Some companies are just not ethical. It's sad, but true. In the past 6 months, two of our clients have been hurt by unscrupulous companies and several others have been contacted. A few things to look out for:
1. The domain renewal scam. An official looking document shows up asking you to renew your domain name. The letter usually shows up several months in advance of the renewal date, encouraging your to renew now to "protect" yourself from losing that domain name. When you pay the invoice and renew the name, the domain gets renewed, but not in your name. It's transferred to the jerks who initiated the scam.
2. The domain name theft. You're searching for a domain name on the website of an unethical company and the next thing you know, the company registers the name for which you just searched. What happens? You can still register the domain, but ONLY from THAT unscrupulous company - for a premium price, of course.
3. The domain name theft Version 2. It's nearing time to renew your domain name registration, but you figure you'll get around to it one of these days. The next thing you know, some company snatched it and you've lost it. It's not that common, but it happens.
Tucows, a legitimate company for which we are resellers, offers these suggested ways to protect yourself:
1. Enable WHOIS Privacy. This is the absolute best protection, stopping the renewal scam dead in its tracks as there is no way for the scammer to contact the Registrant directly.
2. Make sure your domain is locked. A locked domain can't be transferred.
3. Know your Reseller and Registrar. Don't assume someone will take care of this for you. You should keep on file all the information about where and when you registered your domain name. You should know your username and password as well. Keep it somewhere you'll find it when you need it.
