ICANN Domain Name Transfer Policy Becomes Effective
As of the 12th of November, 2004 ICAAN, the
organization responsible for overseeing domain names, made a drastic
change to their transfer policy. Previously when domains were
transferred from one registrar to another the owner had to approve the
transaction via email. Now, if transfer requests are not replied to
within 5 days, the transfer will be automatically approved!
While they claim this "will provide for greater
consumer and business choice, enabling domain name registrants to select
the registrar that offers the best services and price" what has many
domain name holders concerned is the fact that it is now easier to
hijack a domain name, if your contact information is no longer valid or
if you have a spam filter that blocks the transfer email you can find
yourself losing your domain name. There are ways to recover the domain
as long as you can prove you didn't want to the transfer but the down
time and hassles are best avoided.
How To Protect Yourself:
-
Ensure your domain contact info is always up to
date
-
Whitelist or unblock emails from your registrar
if you use a spam filter.
-
Lock your domain name to prevent transfers
All of our customers are automatically protected as
all domains in our system have been locked with
TransferShield™. When our
TransferShield™
service is active, hijacking a domain is impossible. Only remove the
TransferShield™ from your domains if you would like to transfer to
another ICANN accredited registrar.
TransferShield™ Service is FREE, and
is included with all of our domain registrations. This extra security
will help prevent unauthorized transfer requests and more.
Contrary to popular belief, there is no reason to
panic, you simply need to be aware of the change and make sure that you
have followed the 3 steps above to avoid any headaches in the future.
Official ICAAN Announcement here |
