Re: [gnso-irtp-b-jun09] Recommendation for Positive Confirmation of Transfers by Losing Registrar

[Marika Konings <marika.konings@xxxxxxxxx>]

Barbara and all,

I've discussed this proposal internally and concern has been expressed about 
the following part of the proposal: 'Failure by the Registrant to respond 
within the 5 day pendingTransfer grace period would result in the transfer 
request being automatically denied or Nacked'. Apparently one of the reasons 
why the IRTP was developed in the first place was that pre-IRTP, transfers had 
to be confirmed by the losing registrar which resulted in many transfers being 
denied because emails were not received, never sent or additional layers of 
confirmation added. As a result, it was agreed in the IRTP that the gaining 
registrar must confirm the transfer and the losing registrar may confirm the 
transfer. Here you can find one of the position papers explaining the problem 
with the original approach (requiring approval from the registrant by the 
losing registrar): www.dnso.org/clubpublic/registrars/Arc01/pdf00003.pdf.

An alternative approach might be to indeed require that the losing registrar 
informs / notifies the registrant of the transfer that has been requested, but 
not to allow no response from the registrant as a reason to deny the transfer. 
In this way, it could still reduce potential conflicts between admin contact 
and registrant and reduce the need to undo transfers as any potential conflict 
would hopefully become apparent at this stage, before the transfer is completed.

With best regards,

Marika

On 18/01/11 17:23, "Steele, Barbara" 
<BSteele@xxxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:BSteele@xxxxxxxxxxxx>> wrote:

All,
In follow up to our weekly IRTP PDP B call this week, here is a summary of
the suggestion that I made to address the issue raised in Charter Question
B:

Whether additional provisions on undoing inappropriate transfers are needed,
especially with regard to disputes between a Registrant and Admin Contact
(AC).  The policy is clear that the Registrant can overrule the AC, but how
this is implemented is currently at the discretion of the registrar.

Currently Section 3 of the IRTP stipulates that "A Registrar of Record can
choose independently to confirm the intent of the Registered Name Holder
when a notice of a pending transfer is received from the Registry. The
Registrar of Record must do so in a manner consistent with the standards set
forth in this agreement pertaining to Gaining Registrars. In order to ensure
that the form of the request employed by the Registrar of Record is
substantially administrative and informative in nature and clearly provided
to the Transfer Contact for the purpose of verifying the intent of the
Transfer Contact, the Registrar of Record must use the FOA.
The FOA shall be communicated in English, and any dispute arising out of a
transfer request, shall be conducted in the English language. Registrars may
choose to communicate with the Transfer Contact in additional languages.
However, the Registrar choosing to exercise such option is responsible for
the accuracy and completeness of the translation into such additional
non-English version of the FOA. Further, such non-English communications
must follow the processes and procedures set forth in this policy. This
includes but is not limited to the requirement that no Registrar shall add
any additional information to the FOA used to obtain the consent of the
Transfer Contact in the case of a transfer request.
This requirement does not preclude the Registrar of Record from marketing to
its existing customers through separate communications.
The FOA should be sent by the Registrar of Record to the Transfer Contact as
soon as operationally possible, but must be sent not later than twenty-four
(24) hours after receiving the transfer request from the Registry Operator.
Failure by the Registrar of Record to respond within five (5) calendar days
to a notification from the Registry regarding a transfer request will result
in a default "approval" of the transfer.
In the event that a Transfer Contact listed in the Whois has not confirmed
their request to transfer with the Registrar of Record and the Registrar of
Record has not explicitly denied the transfer request, the default action
will be that the Registrar of Record must allow the transfer to proceed. . .
. . "
A possible solution would be to recommend that this section be modified to
require that the Registrar of Record/Losing Registrar be required to confirm
the transfer out with the Registered Name Holder/Registant.  The Registrar
of Record has access to the contact information for the Registrant and could
modify their systems to automatically send out the Standardized Form for
Losing Registrars ("Confirmation FOA") to the Registrant.  Failure by the
Registrant to respond within the 5 day pendingTransfer grace period would
result in the transfer request being automatically denied or Nacked.  At the
time that the transfer is requested via the Gaining Registrar, the Transfer
Contact that requested the transfer would be informed that positive
confirmation by the Registrant is required to complete the transfer and that
the Registrant will be receiving the Confirmation FOA from the Registrar of
Record.

I, personally, am seeing more and more transactions that I conduct on the
internet requiring a positive confirmation within a fairly short window of
time (as little as 1 hour in some cases) so it seems reasonable to me that
this may be a viable option for standardizing how Registrars handle the
Registrant's ability to override the AC as well as resolve the issue of
access to the Registrant contact information since the Registrar of Record
is responsible for collecting this information.

Per Michele's request, please provide feedback (pros and cons) to this
suggested approach.  Many thanks.



Barbara Steele