Revisiting Whether You Really Need More Domain Names

In an earlier post, warnings were given about solicitations from companies seeking to help domain name owners protect and expand their rights. International registrars continue to send these communications to domain name owners in an effort to sell additional domain names to the domain name owners. For example, in a recent email received last week, a Chinese registrar wrote to a domain name owner indicating that the registrar was the department of registration service in China and that it had recently received an application to register domain names which contain the domain name owners name. The registrar indicated that the domain name owner should contact the registrar within seven days if it wanted to stop the registration. Otherwise, the registrations would be approved unconditionally. For domain name owners who respond to such messages, the registrars then attempt to sell them additional domain names with extensions such as .asia, .cn, .hk, and .tw. The registrars indicate that the domain name users can complete a priority registration, but that time is limited. Domain name users should continue to closely scrutinize such unsolicited offers from registrars. Running a quick Google search usually will reveal posts of other companies which have received similar unsolicited offers. See e.g., http://www.firetrust.com/en/blog/chris/domain-name-scams?page=26. From a practical perspective, if the domain name owner is not doing business in Asia, for example, purchasing the .asia domain name containing such companys name should not be a priority. —Kristan B. Burch