Have you ever received an email about domain name registrations?
Dear President, We are the department of Asian Domain Registration Service in China. I have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on July 11, 2013 that a company which self-styled “Mestill Co.,Ltd”. were applying to register some “YOUR COMPANY-NAME” Asian countries top-level domain names. Now we are handling this registration, and after our initial checking, we found the name were similar to your company’s, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we will finish the registration at once. If you did not authorize, please let us know within 7 workdays, so that we will handle this issue better. Best Regards, Ethan Jiang Senior Manager Tel: +0086-28-81453978 || Fax: +0086-28-85915586 9/F,No.4 Guanghua building,JiangDong Road,Chenghua District,Chengdu City,ChinaSounds like our brand/Company/Organization, for which all of us have put in so much efforts is in trouble. Someone is going to misuse it. Well, let us ask these good gentlemen to process our request.
These are the thoughts which cross our minds when we receive such emails. For an organization, in this age of Information Technology, Internet Identity is of prime importance and domain names are associated with the brand-image. Brand-image is associated with your products, skill-sets, your clientele and everything which will assist you to sell your products.
Scamsters will go to any extent to scare you and get their filthy hands on your hard-earned monies. There are stringent rules for domain squatting and ICANN also has its own set of rules for dealing with domain squatters. Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution (UDRP) are a set of rules which govern this aspect of domain-name registration. The set of rules can be read here. However, this is a lengthy and a costly proposition as there may also be a need for the complainant to file court proceedings against the registrant.
However, when we look at emails of this type, aren’t these the border-line cases of domain-squatting? If you ever choose to reply to such emails, the price of each domain registration will not be less than 20USD, and isn’t this a type of blackmail? Let me use a different terminology for blackmail – a polite request to pay 20+ USD or forget the domain. These guys have got nothing to loose as they have already registered the domain for peanuts and all they are asking you to claim them back from the original registrant.
Technically and legally, this act doesn’t even fall under the category of Domain Squatting, everything seems so legit and the amount so small as compared to the fees for UDRP / court case, that anyone and everyone who want their brand-image to be stain-free will not mind paying 20$/per for a couple of domains for a contract period of not less than 2-3 years.
The game of good-guy vs the bad guy can be learnt from these guys, and this incidentally is an age old trick and it seems some of these have been inspired from the story books for kids.
In the end, it is your choice, whether you want to give in to these scamsters and register the domains by paying exorbitantly or neglect these requests or take them to task.
Has recibido un correo electrónico sobre los registros de nombres de dominios?
Estimado Presidente,
Somos el departamento de Servicio de Registro de Dominio Asiático en China. Tengo algo para confirmar con usted. Hemos recibido una aplicación el día 11 de Julio 2013 que una empresa llamada “Mestill Co., Ltd” estaban registrando algunos “SU NOMBRE DE EMPRESA” nombres de dominio de primer nivel de los países Asiáticos.
Ahora estamos trabajando con esta registración, y después de revisar, encontramos que el nombre es igual como su empresa, entonces necesitamos verificar con usted si su empresa ha dado la autorización a esta empresa para registrar estos nombres. Si usted ha autorizado esto, terminaremos el registro a la vez. Si no, por favor déjanos saber dentro de 7 días de trabajo para manejar mejor el tema.
Saludos Cordiales,
Ethan Jiang
Senior Manager
Tel: +0086-28-81453978 || Fax: +0086-28-85915586
9/F,No.4 Guanghua building,JiangDong Road,Chenghua District,Chengdu City,China
Parece que nuestra marca/empresa/organización esta en problemas. Entonces, pedimos estos señores a procesar nuestra solicitud.
Estos son los pensamientos que nos llegan a nuestras mentes cuando recibimos dichos correos. Para una organización, la identidad de Internet es una gran importancia y los nombres de dominios que son asociados con la imagen de la marca. La imagen de marca se asocia con sus productos, habilidades, sus clientes y todo que le asistirá a vender sus productos.
Los estafadores harán cualquier cosa para robar su dinero. Hay reglas para los intrusos de dominio y ICANN tienen sus propias reglas cuando se trata con los intrusos de dominios. “Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution” (UDRP) es una serie de reglas que cubren este aspecto de registro de nombre de dominio. Las reglas puede leerse aquí. Esto es una propuesta costosa.
Sin embargo, cuando miramos este tipo de correo electrónico, no parece un caso de intruso de domino? Si respondes a tal correo electrónico, el precio de cada registro de dominio no será menos de $20. Estas personas no tienen nada que perder ya que han registrado el dominio.
Técnicamente y legalmente, esto aun no cae bajo la categoría de intrusos de dominio. No todo el mundo le importara pagar $20 por unos dominios para un periodo de contrato no menos de 2 a 3 años.
Al final, usted tiene la decisión si quieres rendirse a estos estafadores y registrar los dominios por pagando un costo alto.
4 Comments
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Jo
Hi! I just received an e-mail from them, but it seemed to be tricky. Now I know for sure – thanks to you!
R Sachin
Hi Jo,
1: http://blog.escanav.com/2013/09/23/chinese-domain-name-scams-part-ii/
2: Send the entire email alongwith the headers to christopher@europeandomaincentre.com
Regards
SachinR