Bad registrar. No donut!

[unixronin]

OK, so I know a lot of geeks swear by GoDaddy as a domain registrar.  This sounds like GoDaddy has turned to the Dark Side and is following in the footsteps of NSI.  Names have been elided, but take it from me that the story comes from a geek of the finest water, who has no less than four Cray supercomputers in his home.  (Those of you who know him now know exactly who I'm talking about, and know -- and can attest -- that he would not lie about such a thing.)

 

Hey folks.  This is an unusual one, but I need your help.

The short version:  The domain name of my mom's largest customer, registered with GoDaddy a few years ago, was just stolen... by GoDaddy themselves.  The customer is fuming, and has begun the process of migrating to another service provider.  This has the effect of cutting my mother's income approximately in half, less than a week after signing a lease on a new house.

The domain disappeared from the root nameservers a few days ago, and we called GoDaddy's support people who started an investigation.  A few days went by with no resolution, until tonight when she basically got fed up and called them again to see what was up.

Tonight, they said the domain was "unavailable", because they "received a complaint from a third party indicating that the contact listed in the whois database was unresponsive".  Said contact was my mother, who's had the same phone number for seven years, and the same email address for twelve years...unresponsive, my ass.  Further, this domain had just been renewed this past December, paid in full for two years.  And even further, they just charged my mother's debit card another ten bucks due to the "query" regarding the whois database!

They acknowledged that this is a popular scam.  According to statements by one the support people she spoke with, this is a frequent occurrence, and involves...you guessed it, cash.  It works like this.  Someone figures out that they want a domain that is registered with GoDaddy.  They hop onto GoDaddy's website, and "pre-buy" the domain...paying money to be the first in line to get it if it becomes available.  Then, they make a complaint that they were unable to contact the current owner of the domain (whether that is true or not), then GoDaddy yanks the domain...which then magically becomes "available" to the person who paid to be the first in line.  And oh by the way, the previous owners' money is not refunded.

To make matters worse, they flatly refused to allow her to speak with a supervisor, saying that she had no recourse, and if she had a problem with that, she could go file a complaint with ICANN.  They refused to provide contact information for anyone of authority within the company.

I know GoDaddy is popular in this crowd...to be honest, until tonight, they were popular with me too...so this probably comes as a tough pill to swallow. But this has plainly exposed them as a bunch of suited thieves who have just stuck a knife in my mother's back.

I humbly and sincerely request that you, my most trusted friends, immediately dump that company like a hot rock and move your domains elsewhere.  I realize this is a pain, and may involve a few bucks (which I'd offer to pay if I didn't foresee sending all of my spare money to my mother now), but this company needs a whack on the back of the head.  I'm counting on there being enough GoDaddy-registered domains in the hands of people here to make them notice a little exodus.

Again, I know this is a big pain in the ass, and I wouldn't ask if these suits hadn't just lobbed a hand grenade into my mother's business, and her livelihood.  Please consider helping me with this by dumping GoDaddy, and get as many people as you know to do the same.

Thanks,

- [elided]

Comments

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

You got an alternate suggestion?

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Well, personally, I'm using Dotster. They're only a few bucks more than GoDaddy, iirc, and they've been very proactive about taking pre-emptive measures to circumvent whatever latest nastiness seeps forth from NSI/Verisign (or from ICANN at NSI's behest).

[mortaine.livejournal.com]

We use bulkregister.com and have had no complaints with them.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

enochsmiles says your friend's mom should go to NANOG with this.

-Ogre

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

So I saw; I will relay that ....

[elegantelbow.livejournal.com]

So, GoDaddy lists themseleves as being a member of BBB online (http://www.bbbonline.org/r.cfm?ID=1126001856) which has a listing (http://www.data.bbb.org/phoenix2.asp) about them which includes this information:

GO DADDY SOFTWARE, INC.
14455 N. Hayden Road #226
Scottsdale, AZ 85260

Original Business Start Date: 01/13/97
Type of Entity: Corporation
Principal: Robert Parsons, President
Customer Service Contact: Jackie Baumgartner,
Phone Number: 480-505-8800

I would take a complaint to the BBB Online, and try contacting Robert Parsons directly.

[elegantelbow.livejournal.com]

GoDaddy also says (https://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/legal_agreements/show_doc.asp?se=%2B&ci=299&pageid=PRIVACY) that you should report them to TRUSTe (http://www.truste.org/consumers/watchdog_complaint.php).

[enochsmiles.livejournal.com]

Neither of those options will be nearly as efficient as bringing this to NANOG, but I haven't seen anything cross the list about it yet.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

I have, however, passed that suggestion on to the original source, earlier today....

[elegantelbow.livejournal.com]

Did it ever come up on NANOG?

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Actually, I don't know. I haven't been following it. Too many other things to deal with.

[elegantelbow.livejournal.com]

I'm sure. I was hoping enochsmiles would have noticed something.

[enochsmiles.livejournal.com]

Not to my knowledge, but I haven't been paying close attention.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

I got a problem here. I mentioned vaguely on a list that GoDaddy was being narsty again, and they want details... and even if I point them over here it's not verifiable. *I* trust you, but....

[databeast.livejournal.com]

GANDI dude, they may be French, but they are the ONLY registrar whose EULA specifically states that YOU OWN your domain, and that property rights are only returned upon expiray of registration. me and BluKnight have been using them since about 2000 without a single complaint for 20+ domains.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

I didn't realize that about their EULA. I'll keep that in mind next time I want to register a domain.

Tucows

[cathyn.livejournal.com]

My company (SWCP, of whom many good tales are told) uses Tucows to register domains. Cheap, easy to deal with, and friendly.

Re: Tucows

[elegantelbow.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the recommendation.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

Update?

-Ogre

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

No news on the godaddy issue yet. I do know he's expanding his home colo operation, having just been hit with a huge property tax increase on the rationale of one hurricane or another.