Competitor: GoDaddy is thwarting domain transfers

Macworld - In the face of an avalanche of bad publicity, domain registrar GoDaddy is being accused by a competitor of dragging its feet on allowing customers to leave its service.

In a post on its blog, fellow domain registrar Namecheap reports that customers trying to transfer their domains away from GoDaddy are being delayed. The post accuses GoDaddy of "returning incomplete WHOIS information" as a part of the transfer process, a practice which is against the rules of ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), the process manager for the domain-name system.

"We suspect that this competitor is thwarting efforts to transfer domains away from them," writes Namecheap Community Manager Tamar Weinberg in the blog post. "We at Namecheap believe that this action speaks volumes about the impact that informed customers are having on GoDaddy's business."

Ross Rader, general manager of Hover, another domain-registration company, said he couldn't confirm Namecheap's accusations. "I have no information other than what each has published and transfers are flowing freely over here," he tweeted.

GoDaddy has been a magnet for controversy. Most recently, it received withering criticism for supporting the Stop Online Piracy Act, then backtracked and pulled its support. The company's sexually suggestive commercials haven't helped, nor has the widely reported recreational elephant hunting of its CEO. The company has also been accused before of delaying Whois updates in violation of ICANN policies.

As a result, there's been a campaign online to encourage users to take their business elsewhere. Macworld even posted a guide to transferring your domain-name service earlier this month.

An email to GoDaddy requesting a comment on Namecheap's accusation hadn't been replied to at the time this story was posted.

Hat tip: Ryan Block and Glenn Fleishman.