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View Full Version : Verisign backs down

Zenith
4th October 2003, 01:17
It was only a matter of time before public and technical opinion would bring an end to Verisign's "Site Finder". The Register (http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/33211.html) reported that Verisign have voluntarily taken down SiteFinder "temporarily" at the behest of ICANN.

In case you've been hiding under a rock for the last couple of weeks, Verisign decided to put a wildcard record in the .com and .net TLD's. The effect of this was for every single .com and .net domain that was misspelt or didn't exist to now end up at a site (provided by Verisign) for you to purchase the domain if you wanted to. While the business practice is dubious, it doesn't break laws. It does however break the proper operation of the naming system of the Internet (DNS).

I for one am very glad this idea got pulled. It just proves what can happen if one company owns a fundamental part of the Internet.
GeeDee
4th October 2003, 11:41
Good to hear! Goodness knows what VeriSign were thinking when they launched sitefinder, that nobody would notice or something?

And ICANN actually getting something like this taken down too, didn't think they had it in them.

:)
Say_Ten
4th October 2003, 14:00
They had to threaten with a lawsuit however, the polite request was ignored. So they started coughing and going, breach of contract at Verisign ;)
Boffykins
4th October 2003, 14:09
Still get sitefinder here...
GeeDee
4th October 2003, 16:28
It's supposed to be removed from the root servers by 6pm PDT today, and VeriSign say they are going to comply.

Bye for now sitefinder. Lets hope it doesnt make a comeback.

:)
Mingtea
4th October 2003, 17:31
90% of the time it gave me the correct spelling of sites i could not remember how to spell.

Ho hum.
glow_ginga
4th October 2003, 17:58
interesting..... :E
MONK
4th October 2003, 18:45
OMG ICANN done it.......
ant
4th October 2003, 19:29
it may have helped you find sites that you didnt know how to spell, but it caused alot of hassle for stuff like email being incorrectly addresses being delivered to nowhere and not getting notification of domain unkown. also it caused alot of pain for newly expired domains, this caught me out a few times where the primary nameserver for a domain was resolving to site finder which was horribly breaking things.