Cyber Crime

IDNs have been hailed as a milestone in web accessibility, but unfortunately, this new technology could make it easier for phishers and other cyber criminals to target victims. This is because while certain letters in two different scripts might look exactly alike, they have different meanings in their respective language. …

In an effort to grab increasingly scarce IPv4 addresses, malware makers are now grabbing blocks of IPs. By colocating servers and requesting IPs under a fake business name, cyber criminals are snatching some of the last remaining addresses. Unfortunately, this practice is hard to track down given the shear size …

In an effort to put a stop to online pornography, the Chinese government has shut down 775 pornographic domains in the last three days. This swift action is the result of the country’s new domain name complaint center, where concerned citizens can rat out adult websites. The center is operated …

The Metropolitan Police’s Central e-Crime Unit (PCeU) announced today that it, in conjunction with the .uk registry, has shut down more than 1200 .co.uk domains. The domains in question were used by organised criminal networks for scamming. Many contained fake online stores where consumers could order designer goods for low …

In its yearly Mapping the Mal Web report, computer security firm McAfee rated Cameroon’s .cm domain as the “Most Dangerous Country Domain.” How could what was once a relatively unknown extension obtain such a ranking? A year ago, very few domainers cared about .cm because the government restricted public registration …

It’s become common for DNS providers to redirect users to third-party pages upon entering an incorrect URL. Called NXDOMAIN substitution, many ISPs practice this to make money. ICANN is calling out against this practice, however, citing its harmful effects: If an email is accidentally sent to an incorrect domain and …

Several months ago, New Jersey police arrested alleged domain hijacker Daniel Goncalves. He is suspected of stealing the domain P2P.com, which he sold on eBay for $111,000 USD, from a group of three owners. Yesterday, the state’s technology crime unit hit Goncalves with a seven-count grand jury indictment. The charges …

Analysis done by blog Domain Name Wire shows that cybersquatting is at an all-time low. The site took a look at the number of Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) filings for .com domains. It found that despite an increase in the quantity of registrations, the number of disputes …

Recently there has been heated debate about whether or not WHOIS privacy protection, an inexpensive service that lets domain registrants hide their contact information from the public, should be allowed. In the recent case U.S. v Kilbride, an American judge ruled that using privacy protection constitutes “material falsification.” The defendant …

If you own a .ch (Switzerland) or .li (Lichtenstein) domain, watch out. SWITCH, the registry responsible for the two ccTLDs, has warned of a scam targeting registrants So far victims of the scam seem to all be businesses. Con artists will email or call a firm offering to sell it …