Pirate Bay said it is supporting protestors to Sweden’s plans to scrutinize all domain name registrations that use “bank” in their name.The Swedish authorities want to prevent people from being duped by phishing scams. The rules would only apply to Swedish .SE extensions but protestors say that the practice could create a precedent that other countries will follow and apply to many other names in domain registrations.
Mack.
It would seem that all Swedish banks already own their domain names so any new domain registrations with the word bank in them would probably be registered for nefarious reasons.
What sort of logic is that?
Let's assume that there will never be a new bank opening up or a new bank division or a new local bank location wanting a domain. If I want to launch a website for a local blood bank or milk bank I would now need to beg for government permission to register a domain. What about Banksy, the artist in the UK?
I do not think that this would even slow the scammers down one bit. Many big banks don't use the word "bank" in their domain. Washinton Mutal, Wachovia, Chase, Wells Fargo, HSBC, Barclays even the US Federal Reserve Bank do not use the word "bank" in their domain. If I wanted to register a phishing site for any of these companies I wouldnt need to use the word "bank".
If I wanted to register a phishing site for any of these companies I wouldnt need to use the word "bank".
Or register the domain in Sweden for that matter.
It seams like a pretty good idea to me. Sounds as if you simply need to prove you have a legit reason for wanting such a domain. Only people this will cause real. issues for are people intending to phish.
Or people trying to make a website of widgetbanksucks, since powerful banking lobyists can add 'sucks' sites to the list of restricted reasons to not give out a bank domain.
There are already laws against fishing, we don't need new ones we just need enforcement. Ofcourse enforcement would mean spending more money on enforcing laws, and less on making them. I don't know why, but I have a slight suspecion that those who proposed this law (those who make laws) might not be doing this as much for the benefit of society, as of themselves.
I don't know why, but I have a slight suspecion that those who proposed this law (those who make laws) might not be doing this as much for the benefit of society, as of themselves.
Always a safe guess :-)
If people cannot remember to look at the addressbar and see [bankname.cctld...] and get suspicious when it says bankname.somethingscary.com, how are people going to cope with this?
Most of the fraud takes place when people click links present in emails saying that it is from bank.
I feel some kind of protection at DNS level can also be included checking the correct intended domain when it is related to banking website keyword.Most of the ISPs can do quick check it website contain BANK keyword and inform user that is this really what he want to do or visit this website?
The word "bank" like it appears in: hsbc, citigroup, UniCredit, Sumitomo Mitsui, Morgan Stanley, BNP Paribas, Intesa San Paolo, Wells Fargo, Paypal, VISA, Sparkasse?
Sounds like a great idea to me and will make any future phishing attempts impossible. Because phishers always use the work "bank" in their domain names. It's in the secret code of conduct of the phishers, and if they don't their heads explode.
Bad luck though for the river bank and the riverbank-motel.
Why not add (yet) another ccTLD that's exclusive to banks? .bank - I'll bet the major banks would be more likely to switch over the BankName.bank than to change to a .com with the word "bank' in it. Plus it would be a lot more effective in stopping the phishers.
Phishers hack into servers and install their scripts in other people's domains and the minute one hacker server gets fixed they start spamming to a new location and so forth.
I'm sure the misguided Swede's will feel good that at least they did something even if it was a useless placebo.
The word "bank" like it appears in: hsbc, citigroup, UniCredit, Sumitomo Mitsui, Morgan Stanley, BNP Paribas, Intesa San Paolo, Wells Fargo, Paypal, VISA, Sparkasse?Well, it does not for sure.
However, I am again influenced with a crticism here
If I want to launch a website for a local blood bank or milk bank I would now need to beg for government permission to register a domain. What about Banksy, the artist in the UK?
Phishers hack into servers and install their scripts in other people's domains and the minute one hacker server gets fixed they start spamming to a new location and so forth.This can be termed as smart phishers. But maximum script kiddies follow the keyword law, as per reports from email scams and other organisations.
Regards...jmcc
The people making these decisions in Sweden are the PTS (Post och Telestyrelsen)or Post and Telecommunications Board. The organization has been around for many years and has a very old staff pool and they are not always the most Internet-savvy.
The reason this has been pushed so hard, is that one of the major banks (Handelsbanken) started to lobby for this in 2002. The lobby for banning the word "bank" in domain registrations is being pushed under the pretense of avoiding scam/spam sites. However, the internal incentive from the bank to increase pressure on the issue has not been headed by the online-security department, but by many other departments (such as marketing) who would benefit from said regulation.
I won't go into the details of how this won't slow spammers down (they won't even break pace) because we are all familiar with the obvious secondary tactics. The point I wish to illustrate and emphasize is that this is a very real threat to the openness and freedom the Internet provides.
