auctions GoDaddy Expired Auctions can be tricked

[Furquan]

Twitter user and Chinese domain investor posted that Godaddy Auctions allows people to use two bidder accounts on the same name and a lot of people are using it for tricking the auctions.
 

https://twitter.com/x/status/1678228128194256896

 

 

[Sutruk]

** Whatever...

 

[bmugford]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1708786024548082038

 

[Sutruk]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1708786024548082038

Let's hope they listen to you.

 

[Future Sensors]

Starboard Value, and activist GDDY investor, will be interested in these practices, as well.

https://www.starboardvalue.com/contact/

https://www.starboardvalue.com/wp-content/uploads/Starboard_Value_LP_Letter_to_GDDY_09.12.2023.pdf

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/starboard-delivers-letter-godaddy-120200674.html

 

[Napkin.com]

Has anyone tracked where these domains go?
Private whois?
What landing page do they setup to resell?

Same group of buyers probably?

Selling to the SECOND highest bidder won't work.
If I was fake bid up to $21,000, I sure wouldn't want to pay ANYWHERE near that if I was
the underbidder.
There is ZERO integrity left in these auctions -- no reasonable person would want to bid on these.

Selling names like myuniversity.com for $12 is insanity.

 

[Bannen]

And it looks like there may be a rollback being set up for KVD.com, a new auction there... it has the same earmarks of the other rollbacks...

 

[bmugford]

I guess the bidding on Yabu.com had reached $20,500, but when I just checked it was only $1,611.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1709322842246906097

Brad

 

[bmugford]

Yabu.com went from $20K+, down to $1,611 now over $11K again.

The bidding history makes no sense...

https://twitter.com/x/status/1709366397111808031

How can @GoDaddy auctions even be trusted at this point?

What a shitshow.

Brad

 

[Gary Scot]

Happened to me the 2 days ago. I placed a proxy bid up to $137 on a nice little brandable (not worth a massive amount wholesale but worth a shot) not long after I was outbid - $142.

A few seconds later the price shot up to $715 and ended at $730.

It'll be interesting to see if what happens on NameBio over the next couple of days. My guess is it will be unpaid and passed to the $142 bidder.

This needs to stop.

 

[Lox]

... if GD brains allow auction API to be shut down & restarted 1 by 1 .... they will be able to figure out how the ping pong game works and sources... but the shitshow will continue in a different style.. Still the frontrunners are the biggies problem to all .

Regards

 

[Michael]

... if GD brains allow auction API to be shut down & restarted 1 by 1 .... they will be able to figure out how the ping pong game works and sources... but the shitshow will continue in a different style.. Still the frontrunners are the biggies problem to all .

Regards

Auction API access is extremely hard to come by, and this scheme requires burning accounts left and right. Nobody with API access to the auctions is throwing away their accounts.

It has nothing to do with the API, that's a separate issue where API users automatically jump on names with any interest. While annoying, it doesn't really require API access; the companies doing it have enough staff to do it manually and it would probably still be worth it to them to crowdsource their buying.

I think most people would argue stealing names outright is worse than front running. At least the front runners only gain an unfair advantage in the auctions when they get an end user on the hook. They are also terrible people, but this rollback scam is by far the worst issue plaguing GoDaddy auctions.

 

[NetworkPearl]

Yeah, I was talking about godaddy. If they do back and find someone who participated in many fraudulent auctions, resulting in godaddy's loss of money, do they have a case?

Auction API access is extremely hard to come by, and this scheme requires burning accounts left and right. Nobody with API access to the auctions is throwing away their accounts.

It has nothing to do with the API, that's a separate issue where API users automatically jump on names with any interest. While annoying, it doesn't really require API access; the companies doing it have enough staff to do it manually and it would probably still be worth it to them to crowdsource their buying.

I think most people would argue stealing names outright is worse than front running. At least the front runners only gain an unfair advantage in the auctions when they get an end user on the hook. They are also terrible people, but this rollback scam is by far the worst issue plaguing GoDaddy auctions.

Wouldn't verifcation of all auction accounts through ID card etc resolve the issue to some extent? Plus many of these domain auctions can be legitimate too as I remember having bidding wars in the past few years with another bidder which would stretch an auction from mid 3 figs stright to mid 4 figs if i really liked the domain(s). I used to use namejet and had bought a lot of domains through them.

 

[MasterOfMyDomains]

Is @GoDaddy gonna be like epik and ignore the problem hoping we will find other issues ? Hey daddy’s rep why so quiet? Are you one of us that took a job where you bit off more than you can chew?
Thanks @Michael for keeping us up to date on prices.

 

[kor]

HugeDomains also joined this train and started to doing exact same scheme.

 

[charlesmack]

What if second bidder also denies to pay? Where do the domain goes? Is there any chance to get it back?

 

[Domainication]

Hmm.. do you think this godaddy auction i am a participant is a serious and fair thing? I guess not!

Yellow one is my offer. It smells like bidder #5 will not pay and bidder#4 will get the name for a smooth 37€ / $40.
Got another auction where exactly the same thing happened this morning.

It sickens me... @GoDaddy please stop this fake bidding! It's clearly fraud up here.
Already mailed your auction team. Let's see how they react on this.

 

[Michael]

Latitudes.com and Oasis.org are also being gamed. Maybe HelloSociety.com too. Oasis was driven up from $250 to $16.5k between two bidders in the span of 10 minutes with 11 days left.

It doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in these new measures being announced that it takes all of a few minutes to find 3-4 auctions being actively gamed while they're supposedly being extra vigilant about it.

How many decades and how many millions in lost revenue will it take for GoDaddy to finally admit that the rollback system is fundamentally flawed and no half-measures can stop the abuse? It seems blatantly obvious to everyone except GoDaddy.

You have to re-auction the names, or if you can't be arsed to figure that out you need to delete anything with a 25%+ rollback, and let it end up at DropCatch where a fair and legitimate auction can actually take place. Never deliver a domain to a thief, period. No exceptions. Or it will not stop.

Is GoDaddy selectively re-auctioning expired names? Latitudes.com was being auctioned in late August and was clearly being gamed, and it looks like the auction got cancelled before it ended. Then it just closed yesterday for $27,500 as an expired auction.

Another one I was keeping an eye on for clearly being gamed was MH.net which ended at $57,566 on July 30th. That wasn't ever rolled back, but it just closed at $12,595 yesterday as an expired auction.

Then you have Oasis.org which was being gamed at the same time as Latitudes. Seems that auction was also cancelled before ending. But that's somehow not being auctioned again, and is instead listed for sale on Efty by Nof Investments for $200k. How did he get it if the auction never closed and it wasn't re-auctioned? Are they now doing private, backroom deals for expired inventory too?

Really curious what is going on...

I haven't posted in a while because for the past couple months almost all of the rollbacks have been for SEO names, not names with intrinsic value, or the rollbacks have been very minor. The only ones I can think of recently that were worth noting was:

BornRich.com rolled back from $8,417 to $720.
Corrosion.com rolled back from $25,500 to $12,001.
8662.com rolled back from $15,250 to $6,655.
H48.com rolled back from $6,600 to $210.

Several 5Ns getting rolled back in a big way too, but otherwise it's junk names or minor rollbacks. Here's a pretty typical day of rollbacks to give you an example:

rcltexas.com from 5436 to 83.
52878.com from 4320 to 95.
cirtuks24.com from 2827 to 30.
flightsbank.com from 1025 to 290.
breezeby.com from 729 to 370.
bo778.com from 668 to 25.
feldsparpetspa.com from 652 to 65.
materiel-sage-femme.com from 597 to 55.
dixiebeverageliquor.com from 596 to 41.
storymorie.com from 551 to 26.
selfnote.com from 544 to 524.
mangwondo.com from 513 to 26.
hotelpuccini.com from 485 to 57.
campchyoca.com from 437 to 185.
cradle-song.com from 419 to 22.
pausewithpittsburgh.com from 405 to 205.
gfcv.com from 397 to 149.
exguides.org from 357 to 227.
sierraclubfloridanews.org from 349 to 335.
keo88.org from 60 to 35.
naturesbreath.org from 50 to 30.
sproutyield.com from 30 to 25.
katcha.co from 30 to 25.
modernessentialsshop.com from 15 to 10.

 

[Michael]

Same with 4775.com, auction ended at $46k on October 31st, 2023, wasn't rolled back, and ended again yesterday as an expired auction at $10,750.

9081.com ended July 27th, 2023 for $33,900, was rolled back to $29k, and ended again yesterday at $8,200.

0207.com ended July 14th, 2023 at $18,500, wasn't rolled back, and ended again yesterday at $9,101.

Tutti.com ended March 29th, 2023 at $48,676, wasn't rolled back, and ended again yesterday at $18,250.

 

[CarlosN]

Yes, it seems Godaddy is reauctioning domains.
Today:

8458.com
mycp.com
ulises.com
2506.com
tradesense.com
vyom.com
pokermaster.com

 

[Michael]

Yes, it seems Godaddy is reauctioning domains.
Today:

8458.com
mycp.com
ulises.com
2506.com
tradesense.com
vyom.com
pokermaster.com

I updated our system to watch out for GoDaddy re-auctions, and when one closes it'll automatically remove the original, failed auction. So for example in 3 hours when 8458 ends and gets loaded into our site, it should automatically go delete the July 29th result for $31k.

I also had it go through yesterday's auctions to spot the re-auctions and remove the originals. So with that, and updating rollbacks, we should be fairly well covered.

I'm curious though, has anyone noticed re-auctions ending earlier than yesterday? Wondering how many days I need to go and clean up. Thanks!

 

[kor]

I updated our system to watch out for GoDaddy re-auctions, and when one closes it'll automatically remove the original, failed auction.

Is it possible to tweak the system specifically for auctions to show more details?

So all NameBio visitors can see what's actually going on and be witness of this big shenanigan.

That'll create more reactions and impact on the domain investors' society and hopefully will cause a change of GoDaddy's play of the three monkeys...

 

[CarlosN]

More domains being re-auctioned today:

tm6.com
9148.com
976.cc
23999.com
greenfix.com
hx5.com
usercare.com
55cc.com
jp9.com

If I recall correctly, in the past GoDaddy claimed that if auctions didn't get paid they let the domains drop. It seems they changed their minds.

 

[Greg]

Sounds like a class action lawsuit is warranted

 

[Michael]

Is GoDaddy selectively re-auctioning expired names? Latitudes.com was being auctioned in late August and was clearly being gamed, and it looks like the auction got cancelled before it ended. Then it just closed yesterday for $27,500 as an expired auction.

Latitudes was rolled back from $27,500 to $9,988. So the re-auction of the gamed auction got gamed again. Good news for the scammers I guess, they can still steal names... they just have to burn two accounts instead of one and wait a little longer.

GoDaddy, don't even bother re-auctioning them unless you're going to keep doing it until you get a clean result. Otherwise it isn't much of a deterrent. I know it seems silly, like "oh, we're going to have to run the auction 5 times before it isn't gamed". Well yea, but if you never give them a reward it'll eventually never happen.

Some other rollbacks since my last post:

BlockPlay.com from $4,598 to $145.
0846.com from $13,750 to $8,850.
Propped.com from $3,940 to $510.

Otherwise same story; lots of rollbacks but the names are mostly junk SEO names, or the rollbacks were small.

 

[Michael]

3270․com rolled back from $9,988 to $1,165. Nice deal, congrats to the buyer