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GoDaddy Follows Qwest With Per Spam Charges

(Mis)Uses of Technology

from the how-nice dept

Mon, Jan 23rd 2006 9:13am — Mike Masnick
zanek writes "A check of six major Internet Domain Registrars accredited by ICANN turned up one registrar that actually tucks a "per spam" charge into its Terms of Service: GoDaddy. If your domain is associated with a spammer, get your wallet out. Email Battles takes you through normal contract language, then shows you what's way out of line. Aside from this single registrar, we have found only one business this nervy... And you can bet Qwest is paying the price." The Qwest statement obviously refers to their $5 per spam charge. You can understand why these companies put the fees in there, but it's not realistic in a world where machines do get compromised. Shutting accounts down and demanding cleanup makes sense -- but per spam fines seem to go a bit too far.
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15 Comments

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  • identicon
    Claymore, 23 Jan 2006 @ 10:13am

    Monitor your servers...

    "but it's not realistic in a world where machines do get compromised"

    This is true but it should encourage people to patch and monitor their server. Possibly helping people to not be so lax in their security procedures.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Marc Michaels, 23 Jan 2006 @ 10:42am

      Re: Monitor your servers...

      Sending your company into potential bankruptcy because someone hacks a server through an exploit seems like a pretty stiff punishment to me.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Dave, 23 Jan 2006 @ 10:49am

        Re: Monitor your servers...

        Maybe the company that goes bankrupt over these fines should consider holding M****soft accountable for their faulty Software.

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Jebrew, 23 Jan 2006 @ 11:09am

          Re: Monitor your servers...

          Because it's really Microsoft that made their server insecure, not their lack of sense. They'd be just as screwed with any of the *nix variants. If you don't know how to secure your crap, you should pay for it.

          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          sm, 23 Jan 2006 @ 11:40am

          Re: Monitor your servers...

          Exactly how do you know that MS's faulty software caused the problem? What if the troublesome server is running *nix? MS's fault even then?

          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      mark, 23 Jan 2006 @ 12:14pm

      Re: Monitor your servers...

      but godaddy is the one who secures the servers, not you.... you only rent space from them.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Kevin Mesiab, 23 Jan 2006 @ 12:25pm

        Re: Monitor your servers...

        GoDaddy only secures your servers if you choose to host with them. GoDaddy's primary business is domain name registration. They only added hosting in 2000 (though they have grown to one of the largest shared hosting providers).

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Dam, 23 Jan 2006 @ 12:52pm

          Re: Monitor your servers...

          GoDaddy's primary business is domain name registration.
          And, GoDaddy registers more spammers than many others. When you get a moment, look up the domain some spammers are using, and chances are it'll be registered through GoDaddy

          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            Michael Vilain, 23 Jan 2006 @ 1:18pm

            Re: Monitor your servers...

            But I've filed SPAMCOP complaints against spammers using GoDaddy registration. They were taken out of DNS eventually when there was sufficient evidence that this wasn't an exploit but someone truely spamming. Network Solutions doesn't do that and the service rep got rather huffy when I told them that on moving my domains to GoDaddy from NSI.

            [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Cara, 23 Jan 2006 @ 11:46am

    Come on , let's get real here

    Honestly, even the best security experts out there cannot keep machines completely safe from hackers all the time, it happens, even to the best of us. This is extreme, especially considering a lot of wesite owners can't possibly keep up with and prevent all current and future potential exploits. The hackers will always find new ways in. The only safe computer is unplugged and buried in the back yard.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Rikko, 23 Jan 2006 @ 12:00pm

      Re: Come on , let's get real here

      Tunneling hackers with pocket diesel generators...
      No, it needs to be hanging in a tree where you can keep an eye on it.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Kevin Mesiab, 23 Jan 2006 @ 12:20pm

        Blind leading the blind

        The latest round of compromises that lead to spamming happens to affect *nix machines running faulty xmlrpc interfaces. (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/71230)

        Its irritating to see linux and unix evangelists putting such blind faith into their systems. Nobody is completely secure. (http://www.insecure.org/sploits_linux.html)

        Even some networked printers, copiers, routers and network apliances are subject to being hacked and misused.

        Do us all a favor and hold your tongue until you know what you're talking about.

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          CharlesGriswold, 23 Jan 2006 @ 2:02pm

          Re: Blind leading the blind

          Its irritating to see linux and unix evangelists putting such blind faith into their systems. Nobody is completely secure. (http://www.insecure.org/sploits_linux.html)
          True. *nix OS's are, however, more secure than Windows, for a variety of reasons (not the least of which is that Windows is a large, homogenous, and very tempting target).
          BSD running on a non-intel-based architecture is about as secure as you can get without paying lots of money.
          If you want rock-solid security, get an AS/400 or System 390 server. Even these are not totally secure, however; social engineering can break any computer security.

          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Claymore, 23 Jan 2006 @ 1:18pm

      Re: Come on , let's get real here

      "Honestly, even the best security experts out there cannot keep machines completely safe from hackers all the time, it happens, even to the best of us."

      That's where the monitoring part comes in. If you seen a spike in traffic coming from your server you should probably investigate immediately. Has my site just become more popular or am I now a slave to a spammer?

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    admin, 23 Jan 2006 @ 2:24pm

    time to leave godaddy

    Thanks for the heads up on this. Pissed that I
    just registered another domain with them two days
    ago.. those damn EULA are so long now its like
    MSFT clickthroughs.. who really reads the whole
    thing anymore. shame on me. But I did speak to
    a rep there (who had no idea) just to confirm what
    if anything I had to do on my end to set my account
    up for easy transfer. One really wonders what prick
    at these firms hatches these 'revenue' enhancers.
    I for one will not take the chance of my umbrella
    policy covering a web server (hosted by me or
    elsewhere) never being compromised.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]


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