Cybercriminals Hunting Desperately for Domain Names

Cyber criminals are preying on domain-name registrars worldwide to acquire domain names that comprise a vital part of botnet and phishing operations.

Criminals are accumulating domain names by registering them under fake information and paying for them with stolen credit cards or digital currencies such as eGold. They are also stealing authentic domain name accounts.

Ben Butler, director of network abuse at an Arizona-based domain-name registrar "Go Daddy",stated that the problem is indeed very big, reported IDG on September 14, 2009.

Besides this, Ram Mohan, CTO at Dublin-based registry services provider Afilias, exemplified that the present day's international criminals might be making use of a Chinese registrar, Russian Web-hosting company and an Ireland-based registry. The target is usually a consumer in the US, reported NETWORKWORLD on September 14, 2009.

Mohan stated that Afilias has recorded around 250,000 domain names that have been taken down in the past two and a half years as they were believed to be used for malicious purposes. He noted that initially the registrars with whom Afilias has been working with were not at all happy with the decision to suspend the domain names. However, it was later realized by many that it was rather a wise decision to block such a criminal activity.

Security experts further stated that it might happen that people intending to visit website of an authentic brand end up in visiting a cybersquatting site, which would ultimately direct the users to a phishing site, a webpage with suspicious content or an advertising that links to fake products and services. Well-known brands can be targeted by thousands of cybersquatting sites.

Cybersquatting damages the brand reputation of a business, resulting in subsequent losses, or it can be said that such sites are toxic to brand reputation of any business. At times, criminals copy the entire website of the brand in order to garner passwords and usernames from unsuspecting users.

However, experts warned that despite all these efforts, criminals are still able to carry on with their malicious activities because of highly automated registration services and insufficient authentication processes. In addition to this, the criminals nowadays are more cautious, tech-savvy and determined.

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» SPAMfighter News - 10/3/2009