U.S. Secret Service Seizes JotForm's Domain Name
JotForm, a Web form building service used by hundreds of thousands of users, had its domain name seized by the Secret Service because of the actions of one of its users. According to the company's blog post, its domain name was suspended by GoDaddy after the agency asked. Without explaining further, the domain registrar told JotForm that the suspension was part of an ongoing law enforcement investigation. On Hacker News, the founder of JotForm, Aytekin Tank, said that the Secret Service wasn't being particularly helpful in resolving the matter, even though the company is ready to fully cooperate. At this point, the company is still clueless on why the domain name is seized. "Our guess is that this is probably about a phishing form," Aytekin wrote. If that is the case, the Secret Service may be in overkill mode, since the company is proactively weeding out accounts caught by its Bayesian phishing filter. "We also take any reports about phishing very seriously and quickly suspend the accounts and let the other party know about it," he added. For the time being, the company is using an alternative domain name at JotForm.net (instead of JotForm.com). All existing forms are still safe and sound, and they can be accessed using the new domain name.