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PRESS RELEASE - January 16th, 2002 VERISIGN PROPOSES ANTI-COMPETITIVE WAITING LIST SERVICE Herndon, VA, January 16th, 2002 -- VeriSign (VeriSign, NASDAQ: VRSN) is once again trying to exploit its monopoly status and drive its competitors out of business. The Internet infrastructure gorilla, worth over $8.3 billion in today's market, announced its latest anti-competitive tactic called the Waiting List Service to control the secondary market for domains and force massive new costs on its small competitors. For most of the Internet's history the government granted the former Network Solutions Inc. monopoly status in domain registrations. This policy was widely regarded as a failure since NSI did not meet basic service levels and simultaneously forced every domain consumer to pay onerous fees (usually $70-$119 per registration wherein the new competitive market offers the same for about $16 and provides enhanced service levels). Hence, the government tried to break the monopoly by separating the now Verisign Global Registry with its retail Registrar service. Unfortunately this new policy leaves a monopoly on the registry side wherein every new competitor still has to pay VeriSign $6 for every registration to manage the central database. These $6 fees from competitors rake in a approximately $180 million per year for VeriSign. Despite its monopoly power resulting in windfall profits, VeriSign competitors have been making inroads in to the secondary domain market, which includes expired domains. Versign is now asserting its monopoly power by announcing a $40 fee to every competitor who wants to register an expired name for their customers by getting on a VeriSign controlled "waiting list". VeriSign says this is a way for them to save money on its technical systems yet it already gets $180 million a year to run the database. VeriSign doesn't make basic improvements to the current system, and will still be running the current system in parallel for any domains that aren't purchased via the WLS and expire naturally. Many new competitors who have invested heavily in the secondary domain market would likely fail if VeriSign succeeds in instituting the WLS. While the government has allowed the monopoly to charge $6, VeriSign is unilaterally trying to change it to $40 for a large portion of the registrations, plus the $6 registry fee. VeriSign also seeks to control who is assigned all of these millions of expiring names; currently it's strictly first come first served. Since VeriSign controls both its legacy registrar, with tens of millions of renewals per year, and the registry, which seeks to dramatically increase competitors fees and control all expiring domains, competition is stifled by an enormous conflict of interest. Even more alarming is that VeriSign continues to hoard millions of domains (by not letting them expire and re-circulate as originally required by ICANN and the government) with no legitimate claim. Most of these domain names have expired many months if not years ago by companies that are no longer in business or just don't want to pay for a yearly renewal. By perpetuating the hoarding, VeriSign prevents competitors from registering expired names for a new customer and simultaneously prevents a secondary market in these domains from taking root. All the while, VeriSign tries to push through its newest scheme for controlling the most sought after domain names, the new Waiting List Service. VeriSign wants to charge $40 instead of $6 for all the names that should have been available to the public long ago according to existing contracts with regulating agencies. While VeriSign is the largest offender of hoarding domain names, its chief competitor, Register.com, also hoards hundreds of thousands of expired domain names thereby helping stifle free market activity themselves. Michael Mann, president of the leading secondary domain market, BuyDomains.com, flatly calls VeriSign's anticompetitive efforts "a sham on all domain consumers and VeriSign competitors". BuyDomains.com and dozens of other competitors are urging authorities to put a halt to what they consider to be outrageously anticompetitive behavior. Competitors want all the expired, hoarded domains to be immediately put back into circulation (allowing the free market to flourish) and for VeriSign to rescind its anticompetitive WLS proposal. Below are the people and organizations that should be contacted if you are sick of being abused by NSI/VeriSign's monopoly power. Most are paid with your tax dollars.
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