the mail today, and if GoDaddy (my registrar) hadn't warned me about it a few days ago, I may have filled it out and sent Verisign $30.
:: Have You Had Your Linux News Today?
This is an incredibly sketchy practice on the part of Verisign and it pissed me off (as I'm sure it does many of you). Imagine if the U.S. government or IRS sent notices like this that said "Warning: If you don't send us X amount of dollars by March 31st, you will be in danger of facing criminal prosecution".
I mean, this is essentially what Verisign is doing, but the fact that they're a bunch of uber-capitalist business pigs^H^H^H^Hmen, it is somehow legal.
m o n o l i n u x
My domain was originally created at Verisign and would have expired 2/2002. But last December I moved it to Gandi.net and renewed it until 2/2003. Nevertheless I still got an 'expiration' notice from Verisign stating that I would lose my domain in 2/2002 if I didn't renew it immediately. I think I have checked whois 10 times just on the off chance that I somehow screwed up my registration. I thought consumer fraud was a crime?
We've received numerous calls from customers of ours regarding this issue as well. We've posted a sample of one of these Verisign notices at:
<a href="http://domainscams.com">http://domainscam s.com</a>.
There's also a good thread on the OpenSRS discuss-list mailing list. <a href="http://www.opensrs.org/archives/discuss-lis
What is disturbing to me with this is that while similar renewal scams have been running for some time, these have usually been run from small time registration service providers like Domain Registry of America/Canada. This one is from Verisign, and they've the money behind them to hit a lot of domain holders with this.
Their notice also includes a reply date which is timed 40 days following the expiry date of the domain, the day that most other registrars will drop the domain if not renewed.,
The notice itself is entitled Domain Name Expiration Notice, and looks as close to a renewal form as possible.
If you have received one of these & paid it, you should contact your bank/credit card company about reversing the charge. Verisign won't be able to complete the transfer without you authorising it by an email that is sent to the existing admin email contact for your domain.
You may also want to visit http://www.usps.com and in the search box type in "false billing". You will find the first result link is for: "False Billing Schemes Against Business".
"Notify your local postmaster or nearest Postal Inspector if you receive a questionable invoice or have been taken in a false billing scheme. This will help postal inspectors protect other companies with weak controls."
http://www.register4less.com
I never really figured that Verisign would stoop to being so slimy as to "slam" people with phony renewals... and anyway, most registrars require you to (A)cknowledge the transfer... just in case you forgot where your domains lived. :)
--
Power to the Peaceful
I received one of these letters in the mail the other day. I read most of the letter, and I'm pretty sure that it made no mention of the original registrar. Seems like a blatent attempt to make people switch over without even realizing it. Of course, I already renewed my domain through register.com (I wouldn't recommend them) three weeks ago. Do they really think someone would be stupid enough to renew twice?
Things like this are exactly why I no longer use Verisign/NetSol as my registrar. However, unfortunately this not their only dirty trick.
Aside from this, which is very similar to long-distance carrier slamming, Verisign also has a nasty habit of holding onto domains/not allowing customers to transfer their own domains. I know several people who were forced to wait for MONTHS for Verisign to finally go ahead and transfer their domains to another registrar, and that was only after repeated calls to them. Verisign's own transfer process was completely ignored, in the hopes of squeezing another $35 out of the billing contact.
Verisign also uses deceptive overbilling; if you register a domain with them for a year, come renewal time, they will send you a renewal bill for $70 or more! Of course, only in the very fine print do they tell you that it's $35 a year, so they are trying to make you renew for 2+ years. Yes, you can select 1 year, but they should not default to 2 years unless you previously paid for 2 years. It is very carefully worded to make it look like you actually owe them $70+.
Lastly, they make it ridiculously tough to modify your own contact information for a domain. I had a domain which was registered in my name, and with an email address that was now expired. So, you have to fax them a paper requesting a change of email address. Fine, no problem there. However, I had to send them nine faxes before it got changed. I would call to followup the fax, and they would repeatedly claim that it was never received. It took over 3 1/2 months for me to get an email address changed on a domain contact!! Of course, if you sign up for their expensive premium services, it only takes a day; glad to know where regular customers stand with Verisign.
I recommend that anyone who does use them to switch elsewhere. A company like Verisign/NetSol does not deserve our business.
Anybody who gets one of these in the mail should take it to their local post office and file a complaint for mail fraud.
Verisign routinely sends renewal requests for domains that have been transferred from them to another registrar. At best, it's terrible business practice. At worst, it's highly deceptive.
ever since network solutions turned into verisign they've begun to suck like everyone else. i'm assuming these guys, just like every other registrar, is using 'whois' in order to get their information. interesting that they expect other people to abide by their own server's "information clause" and while disregard everyone else's:
By submitting a WHOIS query, you agree to use this Data only for lawful purposes and that under no circumstances will you use this Data to: (1) allow, enable, or otherwise support the transmission of mass unsolicited, commercial advertising or solicitations via e-mail, telephone, or facsimile;
i know people who work for <a href=alldomains.com>alldomains</a> and they say they use the same technique, knowledgably and with complete disregard for the law. i get a courtesy calls often concerning my domains from other registrars. can we crack down on these guys? or should we just find them and physically hurt them?
by the way, why is crsnic's whois server still screwed up? do a lookup on any major site with it, like microsoft.com, and you get all these BS listings obviously made by someone who hacked them. i don't get it. it's been like that for months!
I've been getting these same type of notices from register.com about domains that I have registered through five or six different registrars.
Go figure...
My office mate got a similar letter from another registrar and sent them a check. He's still trying to get the money back. He just assumed cause it said he needed to renew he did.
I'm trying to read the fine print at the bottom.
It looks like it says "by signing the reverse side of this form, you hereby authorize to transfer the registration of your domain name(s) from your current registrar to Verisign, renew your domain name registration for a period of one year from the current record expires date, and charge your credit card for this order."
So, it clearly states what you are doing. But why is it so easy to transfer to Verisign?
I just let my domain lapse (not that it was doing much anyway) because I watned to get away from Verisign and it was a nightmare the hurdles you had to jump through.
Good think we have ICANN looking out for us...er...well for something.
Welcome to March, dumbass.
I own a house. For those of you not fortunate enough to understand what that means, consider your average junkmail that you receive now in your rental house, apartment, whatever. Multiply that by roughly 15.
This letter may be somewhat deceptive. So is every other friggin' piece of mail in my mailbox right now. Most people do the same thing with all such letters--they throw them out. But, like always, there is a sucker born every minute who will just plop down the credit card number and send the thing in. That's the ropes, folks.
When I looked at the letter, I saw Verisign's name immediately. I also noticed that you are signing for "renewal and transfer authorization", not just renewal. Sure, this might not say explicitly that you're going to change registrars... but there's a heck of a lot of fine print near the bottom that I can't read. My guess is that everything is spelled out there very clearly--to the person who cares to read it anyways.
Sorry folks, that's life. There's enough stupid people in the world who fall for things like this to make it economically worthwhile. Maybe next time get mad at the people dumb enough to sign things without reading--cause it's really their fault in the end.
Long, cute, or funny Sigs are just another form of over compensation, used by geeks, nerdz, etc.
Well, I got a renewal such as this. But the domain wasn't even one that I owned. I figured it was just a scam to sell popular domains that know one had used yet. It was actually registered by someone else. I guess their looking for runners up if the owner doesn't renew. Sheesh!
This issue was already discussed on K5, a while ago, for anyone interested in seeing the discussion there.
Actually, I have received about 4 or 5 of these messages from VeriSign since I registered my domain name 2 years ago. Every 3 months or so, they tell me that my site is going to run out, and if I don't sign up with them, I will lose the name.
Last I checked, my registrar notified me about 1 to 2 months in advance of my name being dropped so that I can renew without issues. Guess I will just keep ignoring them like I have before. Glad I don't use any of their services.
I wonder if the Telco Act as it stands now already cover this? IANAL nor do I keep the law text lying around to study. :-)
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
Imagine if the U.S. government or IRS sent notices like this that said "Warning: If you don't send us X amount of dollars by March 31st, you will be in danger of facing criminal prosecution".
The IRS doesn't need to send out the notices. They've already taken the money from your paycheck. You have to file a form to get the money back. It's only a matter of time before Network Solutions cuts themselves this kind of break.
This is at least two weeks old. I'm fairly certain I came across it earleir than that. So, varasign is enguaging in sleezy business practices. Who here is suprised? As a customer of GoDaddy Software, I recieved the email Declan mentioned and I'm happier than ever to be using them rather than Verasign as a registrar. In fact, I tried over a year ago, so get a domain name report from Varasign (a listing of all the domains I have registered with them) since I have domains that were registered going way back before they migrated away fro mtheir email based registration interface. They still have not provided the requested listing. My service request is still open with them. Talking to their custoemr service is like talking to a brick wall (again, who's suprised?).
--CTH
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
So how is this different from the mail I got from several other Registrars?
I just now sorted through this month's mail, did my bills, and threw away a ton of junk. In my sorting, I had TWO paper mails from other registrars telling me that my domain was about to expire and that in order to keep them I had to re-register them. Well, guess what? I'm registered with Verisign, but both of the letters were from other Registrars. One of which was Registrar of America (or something like that). They're both in the trash now, but the point is, Verisign isn't the only one guilty of it.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
FYI, if you're wondering how some of the Network Solutions policy work I have a story.
I had registered bigcollar.com with Network Solutions. It came time to renew and I tried calling and emailing about some policy questions. I don't remember my exact questions but the process was extremely slow and I let the domain expire as I wasn't using it at the time. They did respond once with canned answers but I haven't heard from them since. I thought 'no problem' I tried to Register elsewhere, Delete and Transfer but you can't do that with an expired record. Their website says they delete expired records (it doesn't say when) so I thought I'd wait. That was last July and they still haven't released the domain. It seems the only thing I can do is pay them. Since I refuse to do that the domain is still listed in the whois database as expiring last July.
This news comes as no surprise. The biggest registrar on the planet, NSI, contrary to their written policies, does NOTHING about people who register domains with phony contact info (spammers are the worst offenders, naturally). I don't expect that VeriSign is any better.
I say this because I seem to recall that VeriSign and NSI are partners, merged, or in some way related on a business level. In any case, this is definitely one of the sleaziest tactics I've ever seen any registrar use.
Also, for the fellow who uses GoDaddy: Hate to break this to you, but a number of spammers registered through GoDaddy as well, and GD does nothing about it when contacted. Are you sure that's the kind of registrar you want to support?
FWIW: Stargate Communications (http://www.stargateinc.com) is cheap (about $9 or so/year per name), non-intrusive (I've never gotten ANY mail from them outside of receipts and renewal notices), and they've got a firm anti-spamming policy. Good tech support, too.
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
Yeah, so we're all IANALBIWTOTs (I Am Not A Lawyer But I Watch Them On TV) ... so what? :)
Be sure to add, "I watched an episode of Matlock in a bar last night. The sound was off, but I think I got the gist of it."
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Just post their email all over the place so they can get spammed into oblivion. Enough people do that and they may think twice. Yes, I have gotten the emails from Verisign too. Here's a good place to start.
right on the outside, and their logo appears at least three places on the document. The only ones getting fooled will live in Florida, and if preying on the stupid and weak was bad we'd never have evolved.
doesn't it imply that there's some sort of "address list selling" by the registrars going on?
Watch the Teaser Trailer for "The Lightning Thief" Her
Interland isn't doing that. If you actually pay one of Interland's renewal notices, you stay on your current registrar. They just want money for no work on their part.
Of course, they're about as incompetent as NSI. I have my domain's registered mail address set to my father's PO Box, and my father paid the Interland renewal notice before asking me. He paid for two years, but my domain was renewed for four. And he paid by check, so they couldn't double-bill us.
Of course, even at half the price it still was more expensive than some alternate registrars...
Avi
This happened to my company a few weeks ago, and I was hopping it was just me;
It happened about a week after we transfered registrars. we started getting renewal notices about or domains even though they were paid up until December. The Verisign people said that it was a "glitch" and that there was nothing they could do to effect a domain name once it had left their ownership.
Hilary Rosen's speech was about her love of money and her desire to roll around naked in a pile of money.
Of course it makes no sense for one person who's lost perhaps $15 by paying too much - and ended up with much worse customer service, but still - to sue. Unless that person becomes lead claimant in a class action suit on behalf of at least everyone who has suckered for this scam, plus perhaps everyone who has wasted valuable business time urgently asking employees or consultants why the renewal hasn't been "taken care of," or assuring bosses or clients that the notice - from the best-known name in the business - is a fraud.
Not to mention that it perpetuates the notion that anything dot.com related is suckersville - but I guess you can't sue for making the neighborhood look bad.
Still, if none of the lawyers reading this can frame it as a rich class action, we need to attract a brighter class of lawyers.
____
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
Are you the Grand Central Parkway?
I live in Queens
Represent
on the page w/ the recievers name and address, it clearly has the verisign logo, and the instructions have for step 3..
Sign the form to authorize your renewal, transfer and payment.
It also clearly states the renewal rate and additionally, it has a section of inputs for 'Renewal and Transfer Authorization'
The fine print didn't really come through the scanner very well, so i have no idea what that says.
In any case, if you bother to read the mail, its not deceptive at all. I don't think its the greatest way to advertise, and it certainly doesn't encourage me to use verisign directly again, but theres nothing improper about it.
Need a Catering Connection
Left shift 1 for e-mail...
Not we own them money,but when they owe us money, which is usually never. So, trust never enters into the relationship. Guillibility, perhaps.
Seriously! Think about it... let's hit them where they feel it!
The short version is that I signed up for a domain transfer to Interland. Everything went fine (that is, they were very efficient at ringing u the sale on my credit card). Then, the troubles started. Various snafus at their end made the domain transfer take not one, not two, not three days - but NINE.
To make matters worse, their POP server went down repeatedly. Their "helpful web-based admin tools" didn't work properly - for example, WebTrends worked, but only sporadically. Server response times were atrocious - I regularly ran traceroutes from a variety of locations and found response to routinely be 2x slower than most other comparable sites.
Tech support failed to respond to any of my above complaints, but each time I received a handy message from their automated system, telling me that the problem had been resolved. How had it been resolved? There was no problem in the first place, so everything is OK!
Finally, I elected to end my misery. I switched to another host, which has given me none of the above-mentioned difficulties. I complained yet again to Interland and they finally promised to send a refund for the unused portion of my 1-year contract.
I faxed in the appropriate form over two weeks ago, and haven't been credited the amount due. Why am I not surprised?
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
There are a variety of companies that do this, that have been doing it longer than Verisign. Maybe you (whomever) has just never got them before but this is nothing new to Verisign. There jsut as stupid for taking up the practice because I lose all respect for companies taht operate in this manner (and may switch my Verisign registrations because of it). But in general this seems to smell of a particular kid of /. whine....
-shpoffo
I work for a semi-large hosting company that conrolls about 2000 domains for out clients. A company called Interland ( http://www.interland.com ) has been doing this for about a year now. They send out the deceptive letters, and out confused/uneducated customers just sent off a check to them. The worst part, is that they totaly screw up the name server entries, and the sites go down. Fortunately, they (Interland) are responsive to our complaint calls, and will at least modify the dns so that it works again.
The / in
The kids will still be living with their parents and get still in trouble if they drink too much or too often, but still get to learn their limits.
When I was studying the worst binge drinkers were the guys and girls who had never been drunk before and who were for the first time out of their parents' sight.
Cool Name. Hot Prices.
I got a letter too. It says to fax it back to
1-866-234-4134, or call 1-800-810-6298 if I have questions.
I think I'll mail the letter back just to be sure, and *boy* do I have questions.
--Just the place for a snark!
Here's my suggestion: Everybody who gets one should photo copy it 3 or 4 dozen times, masking out your personal info. Then send 'em in! I love postage payed envelopes...
Please be aware that Verisign, Inc. (formerly Network Solutions) is sending via the US Mail, what we believe to be deceptive and predatory domain expiration notices.
s play=letter.
.com, .net or .org domain name renewal, the victimized customer would pay $29.00 to Verisign, Inc. instead of the $8.95 charged by Go Daddy Software.
/ problem-rep ort.cgi
The purpose behind these notices is to get the unsuspecting customer to transfer to and renew their domain name(s) with Verisign Inc. at significantly higher prices.
The domain expiration notices are designed so that it is not obvious that the notices are from Verisign, Inc. as opposed to Go Daddy Software. To see a copy of one of these deceptive expiration notices, please go to the following URL: http://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/private_vsrn.asp?di
Those customers who fall prey to the Verisign, Inc. scheme will have their domain name(s) renewed at a price more than 3 times higher than would be the case if they renewed with Go Daddy Software.
For a
Those customers who fall prey to this scheme, will not receive any better service or value. They will however be tricked out of $20.05 per domain name.
Renewal notices from Go Daddy Software are sent via email, and always mention the Go Daddy name. You can be sure that any communications you receive concerning your domain name that do not explicitly and obviously display the Go Daddy name are not from Go Daddy Software.
If you believe, as we do, that this practice of Verisign Inc. is misleading, predatory and improper, we invite you to make your feelings known by writing to ICANN (who is the governing body for all Registrar's and Registries) and to Verisign Registry. Email links for both are provided below.
Sincerely,
Bob Parsons, President
Go Daddy Software, Inc.
ICANN Registrar Complaint Form (hosted at InterNIC)
http://www.internic.net/cgi/registrars
VeriSign Registry Customer Service
info@verisign-grs.com
Phone: 703-948-3200
GeekWares - Buy and Download Today!
I have had several people get this from Register.com. Telling them they need renewal, that Register can get better annual rates, etc.
Typically any person that deals with this stuff knows but the sneaky thing is they send it to the billing or accounting and most of the time the people pay thinking its for the domain to stay up and then it gets switched without the most important people knowing the technical people.
About three weeks ago in the mail, I received a renewal notice in the mail that had exactly the same look-and-feel as Government of Canada correspondence, right down to the color and type of paper and the fonts used. The notice was from a group called the Canadian Domain Name Registry or somesuch.
/dev/null, and forgot about it. In retrospect, I probably should have shown it to someone -- I wonder how many domain owners think that domain registration is a function of government...
Being a government employee, I recognized this as a load of dung, piped it to
One of my husband's relatives got a letter like that from Verisign. He was previously with NetSol. and hadn't even noticed the offer was from a different company. He just wanted to know what to do with it. I switched him to Doster. A helluva lot cheaper and easier to work with than either of the other two.
I guess I didn't consider the letter deceptive because it referred to transfering and the poor uncle just thought it was from his regular host to begin with. He had no idea what their name was.
Most people would die sooner than think; in fact, they do.
I dunno... I'd think that anybody who signs their name on the line right below where it says, "Renewal and Transfer Authorization," can probably figure it out.
...for one of my domains. It's actually pretty obvious that it's a transfer application, but I can see how it might confuse some people. It's just a single sheet of paper that you write your name on, check a couple of boxes to renew (and transfer your domain to them), and print your credit card info on.
I guess if NetSol wants "what--the--fuck.com", they can have it.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
I've gotten two such letters from various registrars, neither of which was from verisign.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
...IT IS NOT REAL
-- johnmc.
The post office is very serious about mail fraud. If a fraudulent transaction involved the postal service at any step along the way, they will get involved. I've heard of problems with some ebay sellers being investidated because the post office recognized it as mail fraud.
ICANN, on the other hand, may not particularly care. But it wouldn't hurt to let them know, too.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
i worked for a large company (read: s&p500 listing) that, as one of their services, did web hosting for small businesses - handling the domain registration and renewal internally. boy, did we start getting angry phone calls when people thought their domains were going to expire (and we weren't going to renew them inclusive to their contract/fee.)
doesn't internic have a policy of conduct for domain name registrars? i seem to remember there being a lot of concern when they broke the netsol monopoly that the 'alternatives' would provide poor customer service and business ethics. who's the pot, and who's the kettle NOW?
www.pixelectric.com
They probably forgot the *: Only applies when you owe us money ;-)
Either that or they're implying that they're not human.
but it's still dishonest.
They are OBVIOUSLY banking on deception to get them more money. Otherwise, why be so obscure?
It's in bad faith. It's deceptive. They should
be punished.
I own a domain with [thedomainname].net
Last year, when I was eyeing on [thedomainname].com that was registerred at verisign and already expired for like 4 and half months, i noticed something odd.
I emailed verisign asking why they are not releasing the domain since it has been expired for almost 5 months. They replied saying that there's some disputes with the domain. But by the next day, the domain is handed to some person, and it's up for sale. And guess who got a first solicitation for that?
Also I noticed that if we do a lot of whois to a domain name, netsol will not release the domain even if it expired for a long while (more than 5 months).....
I knew right away something was fishy since it was addressed to "Jason." Yes, the idiots forgot to put my last name on the envelope. A quick look inside turned up that it was from NetSol and not my real registrar, DirectNIC. (Plus, it was for a domain name that I had just renewed with DirectNIC a week ago.) I'm so glad to be rid of Network Solutions. (And I'm spreading the joy by moving my company's domain names away from them.)
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
If you look at the image of the letter you will see that they blocked out the address, but not the postnet barcode.
To my eyes the POSTNET barcode looks like this to me : (where t represents a tall bar and s a short one)
t ttsss sstst sstts stsst tssst ssstt ssstt sstst ststs sstst ststs tssts t
This decodes into 0 2 3 4 7 1 1 2 5 2 5 8.
which is ZIP+4+2: 02347-1125-25 Checksum 8
The way the POSTNET checksum value is given by (10-((Summation of all digits) Mod 10)). The total of our digits 02347112525 = 32... (10-(32 mod 10)) = 8. The checksum is valid and our decoding is probably successful.
Next step... head to the usps website to find that 02347 is in Lakeville, MA. Mind you, a ZIP+4+2 code in most cases is a unique address. However, the USPS is not going to make this easy for us.
Lets try our friend Google instead... searching for 02347-1125 give us the personal web site of Steve Douillette.
But how can we be sure that this is the letter Mr. Douillette recieved and diligently forwarded to godaddy to warn other customers? I wonder where Steve registered his domain name steve-d.com.
If you want to be anonymous, please be careful with what you post online.
Although Network Solutions is owned by Versign they are not the same company. Network Solutions is the unethical company, which sent out the fraudent e-mail. Versign, their owner had no knowledge of this event (yes, i have inside information).
it's a sig, wtf?
While I do think that this is sneaky of VeriSign and Co, I don't think that it would classify as mail fraud. How are they "defrauding" you? Never did they say that they were associated with your current registrar. They give you the service that you paid for, domain (re)registration. The service that they are "advertising" is legal & not a scam. The card clearly has Verisign on one of the pages. I can't read the fine print at the bottom of the form, but I can see Verisign mentioned in several places.
Maybe there is a case for the FTC or your state's AG office for deceptive practices, but not mail fraud.
Find yourself an OpenSRS registrar and register with TUCOWS. By far the best service I've received.
I've now gotten 2 e-mails and 4 snail-mails from other registrars (including verisign, who I have them registered with) about my domains expiring, all claiming the most dire of consequences if I don't sign up with them immediately.
Dave
There's enough stupid people in the world who fall for things like this to make it economically worthwhile.
How about the ones that look like junk mail, but say, "Your account will be billed shortly if we don't hear from you." I signed up for a free trial of something, and the original terms clearly stated that I would not be automatically billed; I would have to accept the terms of a future communication. That "future communication" was a typical junk mail that said failure to respond would constitute acceptance.
Sure, I can sue to get the money back (I called immediately to cancel) but the legal costs would have been more than I was arguing over. Plus time off work to go make my case to begin with.
Short of a class action, these cases just aren't worth pursuing, and the people who do it know this. That's why I never give out a credit card number any more unless I want to buy something immediately.
Nope, no sig
That's Verisign's motto. I guess honesty and integrity don't aren't part of trust.
Life is like a web application. Sometime you need cookies just to get by.
Looking at the letter it is very unclear that you are signing up with a different registrar.
Okay, Verisign is a lousy registrar and their service sucks. But their letter is reasonably clear, I think. Click on the link to that letter and you'll quickly see:
1. A nice clear Verisign logo. (duh)
2. The words "Transfer Authorization" just above where you sign.
Anyone who can't see those two things in black & white simply isn't up to the responsibility of being the administrative contact for a domain. I still dislike and distrust Verisign, but if the person in charge of my domains didn't clearly see that as a TRANSFER to VERISIGN, then they'd be out of a job.
I have several hundred domains, and Interland insists on mailing web hosting spam. It's absurd. I have the same address registered with each domain.
One day I opened my PO box to find it stuffed with almost 30 identical spam letters.
I have called them on several occasions politely asking them to remove my address from their mailing list. The first couple of times they said "Yeah OK, sure, you're off the list." Months would go by and I'd still get more piles of junk mail. The last time I called them (again, politely asking to be removed), the "customer service" rep told me to just throw away the mail if I didn't want it and hung up.
I would urge everyone to avoid doing business with Interland. They're either incompetent or irresponsible.
It's actually been a couple months since I got any spam from them. I'm not sure if they just hit all of my domains (and are gearing up for round 2), or if somehow I really was removed from their list.
Buncha punks.
If you'r e adumbass and have no idea what registrar you used in the first place
Definately have a look at Dotster - Aside from offering great low rates, they also have an incredible web interface, and a ton of add-on features like parking, DNS hosting, and the like. They also allow you to generate reports every way you could imagine, and allow you to make "global" contact changes for all your registered domains. I've never had a problem with them, or their DNS hosting services (which they do via nameresolve.com). I have no reason whatsoever to look elsewhere. :)
I used to be a reseller for a larger accredited registrar and I received a warning message about such practices. My customers would constantly complain to me about these letters, believing I had sent them. Verisign even tried to steal away my domain. I have received over a dozen from Verisign trying to get me to renew my personal domains with them. When I called Verisign to complain, they were extremely rude. They flat out denied trying to deceive customers of other registrars.
What ever happened to proper 'netiquette'? If I see one more domain renewal scam, pop-under adv, SPAM message, X2 cam promotion, evidence remover scam, or get rich quick scheme.... How I long for the good old days, before the commercialization of the 'net.
No way. This kind of Nancy Drew-attention to detail is outstanding. I tip my hat. Don't listen to this bozo who seems to feel that there's something wrong with technical prowess. He probably thinks he has a "life" because he spends Thursday through Sunday drinking to excess. Hitting the bars with his so-called friends counts more to him than being sharp as a knife.
Accept my congratulations.
Fortunately, most of our clientele are "in the know" when it comes to the Internet and domain registration yet even a large chunk of them have fallen prey to Verisign's deceptive schemes.
It's just as frustrating fighting them for ssl certificate sales. They're making way more profit per sale then we are ($120 vs. $350) so no matter how much we bid for ad placement, they always overbid us. Sometimes it doesn't seem worthwhile to try and be the lowest priced service. Anyway... :-)
Go ahead and look at mine. After all, all the "personal" information in the letter is straight from my "WHOIS" entry, so anyone can look it up.
Follow this link.
Or just wait by your postbox. I'm sure you'll get one before too long.
To: xxxxxxxxxxxxx
s play=letter.
.com, .net or .org domain name renewal, the victimized customer would pay $29.00 to Verisign, Inc. instead of the $8.95 charged by Go Daddy Software.
/ problem-rep ort.cgi
From: service@godaddy.com
Subject: A WARNING TO OUR CUSTOMERS
Please be aware that Verisign, Inc. (formerly Network Solutions) is sending via the US Mail, what we believe to be deceptive and predatory domain expiration notices.
The purpose behind these notices is to get the unsuspecting customer to transfer to and renew their domain name(s) with Verisign Inc. at significantly higher prices.
The domain expiration notices are designed so that it is not obvious that the notices are from Verisign, Inc. as opposed to Go Daddy Software. To see a copy of one of these deceptive expiration notices, please go to the following URL: http://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/private_vsrn.asp?di
Those customers who fall prey to the Verisign, Inc. scheme will have their domain name(s) renewed at a price more than 3 times higher than would be the case if they renewed with Go Daddy Software.
For a
Those customers who fall prey to this scheme, will not receive any better service or value. They will however be tricked out of $20.05 per domain name.
Renewal notices from Go Daddy Software are sent via email, and always mention the Go Daddy name. You can be sure that any communications you receive concerning your domain name that do not explicitly and obviously display the Go Daddy name are not from Go Daddy Software.
If you believe, as we do, that this practice of Verisign Inc. is misleading, predatory and improper, we invite you to make your feelings known by writing to ICANN (who is the governing body for all Registrar?s and Registries) and to Verisign Registry. Email links for both are provided below.
Sincerely,
Bob Parsons, President
Go Daddy Software, Inc.
ICANN Registrar Complaint Form (hosted at InterNIC)
http://www.internic.net/cgi/registrars
VeriSign Registry Customer Service
info@verisign-grs.com
Phone: 703-948-3200
(oh, and the funny thing was they sent it with screwed up mime headers)
Math is like sex. People who get it are popular in class, people who don't are not.
Like I said, Network Solutions have had, um, flexible ethics for a long time. It's not Verisign that's responsible for "corrupting" them.
If Verisign are not a party to this, then I expect that heads will roll. Unfortunately I expect that the crooks responsible will have their asses covered, and they'll end up canning some low-level people in the marketing department...
After reading the article, I just checked my snailmail. Lo and behold, I have a letter from "Domain Registry of America" (not my actual registrar), encouraging me to renew my domain name now, to avoid any "Registrar Lock". This letter is even shadier than Verisign's, because it doesn't even mention the word "transfer" in any large print. The small print on the back is literally too small for me to read without getting a headache. The renewal price? Why, only $25 a year, twice what I'm paying now. What a bargain!
I hate posting me-toos but I agree with clion999. I almost never post on slashdot because I hate the innevitable flame attached to my posts.
I think it is awesome how you decoded that.
It's maintained by an OpenSRS reseller (the "little guys" in the domain reg. biz)
And the only reason people "trust" their CA certificates is that people decided to pay to have them used.
Any joe-blow can make their own RSA key than sell off signatures. What makes them any more "trusted" than Verisign? I'll tell you. Tons of advertising and techy jargon.
e.g.
"We're the leaders in e-trust solutions via endocrygenetic potential leveraging trust devices"
or something like that.
For a good laugh check out the cloakware site. They're a bunch of hacks trying to peddle fairy-crypto. The sad thing is they might one day make a sale!
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
IIRC, using WHOIS information for email marketing is against ICANN rules. Using it for snail-mail is, unfortunately, not.
Tuus crepidae innexilis sunt.
Verisign used deceitful means to trick me into prematurely renewing my domain, too. Only, in this case, Verisign (NetSol) *is* my registar (there were no others when I got the domain). They sent me an email stating, "Your domain is expiring soon! Renew now or lose it!" So I did.
Stupid me for failing to remember that I had renewed it a few weeks prior. Imagine my surprise when I got the confirmation back telling me I was good until 2006.
Yes, it's my fault for not remembering whether or not I had renewed my own domain. And it's also my fault for paying $30/yr for a domain name that doesn't even come with any services.
That does not in any way alter the fact that VERISIGN DELIBERATELY LIED TO ME to get money from me today, that they probably would have gotten in a year or two anyway. After all, Verisign has been my domain registrar for 6 years already.
It should go without saying that that is the last money that Verisign will ever get from me.
I had problems with Godadyy also. They lost my fax so I ran out of time and had to pay NSI another $35. I then went to Joker.com. So far no problems there.
A week later, I got a vague renewal notice from Verisign...
"Karma can only be portioned out by the cosmos." -Homer Simpson
he's right. check out for yourself or use javascript for your needs. Thanks for playing!
Get Firefox!
The solicitation must bear on its face either the disclaimer required by 39 USC 3001(d)(2)(A) or the notice: THIS IS NOT A BILL. THIS IS A SOLICITATION. YOU ARE UNDER NO OBLIGATION TO PAY THE AMOUNT STATED ABOVE UNLESS YOU ACCEPT THIS OFFER. The statutory disclaimer or the alternative notice must be displayed in conspicuous boldface capital letters of a color prominently contrasting with the background against which it appears, including all other print on the face of the solicitation and that are at least as large, bold, and conspicuous as any other print on the face of the solicitation but not smaller than 30-point type (see Exhibit 1.2).
The notice or disclaimer required by this section must be displayed conspicuously apart from other print on the page immediately below each portion of the solicitation that reasonably could be construed to specify a monetary amount due and payable by the recipient. It must not be preceded, followed, or surrounded by words, symbols, or other matter that reduces its conspicuousness or that introduces, modifies, qualifies, or explains the required text, such as "Legal Notice Required by Law."
If you get a solicitation that looks like a bill, and you don't see those disclaimers in huge type, contact the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.
I wonder if they sent one to AOL...
Domain Name: AOL.COM
Registrant:America Online, Inc.
22000 AOL Way
Dulles, VA 20166
Created on..............: Nov 22, 1999
Expires on..............: Nov 22, 2001
I think one of the best things to do (beside nastygrams to verisign), is to send the verisign snailspam to the better business bureau, http://www.bbb.org/, which is what I plan to do. BBB will investigate verisign. I recommend you do the same as well. Put Verisign on notice!
spam sucks - except if it's spam musubi,
binarylovergurl@yahoo.com
ps. damn if I can't login with my account or I'd wouldn't be an anonymous coward.
Looking at the letter it is very unclear... :-)
No, looking at the letter, what I would say is unclear is the scan. I can't make out half the text on there. Unless that's a clean scan, in which case I think they're return rate is going to be pretty low
Received the letter in question today from Verisign billing me for a domain I have registered through register.com that expires at the end of May. Funny thing is the letter showed up in my mailbox less than an hour after I'd renewed the domain through register's website (got a second email reminder from register over the weekend, decided to get it off my todo list today).
So I wake up this morning, and my dad shows me this exact letter asking what to do about it. I tell him "uh, it appears your year is up for your domain, gotta renew it" and I saw that it was Verisign. He replies, "That's a lot cheaper than I payed before" *cringe* well aside from that general naivety, not knowing his original registrar, i was taken by this shite too. What cheeky bastards. I expect this from companies at this rate, but I also expect the larger ones to be a little kinder, gentler. Where are there PR people? Like they don't make enough money off of it as it is.
Greed is evil. Just read Canterbury Tales.
I sent in a story about this several days ago right after I got one of their deceptive letters. Way to go slashdot... I bet if this other letter hadn't been submitted a thousand times Slashdot would never have posted about this.
If it wasn't for the fact that I KNOW who my registrar is, i'd find it easy to get confused.
However, i've found that MANY people/companies tend to be extremely ignorant of the domain registration process, and their general domain setup/Web hosting accounts.
MANY tend to forget/Not understand how to re-register their domains. Then they go screaming at their webhost when the domain becomes unavaliable because the registration expired.
I couldn't even tell you how many calls like that i've taken working as a TS Rep for Verio/Best Internet. These people would let their domain registration lapse, then call up screaming and demanding that I get their domain back up right away.
General call would go like this:
"I can't get my e-mail! it says "host not found"! why have you taken my domain down again? If i can't get my e-mail i'm going to lose thousands of dollars and sue your company!"
click click, check check "whois XXXXXXX" read read
"Well ma'am, it appears as thought your domain's registration has lapsed. You will need to send payment to your registrar and pay the re-registration fee"
"Didn't you just hear me?! I don't CARE about the web site, I need to get my e-mail!"
sigh......
WOW...
sorry.
Hollow words will burn and hollow men will burn.
I had to select "Plain old text" to get that to post. Has anyone else noticed that "Plain old text" and "extrans" are labeled in reverse in the posting menu?
May we never see th
I'm impressed (of course)
I'm curious, however about how you decode the numbers i.e. sstst --> 2, sstts --> 3, etc. It isn't binary and I can't think of an alternate representation that matches. (I verified with one of my own letters that you didn't just make it up).
Thanks
Mmmm.. Donuts
I'm using DirectNIC, http://www.directnic.com/ , for my personal domain.
I'm getting good service so far. I recommend it.
Wasn't Verisign one of the first to switch to a policy of denying registrar transfers by default (claiming that the other registrars were stealing customers by having them switch without knowing exactly what was going on)? Seems to me that they're doing exactly what they were complaining about.
The company I worked for a while ago managed to not renew our project's domain, which apparently expired March 17. On the 21st I got one of these notices from NSI, the day before people started realizing the domain wasn't functioning.
The kicker is that when you do a dig(1) of the domain, it fails at the root nameserver, which is owned and operated by NSI. If you ask register.com, where the domain is held and the zone is served, it happily serves up the right address.
It's blindingly clear that these two things are related. NSI held a domain of mine they screwed up the transfer of for two years, with the zone being valid and the address working perfectly until they finally purged the domain. But if the domain is registered by a competitor, they kill the entry in their root servers within days. Perfectly timed to coincide with the arrival of their letter.
GStreamer - The only way to stream!
It got my wife on my case and my only defense was 'But hon, sweety, I use dotster. Honest!' . She had to read the fine print before she believed me.
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
Be sure to read the TOS!! Some registrars actually become the legal registrant, and just 'lease' the name to you. Be careful. Don't get suckered in with a low price.
This was the last bit of news I needed to convince me that I should move my company's domain name to another registrar. (Which one, I haven't decided yet -- I've seen a number of good suggestions here.) But what about alternate certificate authorities? I'd like to find one that is totally unassociated from VeriSign, and even better, is also a good DNS registrar. Any suggestions or anecdotes, good or bad?
This is ludacrous. My brother got one of these "renewal" notices for a domain that I personally registered for him through Tucows, my brother is a roofer so he has no idea what is going on, I just barely stopped him before he had send a check to Verisign for $29.99 for renewal which would have moved the domain away from my busines www.npsis.com where we only charge $13.00 per year for domain registrations, in my brother's case of course I just renew it for free. I am appalled at the nasty tactics that a reputable company like Verisign would stoop to. I thought that once Verisign took over from NSI, things would be cleaned up a bit, I guess nothing has changed.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
www.haidacarver.com
The letter is infact very unclear. But once I noticed it from Verisign and I knew my domain didn't expire for another 2 years, I just tore it up.
Note from the scan of the letter that the return mail is postage paid - "No postage necessary if mailed in the United States".
I encourage everyone who gets these letters from VeriSign to take the contents of the original envelope (and even the envelope itself), and stuff it into the postage paid envelope (without filling it out, of course). Then toss it in the mail.
Not only do they get their useless crap back, but they pay for it to be mailed - twice.
----------
Darryl Ballantyne
http://www.darrylballantyne.com
"Those customers who fall prey to this scheme, will not receive any better service or value."
I just transferred my last domain name out of NetSol/Verisign, and you don't have any idea how happy I am about it!
They have THE MOST CONFUSING set of forms ANYWHERE! I have a computer science degree and I knew exactly what I wanted to do (change an e-mail address and/or DNS server) but it took me FOREVER just to figure out which form on their site to use, and another forever to figure out how to use it!
By contrast, Domain-Maniac, which I currently use, has a simple login system. You can log in, change contacts and DNS servers and they're updated quickly and easily, no hassles, no headaches, no problems.
I'd use Domain Maniac over NetSol even if they charged twice as much!
But oh wait... they charge less than half of NetSol's price!
Is there ANYONE who registers with NetSol by choice anymore? WHY?????
You just watch, in two years people will start blacklisting any joker.com registered domain.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
My domain is registared with Verisign but i got one of these through a registrar in Buffalo
Because this was sent by US Postal Main, I complained to the USPS at: http://www.usps.com/postalinspectors/fraud/MailFra udComplaint.htm
The text of my complaint:
If you feel the same, perhaps you should complain as well. I suspect the USPS may be more responsive than ICANN ( but that's just a hunch ).
---
Segmentation Fault ( core dumped )
I clicked on the link, and saw a scan of the business reply card and letter. It says "Verisign" in the top left corner. And it says "renewal and transfer" in at least two places, in bold type.
How is this deceptive or even newsworthy?
This is exactly as if you were subscribed to e.g Sprint as your long distance carrier, and then all of a sudden you start getting "past due" bills from MCI.
1) MCI has NO BUSINESS sending me "bills".
2) It's deceptive.
3) It's illegal.
4) The FTC *has* spanked companies over issues like this.
Why should verisign get away with it, just because "others do it too"?
Using that logic, M$ should be let off the hook just because "other companies violate federal law too".
Just because others do it doesn't mean it's OK for verisign to do it too.
Every registrar using these deceptive and illegal practices should be fined and/or shutdown by the FTC.
They also say you agree to the terms and conditions at a URL on their website. The page referenced doesn't exist on their website renewals) ... but the terms I found seemed fairly nasty.
I have contacted my existing registrar (Melbourne IT), and they haven't even replied to my email. Maybe they don't care if all of their customers are getting changed over to another registrar...
I will be scanning the letter in (pdf), and posting it a bluecouch in the next 12 hours... need to get home from owrk ;)
lounge around on the blue couch
I got two of these letters from a company called Interland and even two from Register.com. On the back of the page it mentioned something about how it would effectively change registrars and how this could incur new fees. I was unbelievably pissed and notified my web host, so they sent out an email to all their customers to warn them.
...All I can say is that my life is pretty strange...
This is useful information, and proof that verisign is breaking federal law...
FTC policy statement on misleading advertising
I got the warning from godaddy.com so I'm not going to be deceived in this case, but if I hadn't received that warning I would likely have at least been confused. (I would have read the fine print and not done it, but I'm a cynical SOB.)
- BBB.org
- FTC
- USPS Post Master
Yes, I think you can contact the Post Master on this because you do have the ability to send a check in the mail, that resulted from deceptive and predatiory "advertising." (IANAL)1.3L, 3 moving parts, 280 HP, no Turbos, wanna Race? RotaryNe
I too received this letter after a warning email from GoDaddy.com. I sent Verisign's postage paid envelope back empty. I feel 34 cents better!
This is nothing new. The Domain Registry of Canada
sends crap on stationery that looks like it comes
from the federal gov't, all very official looking,
when in reality they're just another 2 bit registrar
with a P.O. Box in Ontario, and that characterization
is giving them the benefit of the doubt.
Didn't they fine this company from Australia tons of money for registering www.internic.com a few years ago? That company was charging like $100 for 2 years of domain registration, which was more than the $70 from NSI.
Well now it's NSI's turn to get wacked. You can't have it both ways, expecting to punish www.internic.com and get away with tricking other domain name registrants.
eTrade SUCKS
Interland got me for $60 with their faux-invoice back in December. The domain name I thought I was renewing was originally registered in my behalf by a third party, so I was unaware that Interland wasn't the correct registrar.
It gets better-- they cashed that $60 check long ago, but my domain records still indicate that my domain will expire at the end of this coming April. I never got any sort of acknowledgement from them. AND, in the last couple of months they have sent me two more identical "YOUR DOMAIN NAME WILL EXPIRE SOON" notices, probably in the hopes that I'll be dumb enough to pay those, too.
On the entire mailing, it only says "This is not an invoice" in one spot, in fairly small print, buried in a block of text. Clearly not in compliance with the postal regulations you linked to. I just finished filling out a mail fraud complaint on the USPS web site. Anyone else who fell for Interland's little scheme should go fill it out, too.
~Philly
Since when did slashdot become a bunch of sheep quick to cast judgement without knowing the full story.
Why dont you ask Tucows and Melbourne IT, Register.com and others to return the 30% + renewals they took from VeriSign doing the same thing over the past year and a half. VeriSign put an entire development effort to writing applications that send an email before you move notifying you that you are about to switch registrars and if this is what you want to do. Know what it got em? Nothing. So if you owned the company, what would you do? You fight back because if you continue to loose money, you go out of business.
Now, if you want to leave VeriSign because it can take months to get a name transferred and takes hours to maby talk to support, then go ahead. Thats reasonable.
Bash VeriSign for doing what they avoided doing for over a year and had no other choice because General_I_Work_For_Tucows_Corto is pissed that he is getting beat at his own game. Thats ignorance.
Timothy, I have read this board for a very long time. It saddens me to see an unresearched article like this.
...like not releasing expired domains even after they have expired for 6 months in an attempt to get you to contact and sign-up for the new domain name through them or to get you to take advantage (aka. pay for) their SnapNames service.
Signed
Still waiting for the domain's release
I tried everything, and finally called Verisign. They may be evil, but they have toll free phone support... such as it is.
The woman I talked to finally asked me my security question (it's one of those schemes where you make up your own question and answer when you sign up, to verify your identity). For the life of me I had no idea what security-through-obscurity paranoia I had been thinking at that time; but now my own question left me dazzled. Never mind that.
Anyhow, she told me that she would email me some forms, and I had to fill them out and fax them back. My hope of getting this resolved in 10 days dwindled. But what can I do? I assented.
The forms, however, which the nice woman said had "already been sent" before hanging up, never arrived. I on the other hand, talked to my mom about this, and told her the question: amazingly she came up with a brilliantly obvious answer which *had* to be it. So I phoned Verisign back, finally got to the point where the guy (obviously following a script) asks me the security question: i answer. Wrong. Argh. This guy kindly offers me the first letter of the answer though! Alas, I also didn't help.
He told me he would email me these forms, and I needed to fill them in and send them back. I said okay, not telling him that the previous person had already promised them and they'd not come. This guy however, asking my name, then insisted on confirming my email address (which is x @ Vex dot Net). He asks (spelling out the domain): "So your internet email address is X at S E X N E T dot com?" I snorted. Not quite.
We then went back and forth, my correcting him, and him confirming several times. He seemed set in his mind at putting a "dot com" at the end. It took several attempts before I managed to get across that it was V E X, not S E X; and just simply "dot net", not "vex.com" (though that would work), and not "vexnet.com" (took several tries before he came to understand this), and not even "vexdotnet.com"... maybe they just have really crappy headsets in their support center?
Anyhow... after all this the forms did come. Large TIF image... all the requirements... photocopied photo ID, signatures of the person who's name is in the Admin record (not me!)... i dispaired.
In utter frustration I found myself pounding away at the Verisign login page, typing any old pattern or variation on words or passwords I used to use years ago. Again and again and again. i'd already done this off and on for days... but now I had lost hope in any other way to break freak from Verisign... and... i was amazed. After what seemed like a thousand maniacal attempts i managed to brute force my own password from my mind! Got in... quickly changed the admin email. Got the ball rolling (luckily my ISP is an opensrs reseller, so we were able to help push things through a bit). All the confirmations have been made (verisigns final comfirmation email ended with a link expressing their sorrow at my departure and assuring me that it was as easy as clicking the following link to transfer the name back to their humble hands).
That's my story; it happened this week. Sorry to bore!
(Additional note: i just recieved from verisign a "Deactivation notice" warning me that this domain with them will be deactivated in 5 days if i don't click the link to renew...)
No joke, MCI did this to us, not some fly-by-night company no one's ever heard of.
Need a Linux consultant in New Orleans?
u cybersquatters are worse than these spamming scum.
They are cheaper than netsol.com, more efficient, you get complete control over your dns settings (hmm would I like my server to refresh every 20 minutes or every 3 hours? hmm) and from what I gather are used by quite a few linux geeks.
eek I mean GNU/Linux GNU/Geeks.
(The preceding plug[tm] was brought to you by a non-bribed satisfied customer)
NetSoil simply helped themselves to my credit card... Without an invoice or anything, they took $35 bucks. Wrote to them, and sure, they were willing to help me out. Just fax them the invoice.
Followup e-mail went unanswered (and at the time they still held my domain hostage, so I couldn't just get it back from the credit card company either).
I'm glad I've seen the last of them. And even moving was like pulling teeth. Their e-mail system ate the transfer request (delivered according to my mail logs), and after a week they had the guts to send me a thank-you not for not tranferring the domain. Needless to say, followup e-mail to the assistance mailbox mentioned in the thank-you note went unanswered. A second try succeeded mere days before they would've been able to block the transfer for non-payment of the renewal.
Bert Driehuis -- All I asked was a friggin' rotatin' chair. Throw me a bone here, people.
Because if you did you would see it is quite apparent the DN owner will be transferred. They even have to sign a box acknowledging the transfer. Don't you read anything you have to sign? I sure do! Unlike some registrars like Register.com and Interland - VeriSign made it quite apparent the person would be transferred. VeriSign is marketing no different than any other registrar including the high and mighty "we never would do anything like that" GoDaddy who boasts this $8.95 domain price, but conveniently neglects to mention all of their added fees.....
Heh. I got a bill from a telco I'd never heard of, charging me for all calls to my veterinarian over a three-month period. Funny, the vet's office is only a couple of miles down the road; they're local calls, not "1+" as the invoice claimed. I sent them the following:
----
Dear Customer:
Yesterday, I received the enclosed statement from your company for services I have never requested in any form. Furthermore, I am curious as to how a service described as "Casual Calling 1+" could possibly apply to the given list of phone numbers, which are all local calls and are therefore covered by my local telecommunications provider. Since I receive these services exclusively from my provider and not from (company), I ask that you clear all amounts owed from my account and close my account immediately.
I am an engineer with an Electrical Engineering degree working in the telecommunications industry; my time and services are valuable. Because your bill directed me to call (company) at the phone number listed above, you have requested my services in helping you resolve this technical issue. I am pleased to provide this service; this morning, I called (company) and described in detail the problem in order to assist you in correcting it. I have also contacted my local land line and wireless providers to ensure that this issue is completely resolved.
I believe the issue is now resolved. Above you will find an invoice for one hour of my time at a billing rate of $100.00 per hour. Please remit payment promptly to avoid late charges. Since I have never requested telecommunications services from (company) and will never do so in the future, I will interpret any future invoices from (company) as requests for further assistance, billable at $100.00 per hour at a ten-hour minimum. Thank you for your business.
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"I call a baby goat a 'goatse.'" -- my non-Internet-savvy 6-year-old stepdaughter