Domain Registration Related News
Domain Hijacking, and Cyber-Squatting
Awareness
May 2005
Top Level Domain names or TLDs, are new website
name extensions. Current well known TLDs include
'.com', which is used by most for-profits, '.gov';
government organizations, '.org', used by
non-profit organizations and 'name.edu', which
designate educational institutions. The Internet
Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN),
who controls web naming conventions, has added
several new TLDs, including '.eu' for European
Union and sponsored names (sTLD) such as '.travel'
for the travel industry and '.jobs' that is
restricted to use by the human resource
profession.
Domain hijacking is the practice of stealing an
organization or individual website name. The
hijacker could send the current owner a phony or
misleading registration transfer approval form or
submit a fraudulent transfer authorization to the
current website host. Website owners who are not
vigilant can fall prey to these practices.
In Cyber Squatting, a person may register
well-known names or words, or common typographical
errors of popular names as websites. The
registrant then offers to sell the website, often
for a considerable price, or diverts the web
traffic to a website where they make money from
advertising or product sales.
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