јр.com – I was a victim!

[wot]

Mods- leave it here or move it,but it is important.

Taken from my blog.

"You have seen the reported “sale” of јр.com xn--p1a1c.com for $1100
On contacting the new owner it transpires, that as we had guessed, he did not realize it was an IDN and in his words “I am a victim”.

Many of you will be aware that myself and others have been trying to get Sedo to take notice of these lookalike real English words that are in fact IDN this one “јр” being Serbo-Croat cyrillic.

I have no doubt that these names were created solely to confuse and part the unwary newbie from their money.

Currently the same Russian owner of јр.com (sorry ex owner) has these on Sedo, some had been on auction with the necessary one bid to get the name off and running.

ѕео.com Created 11th Dec 2011
аѕѕ.com Created 16th Nov 2011
арр.com Created 16th Nov 2011
есо.com Created 16th Nov 2011

More:

рі.com
ја.com
ѕі.com
хѕ.com
сі.com
іѕо.com
ріе.com
роѕ.com
еуе.com
рѕі.com

I hope nobody else has been caught out by this mutton purporting to be lamb!

Now you may say that the “buyer” should have been aware? But IDN are very new to the majority of the community and as pointed out these names are created simply to take advantage of this and already at least one person has been taken in by it. I am in fact sure he is not the first and will most definitely be the last.

Any chance the buyer could get recompense? Well Sedo will say we pointed out that the name(s) were IDN with a small logo to indicate that and on the auction page it refers to the punycode, a nice get out clause perhaps.

But wait, this seller has had a number of these recently registered names make it to auction. That of course requires an opening bid. I am willing to bet that each of those opening bids were either from the same person or new members signing up with the sole purpose to make a bid.

Yes, I am saying that I think that each of the names from this seller and similar names from other sellers currently on /or have been on Sedo auction are “shill bids”.

Now if that is the case Sedo had been advised on many occasions by myself and others what was going on and had done nothing about it. Sedo should look back at these names in question, check out the first bidder in each case, do a little sleuthing and show some transparency and let the community know if there is anything untoward going on or that they are satisfied that their current due diligence meets requirements.

If I was the buyer armed with this information I would be seeking legal advice at this point in time.

What do you think?"

 

[DnEbook]

I think sedo are a big business and simply don't care ......pity you are not working for them

 

[wot]

I think sedo are a big business and simply don't care ......pity you are not working for them

They couldn't afford me. :p

 

[johname]

Nice that you did the detective work to find out that the buyer thought he was getting jp.com. But begs the question did he see the warning statement that they are bidding on xn--p1a1c.com? And if you tell someone "warning" your bidding on a IDN with an explanation of what a IDN is, and they still dont research deeper into what they are dealing with, then whos to blame? Shill biding would not be unique to IDN names and needs to be looked at separately as increased overall auction security.

 

[eurorealtor]

I have been watching this auctions and I was asking myself the same question, were the initial bids fake, to catch another bidders? So many IDNs with a "regular" looking letters in such a short time in the marketplace auction. There is something unusually going on IMO as well.

 

[wot]

Nice that you did the detective work to find out that the buyer thought he was getting jp.com. But begs the question did he see the warning statement that they are bidding on xn--p1a1c.com? And if you tell someone "warning" your bidding on a IDN with an explanation of what a IDN is, and they still dont research deeper into what they are dealing with, then whos to blame? Shill biding would not be unique to IDN names and needs to be looked at separately as increased overall auction security.

This is the exact response from the buyer:

"I am a victim,I didn't know it was IDN domain name!"

Not really an excuse but I was not surprised,the seller got the result.I am just trying to ensure that it does not happen too often in the future.

And I appreciate that shill bids happen across the domain spectrum but these on Sedo stand out like the proverbial sore thumb and they had been told about them!

 

[tonecas]

MHO is that like in any business there should be done due diligence from the buyer. SEDO puts an icon saying its an IDN, then when someone click the <div> section where the domain name is, he get a more detailed explanation of what the domain REALLY is.

i think in this case (Hurraaay!) Sedo has done its part. people should stop being naive and clear the dolar signs in their eyes.

what Sedo must do is detect better when there is shill bidding. i bet that some bids on those domains were shill bidding. others were serious. eventually the bidding bidders will not pay since it has passed more than a week now.

this is the first issue.

the second issue is that this new comer russian domainer blasts the opportunity in front of more astute domainers, new comers also or not, that can check and generate quickly words in Cyrillic that are similar to those in english who have value and enter the market with a few more IDNs.

namely, we have now a german domainer that following the idea of the russian domainer registered the "apps.com" and others equivalent in Cyrillic and has already two bids at $5,000. I suspect the first one may have been false also.

in the process we start to get a lot of attention and people start to think that at least there is the merit of having a domain that is almost identical to the US-ASCCI one. and yes, it's true that this brings value to a domain but should be the buying domainer that has to acknowledge this value intentionally and not by following fake bids.

regards,
tonecas

 

[DnEbook]

perhaps a red color code would help, but if it's too good to be true there is normally something wrong

 

[wot]

MHO is that like in any business there should be done due diligence from the buyer. SEDO puts an icon saying its an IDN, then when someone click the <div> section where the domain name is, he get a more detailed explanation of what the domain REALLY is.

i think in this case (Hurraaay!) Sedo has done its part. people should stop being naive and clear the dolar signs in their eyes.

what Sedo must do is detect better when there is shill bidding. i bet that some bids on those domains were shill bidding. others were serious. eventually the bidding bidders will not pay since it has passed more than a week now.

this is the first issue.

the second issue is that this new comer russian domainer blasts the opportunity in front of more astute domainers, new comers also or not, that can check and generate quickly words in Cyrillic that are similar to those in english who have value and enter the market with a few more IDNs.

namely, we have now a german domainer that following the idea of the russian domainer registered the "apps.com" and others equivalent in Cyrillic and has already two bids at $5,000. I suspect the first one may have been false also.

in the process we start to get a lot of attention and people start to think that at least there is the merit of having a domain that is almost identical to the US-ASCCI one. and yes, it's true that this brings value to a domain but should be the buying domainer that has to acknowledge this value intentionally and not by following fake bids.

regards,
tonecas

Shill bidding-This is really the crux of the matter.

I can probably detect it just by looking and the minimum of research as can many members here,why do Sedo find it so difficult?

The German is not new to it probably just buoyed by the success of the Russian.

 

[mis_chiff]

Any IP's to check?

 

[wot]

Any IP's to check?

That would be one of the first things to look at but I think the perps are smarter than that and will have buddies living elsewhere doing the initial shill bid.

This is simply my personal opinion.

 

[DU]

That would be one of the first things to look at but I think the perps are smarter than that and will have buddies living elsewhere doing the initial shill bid.

This is simply my personal opinion.

You don't need friends to use proxies

The solution, in my mind, is as simple as a single statement:

CUT AND PASTE THE FOLLOWING INTO YOUR CHROME/FIREFOX BROWSER

роѕ.com

This is what you are buying. The warning doesn't make sense to people who don't understand IDN. They don't understand that these keys are not available on a standard UK/US keyboard.

IDN is a slapped on internet addition without too much forethought.

 

[wot]

Another response from the buyer, actually quite disturbing.

"我对Sedo很失望，当我了解到jp.com是一个IDN域名的时候，我多次与Sedo交涉，

Sedo也已经了解到，当我参与竞拍时，我并不知道它是一个IDN域名。

但是Sedo却不领情，认为我已经竞拍中标，就必须交易下去。也许是因为我已经在Paypal中支付了款项。

但我多次提出，我是上当受骗，是一个受害者时，Sedo并不领情，强制交易！在我不同意的情况下，SEDO为我在maddogdomains.com创建一个帐号，并把IDN域名过户过去。迫使我完成这一次交易。

从始至终，我都没有同意，这一交易继续下去。

因为我不太懂英语，所以也不知道如何申诉，如何把这一事件公开。

即使这一次事件已经无法挽回，但是我希望你能帮我把他公布出来，让大家不要再上当受骗！

最后，我对Sedo的做法，表示强烈的不满！"



"On Sedo, I was very disappointed when I learned jp.com is an IDN domain, I have repeatedly tried to negotiate with Sedo.

Sedo had also been advised that when I participate in the auction, I did not know that it is an IDN domain.

Because I had already bid and won the auction Sedo considered the deal has to go through. Perhaps it is because I have already paid the payment by Paypal?

But I have repeatedly suggested that I was deceived and a victim, Sedo ignored me.
Without my agreement SEDO opened a maddogdomains.com account, and transferred the IDN domain to it forcing me to complete this transaction.

From start to finish, I did not agree to continue the deal.

Because I do not understand English well, I did not know how to complain, and how to make this incident public.

Even though this incident has already occurred and I can do nothing about it but I would like you to help to make it public and warn others.

Finally, I strongly disagree with Sedo’s business practice, expressing strong dissatisfaction with them."

This is only one side but it reads like, "we have the money" tough?

---------- Post added at 01:55 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:48 PM ----------

You don't need friends to use proxies

The solution, in my mind, is as simple as a single statement:

CUT AND PASTE THE FOLLOWING INTO YOUR CHROME/FIREFOX BROWSER

роѕ.com

This is what you are buying. The warning doesn't make sense to people who don't understand IDN. They don't understand that these keys are not available on a standard UK/US keyboard.

IDN is a slapped on internet addition without too much forethought.

True.

But did you know that with FF & Chrome if you used an idn.org is comes up with the actual characters and not the punycode as it does with .com /.net ? Росія.org

 

[DU]

But did you know that with FF & Chrome if you used an idn.org is comes up with the actual characters and not the punycode as it does with .com /.net ? Росія.org

This depends on your own language preferences and how the language is setup on the white-list (at least for FF).

For Chrome I think they do something similar but blacklist confusing characters. There's nothing confusing about your example. That letter (whatever it's called in Ukrainian) is not confusing with an English characters).

You must have Ukrainian/Russian setup as an allowed language either in the browser or on your system?

For me this shows http://xn--n1ade0d8a.org/

 

[DU]

To see how the IDN warning is presented to our Japanese friends.. open attachment.

Obviously it clearly makes sense of those fluent in Japanese.

Compare the Spanish...
Now judge how easy it is to tell what's going on assuming you don't really understand IDN and are Japanese.

I know, I know, do your research

 

[RaiderGirl]

I have no doubt that these names were created solely to confuse and part the unwary newbie from their money.

I agree.. But then again you can say the same thing about .Mobi, the way many mobi investors hyped the extension for the purpose of unloading their inventory on unwary newbies.. Unfortunately, it's a cut throat business were in where many are in it for #1.

 

[DU]

I agree.. But then again you can say the same thing about .Mobi, the way many mobi investors hyped the extension for the purpose of unloading their inventory on unwary newbies.. Unfortunately, it's a cut throat business were in where most are in it for #1.

That's like saying if someone sells you gold and the prices go down it's the same thing as someone selling you Iron Pyrites. Not quite. Not even close.

 

[wot]

I agree.. But then again you can say the same thing about .Mobi, the way many mobi investors hyped the extension for the purpose of unloading their inventory on unwary newbies.. Unfortunately, it's a cut throat business were in where many are in it for #1.

Sorry,no comparison at all!

 

[carob]

Currently the same Russian owner of јр.com (sorry ex owner) has these on Sedo, some had been on auction with the necessary one bid to get the name off and running.

ѕео.com Created 11th Dec 2011
аѕѕ.com Created 16th Nov 2011
арр.com Created 16th Nov 2011
есо.com Created 16th Nov 2011

More:

рі.com
ја.com
ѕі.com
хѕ.com
сі.com
іѕо.com
ріе.com
роѕ.com
еуе.com
рѕі.com

I saw a lot of IDN domain auctions happen at once and assumed Sedo had arranged a themed auction where owners had submitted their best properties. I don't pay much attention to those auctions so I looked no further.

Thanks for the info.

There used to be no IDN warnings at all a few years ago, but I agree they really need to spell out how this works on browser and keyboard.

 

[DnEbook]

Perhaps a warning in their newsletter may be at least a positive step forwards

 

[DU]

Perhaps a warning in their newsletter may be at least a positive step forwards

I'll do a template for them:

Dear Sedo Customers

We realize that that we have an issue with shill bidding and people being ripped off by sellers of some IDNs. We thought an adequate solution would be this newsletter. It's at least positive! Am I right?

Please avoid bidding in auctions that are obvious shill bids and blatant attempts to defraud. As just an escrow service we generally tend to not get involved in anything until payment time by which time it's all part of a contract between buyer and seller.

Hopefully you'll get this newsletter before you get ripped off. There's unfortunately not enough resources to monitor all these activities - we're still busy working on our search results to make sure that three word dot coms rightfully come before exact keyword match ccTLDs!! You wouldn't believe how hard that is. We're also spending more time than expected on teaching our transfer reps avoidance techniques.

Anyway. Be careful out there. Our marketplace might just have people trying to rip you off. Pretty sure we're good now.

Thanks

Sedo Management

 

[wot]

I'll do a template for them:

Dear Sedo Customers

We realize that that we have an issue with shill bidding and people being ripped off by sellers of some IDNs. We thought an adequate solution would be this newsletter. It's at least positive! Am I right?

Please avoid bidding in auctions that are obvious shill bids and blatant attempts to defraud. As just an escrow service we generally tend to not get involved in anything until payment time by which time it's all part of a contract between buyer and seller.

Hopefully you'll get this newsletter before you get ripped off. There's unfortunately not enough resources to monitor all these activities - we're still busy working on our search results to make sure that three word dot coms rightfully come before exact keyword match ccTLDs!! You wouldn't believe how hard that is. We're also spending more time than expected on teaching our transfer reps avoidance techniques.

Anyway. Be careful out there. Our marketplace might just have people trying to rip you off. Pretty sure we're good now.

Thanks

Sedo Management

Classic

 

[carob]

Perhaps a warning in their newsletter may be at least a positive step forwards

How about highlighting these two super domains on offer at sedo:



sedo.com/search/details.php4?domain=shillbidders.com" - shillbidder.com

and

sedo.com/search/details.php4?domain=shillbidders.com" - shillbidders.com



Themed auction anyone?



BTW shillbidding.com takes you to an Ebay policy page.

 

[wot]

Another poor b about to get screwed by our Russian with help from Sedo.

sedo.co.uk/auction/auction_detail.php?language=e&auction_id=124997&tracked=&partnerid=14460&language=e

This gem registered 15th Feb 2012,could not possibly have been another shill bid to get it off and running-could it?

 

[carob]

Another one waiting to hit the jackpot

sedo.com/auction/auction_detail.php?auction_id=125205" - јаскрот.com

Actually that would be pronounced "jaskrot", note the second keyword in the domain LOL.

what the listing says:

Important Notice: This is a Multi-Lingual (IDN) Domain.
Technically you are acquiring the domain xn--80aumhdj2m.com

the phrase Multi-Lingual (IDN) Domain is linked text, click it and get this popup:

IDN Domains

IDN Domains are "Internationalized Domains Names", they make the use of special non-English characters possible (i.e. Umlauts like "ä", "ö" und "ü", other European Characters like "á", "é", "í"). These domains are subject to many temporary technical restrictions, for example users need an IDN compatible browser to visit them.