Stupidity Exposed!

Einstein was right – stupidity IS infinite!

Archive for category Internet Service Provders

I wish hosting companies would take their responsibilities seriously!?!

Feb 19

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders, Uncategorized | Comments off

I wish hosting companies would take their responsibilities seriously!?! Case in point: Bluehost.com

I did a WHOIS lookup for a domain and got back something like this:

[whois.verisign-grs.com]
[whois.fastdomain.com]
Domain Name: REDACTEDFORPRIVACY.COM
Registry Domain ID: 5146808
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.bluehost.com
Registrar URL: http://www.bluehost.com/
Updated Date: 2021-10-11T23:01:28Z
Creation Date: 2021-10-11T16:18:33Z
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2022-10-11T16:18:33Z
Registrar: FastDomain Inc.
Registrar IANA ID: 1154
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: support@bluehost.com
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: +1.8017659400
Reseller: BlueHost.Com
Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited https://icann.org/epp

WHOIS results of a Bluehost customer’s domain

Note the email address for the Registrar Abuse Contact is “support@bluehost.com”. Yet when I try to email the Registrar Abuse Contact, I get the following back:

(I can’t make this shit up!)

‘nuf said!

OVH support page as useful as can be expected

Jul 3

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders, Uncategorized | Comments off

You gotta love it! I can’t make this stuff up!! OVH (a.k.a. OVHCloud) claims to be “the European leader of the cloud”, among other things. Yet when I send a complaint to the email address they provide in their WHOIS records (abuse@ovh.ca), I get a form reply stating the following:

Thank you for taking the time to contact the OVHcloud Abuse Team. This is an automatic reply from our system. The information provided does not allow us to identify the customer or service corresponding to your report. Thus, we advise you to fulfill the following abuse form to be able to take the required measures on :

www.ovh.com/abuse

OK. That’s kind of expected. Most large ISPs don’t want to deal with emails any more – They expect you to find their special form and use it to report the problem.

But let me first point out that their “automatic reply” claims “The information provided does not allow [them] to identify the customer or service corresponding to [my] report”. Really?!?!? I sent the exact email text just as it is stored natively on most mail systems, which includes the standard mail headers easily digestible by any human or automated system with half a brain, but I digress.

So I comply by using their web form to submit the SAME EXACT email header and body. I get an auto-response from the web form asking me to ” confirm your abuse using this address”, then I click on the link to do so.

In the same email, they state the following:

You will receive an answer from our customer or our abuse service as quickly as possible. If you have any questions, please contact our assistance https://www.ovh.com/support/

For the record, I have not received a proper follow-up email from their abuse service ever explaining if or how the spammer on their network was dealt with.

How ironic is it that the very link they provide to ask for support leads the user to a BLANK PAGE?!?

OVH’s “support” page (HA!)

Go ahead and try it for yourself if you don’t believe me!

Oh, and did I mention that OVH has been ignoring my complaints of spammer’s on their networks for months now?! Earlier versions of their “abuse” page didn’t work as well (i.e. would not accept perfectly valid “IP address of infringing content”), but again I digress.

WHOIS PRIVACY completely defeats the purpose of WHOIS!!

May 25

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders, Pet Peeves, Uncategorized | No Comments

Do you own a domain name or two (or more)? Do you know about the WHOIS database that maintains owner and contact information for domains?? Do you know why the WHOIS database exists (at least in its original purpose)??? If so, WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT WHOIS PRIVACY!?!?!

This “service” completely defeats the purpose of WHOIS

Every time I renew my domains, my registrar tries to sell me WHOIS PRIVACY. They claim it protects me from spam – it does not. Using custom email addresses in my WHOIS records, I know if spam is being sent to the contact email address in my WHOIS record. I get so little spam at those email addresses, it completely nullifies any argument a registrar will try to give you that privacy will prevent spam!!

For years now, ICANN has allowed domain registrars to provide a service to hide WHOIS details under the guise of protecting the privacy of the domain owner. These registrars make shitloads of money selling this service which is in direct contradiction to the Domain Registrars’ agreements with ICANN, yet money talks! But no one forces you to sign up for this bogus domain privacy “service” – SO DON’T!

Think about it… if your server gets hacked, how is someone going to find your contact information to let you know about the hack? (especially when the hackers have removed all of your web site’s content!?) A proper WHOIS record with correct and up to date contact information is the only way to make sure someone can contact you swiftly and let you know if your server has been hacked or your web site altered. Maybe your server was hijacked and being use to send out spam. Your ISP may not be so understanding when you tell them “I didn’t know my server was hacked”. Give people the proper tools to contact you for any legitimate reason relating to your domain.

P.S. If you don’t want to use your regular email address in the WHOIS record, just set up an alternate email address and forward it to your regular email address. Also, I don’t recommend you use a Gmail account (or other “free” service email address) because they will filter emails that they deem something looks like spam or phishing. If someone is using your domain name in their phishing URL and it gets reported to Google before you, your “free” account will have it blocked before you ever get a chance to see it. Bad abuse contacts and abuse mailboxes with spam and other content filtering defeats the purpose of having an abuse contact.

Tags: ,

WEB.COM deletes incoming emails without reading them

Nov 1

Posted by admin in 800-Pound Gorillas, Internet Service Provders, Pet Peeves | No Comments

We already know that Domains@WEB.COM has a spam filter on a mailbox that is intended to be used to report spam, phishing, malware, and other abuses that may be occurring on their networks and servers.  Kind of makes the Domains@WEB.COM email address worthless!?

It turns out that even when we think the mail just might get through, it doesn’t.  I just received this bounce message indicating “Your message … was deleted without being read.”:

Nice job WEB.COM!!!

WEB.COM has a spam filter on their abuse mailbox?!?!

Jan 14

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders, Pet Peeves | Comments off

If there is one thing I CAN’T STAND, it’s an Internet Service Provider that puts a spam filter on their “abuse@…” mailbox!

Chicken shit WEB.COM hides their abuse department behind a spam filter

And here is WEB.COM (a.k.a. Network Solutions, Register.com, Name Secure, Snap Names, etc) – one of the world’s largest domain registrars and Internet Service Providers – blocking emails to their ‘abuse@web.com’ mailbox because a report of a phishing site or domain “matches a profile the Internet community may consider spam”?!?!?

How is someone supposed to report a problem to the Internet Service Provider of a phishing site if the simple mention of the phishing site scares the shit out of the abuse department?!?!

Shame on you WEB.COM!! (and all other tech companies that are afraid of their own shadows to run a PROFESSIONAL abuse department)

Public Domain Registry doesn’t make sense!

Jun 6

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders, Pet Peeves | Comments off

I just ran across a web site that is being used to push fake Adobe Flash Player:

Fake Adobe Flash Player update

Fake Adobe Flash Player update

http://www.stupidityexposed.com/wp-admin/post-new.php

I checked the domain’s registration and saw that it was just registered that day, so I attempted to contact the registrar for the domain:

Public Domain Registry's contact email address

There is was, big as life: abuse-contact@publicdomainregistry.com

Now WHY would you list an abuse email address if you’re not going to accept abuse complaints sent to that email address?!?!

Public Domain Registry's lame response

Someone goes to the trouble of looking up the domain registration, and uses the abuse contact provided to send an email to alert the registrar of a problem, and they can’t accept the email!!  Instead, they send you back an email stating that you need to use some web form to file the complaint instead?!?!?

I’m so tired of Internet Service Providers who are so afraid of their own shadows that they won’t use email to perform the normal operations of a responsible ISP!!  Most ISPs understand that there’s a reason for standardized email addresses (abuse, hostmaster, postmaster, etc), but some ISPs think they’re above the rules and that it’s better to waste people’s time than to just do their jobs!

Network Solutions needs some help sending emails?!?!

Jan 14

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders | Comments off

I just got an auto-reply from Network Solutions’ abuse department.  You know Network Solutions – they were one of the first primary domain registrars, so you’d think they were old pros on the Internet, wouldn’t you?  Then why can’t they send an email with images that displays reasonably in any and all current mail programs?  Here is how the email message looks in Thunderbird:

EmailFromNetworkSolutionsAbuseDept

 

I don’t have problems with other people that send messages with images in them, so WTF?!?!

 

GoDaddy doesn’t take phishing complaints very seriously!

Nov 5

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders | Comments off

I don’t know what GoDaddy’s “security / abuse” department does, but apparently illegal activities (i.e. phishing sites) are not very high on their priority list!

This has happened several times in the last 2 weeks.  I’ve submitted several URLs to them that are hosting a few phishing sites.  The sites are hosted on GoDaddy’s servers.  Some of the domains were very recently registered with GoDaddy.  They take several days before they come back to me and say something like this:

GoDaddyLameResponse

REALLY?!?!?!?  “As quickly as possible”????  I don’t think so!

Meanwhile, the phishing sites are still up and the phishing pages (there are at least 8 on just 1 site!) are still collecting information from (new) victims of identity theft!!  If the [phishing] content has ALREADY BEEN IDENTIFIED AND REPORTED, why does it take so long to take it down?!?!?

GoDaddyPhishingSiteSmallIt wasn’t until I called GoDaddy’s “Support” team and threw a hissy fit that the agent asked me to email the URL directly to him (instead of ‘abuse@godaddy.com’).  He accepted my email, forwarded it to his boss, and the site was down 2 or 3 hours later.

But, THAT’S NOT HOW IT’S SUPPOSED TO WORK!!!

Tags: ,

GoDaddy Abuse Dept ignores phishing complaints!

Jun 11

Posted by admin in Internet Service Provders | Comments off

I sent a few complaints to ‘abuse@godaddy.com’ about web sites they’re hosting that have been hacked and are now hosting phishing sites.  Here’s what I get back:

GoDaddy's response to phishing complaints sent to the abuse mailbox

This clearly shows that GoDaddy’s Abuse Department does not want to (and will not) deal with phishing complaints!  It means nothing that every other responsible ISP in the world accepts phishing complaints at their ‘abuse@’ mailbox, but for some reason, GoDaddy thinks their method is better.

To top it all off, they INSIST that the complaint be resent to the ‘phishing@godaddy.com’ email address – that THEY WILL NOT forward the message themselves!!  This means that the phishing site remains operational while GoDaddy was perfectly capable (but perfectly unwilling) to shut down the phishing site while they’re waiting for you to forward the original complaint to their “Phishing Department” instead!!!

And who knows how many people become victims of these phishing sites while GoDaddy leaves the page up when they could have shut it down hours sooner?!?!

At XO Communications “Your Opinion Matters!”?!?

Jan 3

Posted by admin in 800-Pound Gorillas, Internet Service Provders | Comments off

These people make me laugh!  I don’t have time to go into WHY I was trying to contact XO Communication’s support people – it’s a whole nother story.  What gets me is how their support web page touts “Your Opinion Matters!” and offers a link so you can send them your “opinion”.

I was at this web page:

The page proudly boasts this:

Your Opinion Matters!

Yet, the link for “Customer Feedback Form” doesn’t work!  Why??  Well, here’s the HTML for that part of the page:

Oops!

Hmmm… I don’t think my name server is going to be able to resolve the hostname “ektronxostaging”!!  I guess customers’ opinions don’t matter that much after all??

To be fair, when I finally got through to a live person (THE SECOND TIME), she was knowledgeable and helpful!  I should have gotten her name!!