Account Ownership and Recovery Policy
Last Modified: April 1, 2017
The following document constitutes Oracle’s Account Ownership, Access Recovery and Service Separation Policy for Dyn Services. If you (a “Customer”) no longer have access to your Oracle account for Dyn Services (referred to herein simply as an “Account”), or your Account has been terminated, please follow the instructions below to regain access to your Dyn Services, or create a new Account.
Please note: For privacy and security reasons, Dyn does not discuss account ownership or recovery matters over the phone or social media. Please contact our Billing Team at billing@dyndns.com for assistance with account access recovery.
Definition of Ownership
There are two (2) different types of ownership Customers should be aware of when attempting to regain access to an Account or activating services for an Account.
Account Ownership
The creator of every Account on an Oracle owned and operated website offering Dyn Services must, in accordance with Oracle’s Acceptable Use Policy for Dyn Services (the “AUP”), provide a contact email address at which Oracle may contact him/her (the “Authoritative Contact Email Address”). Before any account is activated, Oracle will send an email to the Authoritative Contact Email Address with a link that the prospective account owner must click through to confirm that the account associated with the Authoritative Contact Email Address should be activated.
The person or entity that controls the Authoritative Contact Email Address is considered the “Account Owner.”
Domain Name Ownership
The party that purchases any domain name must, pursuant to the Domain Registration Agreement (“DRA”) the party enters into at the time of domain name purchase, provide the domain name registrar with certain contact information, and such party must keep that contact information up to date with such registrar. More specifically, the party is required to provide the name, postal address, email address, and voice and fax (if available) telephone numbers of the administrative, billing, and technical contacts for the domain name at issue. The person that controls the Administrative Contact Email Address is considered the “Domain Name Owner.”
Domain name ownership supersedes account ownership.
2 Factor Authentication
You can choose to enable 2 Factor Authentication (2fa) to access your account. By enabling 2fa and choosing the “Use Text Messaging” option, in addition to your password, you must enter your mobile phone number and a code will be sent to your phone via text. Note that 2fa relies on third parties, such as your mobile phone provider, to deliver the code to your phone. Any use of your phone number by these third parties is subject to the applicable third party terms & conditions, and privacy policies.
Account Access Recovery
The following methods describe the proper procedures for regaining access to Accounts and related Dyn Services:
Password Reset
All Account owners may use the Reset Password Form to regain access to their Account. An Account owner may enter either their username or Authoritative Contact Email Address into the form. A confirmation email will be delivered to the Authoritative Contact Email Address, allowing the Account owner to change their password and log in with new credentials. This is the primary means of Account recovery in all circumstances.
Recovering Free Accounts
“Expired” Accounts
Free accounts are subject to inactivity expiration. If an Account Owner does not log into the account within a rolling thirty (30) day period, the account and its services are subject to deletion from the Dyn database. Free accounts cannot and will not be restored by the Dyn Billing Team. In the event of a “lost/expired” account, Customers may create a new account by following the steps found here.
Account Deletion for Invalid Email Addresses
The AUP requires Customers to maintain a valid Authoritative Contact Email Address at all times. If the Authoritative Contact Email Address is no longer valid (returns 500-level error code from the responsible mail server, e.g. 550 User Unknown, Message Undeliverable, Delivery Failure, etc.), Oracle may, in its sole discretion, terminate the Account and any associated services for noncompliance. Upon deletion, Accounts and any associated Dynamic DNS hostnames are returned to the pool of available account and service names, allowing Customers to potentially recreate them. Oracle shall have no liability in the event a Customer is unable to recreate an Account, access an Account, or access a Dynamic DNS hostname that was used prior to such termination, expiration or deletion.
To remove a free account with an invalid email address, Customers should contact the Dyn Billing Team at billing@dyndns.com. In the email, Customers must provide the username associated with the account, briefly explain the situation which informed them that the address on file is invalid and that the Customer wishes to have the account removed. The Dyn Billing Team will verify address validity, then, if applicably invalid, remove account at issue and associated services.
Please note: Under no circumstances will Dyn transfer, delete or recreate individual services for free accounts. If Customers lose access to a free account, but the Authoritative Contact Email Address is still valid, or otherwise does not return a “permanent” failure (e.g. returns 421 Service Temporarily Unavailable, mail server times out, etc.), Dyn will not remove the account in question. Customers will need to create a new account and choose a different corresponding hostname.
Recovering Paid Accounts
Information Verification
If the Password Reset method outlined above does not work, a Customer’s next option is to provide certain billing details to verify account ownership. Please contact the Oracle Billing Team at billing@dyndns.com with the Account name in question and request billing verification. Customer will be asked for certain pieces of information regarding the payment method used to purchase the services on that Account; if the information is correct, the Oracle Billing Team will update the Authoritative Contact Email Address for the Account to a new address of Customer’s choosing. Customer will receive a Change Email confirmation request at the new address. Customer may then issue a Password Reset (see above) to regain access to the account.
Please note: This recovery method is only available to Customers who have used a single credit card to purchase services on their Account. If Customer has used more than one credit card, or one credit card in conjunction with another method of payment, even if the billing information is identical, this recovery method will not be available.
Account Change Form
If the other recovery methods are unavailable to you, control over your Account may be recovered by submitting an Administrative/Authoritative Contact Email Address Change Request Form (“Change Request Form”) along with any associated and required documentation. The Change Request Form may be found here. Please note that this recovery method requires an administrative processing fee that must be submitted prior to account recovery.
Please note: The correct fax number is +1-603-668-6474.
Domain Name and Dyn Account Separation
Some Customers create and administer Dyn Services on behalf of others (i.e. a consultant setting up and maintaining websites for local businesses). These Customers frequently keep all of the domain names they administer in a single account for convenience. Unfortunately, sometimes the Account owner becomes unavailable or unresponsive, and the domain name owner must regain access to their services to maintain them.
Because of this, Oracle considers the Administrative Contact Email Address on file for a domain in WHOIS to be ultimately authoritative for a domain registration. If Oracle receives a request from the Administrative Contact Email Address from a domain name owner, Oracle will consider such request to supersede the authority of the Account owner and will comply with the domain name owner’s request.
To separate and recover a domain name, Customer must create a new Account using the Administrative Contact Email Address for the domain in WHOIS. Once created and confirmed, please contact the Oracle Billing Team at billing@dyndns.com stating the desire to move the domain name and its associated services into the new Account. The Oracle Billing Team will verify Customer’s ownership of the domain and transfer it – and all associated services, including Oracle Standard DNS DynECT Email Lite, etc. – to the new account. WHOIS lookups may be performed at http://whois.net/.
Please note: Only the Administrative Contact Email Address is considered authoritative for a domain registration; no other contact information, including registrant, billing, or technical, is considered authoritative, and requests from these additional contacts will be ignored.