Slashdot Mirror
VeriSign Wants Ability To Suspend Domains Without Court Order
GeorgeK writes "VeriSign, the monopoly registry operator for .com/.net domain names, has submitted a proposal to ICANN (PDF) describing an 'Anti-Abuse' policy. If allowed to proceed with such a policy, they would become judge, jury and executioner, with the ability to suspend or even cancel alleged 'abusive' domain names without due process for registrants. The proposal even recognizes that legitimate domain names may be taken down improperly, and offers a 'protest' procedure. However, VeriSign does not appear to offer any ability to protest an accusation of abuse before the suspension or cancellation. They intend to 'shoot first and ask questions later.'"
...this presents no opportunities for abuse.
Governments and corporations keep leapfrogging each other as the biggest threat to the Internet. How are we supposed to know which threat to focus on dammit!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
I'm sure they will offer a service where your domain is "Pre-Verified" and not subject to abuse takedowns... For $1,000 per year, of course.
The ______ Agenda
Doesn't matter if the original owner doesn't want to sell, for a price it can be made available.
Many of these abusive domains are very fleeting and transient designed to live for just a few hours. If you want due process, it has to come before the registration. So domain name registration would then follow guidelines similar to Trade Mark and other corporation registration rules. It would slow down the registration process a lot and impact the fees Verisign is currently collecting. The domain name abuse is getting to be very bad, and it could trigger legislation. Legislation by the congress critters who imagine internet to be a series of tubes would put onerous burdens in the registrants and the registrars. So it is heading it off at the pass.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
as long as an entity can sue them for lost revenue and punitive damages if their domain is mistakenly taken down.
I think it's time for Anonymous to take down Verisign...
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
I am asking for such powers. Just because I asked for it, does not mean I will get it.
Seriously, as if they wouldn't abuse their position, yet again...
Loading...
IF they make Digital trespass, I.E. cracking into any company's servers and DDOS attacks legal activity. I fully support them being able to do DNS resolution Attacks on their customers.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
They cannot be shut down, nor stopped. That is a wonderful thing - as long as a government has the ability to do something, it will find a way to use it to the detriment of its people. The best way to fight that is to remove the weapon from their insane fingers...
They intend to 'shoot first and ask questions later.'
This is helpful for potential malware/virus/etc sites - take it down NOW and address afterwards. As long as the ones taking the deactivation move witness it themselves, it's doable.
The problem comes with reports. Let's say you get 100 reports of a domain being a nasty one in a 5-minute period of time. You just *wham-bam* take that domain down without looking at it and you could have just been the worst link in a staged act chain.
I'm not trying to be an ass, but I'm posting what I witness daily: Everyone wants to save money, including big companies. If VeriSign were to have this ability (along with other TLD registrars), then they will likely want to automate everything they can. See paragraph 2 above.
Don't we have laws and such against these? For what reason is this company still whole?
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
Of course, you'll want to take advantage of their sensational offer you can't refuse on AIG's reputation insurance, too, while you're at it. :-)
Just your tax dollars at work. The hell with 1st amendenment, among others.
rgb
$1k/year? Can I get your Verisign rep's number?
See. If you 'let it be' and everything becomes private, you end up in that situation - private parties, on which you have no rights over, decide how you live your life. what you hear, what you can know.
Read radical news here
This would clearly be a 'terroristic act' as it's anti-democratic and a quick path destroy the US in the long term by sneaking in procedures to circumvent the "Separation of powers".
Let they do, and then fight and burn them down for you fatherland.
What's the process to report an abusive domain? I've taken as much abuse from these people as I can stand. I'd like to report verisign.com
Says more about you than Anonymous, doesn't it.
I mean, Verizon are acting like a bunch of fucking douche bags again. AND they're going to disrupt a lot of things. Yet YOU are happy to let them. In fact, anyone who has "no chance" of affecting them even THINKS of interfering, you'll defend the bigger douche bags.
They already have a license to print money, and nothing they do appears to endanger their monopoly. Why should ICANN stop them now? No need to make them push back on copyright holders complaining to them, they want to just rubber stamp those complaints and shut the domains down.
Thanks for accepting the article. ICANN is still reviewing the proposal. If folks share my concerns, please do send them your comments by emailing registryservice@icann.org (from the top of ICANN's Registry Services Evaluation Process page). You can view comments by others here. EasyDNS has submitted their concerns too.
At a minimum, they should open up a formal 30 day public comment period that is widely advertised, in order that domain name registrants can be heard.
... in countries where the government-licensed utilities already have this power.
If TLD management were split among countries, so that Verisign handled .com and .net for US-based companies and foreign subsidiaries or foreign registrars handled it in foreign countries, then this kind of power might make sense for some foreign subsidiaries of Verisign or for some foreign registrars.
As for companies based the United States who use a domain registrar in the United States, yanking a domain name without a court order insults the Constitution.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Just say no to idiocy. I hope their "proposal" is rejected as the bad idea that it is. Mind you, it just encourages me and everyone else to dump this monopoly in favour of other ones that are less obnoxious. I.e. other domain registries e.g. country codes or .org or whatever.
It will be a mandated purchase, for $499.00, with cost savings to make that $599.00, you cocksmoking occupiers!
This is my sig.
I propose that they should not only implement this idea, but to track down the offenders and subject them to a gratuitous full body cavity search. You should be glad they won't need or require your consent, as this will be for your own good.
Anyone who thinks this won't be used to either bully the little guy into giving up his domain for corporations or just milk more money from customers is being very naive.
If you sum the number of days in each step of the Uniform domain name dispute resolution policy you quickly see that it can take tens of days to get a malicious domain shutdown. ICANN has long been in need of the ability to quickly react to burgeoning threats and though the ambiguity of the policy as described is concerning it's not without merits.
Verisign wants all your base are belong to us
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Q: Were consultations with end users appropriate? Which groups were consulted? What were the nature and content of these consultations? .com/.net/.name domain names.
A: As a registry operator, Verisign did not consult with the registrants of
Verisign is trying to expand their central but minor role as a registry operator into control of the whole system. Their agreement with ICANN expires on November 30, 2012, and, ICANN could choose to get another registry operator. Right now, no proprietary technology or big staff is needed to be the registry operator. This added complication would make it tougher for ICANN to switch registry operators.
So that's why they're doing this.
Verasign continues to pull these dictator moves as the years go by. Get rid of Verisign!
As long as they pay damages when they make a mistake.
and the interests behind this will be as stupid as to not pursue any further avenue to censor is it. are you forgetting that icann is a private american corporation, and currently holds domain name system ?
Read radical news here
Money directly causes lack of consequences, or ameliorates them, often significantly. Therefore, money does corrupt. Power likewise.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I still believe that the only top-level domains should be ones that have a judicial procedure (singular) associated with them, i.e. they should be only countries. Non-geo TLDs should go away. Then it's clear whose courts you operate under if you have a .co.us name, for example; it's the US courts. I believe that to get a .co.jp domain name, you have to be a registered company in Japan, for example. If other countries want other rules/procedures, that's their prerogative. If the US wants to delegate this kind of responsibility to Verisign, OK, but that would make .co.us an 'unsafe street to live on' (you're subject to eviction), and given their first-come first-served historical attitude, it would also be undesirable since consumers would not have much trust that, say froobotz.co.us is actually the Froobotz company. But that would be OK.
It seems to me the purpose of this move is to legitimize the recent practice of taking down websites based on nothing more than US government claims of infringement. As such, I suspect the Obama administration is ultimately the one behind this proposal. This claim is supported not only by recent domain seizures but also by numerous other examples of the Obama administration bending over backwards to satisfy the whims of its entertainment industry contributors.
The government's reasoning must be that as long as it's a private organization taking down websites it will not itself be held responsible for improper takedowns, nor will it have to justify such takedowns to any judge. As such, this constitutes the greatest threat to freedom the Internet has ever faced.
After 20 years they have finally found a way to censor the internet... block the site of anything "they" don't like. What next "we are sorry your site has been impounded please pay $10000.00 to unblock your site, Thank you and have a nice day." Where does this stop? Who is next open source as it can be "used" for illegal activity?
The whole certificate process is flawed, instead we should just have a way of proving that the authoritative dns servers of a domain agree a web site is the legitimate one. This can be done with public keys and crypto fingerprints. No need to pay the kind of scum that runs Verisign (the company that broke the internet one day with their money grubbing schemes) any money.
VeriSign Wants Police State.
Recipes for USA bankrupt - http://tinypaste.com/0d66f dd = dollar deluge (printed in the infinity)
My sister in law works for Verisign. She says the company is basically printing money, the monopoly is so strong. They're the incumbent and no one can unseat them. I don't think my sister in law has worked an 8 hour day since she's been there.
Plus, take Verisign's location - right outside Washington, DC - don't suppose they have a hoard of lobbyists buying Congressmen dinners (and vacations, and hookers, and...) do you? No, of course not.
This company is evil. Evil evil evil. And they've rigged the game so that no one can take over the DNS registry. They're also very skilled at spreading F.U.D. - "uh oh, the internetz will collapse & explode if someone else takes over the .com and .net registries!" Never mind the fact that other companies successfully run the other big registries like .org, .gov, .edu, etc. (I realize they're not as big as .net & .com, but still)
Bastards.
Quoting poster GeorgeK:
ICANN is still reviewing the proposal. If folks share my concerns, please do send them your comments by emailing registryservice@icann.org (from the top of ICANN's Registry Services Evaluation Process page [icann.org]). You can view comments by others here [icann.org]. EasyDNS has submitted their concerns too.