This is a scam?

These are some of emails that my clients received.

Scam / Spam emails from foreign registrars: YOUR DOMAIN NAME’S CURRENT SITUATION

They are kinda legit since they will register your domain name and trademark for you in China.

But I don’t think they received the “application” and there is no laws that they have to ask for the approval to wait for the registration.

More likely, some user searched the domain name using their domain search engine, and the employee picked and choose those names and find out your company.

So this is kinda scam…. but I saw some of my clients’ potential domains were already bought and became “for sale,” so you actually have a risk that your domain name would be sold to somebody else….

So I think it’s not really a 100% scam… I think…. what do you think?

But some of my clients could register  “.com.cn” and “.cn” domains by themselves using their own registrant.

If you are planning to expand your business to China and received these emails,  try to register your “.cn” domain by yourself using your own domain registrant. Most of the major US domain registrant services does offer the registration services for “.cn” domains ranging from US$25-35/year.

And if you are not able to register these .cn domain and .com.cn domains…. your desired domain name might have become one of those “for-sale” domains.

I actually had a courage to contact them for fun. Their pricing was about US$35-40 per year which is pretty much legit price as of winter 2008.

But when I searched on the web, I found that some people were asked to pay $160-200/year.

And if you ever contact them back, and those company may likely to purchase the domains right away, and you only have a choice to buy the domain from them… so be careful.

Well, let me know if you ever tried.

I think this is scam, but in a way, everybody does this anyway regardless you are Chinese or not….

So it’s not 100% scam in a way… I think…

Here are the sample emails that my clients received.

—————-

August 11, 2008
************* Domain name & Internet keyword

Dear Sir or Madam,

We are Hong Kong Network Service Company Limited which is the domain name register center in Asia. We received a formal application from a company who is applying to register “**********” as their domain name and Internet keyword on August 4, 2008.Since after our investigation we found that this word has been in use by your company, and this may involve your company name or trade mark, so we inform you in no time. If you consider these domain names and internet keyword are important to you and it is necessary to protect them by registering them first, contact us soon. Thanks for your co-operation and support.
Kind Regards,

****** *****

Tel: +852-31757930-8026
Fax: +852-31757932
Email: *****@domain-register.hk
Hong Kong Network Service Company Limited
website: www.hknsc.hk

—-
Subject: About your domain name and trademark and internet brand
From:  *****@cn-domains.org.cn
Date: August 10, 2008 11:57:28 PM PDT

Dear manager:

We are Century Net Group Stocks Limited in China, which is a domain registration agent authorised by Chinese Industrial and Commercial Department.We professionally engage in chinese and international domain names registration as well as trademark registration service.We also offer English and Chinese web design.

we received an application from a chinese company asking to register “*********” as their internet keyword and domain name and trademark.However,We find that it will conflict with your trademark via our confirmation.It is our duty to inform you of this issue according to the regulations of CNNIC.

You are the owner of this trademark,so you have the preferential right to register and protect it by yourself.Of course,if you do not have any disagreement on this issue or you intend to give up the registration,any individual has the right to register those domains and internet keyword,which is legal.Then we will take the formal registration for that applicant.If you oppose other company to register your trademark and domains and internet keyword,even you want to protect your trademark completely,please contact us asap.We will protect your domains firstly.

Looking forward to your reply.
sincerely yours,

*****
Registration Dept
Century Net Group Stock Limited
E-mail:*****@cn-domains.org.cn
Website:www.cn-domains.org.cn
Tel:+(0086) 755 28581848、28243058
Fax:+(0086) 755 28243958