Three questions for The Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse (CADNA).
A little over a month ago CADNA issued its first press release and disclosed its members. CADNA’s members are Fortune 500 companies who want to fight against the unsavory practices of typosquatting and cybersquatting. One of their goals is to stop domain tasting (registering domains only to return them within 5 days for a full refund).
Fair enough. I’m a levelheaded guy who doesn’t believe in cybersquatting these big brands and want the tasting loophole to be closed.
But I have a few questions for CADNA. I talked to a CADNA representative on the phone, who promised to have someone call me back. No callback. So I contacted CADNA again a few weeks later. No response.
Since CADNA will not respond in person to my request, I figured I’d lay out my questions here and let CADNA respond on its own time:
1. Does it create any consternation having Dell (NASDAQ: DELL) involved with your group? Through a partnership with Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), Dell typosquats on all of your other members’ trademarks using a tools called “Browser Address Error Redirector”. (Google has a similar deal with computer manufacturer Gateway). Type Verizzzzon.com into your browser and Dell gets paid when someone clicks on the links.
2. I don’t like domain tasting, and neither do you. But your press release states that there are over 1M kited sites registered daily, resulting in $100M-$125M in revenue per year to “criminals” and “profiteers”. Can you justify that revenue number? Also, is taking advantage of a loophole really “criminal” behavior?
3. You say that cybersquatting is costing brand owners worldwide well over $1B every year. This is based on diverted sales, loss of trust and goodwill, and increased enforcement expense. These are fuzzy things to measure, especially the loss of trust and goodwill. And I know a lot of people (and lawyers) who would like to figure out how to measure losses from diverted sales. How did you come up with this number.
So there you have it. Three simple questions. I think it’s reasonable to ask people to back up their numbers and talk about their members’ activities as it relates to what they’re campaigning against.
CADNA, I’m awaiting your response.
Scott Alliy says
Overall I agree with the article. It’s revelations scream for an Internet governing body with actual clout and enforcement capability.
In regards to your statement is taking advantage of a loophole really “criminal” behavior? In a word Yes!
If we are not part of the solution then we are part of the problem.
AfterNic is typosquatting (ergo cybersquatting on DomainsAvailableNow.com our own domain name search engine.)
Where does it end and who should get away with this nonsense more than anyone else?
If you let injustice go unchecked at any level being it petty theft or grand larceny than how can you expect consumers or anyone to trust the Internet?
What was the biblical quote something like Those things we should we do not, Instead we do what we know we should not.
Who is going to rebel agains this post? The very same people that cry foul (er (net fredom) anytime people try to establish realistic Internet laws that would prevent them from doing what they are doing and getting away with but know is wrong.
Johnny B. Good says
Ok, If you want to complain to Dell like I just did , then here is the best link I could find:
http://support.dell.com/support/emailcustomercare/index.aspx?c=us&chat=no&l=en&s=gen
In regards to the first poster, Scott, I would say DomainsAvailableNow.com has no trademark as far a I can see at the USPTO.GOV site, so therefore your argument makes no sense. You are affored no protection by U.S. trademark law. How could you even begin to use the word “criminal”? That is silly. Also, that domain sounds like a pretty generic domain to me 🙂
If your site had been ScottsSearch.com and you had a trademark, then I would say you have a very good case. Everyone knows you need a trademark, that’s established.
Yes, yes, yes please bring on more Gov’t control as we know that always makes things more effiecient, cheaper, and easier for everyone involved. Are you sure you don’t work for CADNA Scott? 😮
Regards,
Johnny B. Good
Patrick McDermott says
Hi,
I’m not in favor of domain tasting because it has been so abused.
I also do not condone or support Typosquatting or Cybersquatting.
That said I think it should be pointed out that not all domains that are “Tasted” are TM typos or variations.
Many,and I don’t know the %,are simply domain names that have expired and up for grabs again.
Thus not all tasting or tasters are “criminal” or engaging in “criminal activity”.
Patrick
Instead of throwing out the baby with the bath water imposing a fee for returned domains should help greatly with the Tasting abuse.
PIR recently started charging 5 cents for canceling .ORG registrations within the 5 day period.
Patrick McDermott says
I just read an article on today’s DomainNews.com blog on “the investigation by ICANN into the practice of ‘domain tasting’”.
Now I say throw out the baby with the bath water and eliminate domain tasting.
The criminal activities performed by some are far worse than TM typosquatting (IMHO).
From the article:
“…criminal practices such as phishing and pharming – activities commonly linked to domain tasting – have posed an even greater concern for businesses operating in an online environment.
…anonymous parties frequently register domains as replica sites in an effort to obtain confidential information from unaware customers. Through this practice, users are able to temporarily set up web pages that look similar to authentic sites, and extract private data without risk of identification as they are yet to register the domain name.”
A company go go after a Typosquatter when discovered but those Phishing and Pharming
escape undetected and just set up new fake sites under other temporary domains.
And here’s a glaring example of abuse:
“the discovery that less than one per cent of .org domain names end up being registered.”.
and
“Domain tasting has been unnecessarily tying up millions of available domain names and adversely impacting the average domain name registrant”.
Typosquatting
Abusive registrations
Phishing
Pharming
Domain tasting has got to go!
full article here:
http://snurl.com/tastingcrackdown
Patrick
Sanket Gupta says
Hi
There are two aspects of tasting.
1. Tasting typos of normal domains.
2. Tasting typos of TM’s.
1 is not criminal at all.It is an opportunity used by smart businesses to make some money on the internet.
Regarding 2,If a company (for eg. dell or microsoft), which has loads of money, gives value to a typo, why hasnt it in the name of god registered all thoe typos.A domain costs just $6.50 .Considering 1000 typos of the word DELL,it would have costed DELL only 6000 dollars to safeguard its so called TM.
So you see, CADNA is nothing but a scam..a way by which they want to make money out of somebody elses smart business sense.
Aneways,insetad of filing a suite why dont they just contact the registrant and tell him to surrender the domain.Maybe all domain tasters should maintain a “Do Not Register” registry, in the lines of the “do Not Call” registry.
Regards
Sanket
Scott Alliy says
Regarding your statement “Everyone knows you need a trademark, that’s established”
Does Everyone also know that when you Do have a trademark and you approach Google that someone is using your trademark in their paid advertisement that you get an email back saying “We are no longer pursuing trademark issues in the U.S. and Canada.
Call youself and others what you are Opportunists. Today you are internet gurus and tomorrow you will be popcorn salesman or whatever the hot money making opportunity is.
You have little investment want only to drain the system of any available cash and will leave the lanscape barren and unsustainable in a heartbeat at the least sight of governance.
It is not total government that I am advocating as we all know even government officials can be corrupt but rather for some body to provide the minimum amount of resistance to chase away the opportunists that have no concern for the internet industry, no sense of fair play and apparently no desire to refrain from infringing on the good will and hard work of others without some law against doing so.
If government is what it takes to scare away opportunists who bring little value to the net or whatever activity they are engaged in then so be it.
An BTW no, I am not a member of CADNA but I have been an active participant in the Internet for over 12 years and have seen its reputation tarnished and growth stymied through the years by opportunists claiming to be gurus that today are not even associated with the Internet.
Johnny B. Good says
Scott,
If you are buying domains around generic terms you are operating within the law, if you are buying domains around tradmarked terms then you are not operating within the law. It really is as simple as that. This is a practice accepted by virtually everyone in the world other than you apparantly.
“Opportunists”?, don’t you mean Entreprenuers? Gov’t intervention to stymie free enterprise? That sounds really smart for the U.S. economy and Net economy.
I think you sound like are one of those old-school techies that was around 12 years ago in 1995 complaining because the Net was changing and you hated it. I was there in 1995 getting domains when they were FREE and I remember plenty of upset tech types that wanted the Net to stay one big BBS, with no commercial interests in play. They kicked and screamed all the way into the new Internet economy. It was fun to watch – your posts have that same vibe.
Just my take on what I see from you post.
If you think domainers are popcorn-salesman like then you really have no clue about about this space and who we generally are.
Johnny B. Good
Dave Zan says
One question I have for CADNA is if they’ll also introduce measures to address potential abuses by their members as well.