Go to the mobile version of this Web site.

Login | Contact Us | Site Map | Paid archives | Electronic edition | Subscription Questions | Extras

New wave of cyber-theft involves names of Web sites

By Jeff Smith, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published August 17, 2008 at 9:05 p.m.

Text size  
Jenifer Sher said, "We had bought the domain name from NameSecure, which is kind of ironic."

Photo by Tim Hussin © The Rocky

Jenifer Sher said, "We had bought the domain name from NameSecure, which is kind of ironic."

Jenifer Sher, Lemon Sponge Cake ballet executive director, and her husband, Robert Sher-Machherndl, artistic director, watch Tessa Victoria-Daines, 30, perform during a rehearsal for A Strange Land on Thursday at Dairy Center for the Arts, in Boulder. The ballet starts today.

Photo by Tim Hussin © The Rocky

Jenifer Sher, Lemon Sponge Cake ballet executive director, and her husband, Robert Sher-Machherndl, artistic director, watch Tessa Victoria-Daines, 30, perform during a rehearsal for A Strange Land on Thursday at Dairy Center for the Arts, in Boulder. The ballet starts today.

After Sher noticed the ballet company's domain name had expired, she wrote the new owner, and he offered to sell it back for $800.

After Sher noticed the ballet company's domain name had expired, she wrote the new owner, and he offered to sell it back for $800.

Related Stories

More Tech & Telecom

More stories »

Officials at Lemon Sponge Cake Contemporary Ballet in Boulder were shocked to discover recently that their Web site had disappeared off the face of the Internet.

"We had bought the domain name from NameSecure, which is kind of ironic," said Jenifer Sher, the ballet company's executive director. "I guess it must have expired, but we didn't receive any renewal notices."

To make matters worse, Sher couldn't send or receive e-mails, because her address was tied to the Web site.

Sher, who admits she isn't tech-savvy, was flustered and in disbelief. She said it wasn't easy getting to the root of the problem.

NameSecure didn't have a phone number on its Web site. Sher called her Internet-hosting company, which told her the domain had expired and gave her NameSecure's telephone number.

A NameSecure customer rep explained there was nothing the company could do. The domain already had been sold by parent company NetworkSolutions to a Japanese man. Within days, a Japanese-language Web site appeared at lemonspongecake.com.

Individuals, small businesses and nonprofits such as Lemon Sponge Cake increasingly own a presence on the Web. But experts say it's not unusual for those domains - which often are paid for annually - to be lost.

"The kind of scenario you describe is unfortunately not a rare case," said Ron Jackson, editor- publisher of DNJournal.com, which covers the industry.

Most often, experts say, it happens when the domain registration company doesn't have a current e-mail address for the customer.

But there are other reasons as well - such as the e-mail renewal notice getting blocked by a spam filter, or a recipient not recognizing or forgetting about the renewal notice.

There's also a more nefarious trend: domain theft or hijacking.

"Domain theft is a real threat, though they will usually target high-value domains," Jackson said.

"Hackers can sometimes break into a registrar account and change the (administrative) e-mail address to their own so they can then approve the transfer of the victim's domain."

Internet attorney Brett Lewis, of Brooklyn, N.Y., said one of his clients had 20 domain names stolen. The hacker used spyware to transfer the domains to other registration companies under aliases and different addresses.

"We were able to document the Web transfers, and we got most of them back" except those already sold to a third party, Lewis said.

Three months ago, hackers temporarily hijacked Comcast's home page, posting electronic graffiti including taunting messages that Comcast had been "RoXed."

With Lemon Sponge Cake, it appears the glitch occurred in the domain renewal process.

NetworkSolutions spokeswoman Susan Wade said company records show two expiration notices were e-mailed to a Lemon Sponge Cake e-mail address in mid-May and late May.

Wade said the domain expired June 2 but remained active until July 8 - reflecting a 36-day administrative grace period - when it was removed for nonpayment "in accordance with NameSecure domain deletion policy."

During the administrative grace period, a domain is listed in the back-order inventory, Wade said. A person who has put in a back order can register the site as soon as the 36 days are up. If more than one person has put in a back order, the domain is auctioned off.

Company records show the Lemon Sponge Cake Web site was re-registered July 12 by the new owner from Japan.

Sher acknowledged that she learned the renewal notices apparently were sent to an old e-mail no longer used by Lemon Sponge Cake.

But she said she finds it staggering, in this high-tech world, that the domain registration company didn't just go to the ballet company's Web site to look up the current contact information.

"But obviously there's no manpower involved" in the renewal process, she said.

Sher contacted the domain's new owner by e-mail, and he offered to sell her back the domain for $800. She took that as highway robbery.

"Originally, it was like $5 (to buy)," Sher said. "I was furious. The fact is we're a nonprofit, not a profitable American business." She explained that by e-mail, but to no avail.

Luckily, Sher found that no one owned lemonspongecake.org. She bought that domain name through NetworkSolutions, but at a rather hefty price of $34.99 for one year.

Sher said she asked NetworkSolutions how it could assure her she wouldn't lose the domain again.

She was told to buy the name for as long as possible. "That's not assuring me it's never going to happen again," Sher said.

Sher said it's hard to measure the impact of losing the domain and switching to another. The ballet company sent out a mass e-mail to its contact list, of course.

"Some people update their records; some people don't," Sher said. "It will take some time."

She also suspects many people don't clear their Web-browsing histories or favorites and will continue to pull up lemonspongecake.com, only to find the Japanese-language Web site.

"It really seems so silly," Sher said of NetworkSolutions auctioning off the site before reaching the ballet company to confirm it no longer wanted it. "It's just obnoxious for obnoxious' sake.

"Why not keep your loyal customers happy?"

smithje@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5155

Protecting your Internet domain * Read the expiration policies.

* Make sure the domain registration company has your current e-mail address, so you get renewal notices.

* If you have more than one domain, centralize your registrations into one account and ensure the contact information is updated, especially in the event that the employee who registered the domain has left the company.

* Consider paying for several years at a time. You also can put a domain on automatic renewal, but make sure your credit-card information remains current.

* Be vigilant about monitoring the expiration date of your domain.

* Consider buying a software program that will monitor your domain and send you an alert if registration details have been changed or if the site is nearing expiration.

Comments

  • August 18, 2008

    8:26 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    HolierThanThou writes:

    * Pick another domain registrar if they're ripping you off.

  • August 20, 2008

    4:03 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    mrm writes:

    Are you kidding me? Sensationalism at its finest. This isn't cyber theft. These idiots forgot to renew their domain name, and that just isn't newsworthy.