Crisis at Registrar RegisterFly: company in disarray, 2 million domains at risk

[jezebel]

http://registerfly-lawsuit.com/

On April 11, 2007, the Dummit Law Firm will appear in Federal Court opposite counsel for RegisterFly, Kevin Medina, and ICANN to argue for a Preliminary Injunction requiring RegisterFly and Kevin Medina to turn over all domain data that is required to protect registrants from permanently losing their domain registrations. Clarke Dummit of the Dummit Law Firm will assert that without the data, current and former customers will face irreparable harm as a result of the potentially permanent loss of their domains. Additionally, Dummit will explicate ICANN's impotency when attempting to protect the public against these irreparable harms. Check back periodically for updates as they are available.

[accentnepal]

[quote author=bargainbloodhound link=topic=7603.msg48465#msg48465 date=1175536505]I wonder which registrar RegisterFly is buying the names from now (I know it's not ENOM  ;D )
[/quote]
This is the craziest part of the whole thing. Registerfly bought an accredited registrar a year or so ago, they are no longer reselling Enom, although some names are still with Enom. As I read it, Registerfly can legally still accept registrations for the month of their appeal. Of course they will never pay for them but they STILL are in the domain selling business for all of April.

http://blog.icann.org/?p=83

:turkey2:      :turkey2:      :turkey2:      :turkey2:      :turkey2:

*

[jezebel]

Updates:

Unfortunately I was just called by the clerk's office this afternoon, and Magistrate Judge Sharp just granted ICANN's Motion to continue the hearing from tomorrow April 11th 2007 to an undetermined date.  I know this is bad news for so many of you who are still trapped, and it is one more breach by ICANN of their duty to protect the public.

more: http://www.registerflies.com/class-actio...aring.html

Registerfly is still open for business and still charging customers who come there to purchase domain names.  We're asking that any of you who have made purchases or who have attempted to renew your domain names with Registerfly to forward this proof so that Clark Dummit can continue to pursue this lawsuit on behalf of the class participants.  Please read on!

more: http://www.registerflies.com/class-actio...money.html

[FiberGuy]

[quote author=regic link=topic=7603.msg48060#msg48060 date=1174959598]

Hosts offer "free" domains with the hosting and then you have a difficult time getting the name from them when you leave.

Microsoft Office Live's free domain offer falls under that category.

The most common problem I've seen over the years is people who hire a web design company to setup their site and register a domain - the design co. lists itself as the registrant of the domain and the site owner is unaware that they don't own the name until they try to move their site.
[/quote]

Apologies for my belated reply... but regic hit the nail on the head mentioning Office Live's "Free" (ahem!) domain/web site service.  There are numerous posts on the officelive message boards regarding the problems people have trying to move a domain.

http://officelivecommunity.com/default.aspx

[mandy]

The latest:

In a welcome victory for RegisterFly customers, ICANN announced yesterday that it had been granted a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) against RegisterFly, the ICANN-accredited domain registrar accused of allowing tens of thousands of domains to lapse unlawfully. The TRO orders RegisterFly to provide copies of all current registrant data within 48 hours, and provide weekly data updates to ICANN...

Whether or not ICANN can use this victory to head off the lawsuits brewing in the wake of RegisterFly’s collapse is another question entirely. Ideally for ICANN, the TRO will render enough of the issues in those cases moot to make them not worth the hassle of litigation...

full article: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/04/18/...gisterfly/

[accentnepal]

and provide weekly data updates to ICANN...

..... as they CONTINUE to register domains that do not exist, and who knows what else.

I just this minute wrote a reply to a poster on another board who was considering transfering into RF a very large number of domains - he had not heard a word about all this.

[bargainbloodhound]

I just this minute wrote a reply to a poster on another board who was considering transfering into RF a very large number of domains - he had not heard a word about all this.

I'm sure there are many more like him.  They haven't even notified their  resellers of the problems...and the RegisterFly about us page still says ICANN accredited.

[jezebel]

Wikipedia has a summary of the Fly mess:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Registerfly

I just this minute wrote a reply to a poster on another board who was considering transfering into RF a very large number of domains - he had not heard a word about all this.

Their merchant account provider cancelled their account but PayPal and Moneybookers don't care that people are getting ripped off.

From Registerflies.com

As every day passes, one has to wonder how Registerfly is still open for business and why?  Well, thanks to an insider that works closely with Kevin, we were able to squeeze a little information from this source as to just how much money Kevin is continuing to milk out of Registerfly customers that have no idea as to what's going on with the company.

Everyday someone still visits registerfly.  While we don't know the exact traffic, and insider working at the Florida location has reported some interesting information about how much money Registerfly is still taking in. It's been reported to us that Registerfly is pulling in between $5000 - $15,000 us dollars on any given day and not rendering services paid for.  On the 16th of this month our sources told us that over $5200 was received by Kevin Medina and Registerfly by way of Paypal alone.  While Humboldt may have shut down Registerfly's credit card merchant account, Paypal and MoneyBookers are still accepting funds through the Registerfly interface.

full article: http://www.registerflies.com/information...thing.html

[BellisimaJ.]

Paypal and MoneyBookers are still accepting funds through the Registerfly interface.

It seems as though that would be illegal.  :blinkie:


Edit to change the title.

[accentnepal]

Light one joint and you are in big trouble.

Steal $15,000 per day every day and they help you out.

This has gone beyond excuses, beyond blaming ICANN. This is a hole in the system of unbelievable proportions. Where are the courts? Where is the media?