Copyright © 2002 to Aardvark Net News
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Local Registrar Unwitting Party to ING Scam Copyright © 2002 to Aardvark Net News |
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Aardvark actively encourages other sites to link to its pages.
Dateline: 12:35pm, 26 April, 2002
Being unable to register .nz domain names directly following its banning as
a registrar last year, the company has instead been using the automated
registration process operated by local registrar
pdom.com.
PDom.com's CEO, Robert Wiles is keen to set the record straight and make it quite
clear that they were not a willing party to ING's actions.
In an email to Aardvark, Wiles writes "I wish to inform you and your readers
that we do not condone ING's activities and are monitoring the situation
and are operating in full consultation with Domainz. The
only way to limit the scam is to ensure that recipients of
the mass mail-out are aware of the scam and aware that they
do not need to register their .net.nz domain name through
and expensive third party when they can do it directly with
an accredited registrar for much less that $125."
Wiles also confirms that by charging $125 for registering domain names,
ING was planning to earn themselves a healthy margin of almost $100.
"It appears that www.pdom.com is unwittingly involved in the
ING scam because of its position as NZ's cheapest registrar
(NZ$28 + GST per year). It appears that once ING staff
receive a faxed response to one of their mass mail-out
letters they charge the customer $125 and then register the
domain name under pdom.com's automated registration process"
Promises from ING that their executive Mark Spektor would return
calls made yesterday asking for comment have yet to be honoured.
Perhaps the company's scheduled court appearance today to face
charges of misleading marketing practices might explain this tardiness.
New Zealand's domain name registry, Domainz has issued a
press release on the matter.
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