So it has recently come to light that anyone who has their domain names registered with Network Solutions might want to take a moment to seriously reconsider as to why. Let us start from the beginning so that you can fully understand the evil that is Network Solutions. Back in the day when we had no choice but to use Network Solutions they treated us like shit. They would “accidentally” double bill us, make mistakes with our accounts, let scammers fax in letters (without any other real proof that they are who they say they are) and take control of our domain name, because hey they faxed in a letter and who would lie via fax? I realize this was some 10 years ago but still, I’m sure many of those guys who had their domain names stolen because of Network Solutions total and complete incompetence are still pissed off an entire decade later, wouldn’t you be?
But all of that pales in comparison to their newest scam … and yes, I know scam is a harsh word but it is what it is. So here is how the scam works …. you think of a great domain name that you might want to register. You look it up using their WHOIS feature and they immediately “reserve” it. This prevents you from registering it with anyone but Network Solutions, of which they charge about 3 times more than the other registrars.
Nice, huh? Well that’s not all. Tech Crunch recently broke a new part of the story that makes it even more amazing that there isn’t some extremely huge class action law suit going on. Which to be honest, may very well already be under way. Sucks that I can’t get it on that one. Fuckers.
Anyway, once you register you nifty little domain name with Network Solutions, they will begin commandeering your unassigned sub-domains. For example FuckYou.LukeFord.com, KissMyASs.LukeFord.com, FuckYouFuckers.LukeFord.com. If you aren’t using them, they will!
They fill those pages with custom “parking” pages full of their own links so that if anyone happens to go to one of the sub domains they’ve hijacked, they are making money off all the links. There is no real way to tell how many of their customers they are fucking in the ass like this but it is estimated that they have done this to hundreds of thousands of sub domains, possibly millions.