Privacy Information protection

Hey guys.

It maybe off-topic but I believe it is the best place I can ask. Besides of it this related to my store where I am selling Unity assets. So maybe moderator will not delete this thread and will not ban me.

Got this mail in the morning from whois company where I purchased my domain name:

The Privacy Protection service for your domain name mr-necturus.com has expired on September 29, 2014, and will be deactivated on November 4, 2014. Please renew this service immediately in order to protect your personal information from being displayed over the public Whois service.
Domain name: mr-necturus.com
Your cost: USD 2.88 per year

For me it looks like blackmailing attempt.
If I not pay USD 2.88 per year they will public my personal information.
Is it legal for companies to publish private information about customers, if they do not pay?

Do somebody know where I can find information about this matter?

Thanks.

 

I was always under the impression you had to pay extra to 'opt out' of the whois information, so that sounds like just a renew of that service to me.

 

Hm... Actually I don't remember I payed it even once. Maybe I did just thought I am paid for domain name. But 2 month ago I bought it for 2 years. So I payed attention.

But generally... There is no lays that tells companies to protect private information of their clients? And do it for free? I have nothing to hide and it is not hard to pay $2.88. But it still looks look like pure blackmailing for me.

 

As you say, it just looks like they're trying to get money out of you for nothing - I'm not opted-out on any of my domains, but I'm fairly sure it's just a tick box in my domain CP that doesn't cost anything. It's fairly common for hosting companies to try and charge you for "services"

Side note: According to this you're not supposed to opt-out if you do business via your domain. This may just apply to the .uk domains, but you may want to check if there any rules regarding .com before you pay / don't pay.

 

Most registrars offer some sort of services like this to mask your personal details. More than likely it was something you paid for initially, or they gave it to you free like an introductory offer. It's just an extra service that appears to be expiring. If it were blackmailing, I would imagine they would try to extort more than a couple of bucks out of you.

 

I do a fair amount of domain buying. There's usually an extra charge for hiding the details from whois. I don't bother with that at all, as they're all for businesses, and whois provides useful contact information for the company.

 

Thank you guys for reply. You are right from the one side it may looks like service.

From the other, why other companies don't even dare to public your personal information?

Imagine: tomorrow Unity or Microsoft, or Apple Store will send you this such letter. And ask you to pay for privacy. Why not?
Why people may don't want their confident information will be published? Isn't it matter of safety and security?

If someone which you trusted once and gave him your confident information will public it after you denied to pay him for his "service". Isn't it crime? I think it is.

 

Whois records are public records, and must have contact information. By default your information is published, that is the way it is and always has been. The company you paid for the domain isn't selling you the domain, they are providing a registration service. And the privacy service is an extra, not core to registering a domain. If you don't specifically pay for the privacy feature, then your contact information will be used.

I doubt your registrar is changing anything or try to extort anything. Check over their policies, and check what your original invoice covered. It's not uncommon for registrars to offer discounts or free extras for new orders. It may have been "free for the first year" or something like that. I am sure all the details are on their site.

 

Usually the who is information is just contact details for the various people within your company who deal with various aspects of the company's online presence. Mostly, companies don't want to hide such information. Looking at the list of details, it's pretty much aimed directly at companies, not individuals. Probably a throwback from a much earlier stage in the history of the internet.

I would imagine that individuals would want to hide such information, and every domain name service I've dealt with has a privacy service which they charge extra for. Normally such services are just checkboxes on the initial domain name registration/payment page.

 

Also, did you verify that the email did actually come from your registrar? It is pretty common practice for spammers/scammers to send various emails telling you are going to lose your domain, it will expire, etc to try to get you to use their service or trick you into signing over your domain so they can try to sell it back.

 

Good point.

 

Thank you guys for explanation. Now I see.
Of course I will not do with this nothing. But to bring this matter to court is a good scenario for Good Wife series.

Zombiegorilla@ No it was from Whois. I am sure.

 

Looks like scenario of dystopia move start.

 

I am not familiar with whois specifically, but I thought I'd share another example of a situation where you are charged for keeping your information private.

In the United States, all land line phones are automatically published in the phone directory. If you want to have a number that people cannot just easily look up, you have to pay extra on your phone bill. This is a monthly charge, though it may also be available for a yearly fee some places.

Businesses, of course, would not do this as they want to be found, but there are plenty of people who do not want their personal land line phone numbers listed in the public directory and available from dialing 411 to get "Information".

In the 1990s, it seemed like making your phone number private was almost seen as a status symbol to some.

 

I felt the same way about the privacy services that registrars offer, but it's true that contact information must be provided by law. What they're actually selling is a service where they work as an intermediary and filter any contact so that your private information is not used. If you don't pay (or someone else) for using their information, then you have to use your own information. And I really don't recommend using a random third party for that, as they could take over your domain and truly blackmail you for it.

So yeah, it sounds fishy, but it's actually not.

 

The privacy on the domains used to not be a big deal until it became clear that governments, businesses, and criminals were collecting it and using it in some cases illegally.

That's why most businesses that do have a substantial amount of money hide behind 3rd party managers of domain names and such.

It also costs a monthly fee to make a telephone numbers private in the US and I've still caught the telephone company I was subscribed to selling my telephone number to 3rd party 'businesses' (scam artists trying to get me to switch telephone companies after they found out I had called Switzerland via the telephone company I was subscribed to). Needless to say I canceled my subscription to that telephone company.

 

$2.88 is a good price, bluehost, for example, charges $10/year. Some webhosts will include it in the first year for free, then charge it after that.

Somewhere in their terms it likely mentions it in small print.