Brands owners benefit from whois privacy, even though they’d prefer their adversaries not be able to use it.
There’s a common myth in intellectual property circles that, if it weren’t for whois privacy and proxy services, there would be a lot less bad stuff on the internet.
I can bust a hole right in the myth. But instead, I’d like to point out something these companies don’t often admit: they are some of the biggest users of whois privacy.
I was reminded of this while reviewing some notes from a recent .NYC Advisory Board meeting. .NYC doesn’t allow registrants to use whois privacy. That’s why, when two firms working on behalf of Michael Bloomberg registered a bunch of embarrassing domain names, I was able to easily find out who was behind it. During the meeting, someone pointed out that Bloomberg’s lawyers had to register the domains in their name, which ended up being rather embarrassing for them.
This is one of the reasons big corporations use whois privacy. They register some defensive domain names and don’t want to call attention to it. The other big reason is that they don’t want to tip off their new product plans.
One of the biggest suppliers of whois privacy services for these companies is brand protection company Mark Monitor, which registers domains for clients under then name DNStination Inc.
When ISIS (the payments company) started registering domains for a brand change, it used whois privacy.
When Bank of America registered hundreds of “sucks” and “blows” domain names for its executives, it used whois privacy.
And when Proactiv wanted to make its recall as quiet as possible, it used whois privacy.
So while IP interests and corporations bemoan the existence of whois privacy services, they should consider how they are already take advantage of its availability.
John says
Now that is telepathy. I have had that thought before, and infact this morning I came across the same thing again, a “Company” using WHOIS Privacy and had same thought as you, what utter hypocrisy.
Really this bias & hypocrisy extends much further than just Whois Privacy, it extends to ANYTHING that a “Respondent” possesses that would support the Respondents bona fide . I personally have been in position of having a TM and the Panelist has thumbed his nose at MY trade mark and even though I have issued Court proceedings has continued onwards regardless of both and ruled AGAINST me . Then when the Courtn heard the case they said the Complainant had no rights and the domain should remain with myself. The Complainant then failed to pay $25000 costs and disappeared from sight.
Robbie says
I think as more domains push over to uniregistry, and their free whois privacy you will see many more domains go under it.
I always used Godaddy’s when it was possible to discount, as it was another layer of protection for premium domains in case of hijacking, as the domainsbyproxy was a different login, and would need to be removed to transfer out.
John Berryhill says
“There’s a common myth in intellectual property circles that, if it weren’t for whois privacy and proxy services, there would be a lot less bad stuff on the internet.”
The IP lobby believes what they want to believe, facts be damned.
Fact: Historically, ICANN WHOIS studies have shown roughly 20% of names to be privacy-registered.
Fact: WIPO data shows roughly 20% of UDRP names to be privacy-registered.
So, if “incidence of UDRP complaints” correlates to “bad stuff”, the correspondence between these proportions speaks for itself.
Because this question is asked again and again, and the data refuses to cooperate by coming up with the answer the IP lobby wants, subsequent studies of the role of privacy/proxy in abuse will continue to be commissioned.
The most recent one I saw reached the same “wrong” conclusion again:
http://gnso.icann.org/en/issues/whois/pp-abuse-study-20sep13-en.pdf
———
To summarise the whole project and to return at
the end to our original hypotheses – we DID
find clear evidence that:
“A significant percentage of the domain names
used to conduct illegal or harmful Internet
activities are registered via priv
acy or proxy services to obscu
re the perpetrator’s identity”.
But, although we did find that it was often tr
ue, we DID NOT find that in all cases:
“The percentage of domain names used to conduct ill
egal or harmful Internet activities that
are registered via privacy or proxy services
is significantly greater than the percentage of
domain names used for lawful Internet activiti
es that employ privacy or proxy services.”
——
It is guaranteed they will keep asking the question until someone uses a methodology that comes up with the answer they want.
I do not, in general, object to whatever religious beliefs people want to hold, as long as their beliefs do not involve me. Unfortunately, the “I want what I want whenever I want it” crowd will continue to spout faith-based bullshit which no analysis of actual data has ever shown.
Volker A. Greimann says
Hey John, why don’t you come join the fun in the PPSAI WG…?
John Berryhill says
If you want to make someone in ICANN disappear, put them on Nomcomm.
Mike says
When you have the type of WHOIS entry shown for arevamines.com you dont need Privacy ,lol
bladel says
Anyone can have WHOIS privacy —if they can afford an attorney to register and manage their domain names. Short of that, Privacy/Proxy services exist as an affordable alternative.
It will be interesting to see how some of these law firms adapt once the Privacy/Proxy Accreditation Program (currently under development) hits the streets. Do they file for accreditation under the program, or risk of losing their clients domains as un-accredited (“rogue”) Privacy services?
Eric Lyon says
Looks a little hypocritical to me. Whilst I’m ok with people that feel the need to protect their identity in a political, famous actor, rock star, company secrets classified for internal use only, etc. type situation, I think that there are a lot of usages by companies and individuals that reach outside the logical norm of the service.
There’s really no way to effectively manage who’s using privacy authentically or unethically until it comes down the pike for resell and someone gets burned. There’s always a chance that the guy/gal you are about to buy from is actually a famous actor hiding their fame (which is totally understandable). The odds of that are on the low end, but it could and has happened.
The privacy debate has always been a hard one due to both sides having legitimate facts and statistics to back them up. I’m not sure there is a fool proof way to offer any form of compromise when it comes to this topic without alienating someone elses rights to privacy for legitimate reasons.