Domain name reseller scam targets hospital
Howard Lake | 23 October 2002 | News
High-pressure salespeople have tried to dupe Guy’s & St Thomas’ Hospital Trust into buying additional Web domain names at premium prices, according to vnunet.
The Trust was told by Domain Registrar Services (DRS) that it domain names similar to its own were being registered by “mystery buyers” and that the charity should therefore buy the variants from DRS.
Susan Pollock, the Web manager at Guy’s, said that the implication was that the mystery buyers would run porn sites with the similar domain names, thereby possibly tarnishing the hospital’s name.
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Such high-pressure techniques are being used by a number of companies, and charities are among the targets. To avoid being caught out, charities should
- maintain a full list of their current domain names
- details of when they run out
- contact details for their current Web host and Internet service provider to get competitive quotes for registering domain names
- learn how to search WHOIS registers to find out who owns particular domain names
- regularly review which domain names they require and purchase new ones from a reputable reseller.
Read “Domain name scams hit the NHS” by Dinah Greek at vnunet.com.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.