Domain Registrars in Tough Spot, Again — China Puts
CNNIC reverses role of registry and registrar, and communicates poorly to boot.
[Update 7/1: Go Daddy is sending out an email to its .cn clients today, which also links to CNNIC’s notice.] Imagine if VeriSign sent an email to the all .com registrants asking them to click a link to verify they have the correct email address.* If you didn’t respond within 15 days, your domain name was subject to deletion.
Sounds crazy, but this is the latest threat from China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), the registry for .cn. Its latest move to clean up the .cn domain space is also putting domain name registrars in a unique position, and reversing the usual roles of the registry-registrar relationship.
In the typical gTLD world, registries prefer not to communicate with registrants and depend on registrars to manage all communications. But CNNIC is communicating directly with registrants and, to a sizable degree, leaving registrars out of the loop.
I talked to Camille Ede, Director of Domain Services at GoDaddy, this afternoon. She confirmed that the registrar received a communication from CNNIC regarding the fresh verification campaign on Monday, but some of the firm’s clients had by now received the confirmation email from CNNIC.
“We didn’t necessarily see it coming but we were prepared for it,” stated Ede. “We’re evaluating if we ought to send further notices to our clients. Our client service representatives are fully equipped to answer any questions from our clients [regarding the notices].”
Go Daddy is going to try to track its clients’ response rate to CNNIC’s verification emails. But keep in mind that registrants are confirming with the registry, not the registrar. So it might be difficult for registrars to know how many of their clients are compliant.
When Go Daddy asked its .cn clients to provide fresh proof of identity earlier this year, only 20% responded. This does not bode well for a high percentage of clients responding to CNNIC’s emails — if they even find their way to their inboxes.
Will CNNIC actually delete domain registrations if the registrant doesn’t verify, or is this just a threat?
“We have to consider the worst case scenario, so we’re definitely looking out for our clients on this one.” Ede stated.
Bluff or not, CNNIC’s handling of the entire situation doesn’t instill confidence. And to think, China is regarding to get two more country code top level domains.
*Yes, I realize VeriSign operates under a thin-whois model, and doesn’t actually retain registrant information. But you get the point.
