.com and .net wildcards cause Internet destabilization

["Malcolm Hoar" <malch@xxxxxxxxx>]

I write on behalf of Electronic Software Publishing Corporation
(Elsop) specifically, and all of those concerned with web site
testing and quality assurance in general.

My purpose in writing is to make a very specific formal complaint
to ICANN regarding VeriSign's recent actions relating to the creation
of "wildcard" records in the .com and .net GTLDs. And to formally
request that ICANN demand VeriSign remove these wildcard records
with immediate effect.

Many organizations utilize automated testing tools to validate
the hyperlinks that exist in the web sites they develop and
operate. Elsop develops and markets one of the leading products,
LinkScan (tm), which is used daily by numerous Fortune 500 companies,
universities and government agencies to maintain their web sites.

Earlier this week, VeriSign Inc. added "wildcard" records to the
.com and .net GTLDs. This action has caused significant problems
for virtually all link checking and similar test automation tools.

In the past, a broken hyperlink such as:

http://somethinginvalid.com/index.html

could easily be detected automatically. The software would report
an appropriate error message indicating a DNS lookup failure.

As a direct result of VeriSign's actions, the vast majority of
automated testing tools will now fail to detect the invalid
hyperlink -- it will now resolve to a valid web page residing
on server(s) operated by VeriSign Inc.

Elsop has already incurred significant time and cost investigating
this issue and testing potential solutions. Although we expect to
have patches available within a matter of days, our clients will
need to spend time and money installing them. We do not believe
they should be so inconvenienced.

Longer term, VeriSign's actions will have the effect of reducing
web site quality across the entire Internet by making it
incrementally harder to automatically identify broken links.

We urge ICANN to act promptly and decisively to remove the
"wildcard" records in furtherance of its ongoing obligations
to ensure stability of the Internet.

We have other more general concerns with respect to VeriSign's
actions including but not limited to the impact on anti-spam
systems and privacy issues. However, we will leave formal comment
on those matters to others who may be more qualified.

Regards,

Malcolm Hoar
Chairman and Chief Technology Officer
Electronic Software Publishing Corporation
http://www.elsop.com/