Worldcom.com Goes Offline

By Derek Iwasiuk
DomainInformer.com
May 05, 2006

According to a report of the Internet services company Netcraft (netcraft.com) on Thursday, the domains worldcom.com and worldcom.net have been taken offline. This means that requests for those URLs return no response. The domains are still owned by WorldCom's successor MCI, Inc., which was bought by Verizon for $7.6 billion earlier this year.

When a company is acquired, its domain names are typically redirected to the web site of the acquiring company, redirection services being freely provided by most registrars. But, according to Netcraft, worldcom.com and worldcom.net have no A record listed in their DNS settings, suggesting the domains have been intentionally taken offline to "retire" the name.

WorldCom had more than $103 billion in assets when it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in July 2003 after the company admitted to having inflated as much as $11 billion in "profits" through deceptive accounting. At that time changed brand name to MCI, which had been used earlier in its corporate existence. MCI ultimately emerged from bankruptcy with about $5 billion in debt and more than $6 billion in cash. Former WorldCom CEO Bernard Ebbers was convicted of securities fraud and conspiracy charges last year, and sentenced to 25 years in prison.