Directi has taken over Estdomains' Registrar operations
Announcement:
http://www.icann.org/en/announcements/announcement-25nov08-en.htm
It is important to note that Estdomains designated Directi as its successor. This is despite the fact that Directi apparently dumped Estdomains as a client a while back (see "Historical Stuff" below).
It will be very interesting to watch developments going forward. What Registrar will the fraudsters use from now on? Will Directi audit the domains that have been passed on to them? How fast (or slow) will takedowns be? Will they red flag and audit domains associated with email addresses which use multiple pseudonyms, or pseudonyms that use multiple email addresses (like these?) (btw, don't assume that these are used for Estdomain/Directi registered domains - they're examples of what the bad guys do):
Historical stuff:
28 August 2008
Washington Post - Hostexploit - Report slams US host as major source of badware (Atrivo) - mentions Directi
http://hostexploit.blogspot.com/2008/08/report-slams-us-host-as-major-source-of.html
3 September 2008
The Register - Anonymous domain registration nixed amid fraud complaints
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/09/03/directi_strikes_back/
6 September 2008
Hostexploit - Atrivo - Cyber Crime US Report - update 090608 - Directi take action
http://hostexploit.blogspot.com/2008/09/atrivo-cyber-crime-usa-report-update.html
7 September 2008
Hostexploit - Joint statement from Directi, HostExploit and Kunujon
http://hostexploit.blogspot.com/2008/09/joint-statement-from-directi.html
8 September 2008
A Superlative Scam and Spam Site Registrar - includes a section entitled "The Role of Directi"
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2008/09/estdomains.html
Domains registered at Directi that have been listed in URIBL - URIBL lists domains that appear in spam (Note: 830 domains have been listed in my URIBL RSS Feed of Directi domains that have appeared in spam since the afternoon of 18 September 2008)
http://rss.uribl.com/nic/DIRECT_INFORMATION_PVT_LTD_D_B_A_PUBLICDOMAINREGISTRY_COM.html
18 October 2008
Directi blog - Action against registry services abuses
http://blog.directi.com/0-directi/actions-against-registry-services-abuse-%E2%80%93-report-oct-2008-hostexploit-and-directi/
Various dates
Mention of Directi at rbn.blogspot.com
http://rbnexploit.blogspot.com/search?q=directi
Various dates
Mention of Directi at knujon.com
http://www.knujon.com/news.html#directi