VeriSign DNS in Trouble

hesiod writes "Over at CNet News, there is an article reporting that VeriSign may lose their ability to sell domains. Evidently, ICANN is miffed because VS's WHOIS database has incorrect information. Not exactly news to most of us, but they have been given 15 days to fix the errors, or risk losing the ability to sell domains."

Re:Yeah

[blochsound]

Have they actually abused their power? Or is this just politics?

PR Stooging

[alexmogil]

"Out of 10.3 million records, they pulled out 17 of these that have inaccurate data on it," said VeriSign spokesman Brian O'Shaughnessy. "That doesn't diminish the fact that VeriSign sees this as an important issue, but 17 names out of 10.3 million would hardly be considered a pattern."

I'm sorry, but my rebuttal is: "HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!"

Only Seventeen?! I'd wager 15% of the domains on there are pointed to the phone number 123-456-7890 at the address of 123 Main Street. I'd call that the beginning of a pattern. Buncha jerks.

This isn't entirely Verisign's fault

[wowbagger]

True, bogus WHOIS data makes it very hard to track down spamm^H^H^H^H^Htroublemakers on the 'Net, but is this really Verisign's fault?

If I register floobydust.com, and I fill in a contact email that becomes invalid three days after I go live, is that Verisign's fault? What should they do, spam everybody in their WHOIS and purge the bounces?

I can think of lots of reasons to yank Verislime's ability to sell domains, but I'm not sure this is one of them.

this isnt about bad whois data

[leto]

It is about
- Getting rid of Verisign in the .org deal
- Getting rid of Verisign before they get the 3
year on .net and 5 year on .com names
- Getting rid of a company that is going bankrupt
and is highly fraudulent (snapnames, bogus
invoices etc)
- ICANN itself getting out of the spotlight for
firing its At Large Directors

Don't threaten, just do it.

[uncoveror]

ICANN should not threaten to take Verisign's licence to sell domains, they should just do it. The scam they ran trying to get customers of other registrars to switch to them with bogus renewal notices should be all the impetus ICANN needs. I recieved those bogus notices for uncoveror.com, and dontbuycds.org, but godaddy.com had already warned me they were bogus.

Re:Screw ICANN

[(startx)]

he's saying the only way he'll put in accurate info is if that info is a P.O. Box, which costs money. He doesn't want to list his home address for obvious reasons.

Missing the point

[FreshMeat-BWG]

The problem isn't that Verisign has incorrect data. The problem is that they "agreed to take reasonable steps to investigate and correct its Whois data in response to any reported inaccuracy" and have not done so. It is that they KNOW they have incorrect data and haven't corrected it.

They have a point

[Kiwi]

I think the point ICANN is making here is not that Verisign has to make each and every single WHOIS contact info accurate. The point is that Verisign does not even care that their WHOIS contact informaiton is bogus more often than not.

People would complain to Network Solutions about spammers having obviously bogus WHOIS information (such as phone numbers of --- --- ----), and their reply was that "WHOIS information is ot guaranteed to be accurate".

I think the response is that, if a given set of WHOIS contact information is bogus, and people complain about the bogus information, Verisign should pull the domain in question until they update the information to have legitimate contact info.

A spam-friendly domain without real WHOIS contact information should be pulled until the information is updated. People should be held more accountable for what they put up on the internet; non-bogus WHOIS contact info is a start.

- Sam (Pot. Kettle. Black. I've moved since signing up for my [samiam.org] domains [maradns.org], and have not updated the WHOIS contact info)

Rare for anyone to be held responsible

[rbanzai]

My company had about eight domains registered through Verisign and were subjected to a few of Verisigns fraudulent business practices as well as their hideous, hideous service.
If they get punished for ANYTHING that will give me a little satisfaction. It's kind of a rarity for companies to be held responsible for being arrogant f-ups. Let's hope this gets carried through and they get the spanking they deserve.

Re:This isn't entirely Verisign's fault

[mindstrm]

No... they should not do that.

But when they are contacted and informed that the contact information for a domain that THEY ISSUED is not valid, then they MUST do something about it.
It is their JOB to maintain that information.
ie: Try to contact the domain holder, decide if the registration was fake or not, then axe the domain.