What would happen if your business’s domain name was stolen?
Imagine waking up one day and finding that your business’s domain name was stolen. That’s exactly what happened to Pablo Palatnik, founder of online sunglasses retailer ShadesDaddy.com. On this week’s episode, Palatnik explains how he first learned his domain was stolen, his understandable freakout, and his full court press to get the domain name back. It’s a fascinating story that hopefully can help other people who become a victim of domain name theft.
Also: Google mobile changes, new TLD renewal rates, and a Fiesta.
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David Gruttadaurio says
Thank you Andrew. What a scary story. Fortunately it had a happy ending. It’s interesting listening to the account told by someone with no knowledge of domains – Pablo’s perspective and the questions he raised about how this happened were enlightening.
Acro says
Pablo is a smart business man that overcame the initial shock of having his business platform stolen and was lucky enough to recover it so quickly. I’m a little surprised that DomainGang wasn’t mentioned as a source of effective assistance, particularly as it was the first domain publication to publish extensive details of the theft outside of Pablo’s own posts.
Having personally engaged the assistance of FBI agents to investigate the theft, I was also hoping that the interview would offer some insight that wasn’t published before. The FBI might take a long time, but they retain and process all such leads to catch bigger fish, when the time comes.
Lastly, I am baffled by the lack of intensity when referencing Ename, the domain registrar where the domain ended up at. According to Pablo, they flat out refused to return the domain, which was picked out ‘by force’ by Verisign. Maybe a follow-up podcast would help add some juice to this interview?
Rahul says
Same issue with my domain Kamao.com – was stolen and moved to Ename. They should have their registrar priceless revoked for being a safeharbor for domain theives
David Gruttadaurio says
If this is a common occurrence, why is ICANN not getting involved in this?
Louise says
@ Rahul, Seems like your Kamao.com is okay, now!
Erwin says
A great story/podcast. It’s good to hear it coming from a non domaines perspective!
Enjoyed listening to it..
AJ Alfieri-Crispin (@AJACs3) says
Unfortunately, I have had the same thing happen to me this month on April 5. My husband and I have owned x3.com since 1995. It has been a personal domain and is heavily tied with our personal identity for TWENTY YEARS! It is very aggravating that the first question is always about business loss, when there is a very real issue of identity theft involved. Like Shadesdaddy, our loss also involved Enom & Ename. We registered and hosted with Dreamhost which partners with Enom for registry services and the stolen domain was transferred to Ename in China.
From changing the registration information to moving to Ename was all of 23 minutes. TWENTY-THREE MINUTES!!! I never thought I’d miss the day of requiring faxing things to a registrar to make changes.
ICANN has a serious problem with things like this can happen so easily.
PLEASE feel free to share this story.