[mamborambo]

The consumer's dependence on "legit-sounding domain name", a green SSL key, and recognizable corporate logos and website layout as the "proof" of authenticity is passe.

In this era of online ubiquity there should be another layer of opt-in validation, ring of trust, p2p feedback and rating, that can all be plugged into the consumer web experience.

[jesterson]

As weird as it sounds, it is still the best.

If we have centralised "licensing" solution it is abused by large capital to wash off smaller - there is plenty of examples.

If we have decentralised solution (which is basically what review is) - it is immediately abused by "marketers".

There is no simple and easy solution to the problem.

[BobbyJo]

IMO, the best solution to the problem is friction. Criminals are criminals because it's easy. If opening a fraudulent store is 90% as difficult as opening a legit one, no one is going to bother.

[FortiDude]

To me it's very simple: nation states should have their own layer that uses the national registry for companies to verify a domain.

When you register a business you also provide your official domains and so the validity of the website is checked against the validity of the business.

[crote]

The thing is, we tried this already. Twice.

First with domain names. The domain "nissan.com" is not owned by the well-known car company but by a completely unrelated computer company. As "Nissan Motors v. Nissan Computer" settled, this is totally fine and Nissan Computer still owns the domain.

Besides exact matches there are also similar-looking names. For example, a student named Mike Rowe started a small webdesign company called MikeRoweSoft, which drew the attention of Microsoft, leading to "Microsoft v. MikeRoweSoft" - which was settled out of court and resulted in the domain being transferred to Microsoft.

Second are Extended Validation domains - which used to show the company name in the URL bar. As Ian Carroll demonstrated[0] this isn't really worth a lot, and browsers no longer bother showing it at all[1].

Company names also often overlap when they are active in different areas, such as Apple Corp (record label founded by The Beatles) and Apple Inc. (tech multinational) - which over the years have shifted towards a rather impressive market overlap! Some companies are split with both sides keeping the original name, such as Motorola Inc.'s split into Motorola Solutions and Motorola Mobility. Sometimes products are sold under a completely different brand name, such as HMD selling Nokia-branded smartphones, or TP Vision selling Philips-branded televisions while MMD sells Philips-branded gaming monitors!

The thing is, reality is just too complicated for a "very simple" register. How are you supposed to fit in all of the scenarios listed above while still keeping it usable?

[0]: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/12/nope-... [1]: https://www.troyhunt.com/extended-validation-certificates-ar...

[null_object]

> To me it's very simple: nation states should have their own layer that uses the national registry for companies to verify a domain.

I think this can just add layers of bureaucracy that don't address the problem anyway.

In the early days of widespread internet use in Sweden it was quite difficult to register a .se web-address: not only were company documents needed, but the authority that granted use of the address also split your right to it geographically within Sweden, so that if you wanted the address to stretch across the whole country you needed to make multiple applications (using a subdomain system).

This process just made it almost impossible for a small personal startup to own a Swedish domain, and it was completely impossible to register a domain on a 'try-it' basis, to see if a nascent business idea would take-off.

In other words it just entrenched the dominant position of incumbents.

What happened instead, was that Swedes registered .com addresses, or .nu ('now' in Swedish), or other variations. And the same sort of thing would happen now: the international fraudulent sites would still be possible - just legitimate registrations would become much harder.

A little like what happens with pirating, where people using pirated software often have to jump through fewer hoops than legitimate users, who've paid for their installs, but need to constantly dial-up to be allowed to keep using the tools they've bought.

tldr; more bureaucracy for legitimate businesses, but doesn't address the core problem for end-users.

[moooo99]

In Germany we have an approach with a somewhat similar effect.

For any site with an commercial intent (which is pretty loosely defined) it is mandatory to have an Imprint with the person representing the company, the address of the HQ as well as the companies registration number and court location. It makes it somewhat more transparent what company is behind the site and gives you information you can lookup in public registries.

I hate it from a privacy perspective but it’s okay for for consumer protection.

[steve_taylor]

To register a .com.au or .net.au domain, you have to provide your ABN (Australian Business Number). The problem with that, however, is you don't have to prove you have the authority to do so. You can enter any business's ABN.

[stevewatson301]

The path to an China-esque ICP recordal system.

[TobbenTM]

Some countries do _kinda_ have this, for registering `.no` domains you need to be a Norwegian citizen or do it through a Norwegian company. Not sure how much that actually helps tho?

[mellavora]

Even better, let's get rid of names as identifiers. We all know names are problematic.

We could use government-issued tokens, maybe on a government-run blockchain.

And we could use the same for our personal (corporate) selves, such that all of our economic interactions were moderated through a government-run identity blockchain.

I want the mark on my forehead please, not the wrist, so I can pay by bowing my head to the money-god instead of just laying my wrist on the sensor.

What could possibly go wrong?

[prox]

That would be a great idea.

[NavinF]

In practice consumers just go straight to Amazon because they're afraid of the wider internet and depend on the return policy to save them when they get scammed. Doubt any "opt-in validation, ring of trust, p2p feedback and rating" will change that in the next decade.

[leveraction]

This and the fact that they have your cc and shipping already on file, which makes things a lot easier. More than once I have found a product on some site and then purchased it from Amazon just because it is so much easier.

[Krisjohn]

That’s kind of what antivirus web plugins do