Re: [registrars] Who "affordable-domains.com" is.

[John Nagle <nagle@downside.com>]

   It gets wierder.  See

http://www.dnso.org/clubpublic/registrars/Arc01/msg02287.html

in which Ivan Vachovsky, the CEO of Aplus.Net, complains
about the "affordable-domains" spam overloading his systems.

It turns out that his company hosts the thing.

"affordable-domains.com" is on a server in China, but
their "mother site", as their FAQ (at
"http://www.affordable-domains.com/faq.html") says, is
"easy-internic.com".  The forms on the "affordable-domains.com"
actually submit to the IP address of "easy-internic.com".
And both sites have much the same content, except for slightly
different graphics.  The FAQs match word for word.

Who hosts "easy-internic.com"?   Here's a traceroute:

  Tracing route to easy-internic.com [66.175.45.95]
  over a maximum of 30 hops:
   ...
   15    abac-gw.customer.alter.net [157.130.240.102]
   16    core01.san-diego.abac.net [216.55.138.242]
   17    easy-internic.com [66.175.45.95]

So ABAC hosts "easy-internic.com".  ABAC is in
San Diego, California, and does business as
"aplus.net".

Now the question is whether ABAC is unwittingly
hosting "easy-internic.com", or whether they're an
active participant in this operation.

It's worth noting that "easy-internic.com" asks
for a credit card number without disclosing their
business name and address first, as required by
California law.  That's a criminal offense in
California; you can't run an anonymous business,
and there are specific Internet disclosure requirements.
Since they're hosted in California, California
law applies, even though they do give a mailing
address which is a Mail Boxes Etc. in Salt Lake
City, UT.

				John Nagle
				Downside.com