Posts tagged: ICANN

How SOPA Will Destroy The Internet

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By , December 22, 2011

As you read this, please keep in mind that I say it all with a track record nearly 14 years of being proactive and having a zero-tolerance policy toward criminal activity and network abuse on the easyDNS system. We have great relationships with Law Enforcement Agencies both here in Canada and abroad. We are always helpful and (usually) happy to answer questions, and help LEA understand the complexities and nuances of the internet. We’ve had the good fortune to meet some really intelligent and clued in cybercrime units. We participate in numerous communities in combating net.abuse and cybercrime.

I finally got around to reading the text of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) today. While the ostensible intentions are to combat online piracy and the sale of counterfeit goods, the bad news is that the legislation contains elements which basically puts every single domain registered under generic TLDs under the authority of the United States Attorney General.

We have already seen in cases if the ICE domain seizures, improper takedowns and overreach resulting in the takedown of tens of thousands of websites when a single one was the target.

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Verisign domain takedown proposal very worrisome.

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By , October 11, 2011

Under a proposed Verisign initiative, all .COM/.NET domains exist at the pleasure of the United States government.

Verisign just released an overview of their proposed “Anti-Abuse Domain Use Policy” Under ICANN’s Registry Services Evaluation Process. The program’s chief aim is to provide a takedown mechanism of malicious websites distributing malware. In itself, not a bad thing, considering some registrars are unresponsive toward abuse or network stability issues.

However, lumped in with the conditions under which Verisign can invoke their takedown capabilities are some troubling “add ons”, as quoted below:

(read the rest on the easyDNS blog)

Who Will Be The Big Winners and Losers of the New TLDs?

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By , August 26, 2011

This is a repost of a guest editorial I wrote for Domain Name News.

When one looks at the track record of introducing new Top Level Domains it is perplexing to see where all the enthusiasm around unlimited new TLDs comes from. So far every attempt to roll one out owes it’s sustenance to purely defensive registrations (.biz, .info) or else it’s degraded into an utter fracas (.jobs) or just plain flopped (.pro)

The latest TLD that isn’t a country code tarting itself up as a pseudo-generic is probably a good indicator of what to expect going forward: .xxx – reviled by the industry it extorts , err, purports to serve and first new TLD that we are seriously considering making a conscious decision not to “grab our name before somebody else does!”. I’m certain it won’t be the last. I believe one of the first things we will see as all this unfolds is a buyers strike in defensive regs. Once that happens everything will go sideways.

So despite the near frenzied hype around these things, I have already gone on record to predict failure for the vast majority of them.

The forthcoming onslaught of TLDs can be divided into roughly three categories: Read more »

How to tell if a new TLD will succeed (and most won’t).

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By , June 16, 2011

I just read Rick Spence’s “What’s in a name? It could be a fortune on the Internet“, (HT to HybridDomainer), which seemingly dials the needle back to (pick one), 2005 or 2007, or maybe 2010 and drinks the Kool-Aid every domainer has on an IV drip: the notion that fortune and success can be achieved simply by virtue of “owning the right names” (i.e How can we be bankrupt? Don’t we own TenMillionDollars.com?)

Only in this case, he’s talking about the seemingly impending new top-level-domains. “New domain names will rank above the current crop”, he gushes. Really? You mean now I get to defend my trademark in .www, .website, .bank, .toledo, .xxx and .FML ? Great! I think what we will see happen is a buyers’ strike in defensive names. It will become impossible to defend one’s names in all possible TLDs, brand owners will simply stop doing it, defensive registrations in new TLDs collapse, kicking out one of the two legs holding up most new TLDs (the other being speculative registrations). Read more »

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