Interesting Chinese Domain Scam

[James]

Yesterday I received the following email scam, it was a decent one because they had done their research and spent the time to make it somewhat personalized. I think this format could in fact trick some old school business owners.

Email 1 below -

Dear James,

This is Andy Zhang---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 May 14, 2014. that a company claimed "RANGLANCE LTD" were applying to register "prosperitymedia" as their Network Brand and some "prosperitymedia" Asian countries top-level domain names(in/hk/tw/etc) and China (CN) 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 "RANGLANCE LTD". Looking forward to your prompt reply.

(This is a very important case, so please transfer this email to your CEO or Principal. Thanks a lot.)

Best Regards,

Andy Zhang

Senior Consultant Manager


Email 2 - below

Dear James,

As soon as receiving the application of "RANGLANCE LTD", we checked and found "prosperitymedia" is your company's using name and brand. We are concerned that your brand name might be affected negatively by their applications, this is why we informed you. following Network Brand and domain names are applied by "RANGLANCE LTD":

Net Brandrosperitymedia
Domain Names:
"prosperitymedia.asia
prosperitymedia.cn
prosperitymedia.cn.com
prosperitymedia.co.in
prosperitymedia.com.cn
prosperitymedia.com.hk
prosperitymedia.com.tw
prosperitymedia.hk
prosperitymedia.in
prosperitymedia.net.cn
prosperitymedia.org.cn
prosperitymedia.tw
prosperitymedia.中国
"You know that the domain names registration is open in the world, "RANGLANCE LTD" also has the right to apply for the available domain names. you only have the preferential rights to register them.

At present, we haven't passed their application, we need your opinion. If your company consider these names of importance to your company's business or interest, I suggest that your company register these names first so as to avoid confusion or speculation. Of course, If you don't want to protect your intellectual property rights, then my suggestion is your company give up these names so that we can finish registering for them as per our duty. Please give me your company's decision as soon as possible in order to handle this issue better.
have a nice day.

Best Regards,
Andy Zhang
Senior Consultant Manager


Now I like the way they worded this scam yet it is clearly suspect after seeing articles here -

http://www.europeandomaincentre.com...partment-of-registration-service-in-china-etc.

Anyone else seen this?

 

[nt81]

I've seen these for at least 6-7 years now. Usually always on a larger corporate entity who care about trademark / copyright etc.

 

[James]

I've seen these for at least 6-7 years now. Usually always on a larger corporate entity who care about trademark / copyright etc.

Yeah I have never seen them, but they seem pretty common and I can see how people would fall into the trap of paying for this.

 

[Cooper Mills DomainLawyer]

yes these are common, I see them often. The sting in the tail is when someone asks to register the domains, they get charged $15,000 or something stupid

 

[eBranding.com.au]

I've received heaps of emails like this. It's just one of the many forms of spam and dodgey scams that hit my inbox.

That's what happens when you have your contact info on hundreds of whois records. That's why I typically avoid using my personal email address.

 

[James]

yes these are common, I see them often. The sting in the tail is when someone asks to register the domains, they get charged $15,000 or something stupid

Well I got the email and then I searched for - RANGLANCE LTD which did not exist, next I search for Chinese Domain Scam and plenty of posts showed up.

Thought I would share it here as I felt it was worth sharing. But yeah I guess that in the trademark business these would be VERY common.

 

[Horshack]

They often send letters with the same wording also.

 

[findtim]

They often send letters with the same wording also.

I haven't had letters but the email is so common its now boring ! the worst thing is when they manage to get through to my clients............ then I get an email or phone call from them.

I now say to all clients: if it has anything to do with online and it didn't come from me, do not reply, do not pay, and do not phone me, .......just forward the email and I will tell you what to do.

my normal reply is simply "scam"

this is one reason why I insist on my clients have their domain names registered with me and I do the hosting, this way I get less phone calls about crap like this.

they own them but all the contact details are mine, but some scams go the extra mile and search the business name so bypass me.

the 2nd thing is if I was to die the owner of the website would not have too many problems taking back control as its registered in their business name and ABN/ACN , ( some currently aren't but that is the clients fault right now )

tim