I am having problems with spam resulting from my public data in the WhoIs databases. My registrar has some of the cheapest website hosting in the net, but his fee for private registration is $14 per year!!! so I am considering changing registrars (switching to Dynadot, of course). I have some questions: (1) All registrars state that "When you register a domain name, ICANN requires that your email address, mailing address, and phone number are made publicly available." So if they require that the info be public, how can they let you make it private? (2) Since the going price for privacy is $6 to $14 a year, how can Dynadot do it for $2? What's the catch? (3) In the light of recent historical developments (proliferation of spam), isn't domain data privacy something which should be standard equipment on any domain name? Isn't charging for the service a bit like a dealer offering a car for sale, and then saying for $100 extra he will install locks on the doors?
Change your whois information into a throw away email account so when spam gets bad dump the account get a new one and reset your whois info. A lot of the whois email grabbers generally only record details when a new domain is registered not changes so it can take quite sometime before spam gets bad.
[This post has been edited by hekler on Jul 7, 2007 8:09pm.]
1) Even though we are required to publish your contact information, nothing is stopping you from purchasing a forwarding service. Our privacy is a forwarding service.
2) Not sure why other companies charge so much.
3) It takes us extra work to run a privacy service, which is why we charge for it. Some people don't want privacy, which is why we don't build it into our prices and make it mandatory.
Hope this helps.
[This post has been edited by dynadot_staff on Jul 7, 2007 11:45pm.]