detection and Landrush applicant protection measures which Afilias Ltd. stated that
the registry would undertake in their .info registry bid document were omitted from
the ICANN - Afilias Registry Agreement.In the Afilias .info registry bid document,
Afilias stated that registrars would be required to check the accuracy of TM details,
that registrars were to contact applicants, who were to be given an opportunity to
amend errors in their TM details, and that registrars who continued to process applications
with TM errors would have their Registry-Registrar License Agreement revoked.
As
we all now know, the ICANN-Afilias Registry Agreement contained none of these basic,
common sense, protection measures. The result was the corruption of the .info
registry with more than 10,000 obviously fraudulently Sunrise registrations, and
heavens knows how many Landrush applicants out of pocket for the Landrush preregistrations
for the names taken by the cheats while the registry and most registrars looked the
other way - but took the money.
Afilias described the .info Sunrise phase with
around 20% of the then 50,000 registrations fraudulent - as successful.
Afilias
orchestrated and oversaw the registration of 10,000 fraudulent applications and permitted
its approved registrars to sell preregistrations for fraudulent Sunrise names, and
to sell Landrush preregistrations for the same 10,000 names.
Afilias said that
it would return the disputed "suspicious" names to the public in an equitable manner
- but never again used the word "Landrush" in its rare public statements.
It is
apparent that the registry which has a TM fraud on its BoD and registered hundreds
of names to its registrars contrary to ICANN rules has created a corrupt culture
which will continue its scam on the Internet community when for the third time it
will offer the chance to win one of the 10,000 "suspicious" Landrush names - FOR
A PRICE.
The Landrushers have paid enough already - and deserved a great deal better
than the scam that Afilias Ltd. has perpetrated.