NS sells domain database. What a shock.

[George at Orwellian.Org]

WSJ.com, 2/16/2001
#    
#    Network Solutions Offers Its Database
#    Of Domain-Names to Marketing Firms
#    
#    By THOMAS E. WEBER 
#    Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
#    
#    The Internet's phone book is up for sale -- and though the 
#    listings may represent a treasure trove for marketers, the move 
#    also risks a serious privacy backlash.
#    
#    At issue are millions of entries in the domain-name database 
#    operated by the Network Solutions unit of VeriSign Inc., Mountain 
#    View, Calif. It is, essentially, the master address book for 
#    the Internet. Since the dawn of commerce on the Web, companies 
#    that want their own dot-com addresses have registered with Network 
#    Solutions.
#    
#    Now Network Solutions is selling that information. "On your mark, 
#    get set, go!" gushes a recent advertisement in a newsletter for 
#    direct marketers. "Available for the first time ever. 
#    Approximately 6 million unique customers, sliced and diced for 
#    you to target prospects, learn about a specific audience or retain 
#    customers ... Take this information and run with it."
#    
#    Exactly what's for sale may come as a surprise to many of the 
#    individuals and businesses who have registered Web addresses. 
#    In addition to names, street addresses, and other routine 
#    information gathered when someone signs up for a domain name, 
#    Network Solutions promises marketers information on whether sites 
#    are dormant or up and running, whether they're set up for 
#    e-commerce -- even whether a site has security precautions 
#    installed.
#    
#    Network Solutions says that while the sales pitch is new, it 
#    actually has been quietly selling such data for at least a year. 
#    Now, the company says, it is moving more aggressively to cash 
#    in on the information. "It's old wine in new bottles," says Doug 
#    Wolford, general manager for Web presence at VeriSign.
#    
#    The move underscores the growing pressure on Internet companies 
#    to find new sources of revenue. Now that the Net boom has slowed, 
#    many dot-com companies view customer databases as a tempting 
#    asset.
#    
#    But such strategies can be perilous given consumer concerns about 
#    privacy online. Last year, online-ad concern DoubleClick Inc. 
#    was forced to back off a plan to combine Web-tracking data with 
#    offline databases after the move triggered a firestorm. And when 
#    online retailer Toysmart.com shut down in May, a plan to sell 
#    its customer database provoked a similar controversy. Walt Disney 
#    Co., a Toysmart investor, offered to purchase and then destroy 
#    the data after the Federal Trade Commission moved to block 
#    Toysmart's plan.
#    
#    The Network Solutions database is a key part of the Internet's 
#    infrastructure. Internet computers rely on numerical addresses 
#    to route information around. When someone registers a domain 
#    name, the information is used to tell computers all over the 
#    Internet how to translate that dot-com address into the 
#    appropriate numerical address.
#    
#    Registrants also must provide the name, telephone number and 
#    e-mail address of a technical contact for their site -- 
#    information that can prove vital for someone trying to trace 
#    a hacker's attack or verify whether an online business is 
#    legitimate.
#    
#    Under its agreement with the U.S. government to operate the 
#    database, Network Solutions is required to provide public access 
#    to the data. Anyone can visit the Network Solutions site and 
#    look up information on Web addresses one by one. And indeed, 
#    some marketers -- especially those sending unsolicited "spam" 
#    e-mail -- have laboriously harvested information this way.
#    
#    But for marketing purposes, it's much more useful to have a 
#    complete set of data outright. Network Solutions offers marketers 
#    this option -- for a price and under its guidelines, which include 
#    stripping out e-mail addresses and forbidding the use of the 
#    information for e-mail marketing.
#    
#    Mr. Wolford says the data are typically used by companies that 
#    want to send direct postal mail to Web businesses or simply want 
#    to merge the data with existing lists to flesh out customer 
#    dossiers. Network Solutions also allows its customers to opt 
#    out of the list and takes steps to insure that only businesses, 
#    not consumers, are included in the marketing efforts.
#    
#    While downplaying any privacy concerns, Network Solutions is 
#    telling marketers that its data are a great way to sell things, 
#    especially where small businesses are concerned. "Nobody offers 
#    a better snapshot of this hard-to-reach group ... over 80% of 
#    our customers are small businesses, representing every major 
#    small business category you could hope to reach," proclaims an 
#    information page at www.dotcom.com, the site Network Solutions 
#    uses to promote its data business.
#    
#    And the fact remains that it's impossible to obtain a Web address 
#    without registering for one -- either with Network Solutions 
#    or with one of the other companies that popped up when the U.S. 
#    government opened up what had been a Network Solutions monopoly 
#    on dot-com domain names.
#    
#    Consumer advocates say any organized effort to use the data for 
#    purposes other than the intended goal of obtaining an address 
#    is troubling. "There's an increasing loss of faith in the ability 
#    to have your information used only for reasonable, legitimate 
#    purposes," says Lauren Weinstein, a privacy advocate who writes 
#    an e-mail newsletter about cyberspace issues. Mr. Weinstein 
#    alerted his readers to the Network Solutions effort in a bulletin 
#    this week.
#    
#    Registering a domain name is a simple process that can be done 
#    online in minutes. Network Solutions charges $35 a year for each 
#    address, and asks for a contact name, phone number and e-mail 
#    address that go into its database.
#    
#    So how does it know whether a site is up and running, or whether 
#    it is engaged in e-commerce, or any of the other pieces of 
#    information that it is promising to sell to marketers? Mr. Wolford 
#    says the company sends software "robots" out onto the Web, using 
#    much the same method that search engines use to catalog sites. 
#    Those robots can look for key phrases such as "online ordering" 
#    or "credit cards accepted" to determine whether a site has 
#    e-commerce.