Comments on: Network Solutions, ICANN Sued Over Domain Front Running

By: 21st Century Identity Crisis: Naming Strategies for the New Marketspace | Atomic Tango

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 15:57:18 +0000

[...] in Third World countries hoping to score an extra buck. The domain-registration and hosting service Network Solutions was recently sued for automatically grabbing addresses that people were researching on their site. Regardless of the [...]

By: Gian Piero de Bellis

Gian Piero de Bellis — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 12:21:47 +0000

Network Solutions are so bad that I had to write a post on them after they canceled my option of moving to another Web Hosting company. If you are interested you can find it at:
Tiscali Italia and Network Solutions : Italian mafia and American racketeers http://www.poly...als/racket.html

By: JD Manning

JD Manning — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 04:15:56 +0000

If it were up to me the entire management team of Network Solutions would be wearing orange jump suits The chickens have come home to roost for Network Solutions

By: GNC-2008-02-26 #351 | Geek News Central

GNC-2008-02-26 #351 | Geek News Central — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 01:52:21 +0000

[...] with Gmail Adobe Air Applications $49.99 HD DVD by Xbox 360 Super X1000 SuperComputer CompUSA RIP Network Solutions Sued for being Greedy Bloglines Outage (DeadPool?) Comcast Versus Everyone Ubuntu Issues to go Mainstream Virgin Atlantic [...]

By: Search Me, Snatch Me | The Simian Downtime Analyst

Search Me, Snatch Me | The Simian Downtime Analyst — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 18:48:43 +0000

[...] around with an unhealthy yet profitable practice of hoarding domain names. Now they are being sued. This post was filed under [...]

By: .Tel Is Just A Featureless Social Network That Costs $10/year

.Tel Is Just A Featureless Social Network That Costs $10/year — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:12:04 +0000

[...] idea). And users will also need to buy the domain names through registrars, which are notorious for abusing user [...]

By: Trademarks.org » Domain Name Tips and Tools

Trademarks.org » Domain Name Tips and Tools — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 00:06:59 +0000

[...] the domain before you … and then charge a high fee to release it. Network Solutions was sued over this for doing this large-scale and the fees were not that high but this has happen elsewhere on a small [...]

By: Trademarks.org » Trademark Searches

Trademarks.org » Trademark Searches — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 00:06:38 +0000

By: Trademarks.org » Choosing a Trademark

Trademarks.org » Choosing a Trademark — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 00:03:32 +0000

By: Die neuen TLDs der ICANN sind super « Kassenzone - Commerce, Mobile, Technologie

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 07:56:55 +0000

[...] so gut anzukommen. Die ICANN hat eher das Bild einer Abzockorganisation – einige Pannen tun ihr Übriges dazu. Aber das gilt es hier nicht zu diskutieren. Die Diskussion auf bbc.co.uk konnte ich leider [...]

By: Who is Your Webhost and Why it Matters

Who is Your Webhost and Why it Matters — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 05:10:35 +0000

[...] more reasons here and here about why Network Solutions should be [...]

By: www.teletubis.info » Blog Archive » Network Solutions Hijacking Unassigned Sub-Domains

Wed, 09 Apr 2008 03:52:42 +0000

[...] another reason to not use Network [...]

By: Network Solutions Now Gives Its Customers The Option Of Being Victimized

Network Solutions Now Gives Its Customers The Option Of Being Victimized — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 00:01:20 +0000

[...] for domain names, via the despised practice of front running. Now with Network Solutions being sued over their antics, they have changed their procedures a [...]

By: Alexandar Tzanov ~ The Titan » Domain Record Info

Alexandar Tzanov ~ The Titan » Domain Record Info — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 05:01:12 +0000

[...] record information on a domain, but I did not want anyone tracking domains I look up. Or like some bad registrars, have any possible domain I look up end up as registered thanks to the ICANN grace period and [...]

By: Sue Taylor

Sue Taylor — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 00:06:14 +0000

If anyone needs another witness, just ask me. I just got scammed by NetSol. They claim to have no affiliation with new.net , basicfusion.com , or the Vendare Group who own the latter two. When I spoke with gregg006 at Network Solutions, he gave me the email contact for Venare Group. The email is netsol-0107@netblue.com. Notice anything fishy? I asked him why their email would begin with ‘netsol’ if they have no affiliation with NetSol? Make sense? Basic Fusion is a taster of the most dirty sort. Check this out: http://www.tast...egistrar_id=187. Network Solutions is just plain nasty and should not be trusted for anything at all. The same day I registered goodguysconcrete.com at 1and1.com, these pukes also registered our name. This is the name of our registered corporation. Where do they get off using our corporate name without permission?

Contact me if you need another victim for class action or any other legal action. Email me at: ggconcrete@gmail.com

By: Jac

Jac — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 16:47:40 +0000

NS changed the verbage on their website. Apparently this is now a “feature” that they offer – how convenient! What a bunch of BS.

By: Sue

Sue — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 05:41:51 +0000

This is fantastic! This front running is happening to everyone including ME and it happened on Register.com – who sold MY domain name (that I was mulling over for a day or 2 before buying) it to Afternic – a search of Whois reveals the purchaser is a company called “Basic Fusion” but they are in cahoots with Regsiter.com because they ONLY offer bulk domain name registration – you have to already own at least 5,000 domain names to be eligible to buy it. IT’s CALLED RACKETEERING AND I’m getting a lawyer on this!

By: 21st Century Identity Crisis: Naming Strategies for the New Marketspace « Cool Rules Pronto

Thu, 13 Mar 2008 06:37:11 +0000

[...] in Third World countries hoping to score an extra buck. The domain-registration and hosting service Network Solutions was recently sued for automatically grabbing web addresses that people were researching on their site. Regardless of [...]

By: Bill

Bill — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 23:31:00 +0000

I set up http://www.nets...rontrunning.com to make folks aware of Net Sol reserving domains when you search for them on NetworkSolutions.com. I searched for a domain there and had to wait 5 days to get it somewhere else.

By: Pink

Pink — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 23:53:48 +0000

Simple solution.

Everyone go there and start “searching” for domain names. If they purchase these names can they keep up with the mass internet population? Do they have infinate money? Make the bitches go broke by overkill.

By: It’s All About the Money With Network Solutions

It’s All About the Money With Network Solutions — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 05:27:09 +0000

[...] http://www.doma...s-searches/1359 http://www.tech...-front-running/ [...]

By: kevin

kevin — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 01:20:55 +0000

Yea, a few weeks ago I read about NS doing this crap. So what to do? Try it, see if it’s really true of course….so I searched for a domain name that only my dad would want (www.his name.com) and it was available. So I waited until the next day, and sure enough that name was no longer available.

Why?

Because the Network Solutions scums bought it. BUT I could “buy it” from Network Solutions for a price higher than had I bought it the night before.

Scum Bags!

In hindsight, I should have checked something less important than a domain name that someone might actually want….but at least it wasnt a name that I myself would have wanted!!!!!

(Oh, and…um….sorry about your domain name being snatched by Network Solutions dad)

By: oleg m

oleg m — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 23:19:54 +0000

Do you guys not see that this problem is really an opportunity in disguise?

You have CONTROL over what domains another company registers.

Since the community thinks that this practice is a stinker, I declare a contest to come up with the best domain ’searching’ script on network solutions. Random alpha-numeric characters are good.
Bonus points for keeping track of the ’searched’ domains and ‘researching’ every 5 days

By: Stig Nordas

Stig Nordas — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 21:24:07 +0000

Serves them right. Its bad enough they got the entire domain market handed to them on a silver platter back in 95, but this dirty-low-down practice is going to serve as a strong lesson for the scum bags who practice it. There are many other players in the ‘Front Running’ game. Their time is up!

By: Scott G

Scott G — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 21:16:57 +0000

So I put it to the test. I went to Dotster and search for the

NoWayToGoThereHaHa

domain. The .com, .net, and .org were all available. I went to Network Solutions a few minutes later and performed a search for the same domains — as expected, the .com, .net, and .org were available. A few minutes later I went back to Dotster in a different tab of my browser and performed the same search I had performed earlier and it is true — in this search, not even 5-10 minutes later, the NoWayToGoThereHaHa.com was no longer available but I could “Make an offer” on it. I click on the “Make an offer” link and that takes me to http://www.sedo.com, a domain name broker.

Interestingly, I went back to Network Solutions via a new tab and repeated the search — the domain name for .com is still available via Network Solutions.

It appears that they are doing a couple of things. First, they are reserving a domain that was searched on immediately such that you can only get that domain name via Network Solutions. Second, it appears that (in my case) any domain that is already “registered” gets the “Make an offer” link which points off to sedo.com. The sedo.com and other domain name brokers may be aware of way Network Solutions reserves searched domain names — what these domain name brokers do then is they check and see if Network Solutions has reserved the name because someone did a search on it and then they offer people a way to “buy” the domain by making an offer, where the minimum offer is $200. If you make an offer of $200 (or more), I suspect the broker will go and buy the domain name from Network Solutions at the cheap rate, and then transfer it to you — they keep the difference between your bid and what they paid Network Solutions.

Interestingly, a whois search on sedo.com (eventually) turned up a connection to tucows.com, but I didn’t pursue it further.

Someone needs to follow the trail of money and company ownerships (who owns tucows.com, for example?).

/s.