GoDaddy, one of the world's largest domain registrars, has won a U.S. patent for “domain name hijack protection.” The original patent proposal was part of a much broader GoDaddy application associated with Whois proxy services. Judging by the brief description, domain hijack protection in this case is actually related to an outdated procedure for transferring a domain from one registrar to another.
Under this procedure, the registrar relinquishing control of the domain could send the registrant a notification via email. The registrant was required to click on the link contained in the email to confirm the domain transfer. The patented procedure obviously provided protection against fraudulent messages of this kind leading to the unauthorized transfer of domains by simply blocking such messages.
However, it should be noted that the patent application was filed back in 2010, and since then, the situation has changed markedly. Today, the domain transfer procedure is the opposite. The email itself has become obligatory and confirms the transfer, requiring no link-clicking. On the other hand, clicking on links or performing some other action is required if the domain owner does not agree with the transfer. Blocking messages confirming a transfer is hardly a good idea.
Marina Nikerova, Senior Deputy Director of the Technical Center of Internet, believes that in Russia conflicts almost never arise when the domain is transferred from one registrar to another one. «For the Russian market illegal transfer of domain from one administrator to the other is a lot more urgent. However, this issue is entirely regulated by registrars working with end-users and accreditation procedure for registrars includes checking how well they can deal with such problems», she said.
