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[IP] Disputes Erupt Over Service for Poor Internet Typists NY Times





http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/18/technology/18MISS.html

Disputes Erupt Over Service for Poor Internet Typists

By ELIZABETH OLSON

WSHINGTON, Sept. 17 ­ Less than 48 hours after the company that controls the most popular Internet names started a site to make money from millions of misspelled or mistyped Web addresses, it found itself under siege from critics who said it was taking unfair advantage of its privileged position.

On Monday, <http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/18/technology//redirect/marketwatch/redirect.ctx?MW=http://custom.marketwatch.com/custom/nyt-com/html-companyprofile.asp&symb=VRSN>VeriSign, which serves as the central directory for .com and .net addresses, introduced a service known as Site Finder. The service is intended to send users of the World Wide Web to a site supported by advertising when they make errors querying the Internet addresses that it administers.

By late Tuesday night, the Internet Software Consortium, a nonprofit company responsible for the software that most domain name servers use to direct network traffic, was offering a software patch to counteract VeriSign's service.

The consortium was responding, it said, to a rash of complaints that VeriSign was commandeering the Web's "mistake" traffic, and routing it to its new site in the hope that users would click on advertiser-paid sites offered as alternatives.

"People started calling me at home and at work as soon as VeriSign's service started," said Paul Vixie, president of the consortium, which is based in Redwood City, Calif. "They were demanding a way around it."

The software patch is being offered free to the consortium's Internet service providers.

The business venture by VeriSign, which is based in Mountain View, Calif., and has major operations here, has raised hackles among longtime denizens of the Internet, with some of them now demanding that VeriSign be stripped of its franchise. Major Internet portals like <http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/18/technology//redirect/marketwatch/redirect.ctx?MW=http://custom.marketwatch.com/custom/nyt-com/html-companyprofile.asp&symb=YHOO>Yahoo, America Online and <http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/18/technology//redirect/marketwatch/redirect.ctx?MW=http://custom.marketwatch.com/custom/nyt-com/html-companyprofile.asp&symb=MSFT>Microsoft's MSN, which offer similar services with their search engines, are also unhappy over having prospective pay-per-click customers taken away.

Brian O'Shaughnessy, a spokesman for VeriSign, who has described Site Finder as a tool to help users surf the Net more effectively, did not return a telephone call for comment. The company's studies estimate that Web misspellings occur about 20 million times each day, and that users would like more than just an error message as help in getting to their desired destination.

One of the biggest complaints about Site Finder is that it cripples the ability of some Internet service providers to filter out junk e-mail, also known as spam, that is sent with false return addresses.

When some spam detectors try to determine a message's validity, they no longer receive an error message; instead, the message is returned to Site Finder. That makes it appear that the message was sent from a valid domain name.

More broadly, Lauren Weinstein, co-founder of People for Internet Responsibility, said that the diversion of queries compromised Internet privacy. He criticized VeriSign on the grounds that turning "unused names ­ many of which are trademarks, of course ­ into a profit center shows a gross abuse."

He is among those saying that VeriSign occupies a status somewhat similar to that of a public utility because it has ultimate control over .com and .net names. Critics say that by starting a new business venture without consulting the Internet community, VeriSign abused its role as the quasi-official administrator of the registry of the most commonly used roots for Internet addresses.

"You don't make changes that fundamental on the Internet without consulting with those who are running it," said David Farber, professor of computer science and public policy at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

"This is not any old company, but one that has been given a privileged position, although they are not behaving that way," he said. "I think what they've done is hijacking."

Professor Farber said VeriSign's service was akin to running a dead- letter office for profit. "This can be compared to giving the post office the right to readdress the letter, and to sell all the information from handling it," like names and addresses.

He called for VeriSign's franchise to be revoked because "if you let them get away with this, there will be chaos on the Net, with anyone getting away with anything."

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or Icann, a private company that regulates the domain name system through contracts with private registries, did not return telephone calls for comment.

A spokesman for the Commerce Department, which regulates the domain name system with Icann, said the agency was studying the VeriSign service, and would not comment until a later date.


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