Domain tasting

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Domain tasting is the practice of temporarily registering a domain under the five-day Add Grace Period at the beginning of the registration of an ICANN-regulated second-level domain. [1] During this period, a registration must be fully refunded by the domain name registry if cancelled. This was designed to address accidental registrations, but domain tasters have used the practice for illicit purposes.

Contents

Overview

In April 2006, out of 35 million registrations, about 2 million were permanent or actually purchased. By February 2007, the CEO of Go Daddy reported that of 55.1 million domain names registered, 51.5 million were canceled and refunded just before the 5 day grace period expired and only 3.6 million domain names were actually kept. [2] ICANN's registry report for February 2007 shows that 55,794,877 .com and .net domain names were deleted in that month alone. [3]

Domain tasting is lucrative in a number of ways:

  1. The registrant conducts a cost-benefit analysis on the viability of deriving income from potential advertising on the domain's website. Domain names that are deemed potentially lucrative and retained in a registrant's portfolio often represent domains that were previously used and have since expired, misspellings of other popular sites, or generic terms that may receive type-in traffic.
  2. Domains are usually still active in search engines and other hyperlinks and therefore receive enough traffic such that advertising revenue exceeds the cost of the registration.
  3. The registrant may also derive revenue from eventual sale of the domain, at a premium, to a third party or the previous owner.
  4. Tasted domains may sometimes be used for spamming and then discarded.

Anti-domain tasting measures

In January 2008, ICANN proposed several possible solutions, including the elimination of the exemption on transaction costs (US$0.20) during the five-day grace period, which would effectively make the practice of domain tasting not viable. [4] The ICANN operating plan and budget for Fiscal Year 2009 included a section intended to deal with the problem of domain tasting. Now the transaction fee of $0.18 [5] is applied to domains deleted in the Add Grace Period where the number of such domains exceeds 10% of the net new registrations or 50 domains, whichever is greater. The "net new registrations" here is defined as the number of new registrations minus the number of domains deleted in the Add Grace Period. [6]

Google said in 2008 that their AdSense program would now look for domain names that are repeatedly registered and dropped. These domains will automatically be dropped from the AdSense program. [7]

Starting in April 2009, many top level domains (TLDs) began transitioning from the $0.18 fee for excess domains deleted to implementing a policy resulting in a fee equal to registering the domain. [8] [9]

In August 2009, ICANN reported that prior to implementing excess domain deletion charges, the peak month for domain tastings was over 15 million domain names. After the $0.20 fee was implemented, tastings dropped to around 2 million domain names per month. As a result of the further increase in charges for excess domain deletions, implemented starting April 2009, the number of domain tastings dropped to below 60 thousand per month. [8] However, these statistics only represent reports from the generic TLDs (gTLD); ICANN does not set policy for the country code TLDs (ccTLD).

Reverse domain tasting

A number of registrars routinely change a domain's name servers to those of their own, or a parking service, when a domain has gone past its expiration or renewal date. [10] Domains continue to resolve for up to 30 days or more after their registration and redemption grace period have expired. The advantage of this "reverse tasting" is that the registrars or parking services can determine which domains have traffic before they are deleted, and hence maintain a list of domains that they might re-register (or even transfer) after the deletion date, as part of drop catch services. [11]

Domain kiting

Domain kiting is the process of deleting a domain name during the five-day grace period and immediately re-registering it for another five-day period. This process is repeated any number of times with the end result of having the domain registered without having to pay for it.

Domain name front running

In January 2008, Network Solutions was accused of this practice when the company began reserving all domain names searched on their website for five days, [12] a practice known as domain name front running.

Domain tasting used for spam

Domain tasting has been used for the purposes of spam. [13] The limited lifetime of the tasted domain allows the spammer to effectively send spam using a disposable domain name.

See also

Related Research Articles

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The domain com is a top-level domain (TLD) in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. Created in the first group of Internet domains at the beginning of 1985, its name is derived from the word commercial, indicating its original intended purpose for subdomains registered by commercial organizations. Later, the domain opened for general purposes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">.eu</span> Internet country-code top level domain for the European Union

.eu is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for the European Union (EU). Launched on 7 December 2005, the domain is available for any person, company or organization based in the European Union. This was extended to the European Economic Area in 2014, after the regulation was incorporated into the EEA Agreement, and hence is also available for any person, company or organization based in Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. The TLD is administered by EURid, a consortium originally consisting of the national ccTLD registry operators of Belgium, Sweden, and Italy, joined later by the national registry operator of the Czech Republic. Trademark owners were able to submit registrations through a sunrise period, in an effort to prevent cybersquatting. Full registration started on 7 April 2006.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">.info</span> Generic top-level domain

.info is a generic top-level domain (gTLD) in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. The name is derived from information, although registration requirements do not prescribe any particular purpose.

A domain name registrar is a company, person, or office that manages the reservation of Internet domain names.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Network Solutions</span> American-based technology company

Network Solutions, LLC, formerly Web.com is an American-based technology company and a subsidiary of Web.com, the 4th largest .com domain name registrar with over 6.7 million registrations as of August 2018. In addition to being a domain name registrar, Network Solutions provides web services such as web hosting, website design and online marketing, including search engine optimization and pay per click management.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">.tk</span> Country code top-level domain for Tokelau

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The Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA), 15 U.S.C. § 1125(d),(passed as part of Pub. L.Tooltip Public Law  106–113 ) is a U.S. law enacted in 1999 that established a cause of action for registering, trafficking in, or using a domain name confusingly similar to, or dilutive of, a trademark or personal name. The law was designed to thwart "cybersquatters" who register Internet domain names containing trademarks with no intention of creating a legitimate web site, but instead plan to sell the domain name to the trademark owner or a third party. Critics of the ACPA complain about the non-global scope of the Act and its potential to restrict free speech, while others dispute these complaints. Before the ACPA was enacted, trademark owners relied heavily on the Federal Trademark Dilution Act (FTDA) to sue domain name registrants. The FTDA was enacted in 1995 in part with the intent to curb domain name abuses. The legislative history of the FTDA specifically mentions that trademark dilution in domain names was a matter of Congressional concern motivating the Act. Senator Leahy stated that "it is my hope that this anti-dilution statute can help stem the use of deceptive Internet addresses taken by those who are choosing marks that are associated with the products and reputations of others".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">.ae</span> Country code top-level domain for the United Arab Emirates

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Generic top-level domains (gTLDs) are one of the categories of top-level domains (TLDs) maintained by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) for use in the Domain Name System of the Internet. A top-level domain is the last level of every fully qualified domain name. They are called generic for historical reasons; initially, they were contrasted with country-specific TLDs in RFC 920.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">.pro</span> Generic top-level domain

The domain name pro is a generic top-level domain in the Domain Name System of the Internet. Its name is derived from professional, indicating its intended use by certified professionals.

WHOIS is a query and response protocol that is used for querying databases that store an Internet resource's registered users or assignees. These resources include domain names, IP address blocks and autonomous systems, but it is also used for a wider range of other information. The protocol stores and delivers database content in a human-readable format. The current iteration of the WHOIS protocol was drafted by the Internet Society, and is documented in RFC 3912.

Domain name warehousing is the practice of registrars obtaining control of expired domain names already under their management, with the intent to hold or "warehouse" names for their own use and/or profit.

RegisterFly was a New Jersey (U.S.) based internet hosting and domain name registrar that had their ICANN-accredited status terminated in March 2007.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">.biz</span> Generic top-level Internet domain

.biz is a generic top-level domain (gTLD) in the Domain Name System of the Internet. It is intended for registration of domains to be used by businesses. The name is a phonetic spelling of the first syllable of business.

Domain registration is the process of acquiring a domain name from a domain name registrar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trademark Clearinghouse</span> Database of trademarks for gTLDs

The Trademark Clearinghouse is a database of validated and registered trademarks established by ICANN to assist trademark holders prevent infringing behavior in the Domain Name System. In combination with the Uniform Rapid Suspension System (URS), it is the second significant attempt by ICANN to handle the "Trademark Dilemma". The first attempt was the Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy.

The Registration Data Access Protocol (RDAP) is a computer network communications protocol standardized by a working group at the Internet Engineering Task Force in 2015, after experimental developments and thorough discussions. It is a successor to the WHOIS protocol, used to look up relevant registration data from such Internet resources as domain names, IP addresses, and autonomous system numbers.

References

  1. ↑ "Google leads, ICANN follows: domain tasters can now eat dirt". ICANN Wiki. 30 January 2008. Retrieved 11 November 2012.
  2. ↑ Bob Parsons: Why it's getting harder to get the domain names you want
  3. ↑ Verisign monthly registry operator report, February 2007
  4. ↑ Preliminary Report for the Special Meeting of the ICANN Board of Directors. ICANN, 28 January 2008.
  5. ↑ "ICANN Fees".
  6. ↑ "AGP (Add Grace Period) Limits Policy". ICANN. Retrieved 16 October 2012.
  7. ↑ Simon Aughton (28 Jan 2008). "Google cracks down on "domain tasters"". PC Pro. Retrieved 16 October 2012.
  8. 1 2 Timmer, John (2009-08-13). ""Domain tasters" bitter as new fees put an end to their games". Ars Technica . Retrieved 2009-08-17.
  9. ↑ The End Of Domain Tasting. ICANN Report on AGP Measures 12 August 2009
  10. ↑ "The End of Domain Tasting | AGP Deletes Decrease 99.7%". ICANN. Retrieved 16 October 2012.
  11. ↑ devolution (20 June 2009). "The End of Domain Tasting | AGP Deletes Decrease 99.7%". Domain State. Retrieved 11 November 2012.
  12. ↑ "Domain Registrar Network Solutions Front Running On Whois Searches". Archived from the original on 2008-01-12. Retrieved 2008-01-09.
  13. ↑ "Aftertaste – the domain tasting era has quietened to a whisper". 15 August 2009.
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