“Bulletproof” registrar takes a bullet to the head
ICANN has terminated a rogue registrar that claimed it offered “bulletproof” domain registrations services.
Fewmoretaps, which went by the ironic d/b/a Trustname.com, will lose its right to sell gTLD domains names on September 11, having repeatedly failed to chase up abuse reports over many months.
In an ICANN Compliance termination notice, the Org alleged that Trustname dragged its feet when responding to reports of its customers impersonating banks and a government tax agency — phishing in other words.
The Estonia-based registrar had bragged about being “bulletproof” and a “registrar built for businesses in competitive niches that often face false or bad-faith abuse reports.”
Its web site said it would disregard DMCA takedown notices and would only remove domains if it received court order from each of the three jurisdictions in which it operated — the US, Estonia, and Saint Kitts & Nevis.
That would be a tall order for any abuse reporter, but unfortunately for Trustname the ICANN Registrar Accreditation Agreement now requires registrars to take prompt action on valid abuse reports.
It was not doing so, according to ICANN, and the registrar’s promises to come into compliance proved inadequate.
Trustname had received three public breach notices over the last few months, though Compliance had been trying to get it to clean up its act behind the scenes since at least February this year.
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