ICANN asked to probe all transfer problems

March 2005

Domain name registrar Melbourne IT says it hopes the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the arbiter of domain-related issues, will investigate all registrars who do not adhere to its domain transfer policy with the same zeal it has shown in investigating the hijacking of the domain of New York ISP, Panix.

Panix had its domain hijacked over the weekend of January 15-16. Its domain was registered with Dotster, a registrar based in Washington. By January 17, the domain had been restored.

Melbourne IT has admitted that it was to blame for the incident as one of its resellers failed to follow the process for seeking authorisation for a domain name transfer request.

ICANN completed its review of the incident on March 14 and laid the entire blame for the incident on Melbourne IT.

Melbourne IT chief technical officer Dr Bruce Tonkin said in a statement that the company, while welcoming the ICANN efforts, considered the hijacking incident to be "an isolated, but serious, security incident among many thousands of transfers that have been processed in accordance with the transfers policy."