How To Protect Your Website From Being Repossessed Or Stolen!

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Did you know that you can lose your digital piece of real ...
without an eviction notice? Imagine losing ... in asingle ...
your ... your brand equity, your ...
your Did you know that you can lose your digital piece of real estate,even without an eviction notice? Imagine losing everything in asingle heartbeat: your business, your brand equity, your trafficand your source of income ... Without your knowledge or consent!That's what happened to many unfortunate online business owners,lately.
Specifically, a stunning controversy has emerged, whichall Internet marketers and business owners should pay very closeattention to. If you own an online business, be extra careful.VeriSign, the online security company, is now not only a domainname registrar but also the company that runs the master domaindatabase (.com's, .net's and .org's).
It's a responsibility onceheld by Network Solutions (since acquired by Verisign) conferredto them by ICANN. Is this monopoly a good thing? Apparently not.If you neglect to pay your mortgage, for example, you lose yourhome.
But this only happens after you've received several "pastdue" notices from the bank and still failed to make your paymenton time. (That's OK, since your physical address never changes.)Similarly, most domain name registrars will notify you by emailwhen it's time to renew.
But what happens if your email addressis wrong? What happens if your postal address has changed? Whathappens if you're on vacation away from your computer? And whathappens if you simply overlooked the notification?If so, you're probably out of luck.According to Janet Kornblum in a USA TODAY article, you can loseyour "digital home" without ever getting an eviction notice. SaysKornblum, "What if you just came home from work, one night, andfound new owners sitting in the dining room, eating your food?"That was the case with a few business owners whose domain names,which were registered through VeriSign, expired and were quicklysnapped up by other people, putting the original owner right outof business in a blink of an eye! VeriSign is not the only one,too.
Some registrars fail to even send a single renewal notice!(One lawyer became aware -- when it was too late -- that his URLfor his law practice website lead to a porn site. Not only did helose all that business and traffic, but he also had to deal witha much bigger loss: his good name, and not just the name itself.)If the domain name is a registered trademark, chances are greaterthat the original owner can have it returned -- but that does nottake into consideration the time and money required for the legalprocess, as well as the potential business wasted during the waitalong with the incalculable damage caused to the company's brand.In other words, if you fail to act (and act fast) when renewaltime comes, it can kill your business ...
Almost instantly, too.Certain web-based services offer people the ability to snatch upexpired domain names, like http://bizmint.com/ for example. Theseservices may appear to prey on these unsuspecting business owners-- but keep in mind that registrars are really the ones to blame.However, such services can be used as effective tools by businessowners who wish to protect their online piece of real estate frompotential loss.
In fact, services like these offer features thatcan become extremely helpful in preventing online identity theft.(Realize that identity theft is not really a "theft." Accordingto Kornblum: "It's hot. It's legal.
And if you've got a populardomain name, you can be sure someone's out there just waiting foryou drop the ball so they can snap it up and run with it.")Here's a three step process to prevent online identity theft (orto protect you from shady registrars with poor customer service):1. Join an online service like http://bizmint.com/, and allow for daily email alerts of expired and soon-to-expire domain names to be sent to you the moment they arise.
(Only a handful of these subscription services offer this important feature.)2. Create filters in your email reader that watches for specific words, including prospective domain names as well as your own, and immediately flags them as they arrive in your inbox.
(And note that BizMint also offers an online tracking service.)3. And finally, renew your domains as quickly as possible.
(Also, some of these services offer members instant registration as well as domain name transfers for existing domains. Therefore, if your registrar's customer service is less than desirable, consider transferring your domain names to better a one.)So, be sure to verify and be immediately notified well in advanceof when your domain names are about to expire.
In fact, USA TODAYreported that an average of 19,260 domain names expire every dayin the last month alone, as opposed to 1,200 just a year ago.Is your domain name among them? If so, you better watch out. Article Tags: Business Owners, Domain Name, Services Offer, Domain Names Source: Free Articles from ArticlesFactory.com .