Senator wants to investigate whether VeriSign is ripping off customers and violating antitrust laws.
  • @[email protected]English
    3•59 minutes ago

    ICANN signed an agreement with VeriSign in 2020, sanctioning the maximum allowable price increases in return for $20 million over a five-year period. Thus, allege Warren and Nadler, “Verisign and ICANN may have a collusive relationship.”

    Yeah that seems a lil messed up.

  • @solrize
    74•4 hours ago

    Tldr: Verisign, the registrar of the .com tld. They have been jacking up domain prices.

    • @[email protected]
      28•4 hours ago

      Year,Wholesale Price (USD)

      2012,$7.85
2013,$7.85
2014,$7.85
2015,$7.85
2016,$7.85
2017,$7.85
2018,$7.85
2019,$7.85
2020,$7.85
2021,$8.39
2022,$8.97
2023,$9.59
2024,$10.26
      • @[email protected]
        3•1 hour ago

        What did they cost in the early 00’s? I vaguely remember it being a lot compared to these prices.

        • @[email protected]English
          3•1 hour ago

          IIRC, when Verisign had a registrar monopoly, they were charging $35/yr with 2 years up front.

      • @[email protected]
        5•2 hours ago

        So, by percentage that’s:

        2021,6.9%
2022,6.9%
2023,6.9%
2024,7.0%

        I’m not sure those raises are justified, but we did just go through a period of high inflation, and even a business like Verisign has employees and other expenses that got more expensive. I’ll be interested to see where this story goes.

        • @[email protected]English
          14•2 minutes ago

          Verisign is a government granted monopoly who’s primary job is to maintain a database of who owns what domains. That job is largely automated. The actual end user sales are delegated to dealers; Verisign doesn’t even do much of that. I’d be surprised if they had 500 employees.

          All they really need to do is run a database server. Not even a big one, like Google copying the entire public internet.

          They get fees from every domain every year. The servers get cheaper and more efficient every year. I’d be stunned if there was any reasonable excuse for these price increases.

  • @Brkdncr
    3•2 hours ago

    Maintaining a single tld is a part time job at best.

  • IHeartBadCode
    -40•4 hours ago

    Elizabeth Warren once again calls for reform on inconsequential shit. She sits on the Finance committee, how about you pass some real fucking fiscal policy instead of yelling at the Fed because of their legally required monetary policy.

    That woman is really high up there for useless Senators.

    • TheTechnician27English
      59•3 hours ago

      Yeah, how dare a sitting member of the Senate Finance Committee target an American company worth over a billion dollars price-gouging the most important TLD on the Internet and arguably violating antitrust laws. Doesn’t she know that politicians are each only allowed one issue to care about? And that now she’s wasted hers?

      Edit: Also, she’s literally the chair of the Senate Banking Subcommittee on Economic Policy which – you guessed it – includes issues regarding the Federal Reserve. Keeping an eye on the Fed is something she does as part of her job. Here’s her three days ago yelling at the Fed. Because that’s her job.