If you’ve recently received a letter, phone call or email in reference to a domain name listing or SEO invoice, beware and pay close attention to the details. A scam that has made rounds in recent years has targeted a number of our clients.
If your domain name is public, as likely your business website is, your information is on the web for scammers to see. Unless you pay extra for domain privacy protection, sites like WhoIs.com list details about the ownership for most websites internationally.
These scams use your actual domain and likely your actual renewal date to try to trick you into migrating to use their services. This is often at a much higher price than a normal site registration fee- typically in the $15 to $20 range. The letters, emails or calls all seem legit and can include returning addressed envelopes and wording that sounds like a regular invoice. They include payment options, billing periods, etc. that all reflect typical formatting for an invoice. They do likely disclose somewhere that the communication is a solicitation and not a bill, but this is often in small or light-colored print much harder for you to catch.
Many of The Miller Group’s clients use us for their websites and hosting so we take care of domain registration, etc. If you receive a communication from someone besides us and you are our client, make sure to give us a call to check. For those of you who don’t use us for your domains, you can check to see your registration info on ICANN’S site or WhoIs’ lookup.
Joe Svoboda is the CEO of The Miller Group. He started with The Miller Group in 1998 as a service technician and was promoted to Service Manager in 2006. After Mike Miller’s passing in 2011, Joe was tapped to guide The Miller Group in the company’s next chapter. He provides strategic direction and has helped established The Miller Group as one of Missouri’s most capable IT firms.
