[ncdnhc-discuss] domain theft and blackmail

[Steve Jalsevac]

Hello,

  I don't know if this has been addressed. It may sound like fiction but I 
can verify it.

I recently became aware that there are domain re-sellers that buy domains 
immediately after the owners accidently allowed them to expire. The 
re-sellers then try to sell the domains back to the original owners for 
exorbitant fees after the owners have found out who immediately bought up 
their domain. The blackmail part is that the domains are re-directed to 
hard-core porn sites so that the original, horrified owners are more 
willing to settle quickly. Most intriguing is that this seems to especially 
be done by Russian domain re-sellers who are likely Russian mob groups.

This situation caused the site that I manage some serious grief since we 
linked to two such domains that were taken over and only discovered the 
problem some time after.

Question: Is anything being done about this?

Also, I suggest that there is a problem with Internet protocols that make 
such extortion far too easy for anyone to do. I recall a few years ago that 
I rarely encountered the problem of having to pay above standard domain 
fees to acquire any domain. Now, I am almost always subject to extortion 
from various businesses that scoop up every domain that they can in order 
to flip them back at a vastly higher price to those who have legitimate 
interest in the particular domains. There is something wrong with this picture.

Suggestion: Prohibit the re-selling of domains by domain re-selling 
businesses or set a cap on the maximum that can be charged for transferring 
a domain. I know this seems radical but I also suspect that if it isn't 
done soon the Internet as we know it will rapidly change for the worse. We 
can't blame the greedy extortionists from taking advantage of such an 
obvious major weakness in the system.

Steve Jalsevac
sjalsevac at rogers.com