Category: Technology Author : JR Posted: August 26, 2008
Tags : beijing, censorship, china, godaddy, olympics
China has blocked all access to domain registrar GoDaddy, according to a report by censorship blog Moonlight. The block started before the end of the Olympics, Moonlight says, and can be traced to a router within China’s China Telecom service provider.
So what’s the real story here? We checked with the folks at GoDaddy, who initially acknowledged having seen the reports but ultimately came back with a “no comment” on the matter. Moonlight speculates the move may have an Olympic connection, and its logic makes sense: The Chinese government had banned anyone but the nation’s Olympic gold medalists from registering domains based on the athletes’ names within the “.cn” suffix. It even “advised” anyone who already owned such a domain to turn it over to the medalist “as a gift.”
Moonlight says the government wants to go a step further and force people to turn over those domains if they don’t do so on their own. If the domain is registered with an outside company such as GoDaddy, however — as opposed to with China’s own CNNIC domain registry service — the government won’t be able to gain control and seize the name.
That theory, of course, is no more than speculation at this point — though, from the looks of it, an official explanation may not be in our sights any time soon.
Sep 7, 2008
If you are in China, you can bypass the blocked wall by using Knoppix. Simply download the Knoppix OS and burnt it onto a DVD. Then simply boot your computer using the Knoppix Disk. The interface is quite similar to Win XP so you won't have much problem using it.
In fact, I give this comment through Knoppix!
Do you use proxy because I have tried almost all and even if they let you see the Godaddy website, you cannot do much login in…
Patrick Stephen Oh
Sep 19, 2008
I am going to post this over on my GoDaddy blog; never knew the communists wanted people to turn over their domains to the State. Incredible.
I wonder if we can setup a .cn site with a GoDaddy storefront using a reseller account? Food for thought….
Dec 27, 2008
looks like Loren Feldman's stolen domain names won't be seen in China
Jul 24, 2009
Its the Tragety news about the Goaddy banned in China..there is an site for domain name registration named as http://www.tucktail.com/it's the Godaddy's reseller's site.