Thread: Domain Privacy Services

I would like to know what you think about the domain privacy services.

I think that people hiding behind privacy services have something to conceal.

Spammers, frauds, thiefs, etc, you name it...

What do you think?

I use them sometimes. It depends on the site. For example, with some of my affiliate sites, I don't want competitors knowing exactly what niches I'm targeting. Thats why I use privacy. But for sites like my personal blog I don't bother

I have done that for one domain for exact the same reason ezyweb just indicated, but my other domains have my personal details on it. To set domain privacy services can be handy, either temporary or permanent.

On thing that annoys me though is that when you lookup my real name on the search engines, my domains -without privacy- show up.

I use privacy registrations for some sites where I am concerned about personal privacy issues.

IMHO, it is not a good idea to use it for an e-commerce site, because some people (like me) do check the site ownership before purchasing something. In some situations I agree that privacy registrations are used when a site owner is trying to hide.

It's on by default on all the domains I purchase. It's on pretty much all of my domains.

I enjoy making the data private because, quite simply, I don't want any regular Joe who can run a WHOIS to get my information.

I've always thought of it as security through obscurification. Easy enough to change the name, address, phone, etc when you buy the domain, list an old information, etc vice paying the extra money where someone can still obtain your info if they are determined

I hope more an more registries will hide the customers details by default in the future because any spammer can take your name, phone, address and use it them for illegal purposes.

Recently red.es (spanish registry) decided to hide the customer address from public, the name is still available and the contact email, few other registries use this system or even hide all customer details.

Originally Posted by menj

I use it often for SEO purposes.

How can you use private registration for SEO purposes?

Originally Posted by Szise

I hope more an more registries will hide the customers details by default in the future because any spammer can take your name, phone, address and use it them for illegal purposes.

Recently red.es (spanish registry) decided to hide the customer address from public, the name is still available and the contact email, few other registries use this system or even hide all customer details.

That's a great idea, but as long as registrars are making lots of money from private registrations, it will be slow to catch on.

I think it has it's pros and cons. Some people also hide their online identities to protect themselves as well as from spammers too. There are so many fraud activities online and it's better to be safe than sorry. But in some cases, it's a case to case basis too.