Don't stress asking about the legitimacy of a writing website, just look it up on WHOIS. What if it's hidden?

As a student, we sometimes need to attend to other stuff, but school work hampers those efforts. The online writing industry has provided an easy way to get that good grade. However, fraudsters especially from Africa have manipulated innocent students from across the US into thinking they are legit with quality service and meaningless guarantees. Now we have a break, it only takes a minute or two to look up a website on WHOIS domain services and see who really is legit or not. I checked out a few and I was shocked; mypapergeek duped me, but I got them.

Related: Getting facts from the website's registration details:

Some people like WB assume that just because it can extract a site`s registrants` details, it can out scams. What it doesn`t realize is that dudes outside of the US and UK are registering companies in the two countries whilst seated thousands of miles from London or, say, California. In fact, if I wanted to open a company right now, I`d just fish out my card, pay the required fees and I will have my company in a matter of days. I`d then have the laugh of my life as WB defends my US `based` company whilst I scam naïve students big time without any fear of legal retributions.

Further, these operatives have their associates in the US and UK who give these virtual companies a sense of `physical-ness` in the countries that they are registered. They just use a flat`s address as their physical address. In fact, these companies have an edge over `native` companies since they only pay a tiny fraction of what they earn as taxes; the rest is carted to different countries tax-free LOL

Outing frauds using only the `location` of a company as the slashing algorithm is a silly, meaningless, useless, bootless waste of time.
I`d rather head to the sea and start counting sand.

Related: Hidden website registration info for a research website - is it normal?

ok so i heard about one site and researched it a little...i looked up the whois info and then researched some of the info i found...it turns out it wasn't really the owner's info because they registered it through another company that's just for that purpose...anyway i guess since there's a business that other companies can register through that maybe its normal and no big deal, but i was wondering what you guys think about whether we should be wary of sites that either have private registration or registered through another company to hide their info

Every site is different. If you post the exact domain name, I can provide the non-private Whois information. But note that a Whois search does NOT show the underlying, "private" registration information.

I'll also add that WHOIS won't help in a lot of cases. Most of the top search results for "essay paper writing services" in google show privacy-protected registrants. My own website is privacy protected because I still work in academics. As much as I hate talking on the phone, I suggest calling if there is a number. If you hear even the slightest nonnative accent, then you'll know the deal. If your still scared stiff, then you can request some freelancers to call you from a blocked number. We can't hand out our number or we would spending our entire days dealing with non-paying callers.

Also, I have checked and there are verifiably good writers to be found on EssayDirectory with website that show unprotected registrant information.

You also highlight another good point: You must dig a little if you want any sort of quality.

Registrant information (domain privacy) can be protected by legally available services such 'privacyprotect.org'. Alongside, registrant information can be easily misrepresented by manipulating the whole concept of WhoIs. Websites in academic writing industry employs both of these strategies.

The right way would be to do, as has already been stated above, some additional research on a company, website, or a writer. This forum is full of such tips.

Shipman I am so sorry for what happened, but in any case, it is not fair enough to blame writers from an entire continent just because of small mishap.

I would be wary of any company which hides data. They are obviously trying to conceal their location which would imply that they are falsely identifying their whereabouts on their site.

Karisdata, ESL writers like you are the problem here. This thread was going along just fine without anybody bashing the ESL scammers from Africa. Then you pop up and mention something about a small mishap and blaming an entire continent. It clearly shows that your level of reading comprehension and ability to stay on topic are pretty close to that of a goat.

On second thought, we can use your case to illustrate the second of two problems that I see coming from ESLers. The first things that a client needs to avoid are the obvious scammers. The second problem, which you underscore so perfectly here, is to avoid the ESL writers who may initially sound as if they can write very well, but in reality lack the depth and critical thinking skills needed to satisfy many client needs.

By the way, when a client gets scammed and/or underserved, it is no small mishap by any measure.

It so sad that your paranoia is being witnessed at such an early stage. Your constant usage of abusive words presents the highest degree of immorality. It does not matter how your judge ESLers or ENLers, but the quality of the jobs that someone does matters. Am once again sad to notice that your teachers did not install a sense of decorum in you. Your chauvinism is highly smelling making you get obsessed in attacking my post and not sticking to the subject matter. I addressed the question of prejudice against African writers, who you claimed as illegitimate. You should note that African writers have been servicing this industry wholeheartedly. Whilst some of you take writing as a short time job, in Africa Academic writing is considered a professional establishment. You can use WHOIS.COM or even dyna.dot to track the legitimacy of a website, but i will assure you quality is an individual aspect and not a continent predicament.

I never claimed such a thing. There is nothing inherently wrong with African writers - I've said this several times in a variety of ways. However, you and the others here have been too dense to notice that I was attempting to be fair. What's with you guys? You all piss and moan about how everybody here is a racist bigot, but when someone says anything remotely reasonable you go on the offensive.

I had actually thought that maybe it would interesting and fruitful to develop a working relationship with some ESL writers from Africa and elsewhere. I'm seeing that I was dead wrong as you are all a bunch of barbaric nincompoops intent on making chaos. Do you guys have some sort of cultural auto-destruct button that gets pushed every time someone says something slightly reasonable?

So I'll just say it now that I may have been naive. It now seems fair to say that, at least on this forum, ALL African writers are not to be trusted until one steps forward and constructs a logically coherent argument. This seems unlikely. You guys are bottom feeders simply because you are preying on students who don't understand logic. That is to say that we are not in the same league. Again, I'm not an example of morality. But I'm not going around looking for people too stupid to figure out what is happening.

What kind of awkward nonsense is that, anyway? It's an "ESL special," that's for sure.


You are a clueless idiot. The debate starts and ends right there.


Good stuff.

Search improvements have been made since this thread was first opened. These days, the Google search for a writing website already returns, not just the WHOIS information, but a geolocation representation of the registered address of the company. Since these company websites can buy a US or UK based address for their physical location, the geolocation map comes in handy when doing deeper investigation into a service prior to hiring the company. For one, the photo representation of the office address tells you exactly where that address is located. More than once I've seen that the address leads either to an empty lot, a children's playground, or a very abandoned looking street in a not so well to do neighborhood. These are better indicators as to the legitimacy of a company when compared to WHOIS. If the address is obviously false, then, once a student sees the information, he may very well decide to move on and try to find a company that actually has a physical office in the place it claims to be located in. Good luck with that though. It will never happen.

IP search websites have also become a bit greedy when it comes to releasing of information. What was once a free source of information now asks the user to register and pay. Otherwise, only basic information will be given. The basic information still keeps the actual location of the company a secret. Only the technical support information is released, which is of not much help to a student who really wants to verify the location of a given company.

IP information has become more secretive as the years have gone by. I believe that this is because of the advent of the Data Privacy Act across various countries. While this is meant to protect the privacy of a business or person online, it also poses a risk to the people engaging with these people and businesses since they can no longer see pertinent registration information that would help the person assess the potential problems they may encounter when dealing with a business

IP information is unreliable, both because it can be deliberately masked by bad actors and because it often (innocently) reflects only the location of the host's servers, which is (obviously) totally unrelated to the location of a completely legitimate company (or person) running a website. That's why your safest bet is simply to use only providers whose actual personal identity and physical location can be confirmed on your end, such as through local landline phone directories. Avoid providers who refuse to disclose their real names and/or whose names and locations can't be verified independently.