Provided by ICANN-accredited registrar Sibername, this letter shows what appears to be a renewal notice from the Domain Registry of Canada, a client of Brandon Gray Internet Services.
(WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — The organization that manages the .ca domain name is facing a lawsuit from Brandon Gray Internet Services Inc. that operates domain registrar Namejuice.com (www.namejuice.com) over claims that its licence was denied renewal earlier this month without reason, despite allegations of providing services to a known “domain slammer”.
According to a new report from ITBusiness.ca based on court documents, Brandon Gray claims the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (www.cira.ca) provided no cause for the termination on September 10, 2010, and is suing the organization for $10 million in damages for breach of contract and harm to its business reputation.
Brandon Gray is reportedly the registrar for a total of 25 resellers, including “Domain Registry of Canada”, which reportedly sends unsolicited domain renewal emails to .ca domain holders, leading individuals to unwittingly switch their domain name registrar, in a practice that CIRA calls “domain slamming”.
This tactic involves mailing what appear to be renewal notices or invoices from the consumers’ current registrars, saying that their domain names are about to expire, and requesting payment for the renewal of their domain.
Brandon Gray Internet Services Inc. has allegedly been behind similar activities. In 2003, the Domain Registry of America (www.droa.com), one of Brandon Gray’s reseller customers, was investigated by the US Federal Trade Commission (www.ftc.gov) for misleading consumers into thinking that they are renewing their registrations, when they were, in fact, transferring their registrations. DROA also allegedly failed to disclose a $4.50 processing fee for any transfer requests not completed, even when the failure occurs without any fault of the consumers, as well as violation of the Truth in Lending Act with its failure to issue promised refunds in a timely manner.
The messages sent by the Domain Registry of Canada came not only as emails, but also as mailed letters. ICANN-accredited registrar Sibername (www.sibername.com) provided an example of a letter it received for one of its domain names. The letter heading reads: “Domain Name Expiration Notice”, and there seem to be few indications, if any, that the recipient need not renew their domain with the Domain Registry of Canada.
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