I talked recently about a domain name appraisal scam that seems common these days here. That is not the only scam I have been subjected to over the years.
With the amount of domains I own, I am bound to get a lot of the jerks trying to swindle me out of my online possessions. One common scam that seems to follow me like a flu, is a warning approach where the people in question send me an email warning me about losing my alternative domain name.
Say I own something.com and something.net was available. These scammers (who happen to be a startup registrar or reseller), send me an email with a "neighborly" warning that "some person" has approached them with the intent of registering my beloved something.net. They tell me nicely how they really can't wait long, and they tell me that they care about me and wanted to offer it to me first. However, since they are a business after all, they need a quick reply on whether I want to get this name, and if I don't they will proceed to sell it to the "other person".
How "nice" of them to care about me so deeply. What's more, they are nice enough to provide me with the link to their page, which I can use to purchase something.net.
I reply "nicely" that I do not wish to purchase that domain name, and if they wish to do so, they can proceed to sell something.net to the "other person".
Even if I wanted to purchase the domain name I would definitely not go through them. In any case, you get my drift, many people fall for this scam, their first instinct is to buy the domain name in order to protect their brand.
Another popular scam involves a registry which you have never been involved with sending you a warning email telling you that your domain name is about to expire and that if you don't wish to lose the domain name you should renew it immediately. The letter is made out to be a renewal notice, but in actual fact it's a domain transfer form, and the steps you need to take are actually for a domain transfer.
Again, I didn't fall for this, but I can understand how some people that are not as technically aware of their domain name facts can easily fall for something like this and never even realize they were scammed into it.
To conclude this rant, be very careful with all email your receive concerning your domain names. Your domains are your real estate, guard them carefully. You should only consider emails that you get from your registrar and even then, your registrar is never going to initiate a weird action concerning your domain name. If you do not understand something, contact your registrar directly and ask. They will welcome your inquiry and help you swiftly. If you are approached by a scammer, note down their details. Write down the email address they use, and if they provided you with a link, use a whois service to find their details and use this to report them to the proper authorities.
If you don't know who to contact, contact your registrar, they will happily take it further from there.
| John Motson writes for http://www.dnxpert.com |
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