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November 27, 2019 02:01 pm
It's Way Too Easy To Get a
Brian Krebs: Many readers probably believe they can trust links and emails coming from U.S. federal government domain names, or else assume there are at least more stringent verification requirements involved in obtaining a .gov domain versus a commercial one ending in .com or .org. But a recent experience suggests this trust may be severely misplaced, and that it is relatively straightforward for anyone to obtain their very own .gov domain. Earlier this month, KrebsOnSecurity received an email from a researcher who said he got a .gov domain simply by filling out and emailing an online form, grabbing some letterhead off the homepage of a small U.S. town that only has a ".us" domain name, and impersonating the town's mayor in the application. "I used a fake Google Voice number and fake Gmail address," said the source, who asked to remain anonymous for this story but who said he did it mainly as a thought experiment. "The only thing that was real was the mayor's name." The email from this source was sent from exeterri[.]gov, a domain registered on Nov. 14 that at the time displayed the same content as the .us domain it was impersonating -- town.exeter.ri.us -- which belongs to the town of Exeter, Rhode Island (the impostor domain is no longer resolving). "I had to [fill out] 'an official authorization form,' which basically just lists your admin, tech guy, and billing guy," the source continued. "Also, it needs to be printed on 'official letterhead,' which of course can be easily forged just by Googling a document from said municipality. Then you either mail or fax it in. After that, they send account creation links to all the contacts." 
Original Link: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/-bYdK4LcPXI/its-way-too-easy-to-get-a-gov-domain-name
It's Way Too Easy To Get a .gov Domain Name
Brian Krebs: Many readers probably believe they can trust links and emails coming from U.S. federal government domain names, or else assume there are at least more stringent verification requirements involved in obtaining a .gov domain versus a commercial one ending in .com or .org. But a recent experience suggests this trust may be severely misplaced, and that it is relatively straightforward for anyone to obtain their very own .gov domain. Earlier this month, KrebsOnSecurity received an email from a researcher who said he got a .gov domain simply by filling out and emailing an online form, grabbing some letterhead off the homepage of a small U.S. town that only has a ".us" domain name, and impersonating the town's mayor in the application. "I used a fake Google Voice number and fake Gmail address," said the source, who asked to remain anonymous for this story but who said he did it mainly as a thought experiment. "The only thing that was real was the mayor's name." The email from this source was sent from exeterri[.]gov, a domain registered on Nov. 14 that at the time displayed the same content as the .us domain it was impersonating -- town.exeter.ri.us -- which belongs to the town of Exeter, Rhode Island (the impostor domain is no longer resolving). "I had to [fill out] 'an official authorization form,' which basically just lists your admin, tech guy, and billing guy," the source continued. "Also, it needs to be printed on 'official letterhead,' which of course can be easily forged just by Googling a document from said municipality. Then you either mail or fax it in. After that, they send account creation links to all the contacts." Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Original Link: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/-bYdK4LcPXI/its-way-too-easy-to-get-a-gov-domain-name
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