Comcast Starts Typosquatting Domain Names
Thursday, July 9th, 2009
Cable provider latest ISP to hijack typo traffic.
Comcast (Nasdaq: CMCSA, CMCSK) has introduced a “Domain Helper service”, which redirects web address typos to a page featuring pay-per-click advertisements. The pages also include a link to a web site that may be what you were originally looking for and organic search results.
The service is very similar to what ISPs such as Verizon and Time Warner, and computer manufacturers such as Dell and Gateway have instituted. The services are akin to typosquatting, but ISPs tend to rationalize them by saying they help customers find what they’re looking for and that customers can opt-out.
In comments submitted to ICANN regarding Implementation Recommendation Team proposals to combat cybersquatting, some commentors including eNom called out Verizon for its apparent hypocrisy. Both Verizon and Dell are members of Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse. Verizon was sued over the scheme in response to a lawsuit Verizon itself filed against a typosquatter.
Does your ISP kindly redirect non-existent domain names for you? Help Domain Name Wire collect examples of these error landing pages. Capture a screenshot of a non-existent typo of DomainNameWire.com and Verizon.com. E-mail it to editor (at) domainnamewire.com including the name of your ISP, the service (such as Fios or DSL) and the city you reside in.
Related posts:
- Virgin Media Joins Typosquatting Club
- 2008 Domain Dunce Awards: Verizon
- Time Warner, Yahoo Team Up to Cybersquat
Tags: Comcast, dell, gateway, time warner, verizon
If they were really trying to help their customers, they’d redirect non-existent domain type-ins to Google instead of trying to profit off it just like a typosquatter…
Verizon, Gateway, Dell, Sony and others have been doing this for a long time now. In Germany, Deutsche Telekom is doing it, too.
Sometimes it’s the ISP forwarding you to the parking page, sometimes it’s a pre-installed software on your newly acquired computer. I wrote about this in May 2007 already, and not much has changed since then.
Domainers get (deservedly in most cases) bad press for the monetization of typos, but the large companies, which are probably making way more money from this than even the large domain portfolio owners, get easily away with it.
This is called the law of the rich. It is a double standard.
Take Bernard Madoff. He did not do much different than US banks are doing today. US Banks are leveraging your dollar 75:1. That’s a Ponze scheme worser than Madoff.
Anyone with power, authority, money will do the same thing as a joe shmoe and they are able to get away with it.
It has been like this for thousands of years and will never change.
Reece said: If they were really trying to help their customers, they’d redirect non-existent domain type-ins to Google instead of trying to profit off it just like a typosquatter…
–> It is actually a Yahoo search page. Does that pass muster or will only Google do?
This is fine.
Verizon and Comcast are perfectly allowed to profit from typo’s of trademarks. They are big companies with lots of money and influence, and are therefore trusted to do this kind of thing.
John, are you saying?
The poorer a company or person, the sleazier they are.
I knew there was something sleazy about Mother Teresa.
Andrew: What are you planning to do with your collection of parking page screenshots?
Just curious…
Jorge – publish them to show how these big companies are basically parking typos. I think there are some key differences between various implementations, too. Some are less infringing than others.
@ Domain Investor – I believe John is saying they can get away with it, because they believe they are holier than thou
can we get a class action lawsuit going?
Don’t forget Windstream they typo squat also.
This breaks a useful feature of Safari (which would give you an option to search google). Lame
What really stinks is that you are automatically opted-in! And to opt-out, you have to type in your cable modem’s MAC address into an online form (and, of course most non-geeks are very comfortable locating and typing in a 12-digit MAC address!).
Thank you, ComCast for making my life more complicated! I was SO bored!
@ Robert G.
The current opt-out is a temporary one for the trial. A new one will be rolled out soon where you just click to opt-out and need not include your MAC address.
@JL
Why should I have to opt-out at all? Shouldn’t I have to opt-IN?
Oh wait, of course, ComCast knows what’s best for me, the idiot consumer! I’m so glad they’re looking out for my best interests!
You can forget about the “opt-out”. I opted out twice. Once online. Then again on the telephone where they young lady said “I can see the ‘opt-out’ going into effect now.”
Yeh. Right. Two weeks later I still get their stupid ads.
Anyone know how to find another DNS?
@Howard – I am not sure what the issue is but if you email Tom Creighton, he can help you out at tom_creighton at cable.comcast.com
@Howard: As much as I resent ComCast hijacking my internet connection to make money, I have to admit that after opting out (which I shouldn’t have had to do) AND typing in the MAC address of my router, they have stopped typosquatting domain names.
So although the process is a pain-in-the-@$$, it does work.
I have just tried to opt-out by logging into comcast and clicking to disable this “service”. Unfortunately there own controls do not work. Where is the form to type in the MAC address?
@Brian
Would you please contact me to help resolve your opt-out situation? I can be reached at chris_griffiths at cable.comcast.com.
Thanks
[...] of companies like Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner, and other Internet Service Providers who display an error page laden with pay per click links when a user types in a domain name that doesn’t exist. It really irks me when ISPs monetize [...]