I think you have engaged in a classic example of overthink. URLs are resolved right -to-left. In other words, xyz.com.com is requesting the subdomain xyz of “com” of the .com TLD. If you pop com.com into WHOIS you will likely discover it too is owned by cNet.

I hadn’t even thought about that. Many thanks to Reese for the solution!

The Original Post

I have spent the last few hours troubleshooting a really odd problem.  To kind of get my thoughts in order on what I have done and could do, I thought I would spell everything out here.  The problem is that whenever I enter any domain name and put the extension twice (like mitchkeeler.com.com) it redirects me to a search.com search page for it instead of giving me the normal error message.

To give you a little more information ahead of time, my DSL provider is AT&T (or Yahoo! AT&T to be more specific).

Here is where I would be redirected for that:

http://domainhelp.search.com/search?q=mitchkeeler&d=mitchkeeler.com.com

I always use Firefox, so first thing I checked was the other browsers I have installed right now.  Both Google Chrome and Internet Explorer 7 gave me the same results.

So then I thought, well maybe I have some sort of odd malware or virus on my PC.  So I tested another PC, running Windows XP and it gave the same problem.  So I thought, maybe it could be a Windows problem or it had spread to that machine?  So I turned on my laptop – which is running Kubuntu – and it gave me the same result.

Going out on a limb, I wanted to try something different – so I fired up my PlayStation Portable and tried to recreate the problem it it’s browser.  It sent me to the same result.

So now, you would think – well, there is a problem with the router or the connection from AT&T, right?  So I unplugged my PC from the router, hooked the DSL line up directly to my PC (taking the router out of the mix) and I still was given then stupid domainhelp.search.com page.

Now I decided to do a traceroute to the badly typed domain to see how it was redirecting.  That traced back to cNet, which owns the search.com domain name.

That is where I am at now, and I am kinda out of options on where to look next.  If you have any ideas, let me know!  Would love to hear ‘em.

Update: Also posted about the problem here on broadbandreports.com!

Bonus!  Bad Live Chat Support from Yahoo! AT&T DSL!

As a bonus – for those of you still checking in on this issue, here is my chat transcript with a Yahoo! AT&T DSL support member:

Mickey: How can I help you?

Mitch: Hello, I noticed that when I mistype a domain name such as adding an extra .com at the end, I am now being redirect to domainhelp.search.com

Mitch: Instead of getting and error page

Mickey: That is normal.

Mitch: When did this redirection start?

Mickey: Well, when did you try to put an extra domain?

Mitch: Well, just noticed it today, for example if I type in google.com.com by mistake I am taken here: http://domainhelp.search.com/search?q=google&d=google.com.com

Mickey: Just do not put any weird domain if you do not want to be directed.

Mitch: But, just to confirm – this is a “service” provided by AT&T, correct?

Mickey: All ISP do that.

Mitch: Alright, thanks you for your time.

Well I guess it finally happened sometime last night. The nice sleek and clean interface of Yahoo! Mail became ad-tastic. As an AT&T DSL customer I was getting the “plus” E-mail pack with my Web mail from Yahoo. I have been over this story before though.

I don’t mind ads on Web sites that are more “general” – that isn’t what bugs me. I just don’t like ads in my applications – such as Web mail, feed readers, ect.

Here is some feedback from others who don’t like being in the same boat:

I am on the phone with Yahoo At&T right now and they maintain that this is a part of their world class service. They are actually telling me that over the phone! It does get better, they are trying to give me a case ID that….you guessed it….they cannot send via email! I am a mail plus customer as well, no way I am sticking around and paying for something like this. Off to Google and GMail.

I’m a paid AT&T/Yahoo Mail, and first the very fist time I’ve found it being “decorated” and “laced” with all sorts of ads. I suppose I’d just have live with them now.

The ads hit my inbox tonight. Unacceptably obtrusive and annoying. I cannot believe paying DSL customers are being treated this way. No way I’m gonna send AT&T/Yahoo more money for an ad-free “plus” account. That is part of what I’ve been paying for the past several years. Time to change my homepage to Google and set-up a G-mail account.

So looks like I have two options that I’d consider going with. Go out and find a Greasemonkey script to take ‘em out or go give my money to Google for their apps service. I’m starting to lean towards the Gmail option – just got to find the time to give Yahoo a swift kick in the rear and a wave goodbye.