How To Hijack A Domain Name

In this post you will know how domain names are hacked and how they can be protected. The act of hacking domain names is known as ‘Domain Hijacking’. Here’s what domain hijacking is all about.

Domain hijacking is a process by which Internet Domain Names are stolen from its legitimate owners. This is also known as domain theft. Below you’ll see how the domain names operate and how they get associated with a particular website.

The operation of domain name is as follows

Any website let’s say hiptv.com has two parts – 1.The domain name(hiptv.com) and the web hosting server where the files of the website are actually hosted and stored. In reality, the domain name and the web server are two different parts and they must be integrated before a website can operate successfully. The integration of a domain name with the web hosting server is done like this:

1. After registering a new domain name, we get a control panel(cPanel) where we can have full control of the domain.

2. From this domain cPanel, we point our domain name to the web server where the website’s files are actually hosted.

An example:

Michael registers a new domain ‘xyz.com’ from ‘X domain Registration Company’. He also buys a hosting plan from ‘Y hosting company’. He uploads all of his files (.HTML, .PHP, CSS etc.) to his web server (at Y). From the domain control panel (of X) he configures his domain name “xyz.com” to point to his web server (of Y). Now whenever an Internet user types “xyz.com”, the domain name “xyz.com” is resolved to the target web server and the website is displayed - This is how a website actually works.

What happens when a domain is hijacked?

Now let’s see what happens when a domain name is hijacked. To hijack a domain name you just need to get access to the domain cPanel and point the domain name to another web server other than the legitimate one. So to hijack a domain you need not gain access to the target web server.

For example, a hacker gets access to the domain cPanel of “xyz.com”. The hacker re-configures the domain name to point it to some other web server (Z). Now whenever an Internet user tries to access “xyz.com” he is taken to the hacker’s website (Z) and not to Michael’s original website (Y).

In this case the domain name (xyz.com) is said to be hijacked.

How the domain names are hijacked

To hijack a domain name, it’s necessary to gain access to the domain control panel of the target domain. To do this you need the following;

1. The domain registrar name for the target domain.

2. The administrative email address associated with the target domain.

All these information can be gotten by accessing the WHOIS data of the target domain. To get access the WHOIS data, go to whois.domaintools.com, enter the target domain name and click on Lookup. Once the WHOIS data is loaded scroll down and you’ll see WHOIS Record. Under this you’ll get the ‘Administrative contact email address’.

To get the domain registrar name, search for something that looks like this under the WHOIS Record. ‘Registration Service Provided By ABC Company’. Here ABC Company is the domain registrar. In case if you don’t find this, then scroll up and you’ll see ICANN Registrar under the “Registry Data”. In this case, the ICANN registrar is the actual domain registrar.

The administrative email address associated with the domain is the backdoor to hijack the domain name. It is the key to unlock the domain control panel. So to take full control of the domain, the hacker will hack the administrative email associated with it.

Once the hacker has full control of this email account, he will visit the domain registrar’s website and click on forgot password in the login page. There he will be asked to enter either the domain name or the administrative email address to initiate the password reset process. Once this is done all the details to reset the password will be sent to the administrative email address. Since the hacker has the access to this email account he can easily reset the password of domain control panel. After resetting the password, he logs into the control panel with the new password and from there he can hijack the domain within minutes.

How to protect the domain name from being hijacked

The best way to protect the domain name is to protect the administrative email account associated with the domain. If you loose control of this email account, you loose control of your domain.

Another best way to protect your domain is to go for private domain registration. When you register a domain name using the private registration option, all your personal details such as your name, address, phone and administrative email address are hidden from the public. So when a hacker performs a WHOIS lookup for you domain name, he will not be able to find your name, phone and administrative email address. So the private registration provides an extra security and protects your privacy.

Private domain registration costs a bit extra but is really worth for its advantages. Every domain registrar provides an option to go for private registration, so when you purchase a new domain make sure that you select the private registration option.

From my experience the best email service provider you should use is Google Mail. This is because Google has double protection for its users accounts and it alerts you every time someone tries to access your account from a foreign location. Also Google lets you use your phone to get back access to your phone if it’s been hijacked.