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edit approved Jan 7, 2019 at 17:17

Domains can be pre-registered out up to 10 years ahead. My own domain expires in 2025, so I'm getting sloppy. :) Long before that I will revisit it and push it out to the max again. When I survey small businesses for domain expiry, I find only about half are set to expire more than 2 years out.

This problem is often caused by people bundling their domain name registration with their web hosting. Domains are a measly $12/year. They are often "tossed in for free" with an expensive $180 to $600++++$600+ hosting plan. That's great for the web hoster, as he controls your domain and can ransom it if there's a billing dispute such as a $2000 bandwidth overage due to blowing up on social media. If you lapse the web hosting for the wrong 30 day period, the domain can be gone for good. The hoster doesn't care and why would they sink money into registering it out a day longer than necessary?

The ability to monetize (drive ads on) the organic traffic (links and bookmarks) to your web site, as well as any Google/Bing traffic while that holds.
The ability to monetize (drive ads on) the organic traffic (links and bookmarks) to your web site, as well as any Google/Bing traffic while that holds.
to benefit from the PageRank and other metrics which your site earned with search engines over the years. In the link economy of the Web, a link from a reputable site is worth its weight in gold. Web spammers use this to boost their spammy, scammy or lousy sites.
to benefit from the PageRank and other metrics which your site earned with search engines over the years. In the link economy of the Web, a link from a reputable site is worth its weight in gold. Web spammers use this to boost their spammy, scammy or lousy sites.
To trick Google by directly hosting their junk content on your domain name.
To trick Google by directly hosting their junk content on your domain name.
To attack organic/search visitors to the site with malware, Flash or PDF exploits, etc. They typically use older exploits to target people who don't keep their system updated.
To attack organic/search visitors to the site with malware, Flash or PDF exploits, etc. They typically use older exploits to target people who don't keep their system updated.
- One small company lost a site which reappeared with its earlier content. Really. The goal was to convince Google the previous owner was still in reputable control, because (they assumed) Google knew to watch for sudden content changes. A few pages were added advertising Acai Berry pills. See how this works? The site outranked the company's new real site for several years.* Normally web-spammers operate on a much larger scale than this with thousands of doorway pages, but this guy was small potatoes.

One small company lost a site which reappeared with its earlier content. Really. The goal was to convince Google the previous owner was still in reputable control, because (they assumed) Google knew to watch for sudden content changes. A few pages were added advertising Acai Berry pills. See how this works? The site outranked the company's new real site for several years. Normally web-spammers operate on a much larger scale than this with thousands of doorway pages, but this guy was small potatoes.

To intercept email to your site simply to harvest email addresses.
To intercept email to your site simply to harvest email addresses.
To use their control of your email to do password resets/gain control of your web accounts. They will discover your accounts at at smaller, less protected vendors when those vendors send their routine promotional emails.
To use their control of your email to do password resets/gain control of your web accounts. They will discover your accounts at at smaller, less protected vendors when those vendors send their routine promotional emails.
To sift through human email to your site looking for opportunities for con games or social hacks.
To sift through human email to your site looking for opportunities for con games or social hacks.

Domains can be pre-registered out up to 10 years ahead. My own domain expires in 2025, so I'm getting sloppy :) Long before that I will revisit it and push it out to the max again. When I survey small businesses for domain expiry, I find only about half are set to expire more than 2 years out.

This problem is often caused by people bundling their domain name registration with their web hosting. Domains are a measly $12/year. They are often "tossed in for free" with an expensive $180 to $600++++ hosting plan. That's great for the web hoster, as he controls your domain and can ransom it if there's a billing dispute such as a $2000 bandwidth overage due to blowing up on social media. If you lapse the web hosting for the wrong 30 day period, the domain can be gone for good. The hoster doesn't care and why would they sink money into registering it out a day longer than necessary?

The ability to monetize (drive ads on) the organic traffic (links and bookmarks) to your web site, as well as any Google/Bing traffic while that holds.
to benefit from the PageRank and other metrics which your site earned with search engines over the years. In the link economy of the Web, a link from a reputable site is worth its weight in gold. Web spammers use this to boost their spammy, scammy or lousy sites.
To trick Google by directly hosting their junk content on your domain name.
To attack organic/search visitors to the site with malware, Flash or PDF exploits, etc. They typically use older exploits to target people who don't keep their system updated.

To intercept email to your site simply to harvest email addresses.
To use their control of your email to do password resets/gain control of your web accounts. They will discover your accounts at at smaller, less protected vendors when those vendors send their routine promotional emails.
To sift through human email to your site looking for opportunities for con games or social hacks.

This problem is often caused by people bundling their domain name registration with their web hosting. Domains are a measly $12/year. They are often "tossed in for free" with an expensive $180 to $600+ hosting plan. That's great for the web hoster, as he controls your domain and can ransom it if there's a billing dispute such as a $2000 bandwidth overage due to blowing up on social media. If you lapse the web hosting for the wrong 30 day period, the domain can be gone for good. The hoster doesn't care and why would they sink money into registering it out a day longer than necessary?

The ability to monetize (drive ads on) the organic traffic (links and bookmarks) to your web site, as well as any Google/Bing traffic while that holds.
to benefit from the PageRank and other metrics which your site earned with search engines over the years. In the link economy of the Web, a link from a reputable site is worth its weight in gold. Web spammers use this to boost their spammy, scammy or lousy sites.
To trick Google by directly hosting their junk content on your domain name.
To attack organic/search visitors to the site with malware, Flash or PDF exploits, etc. They typically use older exploits to target people who don't keep their system updated.
- One small company lost a site which reappeared with its earlier content. Really. The goal was to convince Google the previous owner was still in reputable control, because (they assumed) Google knew to watch for sudden content changes. A few pages were added advertising Acai Berry pills. See how this works? The site outranked the company's new real site for several years.* Normally web-spammers operate on a much larger scale than this with thousands of doorway pages, but this guy was small potatoes.
To intercept email to your site simply to harvest email addresses.
To use their control of your email to do password resets/gain control of your web accounts. They will discover your accounts at at smaller, less protected vendors when those vendors send their routine promotional emails.
To sift through human email to your site looking for opportunities for con games or social hacks.

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created Jan 5, 2019 at 21:51

Harper - Reinstate Monica

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Loss of domain name is actually one of the biggest security vulnerabilities that I see "in the wild".

It may not rate a symposium topic at Blackhat, but the threat has a gigantic surface area and high business impact, and is at the top of the list when I am briefing a small organization's Board of Directors.

So, if you're serious about a domain name, plan to keep it for life. If you're not serious about a domain name, don't put your email on it. That simple.

Don't treat your (serious) domain like an annual subscription

Domains are marketed in a way that encourages you to treat them like a magazine subscription or a Netflix membership, thinking they can just renew at any time. They lapse, and return a month later and find someone else has registered the domain for its cash value.

This problem is often caused by people bundling their domain name registration with their web hosting. Domains are a measly $12/year. They are often "tossed in for free" with an expensive $180 to $600++++ hosting plan. That's great for the web hoster, as he controls your domain and can ransom it if there's a billing dispute such as a $2000 bandwidth overage due to blowing up on social media. If you lapse the web hosting for the wrong 30 day period, the domain can be gone for good. The hoster doesn't care and why would they sink money into registering it out a day longer than necessary?

How they profit by poaching domain names

When you let your domain lapse, and the grace period ends, in milliseconds it gets pounced on by at least a dozen different actors' automated scripts, all trying to do the same thing. Here's what it gets them.

The ability to monetize (drive ads on) the organic traffic (links and bookmarks) to your web site, as well as any Google/Bing traffic while that holds.
to benefit from the PageRank and other metrics which your site earned with search engines over the years. In the link economy of the Web, a link from a reputable site is worth its weight in gold. Web spammers use this to boost their spammy, scammy or lousy sites.
To trick Google by directly hosting their junk content on your domain name.
To attack organic/search visitors to the site with malware, Flash or PDF exploits, etc. They typically use older exploits to target people who don't keep their system updated.

To intercept email to your site simply to harvest email addresses.
To use their control of your email to do password resets/gain control of your web accounts. They will discover your accounts at at smaller, less protected vendors when those vendors send their routine promotional emails.
To sift through human email to your site looking for opportunities for con games or social hacks.