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Worst mistake an ecommerce site can make
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June 10th, 2007 by 
Jay Westerdal
The biggest goal an ecommerce site has is to earn the trust and confidence of the consumer. Before making a purchase or signing up for a program at a new company, I am in the habit of doing my due diligence to investigate the company. I check how many years they have been in business using the WHOIS record. Then I Google for them using the keywords of mistrust such as [insert company name] “COMPANY scam” and “COMPANY warning”. If people describe really bad situations, then I stay clear.
This evening I checked out Auction Ads - I had heard about the company in a blog post. But while doing my background checking it appears they block access to see who the company is runs by. They are using Domains by Proxy from GoDaddy to block their WHOIS information from appearing in the public. I have to ask, “what are they trying to hide”? Last time I saw this it turned out to be an ecommerce site run by some scammers out of India. I looked at the WHOIS history and it says a person named James Hagans was the last registered owner of the website and he lived at “75 Blenheim Rd, Columbus, OH, 43214″.
Check the WHOIS before doing any sort of ecommerce transaction. You never know what you are going to find. I never enter my credit card information on any website I find which hides who they are. They want my credit card information but they will not tell me who they are… I think not.
Here is the WHOIS for Auction Ads.com, I am glad to report there is some talk in sub-committees at ICANN for making it a requirement to show WHOIS information on ecommerce sites. I have heard ShoeMoney owns the site, but he commented that “Its actually a joint venture between my parent company and Media Wiz (owner of text link ads, review me, etc..)“. Honestly it is hard to say what the real truth is because it is hidden.
I think one day I will make a list of ecommerce websites that hide their identity. Any other websites out there that look legitimate from the HTML side but they look shady on the WHOIS side?
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Posted in Private Registration, Proxy Whois |
June 10th, 2007 at 12:00 pm
Would you please explain why some sites are “parked” at “Domain Parking Lot” and their SEO information (i.e., keywords, meta descriptions, etc.) seems to be blocked.
Neil E.
Also, I have a consumer scam you may be interested in. They are bus brokers of commercial buses and assorted other vehicles. These people make their sites look like they own and operate their own vehicles, when in fact they subcontract out (mostly to cut rate bus companies) and charge ridiculously high prices to the consumer. They so dominate the search engines that it is virtually impossible for legitimate carriers like myself to get on the first page of Google searches (in particular). There are dozens of these brokers, but approximately 6-7 absolutely dominate with their site, blogs, sub sites and well hidden advertising sites.
June 10th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Neil,
Some parking websites don’t have a lot of meta information. I am unclear what you mean by “blocked”, perhaps you can give me an example.
Jay
June 10th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
AuctionAds really isn’t an eCommerce site. They just serve up ads taking auctions from eBay based on the keywords you specify. All you really need to give them is your Paypal address, so they can pay you.
Plus, since multiple people/companies own it, which address are you going to use? I’m assuming it’s not a brink and mortar company, just an online one. So, it really doesn’t matter…
June 10th, 2007 at 7:42 pm
Jay, regarding privacy, I have a question. Does Domain Tools share information with anyone about the whois lookups that are done here? What is your privacy policy on this information?
UPDATE BY JAY: Joe, you can read our privacy policy, we never share information about what people look up.
June 10th, 2007 at 10:12 pm
I think some of us use the privacy option as we don’t like getting spammed or unsolicited calls. Based on the nature of the site, I may choose not to show the info. If I were an ecommerce site, I would show that info. I also seem to recall one of my previous registrars had the privacy option as a default.
As for AuctionAds, I’m sure your research pointed you to “shoemoney” or Jeremy Schoemaker. He has a blog at http://www.shoemoney.com which has his opinions about a lot of items. I find him to be pretty up front so am surprised that he uses a privacy option.
June 11th, 2007 at 2:17 am
There is no legitimate reason for a company to hide its registered office address - in cat, in the UK it is now a requirement for limited companies (read LLC for US equivalent) to display their registered office address and comapny number on their website and, later this year, individual traders will have to give a trading address (has to be somewhere documents will be accepted on their behalf).
Even more annoying is the people who withhold addresses claiming to be non trading individuals when they clearly are not and I believe that is a breach of ICANN requirements.
One of the basic requirments for free trade to exist is that the parties to a transaction know with whom they are contracting
June 11th, 2007 at 8:13 am
That publication of company contact data is apparently a European Union requirement - most states in the EU would now have it as part of national law. It could have a very serious impact on the domain parking and monetisation business where companies (or their local equivalents) own the parked domains especially as the legislation might be open to wide interpretation.