Namecheap just seized and disabled all my domains

https://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/1x8cycd/namecheap_just_seized_and_disabled_all_my_domains/

101•sashk•2h ago

Comments

CharlesW•2h ago

Namecheap cannot be trusted. I purchased a domain for a "normal" price (and yes, I have receipts). Shortly after they realized they fucked up, voided the purchase, and made it a $1,500 premium domain. Obviously, my recommendation is to avoid Namecheap.

reddalo•27m ago

Was the name actually available? Or were they reselling a domain they owned?

throw-the-towel•1h ago

There's a reason it's called Namecheap not Namesafe.

bluebarbet•35m ago

Indeed. Personally I would never pay for any service whose name includes the word "cheap" (it's literally why I gave this one a wide berth despite all the breathless recommendations here and elsewhere). Cheapness should never be the declared mission of a business, it should be the incidental by-product.

ericholscher•1h ago

Yea they did something like this with us. Fully turned off our business domain because we didn’t reply to a phishing email in 48 hours. We migrated out the next day once we got it resolved. It took over 6 hours from when we noticed the issue and responded until they turned it back on. Absolutely horrible service.

rcleveng•1h ago

Who did you move to? I used to use google domains before they sold and and am not sure who is decent anymore

londons_explore•48m ago

Internet.bs

bertt•42m ago

Porkbun has been great.

Faaak•28m ago

infomaniak

nasso_dev•7m ago

i can vouch for porkbun and cloudflare

sirnicolaz•1h ago

This gave me the final kick to finally move away from Namecheap

sourcecodeplz•1h ago

namecheap purchased by private equity CVC in 2025 for $1.5B

so costs need to go down (-human support + ai automation)

and prices go up (they increased i think .com 3 times this year alone)

alterom•53m ago

And well, business goes down.

I purchased a domain name from them yesterday, in addition to a few I already had.

This will be the last purchase unless I see some significant traction in the case we're discussing in particular, and company wide in general.

Hope others will do the same. Not punishing this behavior is encouraging such abuse in the entire industry (if Namecheap gets away with that, everyone else will follow).

ryandrake•32m ago

I remember years and years ago moving all my domains to Namecheap because they were considered "the good guys." I suppose I'm going to have to start looking around once again to see who are currently the good guys.

CuriouslyC•21m ago

IMO Cloudflare is the closest thing to a "good guy" these days. Very customer friendly, affordable and generally fairly ethical (if you pass over the part where they share data with the NSA).

richstokes•13m ago

Ohhh so that’s why I got those price increases emails. Yay. What are some good alternatives?

js2

chung8123•59m ago

Out of curiosity where are people going for their domains. I have a GoDaddy because changing seems like a task that would be more annoying than it is worth and that is even if you can find a place that is better.

jordanb•56m ago

I've always used Joker. Never heard anything bad about them or had any problems.

masfuerte•27m ago

Same here. This is the first time I've ever heard anyone else even mention them!

kardianos•54m ago

porkbun

mat_epice•54m ago

I've used porkbun.com for a bit. I've had no complaints, and at least when I looked initially their prices were pretty good.

reddalo•28m ago

+1 for Porkbun

The only downside is that they use Cloudflare DNS behind the scenes, so when Cloudflare goes down, your website goes down too unless you use third-party DNS.

ranger_danger•

blinding-streak•59m ago

What are good alternatives to namecheap?

tarr11•54m ago

Cloudflare is pretty affordable and it seems unlikely to be bought by PE

mat_epice•53m ago

Porkbun has been good to me.

rwyinuse•51m ago

Hetzner, OVHcloud are decent European options. I migrated to them after geopolitical risks with US providers got too high. No problems so far.

ivan_gammel•39m ago

I'm on EuroDNS as domain registrar for many years, parked there a couple of companies where I worked. They don't have scammy vibe of other registrars, have multi-user accounts, which is convenient for businesses.

bluebarbet•34m ago

Dynadot. Over a decade without issues.

Faaak•27m ago

infomaniak.ch is swiss, and (relatively) good. Lacking features overall (though their domain+DNS is solid), but at least no bullshit like this

convolvatron•49m ago

this is going to be an unpopular opinion, but this was the inevitable result of changing a function with trivial cost and broad social utility (name registration) from a public service to a commercial one. at the time we heard a lot of standard arguments about the innovation and competition that only a market based solution could bring. its really not a surprise that this is the kind of innovation that resulted.

londons_explore•44m ago

Yes - domain registries should be run by the government.

DNS etc can be run by third parties

proxyscore•13m ago

Nominet does yet they outsource.

Besides, which government do you want to run .com domains

farlight•49m ago

If you still did business with them after this, it's your own fault and you deserve everything they're doing to you:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30504812

(Before reacting to the headline, please read at least some of the discussion.)

tbrownaw•36m ago

Are you trying to suggest that the issue in the current post has the same underlying cause (not doing business with countries on the other side of a war)?

Sparkle-san•31m ago

I read this particular comment[0] and I can't say that I understand the connection you're suggesting. If I ran a company and a country was directly attacking the city were ~1k of my employees live[1], I wouldn't want to continue to do business with them either.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30507103

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Namecheap#Termination_of_servi...

janalsncm•20m ago

No, I don’t see how one follows from the other. Most of us are not Russian and don’t have websites NC would consider relevant to the war.

On the other hand, most of us probably can imagine not checking our email for three days, getting caught up in some automated purgatory, and experiencing customer neglect. We can imagine this because it is the default customer experience these days.

andrewstuart•39m ago

I’ve found really great but quite unique .com domain names available on name cheap then mysteriously gone registered to name cheap within hours, available for purchase at thousands.

Always strenuously denied by the name cheap CEO “we do not front run domain names!”.

I’d never do a domain name check there again.

pmkary•7m ago

I'm an Iranian---which is something you have no choice in, you just turn 4~5 and understand enough language that they tell you that you are an Iranian. And well out of believing namecheap is a good company (since I had my DNS there) I purchased my domain from them. Then one day these fuckers banned my domain, and my access to the dashboard without any warnings or headsup, didn't even allow me to move my domain to somewhere else, and those vultures from GoDaddy bought it in the auction and have put it for 3500€... Horrible people

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