internet

That's it. We've had enough. Until internet domain name registrars start to adopt responsible practices over who they sell domains to, especially the plethora of top level domains that criminals habitually use for the nefarious activities, it's time to block them entirely.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has begun proceedings in the Federal Court against Sony Interactive Entertainment Network Europe Limited (Sony Europe).

 

The complaint relates to limitations on warranty for Sony's online sales of PlayStation products that appear on its website and have been notified to Australian consumers in dealings with them.

It's far, far more complicated than the ACCC suggests and for global retailers it's a major threat.

Australia has long been in conflict with foreign discounters marketing, amongst other things, by internet. It all started with a fight over the price of books.

This is just silly. We own dozens of domain names and we manage a handful for friends and family because it's convenient, we can include them on our data protection system and deal with domain admin within our own processes rather than them have to do it. As a result, we get a lot of correspondence from domain hosts and domain registrars, especially as we are moving all the domains and websites, in batches, from one unsatisfactory host to a far better one. In addition, we also get notices from ICANN which really hasn't got a grip on this GDPR thing at all.

When Australia took action against an internet scammer for sending out notices relating to domains (see here) the effect on those committing similar frauds was... zero.

E-mail inboxes have long been plagued with dubious offers to renew domain names or to buy similar names to prevent cybersquatters taking control of them or even for entries into some kind of directory. It's a nuisance but, so far, the perpetrators of the actions have avoided prosecution by a range of sneaky tactics. Australia's Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has obtained orders (not convictions) against two companies and a disqualification order against their principle officer.

There's a lot of dispute over exactly what constitutes "spam" with legislation influenced by the advertising and marketing industry often defining the term far more narrowly than the public at large. Whether it's legally spam or not, one thing happens far more than it should in unsolicited advertising. That thing is where the e-mail is dishonest in some respect ranging from fake senders through misleading content to out and out lies. The basic rule for recipients is simple: if a mail fails a simple test - "is it true?" - the only safe option is to bin it and block the sender.