The Freename Forum

The ink is barely dry on the registry contract for .com and VeriSign Inc. is once again facing trouble: US Senator Elizabeth Warren and Democrat Representative Jerry Nadler have called on the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to take action against VeriSign's monopoly on fees for .com domains.

In their press release dated 22 November 2024, the politicians state that VeriSign has sole control and thus a government-approved monopoly over .com. VeriSign has abused this right: ‘Verisign has squeezed customers to enrich its investors while doing little to improve service’, they write. ‘Verisign is ripping off the owners of 150 million .com websites by charging over $10 annually for each .com registration, making over $1 billion with its predatory pricing scheme that the Company then uses to pad its shareholders’ pockets.’ This problem has only worsened under Donald Trump's (first) presidency. During Trump's first term, the NTIA, which reports to the US Department of Justice, relaxed existing restrictions on price increases at VeriSign; since then, VeriSign has increased the price of its annual registration fee by more than 30 per cent - without changing or improving its own services. VeriSign has used the profit to buy back shares. By 30 November 2024, the NTIA is asked to investigate the pricing of .com and whether it is in the best interest of consumers not to renew the contract with VeriSign in the future. At the same time, they are asking the Department of Justice to investigate whether VeriSign has a monopoly that violates the Sherman Act.

It remains unclear why Warren and Nadler are only now taking this step. On 25 November 2025, VeriSign announced that the registry agreement with the Internet registry ICANN for .com had been extended for a further six years. This step comes as no surprise; ICANN had already published the draft of the extension agreement in September 2024. It also gives VeriSign the right to increase the fees for .com domains by seven per cent in the last four years of each six-year contract period. Domain expert John Levine points out that the current wholesale price of US$10.26 for .com is in line with other top level domains, which is about the same as .org charges and less than what most nTLD registries charge for their new domain extensions. Even if the wholesale price were halved, it would not be a significant factor in the overall package of hosting and website design. Moreover, domains that are too cheap would attract criminals. Putting the registry contract out to public tender is also risky, because no matter what you think of VeriSign: the company is technically very competent and operations have been running 100 per cent without failures for decades. No other registry manages a TLD that is even half the size of .com. Levine admits that .com is a ‘cash cow’; however, the declining number of domain registrations shows that .com has no growth prospects, except through price increases, which further limits the interest of third parties.

VeriSign has already responded to the letter to wired.com. ‘We intend to respond to senator Warren and representative Nadler's letter, which repeats inaccuracies and misleading statements that have been aggressively promoted by a small, self-interested group of domain-name investors for years,’ said VeriSign spokesperson David McGuire. ‘We look forward to correcting the record and working with policymakers toward real solutions that benefit internet users.’

The letter from Elizabeth Warren and Jerry Nadler can be found at:
https://www.warren.senate.gov/newsroom/ ... ite-prices