Network Solutions, ICANN Sued Over Domain Front Running
Tuesday, February 26th, 2008
Network Solutions, ICANN Sued Over Domain Front Running
I just experienced this the other day and it really pissed me off.
I used the whois lookup field at Network Solutions to look up a domain I was thinking of registering. The domain was available and Network solutions popped me onto a page with all sorts of upsell crap on it (buy misspellings, .org, .net, etc.). I left that site and went over to godaddy.com to see what they’d charge for the domain and when I looked it up there it was taken. I went back to Network solutions and low and behold, they’d tied up what 2 minutes before was an available domain.
I was mad as hell. I hope they go out of business with practices like this and if ICANN is part of it that really sucks. What a racket.
[via David Clark]
Richard, that’s amazing and distressing if true. I have check domains at GoDaddy, not purchased them, and returned later to find them still available. I have not experience what you described with Network Solutions. Is it possible that they held it because of your session, and then would release it if you opted not purchase it after your session expired? If this is true, and if the session was short, I can see how this could be acceptable. If it is as you suggest, a front running scam, they should be brought to task for it, and I hope that no one will use their service.
Dale: It is what I have described, people all over the net are reporting similar experiences. I was flabbergasted that this could be happening.
The other marginally related issue for me is that on both sites: network solutions and godaddy there is so much visual clutter and so much up-sell crap to wade through that an internet novice would either buy too much or just give up.
I’m no novice but I thought it was terribly confusing.
I had read about this practice but I will now pay closer attention and tell people to avoid Network Solutions. Thanks for the heads up.
That is shocking Richard - I haven’t heard of Network Solutions - I tend to use Bluehost to buy domains and host stuff.
Have you challenged them on this? And other people have also experienced this? Oh man. How dishonest - awful business practice.
Like Mike, I will tell others to avoid Network Solutions.
Richard, I agree about the “visual clutter” of GoDaddy et al. It’s mind numbing at times. I’ve used GoDaddy to register many domains, but have hated the process every time because of this clutter and annoying up-selling.
Jon: Network solutions is the oldest domain registry on the internet. Are you sure Bluehost does their own domain hosting? They may be a Network solutions reseller… ;)
Dale: I thought google was getting into domain hosting and if they were their UI would no doubt be a bit nicer. Let’s go check on that…
I hate the upsell stuff on Network Solutions. I have even received emails from them trying to sell me the domain I already got through them. I normally use pairnic.com which doesn’t have all the clutter and upselling stuff, but they do not do .name extension and I needed one.
david.
Is pair the actual domain registrar and host or are they a reseller for someone else?
PairNIC is the domain name registration division of Pair Networks. I do not know the exact legal construction but if you can’t find it on their site at http://www.pairnic.com I suggest you give them a call or write an email to find out.
Thanks David. Many of these web hosts resell domain services of others, I’ll dig a bit to find out about pair.
I see what you mean, but I have the impression this devision is a true registrar and not a simple add-on to their hosting services. Let me know what you find.
Will do. Thanks.