We had this same email as well. Why would anyone want to register “bluewaterforklift” in China. So we were about to respond when we saw this blog. Thanks for your view on it, we agree, nice to see a second opinion. I wonder how many emails they sent out. Clever.
Tony

We also got the e-mail yesterday. Thanks for alerting us as we were about to respond to them. Does anyone know how this might be stopped? Isn’t googlo great!! Ron

We also got one today. Thanks for the above sharing.

Got the e-mail yesterday…thanks for alerting us!

I also received this e-mail today. I too worried that someone wanted to register my name, than 2 seconds later, being suspicious as I am of unknown e-mails, decided to google their name. Thank you for posting this. How DO we report them?

My company got the same email, although from someone named paker.lin at Star East Technology. Everything else was the same. Same alledged “squatter” Viva International Holdings. Thanks for blogging this, I almost fell for it also, as we had been victimized earlier this year by someone who was infringing on our trademark with a similarly worded domain registration. But something about this email was odd enough to cause me to do some searching. Glad I find your posting.

We also rec’d several emails from this “company” over the last few days with the same “threats” that everyone else is getting. I must admit that we were upset in the beginning. We also got about 300 hits on our site over a few days from the same person. We did email them back and told them the same thing I told the guys who were from “THE EMBASSY IN AFRICA” and I could gain millions of dollars if I helped them….I said (after months & months of deleteing the emails) “if you email me again I will turn you into to Dateline NBC…it all stopped!!! Mindy

[...] a few. Thanks to blogging though… all it takes is 5 minutes of Google-ing to know that such scams can never last.  Just when I started to think that the world had enough of the [...]

[...] You can see a huge list of domain name scammers here! But this list of organized scams is getting shorter by the day. Thanks to blogs… all it takes is 5 minutes of Google-ing to know that such scams will never last.  [...]

[...] a seller of small articles, usually of cheap or shoddy quality – the latest in a series about the domain-name [...]

Unfortunately, a client of mine was recently hit by the same scam, although via telephone conversation. The company in question (iserveuk.net) suggested that he registered 10 domains for 10 years… at £10 a pop.

£1000 later, I discovered that the domains have been registered for the minimum period of time. The victim was so angry that he drove to the ‘registered address’ of iServeUK… only to find that the address didn’t exist.

Keep an eye on http://www.domainscams.co.uk/ for recent updates.

A client just got this one yesterday and my blackberry was plagued with emails from him about it all day.
Theres been variants of this scam been going around for several years now. The problem with this one is it does have the air of being legitimate.

The bit that scares people, is the implied threat of the fictional company thats about to register a trademark on your domain, could at some point take your domain from you. And this scamm works.

A lot of businesses dont have on staff IT or web developers, and hire them on an ad hoc basis when needed, but still register all their own domains, after all how hard is it to set up a godaddy account and buy a domain or ten. And when the guy with the credit card gets this scam he doesnt have several years experience of spotting these and hits the reply button on his outlook.
And another scammer makes a buck. Sucks doesnt it.

Everyone should be aware and have the so-called “instinct”. You can also try Scam Search so that you can avoid if the companies are really scams or not.

Just got another one of these, from some bloke called Fred Han in Shanghai. I only mention this for Google reasons, and quote a bit of it to assist Google in this quest! ;)

(If you are NOT CEO,please forward this to your CEO, because this is urgent.Thanks.)
Dear CEO,

We are the department of registration service in China. we have something need to confirm with you. We formally received an application on August 27 2009, One company which self-styled “Indian Borm Trading Co.” are applying to register “mediauk” as Net Brand name and CN domain names as below :
mediauk.asia
mediauk.com.hk
mediauk.com.tw
mediauk.hk
mediauk.in
mediauk.net.cn
mediauk.org.cn
mediauk.tw
After our initial examination, we found that the internet brand name applied for registration are as same as your company’s name and trademark.

Yes, I also received the same email from Fred Han re the “Indian Borm Trading Co” trying to register domain names similar to ours. Thanks for posting these scams – so helpful when trying to wade through the “rubbish”.

Hey, Mike Lee has been on the email, from Shanghai. He says, in an email eerily familiar…

(If you are not in charge of this please transfer this email to appropriate dept, thanks.)

Dear CEO,
We are the department of Asian Domain registration service in china. we have something need to confirm with you. We formally received an application on December 04, 2009, one company which called “Head investment & Development ltd” is applying to register “mediauk” as network brand and following Domains:
“mediauk.asia
mediauk.com.hk
mediauk.com.tw
mediauk.hk
mediauk.in
mediauk.net.cn
mediauk.org.cn
mediauk.tw”
After our initial examination, we found that the network brand applied for registration are as same as your company’s name and trademark. These days we are dealing with it, and hope to get the affirmation from your company. If your company has not authorized the aforesaid company to register these, please contact us as soon as possible.
In addition, we hereby confirm that our time limit is 7 workdays. If your company files no reply within the time limit, we will unconditionally approve the application submitted by “Head investment & Development ltd”.
Best Regards,

Mike Lee (Mr.)
Senior Consultant
Room Room520,Unit A,International Shoes City,
No.1775 CaoAnRoad,Jiading District,Shanghai,China
Tel : +86-21-69106991
Fax : +86-21-69106670

Received almost a word for word as above for my domain, in regards to SWS Soft CO. from:

Fred Han
Auditing Dept.
Address: Room 515-516, No.885 Green Ark Building, East Huancheng Road, Fengxian District, Shanghai

Tel: +0086-21-37529318
Fax: +0086-21-37529316

Another one, by the way. Here’s the Googlebait:

Dear CEO,

We are the domain name registration organization in Asia, which mainly deal with international company’s in Asia. We have something important need to confirm with your company.

On the Jan 18, 2010, we received an application formally. One company named “Bandns International Holdings Ltd” wanted to register following.

Internet keyword: mediauk

Domain names:

mediauk.asia
mediauk.com.hk
mediauk.com.tw
mediauk.hk
mediauk.info
mediauk.tw

through our body.

After our initial examination, we found that the keywords and domain names applied for registration are as same as your company’s name and trademark. These days we are dealing with it. If you do not know this company, we doubt that they have other aims to buy these domain names. Now we have not finished the registration of Bandns International Holdings Ltd yet, in order to deal with this issue better, Please contact us by telephone or email as soon as possible.

Best Regards,

Fairy.Yang
Sponsoring Registrar: sk holdings company ltd
HongKong Office
Tel:+85295660489/+85295660103
Fax:+00852-30696940
Email: fairy.yang@skdmrc.org
Web: www.sk-dns.org/www.asia-gov.com

…and another in quick succession:

From: “John Wang”
Date: 18 January 2010 15:10:38 GMT+08:00
Subject: About Your Brand name and domain names:”cridland”
Reply-To: john.wang@china-fowa.org

Dear CEO,
We are the department of registration service in China. we have something need to confirm with you. We formally received an application on January 18, 2010, One company which self-styled “Weimin Technology Limited” are applying to register “cridland” as brand name and domain names as below :
cridland.asia
cridland.cn
cridland.com.cn
cridland.com.hk
cridland.com.tw
cridland.hk
cridland.net.cn
cridland.org.cn
cridland.tw
After our initial examination, we found that the brand name applied for registration are as same as your company’s name and trademark.These days we are dealing with it, hope to get the affirmation from your company. If your company has not authorized the aforesaid company to register these, Please contact us as soon as possible.
In addition, we hereby affirm that our time limit for dissent application is ten days. If your company files no dissent within the time limit, we will unconditionally approve the application submitted by “Weimin Technology Limited”.

Best Regards,

John
John Wang
Senior Consultant

Thank you all for your opinion and experience shared reagrdingthis new scam. I had one this morning, everything the same with my domain name and the Company interested was Bandns International Holdings Ltd. We did reply to them with our contact details and were responded via email for the dispute form. Just a wild thought compelled me to google it. And here lies the TRUTH.
Thanks & Regards.

Thanks

And there’s more:received this morning

Dear CEO,

We are the domain name registration organization in Asia, which mainly deal with international company’s in Asia. We have something important need to confirm with your company.

Today, we received an application formally. One company named “YellowFountainhead Investment Corp” want to register

some domain names which are related to “dbl”

After our initial examination, we found that the keywords and domain names applied for registration are as same as your company’s name and trademark. You know this company? Do you have consigned them to register these domain names with us? These days we are dealing with it. We doubt that they have other aims to buy these domain names. Now we have not finished the registration of YellowFountainhead Investment Corp yet, in order to deal with this issue better, Please contact us by telephone or email as soon as possible.

Best Regards,

Yoyo.wan
Sponsoring Registrar: sk holdings company ltd
HongKong Office
Tel: +85295660489 /+85295660103
Fax:+00852-30696940
Email: yoyo.wan@skdmrc.org
web www.sk-dns.org www.asia-gov.com
________________________________________
yoyo.wan
2010-01-31

Here’s another…

(This is very urgent, Please forward this to your CEO.)

Dear CEO,

We are the department of Asian Domain registration service in china, have something to confirm with you. We formally received an application on May 18, 2010. one company which self-styled “Kamas investment Co., Ltd” were applying to register”mediauk” as Network Brand and following domain names:
mediauk.asia
mediauk.com.hk
mediauk.com.tw
mediauk.hk
mediauk.in
mediauk.net.cn
mediauk.org.cn
mediauk.tw After our initial checking, we found the brand name were similar to your company’s, so we need to check with you whether your company has authorized that company to register these names. If you authorized this, we will finish the registration at once. If you did not authorize, please let us know within 7 workdays, so that we will handle this issue better. Out of the time limit we will unconditionally finish the registration for “Kamas investment Co., Ltd”.

Best Regards,

David Chang

Senior Consultant
Tel : +86-21-69106991
Fax : +86-21-69106670
Postal Code: 201315
Address: Room520, No.1775 CaoAnRoad,Jiading District,Shanghai,China

(Looks like they’ve woken up again!)

(If you are not in charge of this please transfer this email to appropriate dept, thanks.)

Dear CEO

We are the department of Asian Domain registration service in china. we have something need to confirm with you. we formally received an application on May 19, 2010. one company which called “Beai Group Ltd” are applying to register “mediauk” as Internet Keyword and the following Domain Names:
mediauk.asia
mediauk.com.hk
mediauk.com.tw
mediauk.hk
mediauk.in
mediauk.net.cn
mediauk.org.cn
mediauk.tw
After our initial examination, we found that the Domain Names applied for registration are as same as your company’s name and trademark. these days we are dealing with it, hope to get the affirmation from your company. if your company has not authorized the aforesaid company to register these, please contact us as soon as possible.
In addition, we hereby affirm that our time limit is 7 workdays. if your company files no reply within the time limit, we will unconditionally approve the application submitted by “Beai Group Ltd”.

Best Regards,

Buddy Wang
Senior Consultant

I’m always sceptical about these things, but this one really almost had me fooled! But the email was sent to me at the company’s president, and neither of our email addresses are on the website, so I was suspicious (especially since I’ve recently posted some jobs on Craigslist and Kijiji). Mine came with a website that looks really legitimate, which is why I was fooled: www.ds-network.org

Mine came from Gordon Chang
Senior Consultant
Tel : +86-21-69106991
Fax : +86-21-69106670
Postal Code: 201315
Address: Room520, No.1775 CaoAnRoad,Jiading District,Shanghai,China

and warned me about 4K investment Co., Ltd. So clever…

Received: from mx02.diaocha8.com (static-ip-251-116-134-202.rev.dyxnet.com [202.134.116.251])
From: “Alan Bob”
To: “your”
Subject: Notice of Internet Intellectual Property Rights Dispute in China
Date: Thu, 10 Jun 2010 09:19:44 +0800

(If you are NOT CEO,please forward this to your CEO, because this is urgent.Thanks.)
Dear CEO,

We are the department of Asian Domain registration service in China, have something need to confirm with you. we formally received an application on June 9,2010. one company which called “Brazil Kume Investment S.A” are applying to register “mediauk” as Brand Name and Domains.
mediauk.asia
mediauk.com.hk
mediauk.com.tw
mediauk.hk
mediauk.in
mediauk.net.cn
mediauk.org.cn
mediauk.tw
But we found that “Brazil Kume Investment S.A” is not the original owner of the brand and trademark in the checking period,which belong to your company .I need confirm with you whether your company authorized that company to register these domain name.If you have done that ,We will finish the registration for them and link to their website.
If not ,please let me know ASAP.
In addition, we hereby affirm that our time limit for dissent application is 7 workdays. If your company files no dissent within the time limit, we will unconditionally approve the application.

Best Regards,
Alan Bob(Mr)
Auditing Consultant

Tel: +0086-566-2629-555 Fax: +0086-566-2629-666

Address:Room205, No.D4 Qingxi South Garden, South-ChangJiang Road,Guichi Shi District,Chizhou,China

I must say I was surprised that a guy in China would want to call his business by MY name…
In the next email, they suggest that I buy these domain names…

Dear Sir/Madam

I’m sorry to disturb you so abrupt. We are a domain name registration service company in Asia,

On 8th June. we received a formal application submitted by Mr. John Wang who wanted to use the keyword “ericmessier” to register the Internet Brand and with suffix such as
.cn
.com
.cn
.net
.cn
.hk
.asia domain names.

After our initial examination, we found that these domain names to be applied for registration are same as your domain name and trademark. We aren’t sure whether you have any relation with him. Because these domain names would produce possible dispute, now we have hold down his registration, but if we do not get your company’s an reply in the next 5 working days, we will approve his application
As authorized anti-cybersquatting organization we hereby suspect Mr. John Wang is a domain investor. so we need you to attach importance to this issue.
In order to handle this issue better, Please contact us by Fax ,Telephone or Email as soon as possible.

Yours sincerely 　　　　　　　　2010-6-9
Judy
Oversea Marketing Manager
——————————————-
Room 1008,
International Building,
No.38 YueLong road,NanTong City
Tel:+86(513)85330968
Fax:+86(513)80260081
Email:Judy@domainasia.cc

Return-Path:
Received: from smtp.chinaemail.cn (smtp.chinaemail.cn [218.5.79.118])
by mx.google.com with ESMTP id d5si5881533wam.28.2010.08.13.03.32.00;
Fri, 13 Aug 2010 03:32:01 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from mx4.chinaemail.cn (mx4.chinaemail.cn [59.151.120.231])
by smtp.chinaemail.cn (Postfix) with ESMTP id 27A73383A8C;
Fri, 13 Aug 2010 18:19:52 +0800 (CST)
Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2010 18:39:30 +0800
From: “Bram”
To: “admin”

Dear President & CEO,

We are a professional intellectual property rights consultant organization in Asia, who mainly deal with the global domain name registration and internet intellectual property rights protection.

Right now we have an important issue to confirm with you. On August 12, we formally received an application, one company named XingHuang AP Company applied for the internet keyword “mediauk” and following domain names:
mediauk.asia
mediauk.ca
mediauk.de
mediauk.fr
mediauk.hk
mediauk.ru
mediauk.tw
mediauk.us

with our organization.

During our preliminary investigation, we found that these domain names keyword is identical with yours. I wonder whether you consigned XingHuang AP Company to register these domain names with us? Or are they your business partner or distributor? If you have no relationship with them, we assume that XingHuang AP Company has other purposes to obtain these domain names.

Currently, we have already postponed this company’s application temporarily. Therefore please let the relevant person make a confirmation with us by telephone or email as soon as possible.

Thanks & Regards,

Bram

Web: http://www.chinaonenet.net
Tel: +852-95660-103
+852-95660-489
Fax: +852-30696-940
Mail: Bram@wanyinet.com & Bram@one-net.com.cn

@James, I got that exact message from ‘Bram’ on AUg 3 but with my domain. He actually wrote me again yesterday telling me I have 3-5 days to contact me or those worthless $10 domains will be owned by XingHuang forever.

I’m kind of enjoying dragging it out just to waste his time. I send him a reply at the latest date to make him think I might be stupid enough to fall for his scam.

Catherine

Thanks for posting this blog, it is easier now to recognize scams. We received this one last week. People united can overcome evil :)

Dear CEO,
We are a leading internet solutions organization in Asia, we have something need to confirm with you. We formally received an application on September 1 2010, One company which self-styled “Kume Trading Co.LTD” are applying to register brand name and domain names as below :

domain names:
mirgenpharma.asia
mirgenpharma.cn
mirgenpharma.com.cn
mirgenpharma.com.hk
mirgenpharma.com.tw
mirgenpharma.hk
mirgenpharma.in
mirgenpharma.tw

Brand name :mirgenpharma
After our initial checking, we found the brand name and these domain names being applied are as same as your company’s, so we need to get the confirmation from your company. If the aforesaid company is your business partner or your subsidiary company, please DO NOT reply us, we will approve the application automatically. If you have no any relationship with this company, please contact us within 7 workdays. If out of the deadline, we will approve the application submitted by “Kume Trading Co.LTD” unconditionally.

Best Regards,

Tony Cui

Thank you for the posting. I received one this morning. After reading it a few times and noticing that the sent email address was slightly different then in the signature, I became suspicious. Plus I was wondering why anyone from Brazil, in a non related industry, wanted to register our company name in the Far East. I copied their phone number and put it into Google, thank you google, and found all the other stories.

Got the same message, about some Brazilian company. Mine is from a ‘John Wong’. Hilarious.

I received the following too! The same address. Thanks for posting this up!

BTW, mine’s a Anna Don (Mr)..I wonder since when men started using Anna as his name.