Down Alpnames domain name registrar — ICANN shuts

ICANN takes emergency action following Alpnames seemingly shutters.

Domain name overseer ICANN has shut down registrar Alpnames following the registrar seemingly went dark.

I received an email from a client regarding a week ago complaining regarding not being able to log in to his account. Kevin Murphy at DomainIncite has done a good job tracking the situation at Alpnames.

The termination will be a good test of the mechanisms ICANN put in place following RegisterFly was shuttered many years ago. Yes, other registrars have been terminated, but Alpnames is fairly sizable in terms of domains under management. It is the ninth-largest registrar for fresh top level domain names. At one point it had some common ownership with Famous Four Media, which offered its domains at cut-rate prices.

It was also shut down without warning.

Let’s hope that Alpnames was properly escrowing its domain ownership data.

Just last year in February, the firm put out a press release stating that “Iain Roache has increased his ownership of AlpNames a leading domain registrar and web hosting firm by acquiring a further 20% of the Firm’s share capital for a consideration (counting combined costs) of £3.9 million with a view to growing the business into a Tier 1 registrar.”

That didn’t work out.

The demise of Alpnames is another reminder to choose a domain name registrar you trust to be in it for the long haul.