Studies & Opinions
Third-level
Domain Name Hijacking
Alex
Tajirian
November 26, 2004
A new type of domain-name hijacking is being carried
out unnoticed. It involves third-level domain-names associated with
affiliate programs.
If you had been an online affiliate of, say, company
xyz.com, your affiliate Internet address could have looked like
YourCompanyName.xyz.com. If you or xyz.com terminates the relationship,
xyz.com might decide to assign your affiliate address YourCompanyName.xyz.com
to a new entity that has no relationship to you or YourCompanyName.
The new entity would use YourCompanyName to exploit its intrinsic
value.
The assignment of your affiliate third-level domain
name to another company creates two sources of value loss to you.
The first is through lost traffic from http://YourCompanyName.xyz.com
and the second is a result of the infringement on your company’s
brand name.
In such situations, there are two levels of initiatives
that you can take to protect your brand name. First find out whether
such an infringement is underway and the second is a proactive measure
to monitor and limit damages from such violations. If you are already
a victim:
- You
should first ask xyz.com to immediately deactivate the third-level
domain name YourCompanyName.xyz.com, or to restore your affiliate
link.
- Contact
the entity infringing on your intellectual property and ask them
to cease using your name in any affiliate programs.
- Contact
us to assist you with (1) and (2) above. We are considering making
public the names of such violators.
As for proactive protection, we have developed
a service to monitor and notify you when infringements take place.
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