Blacknight warns of 'false promises' in New gTLD program

Domain name registrar Blacknight Solutions has warned domain registrants of the possibility of being "scammed" by registrars that offer pre-registrations in new top-level domains that have not yet been approved.

"Every time a user is defrauded, it causes great harm to our industry – the domain name industry. Companies like ours are forced to clean up the mess," said Blacknight Managing Director Michele Neylon.

After receiving several inquiries from clients, Blacknight discovered that registrants interested in purchasing domains in the rumored new gTLDs were being deceived by these offers because they were unfamiliar with the new TLD implementation process.

While the company was diplomatic enough not to name names, this information likely refers to United Domains (UD), which has been offering such pre-registrations for the past several months.

UD currently offers pre-registration services for dozens of defunct top-level domains, such as .bank .bayern .bcn .berlin .bike and .board (and that's just starting with the letter "b").

The 50-odd potential applicants for the above gTLDs may be left disappointed.