ICANN has held off terminating the accreditation of EstDomains, an Internet registrar long accused of being an open house for malware distributors. The move comes a day after ICANN notified EstDomains in a letter it was shutting it down due to EstDomains' president being convicted on fraud and money laundering charges.Just when EstDomains appeared to be on the proverbial chopping block, it has gotten a stay of execution.
ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) stated
Oct. 29 it will hold off on shutting down the notorious Estonian domain
registrar pending a review. The decision came a day after ICANN informed EstDomains that
it was terminating its accreditation Nov. 12 due to EstDomains
president, Vladimir Tsastsin, being convicted in February on money
laundering and fraud charges in Estonia.
In the termination letter sent Oct. 28, ICANN stated it planned to
move the roughly 281,000 domains under EstDomains management to
another registrar. However, EstDomains responded with
a letter stating Tsastsin had resigned as president in June, and that
his conviction is being appealed to Estonias Supreme Court. According
to the letter, the registrar did not inform ICANN of the change because
it did not believe it was a requirement under its agreement.
To assess the merits of the claims made in EstDomains response,
ICANN has stayed the termination process as ICANN analyzes these
claims, ICANN officials said in a statement.
News of the pending termination was greeted with glee by several
members of the security community. EstDomains has long been accused of
playing nice with malware distributors. Over the past several years, it
has provided domain registration services to the infamous RBN (Russian
Business Network) as well as cyber-criminal organizations tied to spam
campaigns and other activity.
For its part, EstDomains has denied links to malware distribution,
going so far as to send out press releases to that effect. Ironically
however, the controversy over malware is not relevant to ICANN's
decision. Instead, at issue is a section of the Registrar
Accreditation Agreement that states accreditation can be revoked if
any officer or director of a registrar is convicted of a financial
crime unless that person is removed.
ICANN will take all reasonable measures to protect the interests of
registrants during the stay period and the subsequent termination
process that may follow, ICANN officials said.
Network Security & Hardware 
/ 3 
