I wrote about the fraudulent domain name sales listing attempts at Afternic that have triggered Fast Transfer authorization emails to be sent to GoDaddy customers over the past few days. This isn’t a new issue, but it seems to be more widespread now than it was previously.
I reached out to GoDaddy seeking comment about this, and a company representative responded to me today with a comment:
Last Summer, I wrote an article urging caution to domain investors who might be tempted to blindly approve “Authorize your domain listings” emails from Afternic. If someone fraudulently lists your domain name for sale on Afternic and you click the approval link, it could get listed in someone else’s account without your approval. This could cause major problems down the road.
Andrew Allemann mentioned that he received a fast transfer opt-in email for a domain name he wasn’t selling. I also received an email for MLR.com that I reported to Afternic immediately. Their system had it removed by the time an account manager had a look.
Other domain investors mentioned receiving multiple approval emails:
This is getting out of hand. I've gotten dozens of these over the last 24 hours and have had some previously. I have zero names at afternic now. Too risky if I do not know who is instigating a listing. @GoDaddy Needs to be a better way other than letting anyone list any name
— adamstrong 🌲 (@adamstrong) January 23, 2024
I received 9 emails from @afternic in the last 12 hours to "authorize your domain listings".
I did not list anything, so I have no idea what is going on with that.
All of them were for LLLL, many of which I have owned for well over a decade. https://t.co/KjJxjZozHU
— DataCube (@datacubecom) January 23, 2024
I believe a third party – or multiple third parties – is creating faulty listings on Afternic en masse. I don’t know what the objective is, but I know the potential damage this could cause if an investor accidentally approves a listing they did not authorize.
If you receive one or more of these emails, be wary. They come from Afternic, but if the emails weren’t sent because you added domain names to your account, someone else might have added them for sale in their account. By clicking the email, you are authorizing a fast transfer.
I believe I was told one work around is to add domain names to your account that you own but aren’t selling and put them as “Not Listed” for sale. People should not have to do a workaround to prevent fraudulent listings, but it was something I was told a while back.
Automated Lease To Own (LTO) deals at scale are a nice innovation for selling domain names. I like the passive income produced by my LTO sales, and if a buyer defaults on a deal, I get the domain name returned to me. Dan.com introduced automated LTO deals at a scale, and Afternic began offering LTO deals to buyers in the second half of 2023.
At the end of November, I closed my first LTO deal via Afternic. The domain name is being acquired for $4,999 on a 12 month payment plan. The buyer paid on November 27th, and the first payout was sent to me on November 29th. Because Afternic utilizes the Dan.com payment schedule, the second payment was scheduled to be made to me on January 7th. I assume the buyer was obligated to pay on the one month anniversary – December 27th.
If you have .XYZ or .IO domain names listed for sale on Afternic, you probably received emails with the subject: “Opt-in to the Afternic Premium Network.” Last night, I received 31 of these emails from Afternic because I own 31 .XYZ domain names that are listed for sale on Afternic. In addition, I received several corresponding “Action required: Authorize your domain listings.” emails from GoDaddy. Michael Cyger mentioned this last night on Twitter.
The reason for these emails is that .XYZ and .IO domain names joined the Afternic Fast Transfer network. This was announced last week by Afternic:
In a tweet this afternoon, GoDaddy announced that it will be auctioning some short domain names from its NameFind portfolio. These domain names will be auctioned in 7 day auctions without reserve prices on GoDaddy Auctions. These are private seller domain names rather than expiry domain names:
To celebrate the upcoming end of GoDaddy Auctions’ Beta phase, we’re adding some top-notch domains to the platform!
Don’t miss out on Cliche​.com, VisitVegas​.com, plus tons more, all in no-reserve auctions.
New names added daily!https://t.co/olrNSvSX8o
— GoDaddy Auctions (@godaddyauctions) December 6, 2023
Last week, I announced that I sold my first domain name via Afternic’s Lease to Own option. The domain name was sold for $4,999, which will hopefully be paid over 12 months. Notably, I turned off LTO for domain names priced below $2,000, so when I received the email I knew it wasn’t going to be a table minimum LTO.
Just landed my first LTO sale at @Afternic. It’s a 12 month, $4,999 deal.
Other than removing the domain name from Dan and Sedo, they’re handling everything else.
— Elliot Silver (@DInvesting) November 27, 2023
Yesterday afternoon, I checked to see if anything had been done with the domain name I sold. To my surprise, the buyer already launched a website on the domain name. It’s not a simple WordPress theme or a template that was uploaded and potentially forgotten about. I think this bodes well for the completion of this payment plan.
