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Comment by dizhn | Hacker News Reader

That is the bit that jumped at me immediately too. Why would a registrar take it upon itself to suspend a domain that another entity entirely blacklisted as part of their own completely opaque process? Who is Google? God?

On the flip side of the coin I cannot get a site removed that is a blatant rip off of one of our websites being actively used for invoice redirection fraud.

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It's like being unable to get a passport because Microsoft has you on The List, and Microsoft needs to see your passport to check why you're on the list.

Considering that getting a domain is a normal part of business these days, this kind of thing should be illegal. Not to mention, why does Google have any say in this?

You know it's getting bad out there when corporations act like the government.

It's like the domain registrar is acting like a vassal state. I don't think Google actually has any say in their decision.

> Why would a registrar take it upon itself to

Because keeping Google happy or at least not bothered is an existential priority for registrars

I am suspecting something like this too but what is the mechanism by which Google would have influence on the registrar? As far as they are concerned the domain is gone from their index.

Well until a human can verify.

Which likely is slow without a poke it's reasonable to base the decision on whats available.

That's just how reputation works.

It doesn't sound reasonable to me at all. Why would we think that the reasons google blacklists a domain would align perfectly with reasons a domain name would be suspended? In the end they don't seem to agree already since the domain was unsuspended. Who knows why it was blacklisted by google? Even the decision to unsuspend it looks arbitrary.

and anyone that trusts googles judgement here clearly needs a reputation of their own

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