Web.com subsidiary gets patent for Whois Privacy, as compared to Whois Proxy.
Patent application shows difference between Whois Proxy and Whois Privacy.
GoDaddy has patents for domain name proxy services. Now a competitor, Web.com’s Network Solutions, has a patent for Whois privacy.
U.S. Patent #9,817,979 (pdf) for Private domain name registration covers Whois privacy in which a domain is registered in the name of the actual registrant but the contact details (email address, phone and postal address) are that of the privacy service.
GoDaddy’s service Domains By Proxy is technically a proxy service instead of privacy. Domains By Proxy is the technical owner of the domain name acting on the customer’s behalf.
As Web.com (NASDAQ:WEB) points out in its application, proxy services can create challenges when transferring domain names. The proxy service needs to be removed for a transfer to another registrar. Privacy, on the other hand, keeps the registrant’s name in the record and domains can still be transferred.
Network Solutions’ has long offered a privacy service. In recent years it added a proxy service called Perfect Privacy which is confusingly also referred to as a privacy.
The company applied for a similar patent in 2004 but abandoned it. This issued patent was filed in May 2012.
>The proxy service needs to be removed for a transfer to another registrar. Privacy, on the other hand, keeps the registrant’s name in the record and domains can still be transferred.
Registrant’s name has nothing to do with it. You just need to receive email at the admin account listed in whois. Most whois privacy/proxy services will forward that to you just fine.
So what does this mean practically? They can turn around to every other registrar and say they can no longer offer privacy, and sue them if they do?
How can something that has been in place and been used by other registrars since 2004 have a patent applied to it.
This application has a 2004 priority date, and was granted post Alice, so it looks legit and enforceable . . .
Patents are for innovations. what part of hiding owner’s name, or acting on their behalf is innovation and unique?? what is next? forwarding your domain to another domain will be patented too??? Ridiculous….