Imagine a world without domain names. While it is possible to live in one, the majority of people would have a hard time memorizing sets of numbers instead of names. If you want to visit google[.]com, for example, you would need to type in 172[.]217[.]11[.]14 every single time – not to mention that this IP address might change every time Google changes the way it deploys its web server network. But you get the point. People would need to memorize several series of numbers so they can shop, pay bills, and get in touch with people from across the globe online.

We dare say that without domain names, the online world would not be flourishing as it is now. The domain name industry in itself is also thriving, with thousands of domains bought and registered every day. Verisign disclosed that during the fourth quarter of 2019, it closed 362.3 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs).

With that enormous number, how can you monitor new domain names? That is where Newly Registered & Recently Expired Domains Data Feed comes in handy. But perhaps a more pressing question is why there should be a need to monitor domain names, notably, newly registered ones? We addressed these questions in this post, starting with the practical usages of having a newly registered domain list or database.

4 Practical Usages of Newly Registered & Just Expired Domains Data Feed

1. Industry Monitoring

Monitoring the industry is an effective way of meeting the demands of the target market in time. Being in the know when it comes to industry trends helps companies get ahead of their competitors. There are several ways in which companies can monitor industry trends, such as reading the news and keeping in touch with their networks. However, looking at newly registered domains would also allow them to see what other companies, specifically market leaders in the industry, are doing.

Companies in the lending industry, for instance, would learn through a newly registered domains list that in recent days, 98 domains with the word “loan” went online.

From this information, loan officers could see some of the industry trends, including delivering cash loans to the clients’ homes. They could consider offering the same services, thereby meeting the needs of their prospects better. After all, domain information is frequently used in the context of entrepreneurship.

2. Competitor Monitoring

As was mentioned earlier, a newly registered domains database enables organizations to know what other companies are up to. Specifically, the database helps companies in competitor monitoring activities by giving them a glimpse of the competition’s business strategies. For local businesses, a newly registered domains list could inform them about what new businesses are coming in.

Considering the term “Tampa Bay” (a city in Florida), for example, we can see that 11 domain names were recently registered with businesses ranging from dog training and hypnosis to real estate and tutorial services.

An online marketing services firm based in Tampa Bay would mainly be concerned about the new domain name “getyourbusinessonlinetampabay.” The registration of this new domain could mean that a recently established online marketing company is targeting Tampa Bayece business owners. Upon knowing this, the firm could step up its marketing efforts, develop deeper relationships with existing clients, and ramp up its overall business efforts.

While around 91% of companies track their direct competitors, take note that you should also monitor your indirect competitors, market leaders, and prospects.

3. Brand & Phishing Protection

Brand protection these days goes beyond just having an excellent advertising and public relations (PR) team. As more businesses go online, monitoring domain names should be a crucial element of a company’s brand protection strategy.

Obtaining a newly registered domains list helps brands, especially those that have registered trademarks, monitor how these figure in domain names.

If YouTube monitors newly registered domains, the video streaming giant will know that 23 new domains that use its brand went online recently.

Note that some of these domains may indeed belong to YouTube and thus use Google LLC as registrant name. However, some are not owned by Google, which was easy to verify using WHOIS Lookup.

• youtubesupport[.]com

• funnyvideosyoutube[.]com

• guide-youtube[.]com
  

These domain names could be involved in different activities, including malicious ones. For instance, YouTube content creators may visit youtubesupport[.]com thinking that it is the Internet giant’s customer support page. If prompted to, when they type their login credentials, threat actors may record their keystrokes using malware. In no time, cybercriminals could get hold of YouTube content creators’ AdSense and other Google accounts.

Companies can prevent cybersquatting by monitoring the use of their brand names on the Internet. In the process, they also thwart other possibly malicious activities.

4. Cybersecurity

A robust cybersecurity posture requires an organization to derive a wide range of threat intelligence from different sources. For one, security teams could make use of malware data feeds and IP geolocation to strengthen their systems. Another source of data is domain intelligence, which could come from a newly registered domains database.

By monitoring newly registered domains, organizations will see which ones are potentially dangerous. They can investigate further by feeding the domain data into their existing threat intelligence platforms or security information and event management (SIEM) solutions.

To illustrate, we ran grlfr[.]com on Threat Intelligence Platform (TIP). This domain name is on the newly registered domains list. Indeed, the platform detected some vulnerabilities, even giving it a very low reputation score of 67.5%.

How to Access Newly Registered Domain Database Download

Listed below are the steps in accessing Newly Registered Domain Database Download:

• Log in to your WhoisXML API account.
• Click the “Download Database” button on the Newly Registered & Just Expired Domains home page.
• You should reach the data feed directory where you can see different data feeds, depending on your subscription.

• Click “Newly_Registered_Domains,” where you will need to enter another directory called “Enterprise.”

• At this point, you will see other directories such as the New gTLDs (domain_names_ngtlds_new) and Dropped Domains (domain_names_dropped_whois) databases. Click domain_names_new to access the newly registered domains database.

• Once inside the directory, you will see that the domain names appear according to TLD—.aero, .asia, .biz, .com, and so on. Choose the TLD you’re interested in. Our examples in the previous sections are from the .com list.

• Inside each TLD directory, you will see different databases listed according to their extraction date from oldest to newest.
  

• The examples cited in the previous section are from the database labeled “cur,” extracted on March 27th.

• Click your preferred date, and you will reach another directory where you can download a .csv file of the newly registered domains list.

Conclusion

With Newly Registered & Just Expired Domains Data Feed, you can access more than 100,000 recently registered domain names, spanning major gTLDs and new gTLDs. As a bonus, you also get access to lists of dropped or expired domain names with their WHOIS records. This data can prove useful when investigating or tracking down the owner of a suspicious domain.

Monitoring newly registered domains enables companies to ramp up their marketing efforts and competitor analysis. Aside from this, the domain intelligence gleaned from the database could also help them protect their brands and trademarks, and beef up their cybersecurity posture.