Domain Name Forensics Tweet  

Today, everybody needs a website and to acquire a domain name has become a simple and very trivial task. But is it?

Buying and managing a domain name, is not always a simple task. One has to consider several marketing implications, and have a plan to protect themselves from competition.

Did you know that there are at least 1099 different domain name extensions?  These include country specific and industry specific options.

But there is another dimension to the purchase of a domain name. What is the history of this domain name? Has it been used before? And for what reason? Are there similar domain names and what are they used for? What will potential customers see if by visiting your site, they mistype your domain name or extension? What is the .com or .biz version of your domain name used for? A very interesting example from the past was the Whitehouse. The US Whitehouse had the domain name www.whitehouse.gov but they had failed to secure the www.whitehouse.com , a site that at the time was a porn site called ... "First Ladies" !

Today things change rapidly and domain names are at the forefront of these changes. Up until now domain names were all in English. If one wanted to have their domain name in their own language and alphabet (i.e. in Chinese, Russian, Arabic or Greek) or even with a Latin derived alphabet (Turkish, French, German etc.) they would have to use it transcribed in English. For example if someone wanted to register the French name Gérard would not be able to have the www.Gérard101.com because of the French "é". Instead they would need to register the English-version of www.Gerard101.com . Later on, a new option allowed us to register www.Gérard101.com but it had to be translated by your browser (ie. Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Chrome) as a Punycode text. This would make the Gérard101.com  look like xn--grard101-b1a.com on the browser. This was of course a short-term solution. Today the IDN (Internationalized Domain Name)  format of domain names allows you to register any domain name in any language and alphabet set (Unicode). This creates a huge problem for protecting your brand (or your client's brand). 

This is how the Russian Government domain names looks in Russian: правительство.рф 

The first photo is the how the domain name is typed in Russian in Sundial (an IDN enabled browser), the second is how it will appear in a conventional browser (in Punycode) and the third is with the conventional registration in English. Although this is the same website, the Russian (1st photo) and the English (3rd photo) domain names are totally different.

By changing ONE SINGLE LETTER in a domain name with the same in another language's set, you create an entirely new domain.

Can you spot the difference in these domain names?   (*) Answer at the bottom of the page

1.  http://www.facebοok.com/       2.  http://www.faceboοk.com/       3. http://www.facebοοk.com/  

If you click on any of the links above you will see that none goes to the website its name suggests. The differences are simple, but enough to create websites that will steal a lot of traffic from the legitimate owner. This will soon create a nightmare to brands of any size.

Early consultation and research is required for a brand to avoid issues of homograph attack. Strathclyde Forensics will discuss YOUR needs, YOUR brand and YOUR image, evaluate the threats and produce an appropriate strategy for your business.

Contact us, for a discrete and thorough investigation of your current or desired domain names.

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