According to Go Daddy, itself a large domain name registrar, the registration process is “so unique” that it has two patent applications pending on the technology supporting the service.
Normally, domain name registrations require that certain personal information of the registrant, including a name, e-mail and mail address, is made publicly available. Go Daddy is banking on the desire of many people to keep such information private – and, in particular, to keep it hidden from those who send spam.
Domains By Proxy will create a private email address for each customer’s domain. When that private e-mail address receives messages, the company will, at the customer’s direction, forward, not forward or forward after filtering the messages for spam.
The agreement gives customers the rights of selling or transferring their domains, and no penalty for doing so is mentioned in the terms of agreement. Registrants lose the benefits of anonymity if they use the service to break laws or engage in “morally objectionable activities” such as child pornography, harassment and dissemination of viruses.
Further, users of the service will still have to comply with the ICANN’s domain name dispute resolution policy.
According to the agreement, Domains By Proxy retains the right, without liability, to close the account and reveal the name and personal information of registrants if “the domain name DBP registers on [their] behalf violates or infringes a third party's trade mark, trade name or other legal rights.”