I’ve gotten a large response from my original post on UltraRPM, and wanted to write a little more about what I’ve found in my research on this company.
The Daily Mail has a story called Sick web hijackers cash in on Madeleine that mentions UltraRPM:
So-called ‘typosquatting’ is a growing menace on the Internet and involves registering domain names similar to those of popular websites.
Some bogus sites are set up to imitate the original with the intention of fraudulently obtaining personal details, such as bank account numbers.
Others simply aim to increase traffic to their own services or sell advertising space.
One of the companies exploiting the popularity of Madeleine’s website is California-based UltraRPM.
The firm registered at least three domain names similar to the official site this week, one with just a single letter missing.
It then used a ‘domain parking’ company called Trafficz.com to manage the site and fill it with adverts from mainly British companies whose advertising agencies pay a fee for each visitor who clicks on the links.
The fees are usually no more than about a penny a click, but can rise up to £40 in some cases.
UltraRPM also does business as Metapredict.com.
Who Is UltraRPM?
A comment from August 13, 2007 on the Domain Tools Blog says:
In the last four days my Domain Tools Mark Alert reports have been off the wall. ALL of the traffic is from exactly one Registrar UltraRPM, Inc. and its front organization MetaPredict which is just another name for UltraRPM. What UltraRPM is doing is not even Domain Squatting, it is Domain Extortion!
When is ICANN going to pull the plug on UltraRPM? Only a licensed Registrar could pull this off.
There is a clue that possibly links UltraRPM with another registrar called OnlineNIC.com which appears to be associated with some Chinese Web sites.
If you have information on UltraRPM, Metapredict, or a possible connection with OnlineNIC, please leave a comment below.
One Comment
I searched my webste name.com
on godaddy it was available a month back
but just today i landed on godaddy and found that it has been registered by the met$#$#@ what to say about them…..
They registered few days back
So is there a chance that the name will be deleted after 5 days…..
few more thing
does registering means confermation that the website is owned for one year?
if it is registered will I be able to get it after the one year time period expires?
I have rechecked the site on IE many times…does that mean the metapredicts will get to know that I want and register that site?
now when to check whether the site is deleted or not and where?
from now onwards I promise myself to keep my updates on,AV installed….and put every seccurity suite on system
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[…] UPDATE: I’ve written additional articles about Metapredict.com and UltraRPM. […]
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