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Tuesday
May152012

Chinese domain offers - beware!

Year of the Dog?

I’d hoped that this scam had been nailed once and for all but it’s back again in 2012. I last saw it five years ago when I advised a legal firm about this domain name con-trick. Their client had been approached by a Chinese company purporting to be suppliers of domain names.

The way it works is that a Chinese outfit contacts a UK company with a distinctive name, and tries to flog them a raft of Asian domain names. Their covering story is that someone else [a phony company] recently tried to register [the following domain names] but as you appear to be the genuine holder of intellectual property rights, you’re being contacted first for permission [in reality, to see if we can bounce you into buying them].

This also used to happen in the UK in the early years of the web. Domain name scammers based in Britain would flog a domain for an absolute fortune, and people fell for it.

Typically, the domains being offered have Chinese, Hong Kong, Indian or Taiwanese TLDs (top-level domains – eg  .in or .cn  for India and China respectively). For pretty much every business I can think of, owning a domain with these TLDs will be of no value whatsoever. It’s unsettling stuff for someone who doesn’t know the score though and the temptation is to cover yourself and buy them just to be sure.

One contact forwarded an email that he’d received recently from “NaSnet Company” in China.

(It's very urgent, Please transfer this email to your CEO or appropriate person, Thanks) 
                
Dear CEO/Principal,
 
This is Deray Qian---Senior Consultant of domain name registration and solution center in China. have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on May 9, 2012, one company which self-styled "Diocesis & Holdings Co.,Ltd" were applying to register "s******r" as Network Brand and following domain names:                
s******r.asia
s******r.cn
s******r.co.in
s******r.com.cn
s******r.com.hk
s******r.com.tw
s******r.hk
s******r.in
s******r.net.cn
s******r.org.cn
s******r.tw
After our initial checking, we found that the brand name applied for registration are as same as  your company's name and brand, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we will finish the registration at once. If your company has no relationships with that company nor do not authorized,please reply to us within 7 workdays,if we can't get any information from yours over 7 workdays, we will unconditionally approve the application submitted by "Diocesis & Holdings Co.,Ltd" .
Thanks for your cooperation.    
          
Best Regards,

Senior Consultant Manager

Does this pass the sniff test? I looked at their Chinese site http://www.nscns.org.cn/ [now defunct] to see what gives. Much of the text is images (try the Hosting Plans pages), text is badly written and the Add to Cart buttons don’t work. Note the credibility-enhancing logos: what have Mercedes, Omron, Panasonic, Canon or Sharp got to do with it? The last Tech Support announcement is dated July 2009 and their Search box results always lead to a Contact Us page. Much information is missing, but overall it gives a passing impression that it’s an authentic site to do with hosting, email plans, DIY websites.

However, most of the content doesn’t ‘work’, they try to rush you into deciding and finally, I found no information on “Diocesis & Holdings Co., Ltd.” anyway. I noticed one or two product similarities with the (authentic) web hosting firm Dotster whose name is also found in the 'Announcement' in their 'Support KB'.

Emails on the same lines have also been received from an outfit calling themselves "Shanghai  SPS Network Technology Co., Ltd" who were allegedly instructed to register a client's trade mark in domain names ending in "cn; hk; mobi; net.cn; org.cn and tw".

Needless to say, on checking a WHOIS database a month later, the proposed domains remained unregistered.

As always, you have to be vigilant out there and my advice is to trust your instincts when confronted by fishy-looking emails like these.

(I updated this on 22nd May.)

 

Reader Comments (103)

something similar came through our company mail last week. At first i thought it was real but when i visited the website i started getting suspicious then a little google search brought me here. Looks like scams are being created by the hour.

May 22, 2012 at 6:58 | Unregistered Commenterenoch

I got this email on 7/7/2012, seemed like a scam, googled, and i got here.

Thanks!

July 7, 2012 at 22:30 | Unregistered CommenteriOS Company

I got almost the exact same email as described above, thank you so much! Here's what my email looked like: with domain replaced with " * "

(It's very urgent, Please transfer this email to your CEO or appropriate person, Thanks)

Dear CEO/Principal,

This is Deray Qian---Senior Consultant of domain name registration and solution center in China. have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on June 21, 2012, one company which self-styled "Diocesi & Holding Co.,Ltd" were applying to register "*******" as Network Brand and following domain names:
" *******.asia
*******.cn
*******.co.in
*******.com.cn
*******.com.hk
*******.com.tw
*******.hk
*******.in
d*****a.net.cn
******a.org.cn
*******.tw "
After our initial checking, we found that the brand name applied for registration are as same as your company's name and brand, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we will finish the registration at once. If your company has no relationships with that company nor do not authorized,please reply to us within 7 workdays,if we can't get any information from yours over 7 workdays, we will unconditionally approve the application submitted by "Diocesi & Holding Co.,Ltd" ...
Thanks for your cooperation.

Best Regards,

Deray Qian (Mr.)
Senior Consultant Manager

August 1, 2012 at 18:04 | Unregistered CommenterMatt

I just received this same email from NaSNet. My director of operations found your web site. Is there some authority that I can report this scam to and hopefully stop them?
Thank you

August 3, 2012 at 15:55 | Unregistered CommenterIris

I guess there's the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information (www.miit.gov.cn) but there's a bit of a language barrier :-( According to the Chinese Government website at http://english.gov.cn/links.htm there's no English website to click through to.

If I make those links work unfortunately they mouse-trap you and send you off elsewhere, sorry!

August 3, 2012 at 17:20 | Registered CommenterAlan W

I received a couple of times these kind of rubbish.....

(It's very urgent, Please transfer this email to your CEO or appropriate person, Thanks)

Dear CEO/Principal,

This is Nicholas Lee---Senior Consultant of domain name registration and solution center in China. Here I have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on September 17, 2012 that a company claimed Dentriy Company Inc were applying to register "XXXXXX" as their Network Brand and some "XXXXX" Asian countries top-level domain names through our firm.

Now we are handling this registration, and after our initial checking, we found the name were similar to your company's, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we would finish the registration at once. If you did not authorize, please let us know within 7 workdays, so that we could handle this issue better. After the deadline we will unconditionally finish the registration for Dentriy Company Inc. Looking forward to your prompt reply.

Best Regards,

[...]

www.nscns.org
Adress:No.8-3 New times business street Wuhu City, China

September 18, 2012 at 12:25 | Unregistered Commenterhhd

Today I also got the scam mail. But with a different text. Look here:

(It's very urgent, so please transfer this email to your CEO or appropriate person. Thanks a lot.)

Dear CEO/Principal,

We are the department of Asian Domain Registration Service in China. Here I have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on September 19, 2012 that a company claimed "KIOSK Holding Limited" were applying to register "***" as their Net Brand and some "***" Asian countries top-level domain names through our firm.

Now we are handling this registration, and after our initial checking, we found the name were similar to your company's, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we would finish the registration at once. If you did not authorize, please let us know within 7 workdays, so that we could handle this issue better. After the deadline we will unconditionally finish the registration for "KIOSK Holding Limited" Looking forward to your prompt reply.

Best Regards,

Ivan Dai (Mr.)
Senior Consultant Manager

September 19, 2012 at 6:45 | Unregistered CommenterAsuak

I received exactly similar email, googled and landed here. Who needs these chinese TLDs, at least not unless you are a MNC [Multi National Corporation] who someday dreams to go there.

September 20, 2012 at 6:09 | Unregistered CommenterRobin

Great work here. You have saved me from getting scammed. Thanks for notifying about this. :)

October 2, 2012 at 11:23 | Unregistered Commenterweb hosting bangladesh

Thank you for posting this! I've gotten this before and thought it was spam, but it feels so much better to KNOW it. Here's mine, today:

(It's very urgent, so please transfer this email to your CEO or appropriate person. Thanks a lot.)

Dear CEO/Principal,

We are the department of Asian Domain Registration Service in China. Here I have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on November 28, 2012 that a company claimed "Capkco Company" were applying to register "***" as their Net Brand and some "***" Asian countries top-level domain names through our firm.

Now we are handling this registration, and after our initial checking, we found the name were similar to your company's, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we would finish the registration at once. If you did not authorize, please let us know within 7 workdays, so that we could handle this issue better. After the deadline we will unconditionally finish the registration for "Capkco Company" Looking forward to your prompt reply.

Best Regards,

Neil Dong (Mr.)
Senior Consultant Manager

November 28, 2012 at 19:53 | Unregistered CommenterKatherine

Many thanks for this help. We received an identical one. It is so incompetently written that I didn't even bother to forward it to our Head Office....and we have branches there anyway.

December 5, 2012 at 13:04 | Unregistered CommenterJeff

So glad I found this I got the exact same e-mail as Katherine above. (Except Capko Company was changed to Caplco Company). Ridiculous.

(It's very urgent, so please transfer this email to your CEO or appropriate person. Thanks a lot.)

Dear CEO/Principal,

We are the department of Asian Domain Registration Service in China. Here I have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on December 11, 2012 that a company claimed "Caplco Company" were applying to register "unitour" as their Net Brand and some "unitour" Asian countries top-level domain names through our firm.

Now we are handling this registration, and after our initial checking, we found the name were similar to your company's, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we would finish the registration at once. If you did not authorize, please let us know within 7 workdays, so that we could handle this issue better. After the deadline we will unconditionally finish the registration for "Caplco Company" Looking forward to your prompt reply.

Best Regards,

Neil Dong (Mr.)
Senior Consultant Manager

December 12, 2012 at 1:09 | Unregistered CommenterMari

Thank you guys, this is what i received yesterday. Scammers!

(It's very urgent, so please transfer this email to your CEO or appropriate person. Thanks a lot.)

Dear CEO/Principal,

We are the department of Asian Domain Registration Service in China. Here I have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on January 24, 2013 that a company claimed "Caplco Company" were applying to register "thelab003" as their Net Brand and some "thelab003" Asian countries top-level domain names through our firm.

Now we are handling this registration, and after our initial checking, we found the name were similar to your company's, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we would finish the registration at once. If you did not authorize, please let us know within 7 workdays, so that we could handle this issue better. After the deadline we will unconditionally finish the registration for "Caplco Company" Looking forward to your prompt reply.

Best Regards,

Neil Dong (Mr.)
Senior Consultant Manager

January 25, 2013 at 9:03 | Unregistered Commentermarcos

I recieved this exact email yesterday, immediatly became suspicious and checked the internet to find this post. Thank you for clarifying my thought that this is a scam. What is the best way to handle something like this? Send a reply, report it to (?) or just ignore it?
Thanks Again,
Lara

April 3, 2013 at 17:18 | Unregistered CommenterLara

Unfortunately there's no-one really you can report it to (who could make any difference anyway). Replying to them just proves your Email address is live. To be realistic I would just delete it. The problem is that it tends to nag away at some people who half-think that it could be genuine, I have seen this unsettling effect several times.

April 9, 2013 at 14:09 | Registered CommenterAlan W

The scam is still being conducted. I received this same email yesterday, from but this one from "Wendy Xu (Mr.)" at nswebs-asia.com.cn with yet a different website address posted in the signature area (won't even bother posting the name as don't want to give them traffic or credibility). The supposed company looking to register my domain was the "Pleying Company." Sure. Didn't smell right. Doesn't show up in a search. Looked at raw source code for the email. Something there didn't look right either. Anyway, I searched for the nswebs address above, found this article and it confirmed my suspicions. Thanks for posting this. A great service.

April 12, 2013 at 13:35 | Unregistered CommenterG S

I have received it as well. But I have replied it before I saw this web site. Will it be the big problem?

April 17, 2013 at 4:39 | Unregistered CommenterSL

No, just ignore any more emails, you'll be OK. Under no circumstances buy any domains this way though.

April 17, 2013 at 11:07 | Registered CommenterAlan W

'a company claimed "Pleying Company" were applying to register...' I got exactly the same! I checked in companies registration Chinese sites and no entry for "Pleying Company".

April 23, 2013 at 23:06 | Unregistered CommenterD S

Got this email, same scam on 5/1/13.

May 8, 2013 at 7:14 | Unregistered CommenterTy frank

Yep, same here for me, what a joke. Thanks for posting this. SPAM deleted.

May 21, 2013 at 16:08 | Unregistered CommenterLarry

Thanks for your advice. Same scam arrived now in France !

July 9, 2013 at 6:59 | Unregistered CommenterMiquel

August 2013 Latest variant

All, I got another one for one of my own domains, check this out!

Dear Manager,

(If you are not the person who is in charge of this, please forward this to your CEO,Thanks)

We are the organization of trademark intellectual property protection in China. Here we have something to confirm with you. We received a formal application on 06/08/2013. A company named "THD Import & Export Co. Ltd" was applying to register "epemag" as its Trademark and the following domain names:

epemag.asia
epemag.cn
epemag.com.cn
epemag.com.tw
epemag.hk
epemag.net.cn
epemag.org.cn
epemag.tw


After our initial checking, we found the names were similar to your company's, so we need to check with you whether "THD Import & Export Co. Ltd" has any relationship with you and whether the registration of the listed domains by "THD Import & Export Co. Ltd" would bring any impact on you. If no impact on you, we will go on with the registration at once. If you have no relationship with that company and the registration would bring some impact on you, please inform us within 10 workdays.Out of the time prescribed we will unconditionally finish the registration for "THD Import & Export Co. Ltd"


Please contact us in time in order that we can handle this issue better.

Best Regards,

Jason Chen

Auditing Department.
Registration Department Manager

4/F,No.9 XingHui West Street,

JinNiu ChenDu, China

Office: +86 2887662861

Fax: +86 2887783286

Web: http://www.cn-network.com

Please consider the environment before you print this e-mail.

August 6, 2013 at 21:50 | Registered CommenterAlan W

Thanks for sharing your knowledge on this. I received the email this morning, coincidently my business partner is arriving in China today and although it looked suspicious it did concerne me slightly. My mind's at rest now and I'll ignore it.

August 20, 2013 at 7:11 | Unregistered CommenterJacqueline

I have just got the exact same email about our company domain from Richard Wang and am grateful to you and Google for your post which comes up immediately. Saves much wasted time!

October 4, 2013 at 12:59 | Unregistered CommenterFiona

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