Did Pentax kill pentaxphotogallery.com?

**monochrome** · 07-20-2015, 07:20 PM

Originally posted by foto guy

They are aware and working on issue.

https://twitter.com/foto_gy/status/623306426761506816

Originally posted by jatrax

I emailed my contact at Pentax who expressed surprise. I was told they were contacting the web team for an explanation.

If you look at the page it simply says the domain name has expired and is pending renewal. Somebody messed up, but I seriously doubt the gallery is going away. If you want to close a website you take the site offline, you don't just wait until the domain name expires. Even if RIcoh is closing out the PPG they would not want anyone else to get that domain name.

Quite possible the registered notification emails are no longer valid. A screw up but if the notices went to ex-employees or abandoned accounts easy to see how it slipped through. When I took over my present job I nearly lost our domain name because my predecessor had passed away and the notices were going to his personal email.

Originally posted by boriscleto

A whois shows the domain registered to Pentax Ricoh Imaging Americas Corporation.

Note the Registration wasn't updated to reflect the change of corporate name from 2013. Not so unusual, I suppose, but the Ricoh Imaging DOMAIN ITSELF changed over two years ago - to 'us.ricoh-imaging.com' - so it is quite possible renewal emails are floating around the ether addressed to someone@PRAC.com (or whatever it was). Furthermore, if the person responsible for (among many, many other things) relations with GoDaddy left Pentax 18 months ago to pursue a career in another state - and her email address is no longer monitored - well, you know what happened.

My contact no longer works for Ricoh Imaging US.

Last edited by monochrome; 07-20-2015 at 08:00 PM.

mee · 07-20-2015, 07:22 PM

Originally posted by jatrax

I emailed my contact at Pentax who expressed surprise. I was told they were contacting the web team for an explanation.

If you look at the page it simply says the domain name has expired and is pending renewal. Somebody messed up, but I seriously doubt the gallery is going away. If you want to close a website you take the site offline, you don't just wait until the domain name expires. Even if RIcoh is closing out the PPG they would not want anyone else to get that domain name.

Quite possible the registered notification emails are no longer valid. A screw up but if the notices went to ex-employees or abandoned accounts easy to see how it slipped through. When I took over my present job I nearly lost our domain name because my predecessor had passed away and the notices were going to his personal email.

That is a major flaw on their part to place company business on personal email accounts. I surely hope Ricoh isn't that backwoods in their handling of front facing systems.

K David · 07-20-2015, 07:35 PM

Originally posted by mee

It is a little offputting that they'd even need to be contacted.. as in.. no one is upkeeping with site?

The root cause boils down to the registered e-mail being of a former employee. After two years, they're probably not forwarding that person's e-mail to anyone. So all the notices probably went unread. I've taken over for people who were let go from jobs before and never received their e-mails for more than a year after they left. That's typically enough time for all the old business to clear out. So they probably have to re-learn how to renew the subscriptions and change the contact info. It shouldn't actually be too difficult since there's a post-turn-off grace period when no one can buy it, IIRC from the time I lost my website for a half day.

**jatrax** · 07-20-2015, 07:48 PM

Originally posted by mee

That is a major flaw on their part to place company business on personal email accounts. I surely hope Ricoh isn't that backwoods in their handling of front facing systems.

In my case they really did not have 'company' accounts at that time, everyone used their personal account. And yes, that is not proper but that's how it was done. In Ricoh's case it appears the registered contact used a @prac.com account but that person is no longer an employee. Why dead accounts are not forwarded to an email admin is another question but stuff happens.

johnmflores · 07-20-2015, 07:53 PM - **1 Like**

These reasonable explanations aren't good for the neurotics among us. As TMBG says, "If it wasn't for disappointment I wouldn't have any appointments."

**tlong423** · 07-20-2015, 08:09 PM - **1 Like**

It does rather beg the question, why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains? /vent

K David · 07-20-2015, 08:15 PM

Originally posted by tlong423

why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains?

Because they're more focused on research and bringing good products to market than domain names.

**boriscleto** · 07-20-2015, 08:20 PM - **2 Likes**

Originally posted by tlong423

It does rather beg the question, why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains? /vent

It does beg the question, upon seeing that you have posted 166 times in 4 years, why would I not add you directly to my ignore list? /boriscleto'd™.

**monochrome** · 07-20-2015, 08:20 PM - **1 Like**

Here's an interesting sidebar, as I recall in general reading about it in Forbes.

Target Corp., object of a massive Credit Card hack - at the time the largest ever and quite a big deal - actually had the best internet security strategy of any major retailer. It was multi-layered, duplicative, used both internal and external systems, employees and contractors, was compartmentalized and layered - they did EVERYTHING right, actually invented certain techniques - except ONE CRITICAL ERROR.

An outside contractor responsible for shell-penetration monitoring actually discovered the first intrusion attempts and reported them according to the Security Protocol. Another contractor determined there was unusual activity happening inside their core systems and reported according to Security Protocol. Internal analysts discovered a series massive files on core servers that sat for several days - and shouldn't have been there at all - and reported them according to Security Protocol.

Security Protocol was to report by secure email to the Head of Internet Security - and only to that person, as a 'mole-control' technique (who trusts the watchers?). Unfortunately the Head of Internet Security had left the post three weeks before the first report of unusual penetration attempts was made by the first-layer contractor. No one had been appointed to replace the IS Head, and NO ONE - literally NO ONE - had authority to access his email until he was replaced. Only the CEO (who IIRC was forced out) could designate access to the email account and there were three, compartmentalized steps to obtain access.

Repeated emails - escalating in severity of warning - to that email address went unread and unanswered during those critical days. By the merest chance the hack was pulled off while the company interviewed IS Head successor. The compartmentalization of Security actually worked to prevent any one layer contractor from breaking out of the Protocol to raise an alarm anywhere else - they couldn't and didn't know who to contact.

mee · 07-20-2015, 08:24 PM

Originally posted by jatrax

In my case they really did not have 'company' accounts at that time, everyone used their personal account. And yes, that is not proper but that's how it was done. In Ricoh's case it appears the registered contact used a @prac.com account but that person is no longer an employee. Why dead accounts are not forwarded to an email admin is another question but stuff happens.

Both cases are huge flaws in the system. I can understand the mom and pop company just starting up not having that sorted. However, with Ricoh, these shouldn't be going to a single employee account, but to an account that redirects to several people in the chain. Or at least, as you said, redirecting to a catchall admin. These type of issues are very avoidable... this stuff should never happen within major corporations.

I mean, at the end of the day, it isn't a massive issue. But it does show how flawed some parts of their company are (in terms of communication).. I mean they are a multibillion dollar company and they can't get contact information sorted internally over such a simple matter? That doesn't build confidence on the consumer level with me..

What does a potential customer think when they hit the pentax gallery to see what a Pentax camera can do and are greeted with a godaddy page. hahahaha.. it looks like amateur hour to them.

rawr · 07-20-2015, 08:35 PM

Originally posted by tlong423

why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains?

I've seen this issue happen several times before - even to companies like Microsoft (which forgot to renew it's UK hotmail domain once).

There are companies out there nowadays that you can pay to manage these things for corporates with large global domain portfolios, but a big enterprise like Ricoh should be able to do it themselves. If they haven't done so already, they need to audit all their business units to find all their public online assets, build a centrally managed database in Tokyo of their global domain assets, then task a small team to look after that. They should also integrate that project, of course, with their online security and IP protection framework.

RonHendriks1966 · 07-21-2015, 12:09 AM - **2 Likes**

Looking forward to see Ed from photouniverse to talk about this for 10 minutes.

Giklab · 07-21-2015, 12:24 AM - **2 Likes**

Originally posted by RonHendriks1966

Looking forward to see Ed from photouniverse to talk about this for 10 minutes.

XD

deus ursus · 07-21-2015, 01:08 AM

Originally posted by RonHendriks1966

Would there still be a back-up for the entire content?

This reminds me of once on another forum I participated in. One guy had some trouble accessing the forum or whatever. We "found out" that he had messed up the whole internet and others "had trouble" accessing it as well. Luckily one of us had a backup of the internet on some floppy discs, so he should be able to recover it.

We almost made him believe it. :-)

Not a Number · 07-21-2015, 01:38 AM

What's the big deal? GoDaddy holds dot com domains for 25 days after the expire before auctioning it off.

So maybe the person that was in charge of the registration forgot to their successor about the registration or give them the passwords.

So maybe HR forgot to tell IS that the emails should be forwarded to the successor.

So if you change hosts or registration authorities and for a while your website url comes up with 404 errors - that looks very amateurish too - but there's not a damn thing to be done about it as it takes time for DNS changes like this to propagate throughout the web.

The bottom line is “The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men, gang aft agley,”

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07-20-2015, 07:20 PM	#31
monochrome Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Working From Home Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 26,276	Originally posted by foto guy They are aware and working on issue. https://twitter.com/foto_gy/status/623306426761506816 Originally posted by jatrax I emailed my contact at Pentax who expressed surprise. I was told they were contacting the web team for an explanation. If you look at the page it simply says the domain name has expired and is pending renewal. Somebody messed up, but I seriously doubt the gallery is going away. If you want to close a website you take the site offline, you don't just wait until the domain name expires. Even if RIcoh is closing out the PPG they would not want anyone else to get that domain name. Quite possible the registered notification emails are no longer valid. A screw up but if the notices went to ex-employees or abandoned accounts easy to see how it slipped through. When I took over my present job I nearly lost our domain name because my predecessor had passed away and the notices were going to his personal email. Originally posted by boriscleto A whois shows the domain registered to Pentax Ricoh Imaging Americas Corporation. Note the Registration wasn't updated to reflect the change of corporate name from 2013. Not so unusual, I suppose, but the Ricoh Imaging DOMAIN ITSELF changed over two years ago - to 'us.ricoh-imaging.com' - so it is quite possible renewal emails are floating around the ether addressed to someone@PRAC.com (or whatever it was). Furthermore, if the person responsible for (among many, many other things) relations with GoDaddy left Pentax 18 months ago to pursue a career in another state - and her email address is no longer monitored - well, you know what happened. My contact no longer works for Ricoh Imaging US. Last edited by monochrome; 07-20-2015 at 08:00 PM.

07-20-2015, 07:22 PM	#32
mee Veteran Member Join Date: May 2010 Posts: 7,403	Originally posted by jatrax I emailed my contact at Pentax who expressed surprise. I was told they were contacting the web team for an explanation. If you look at the page it simply says the domain name has expired and is pending renewal. Somebody messed up, but I seriously doubt the gallery is going away. If you want to close a website you take the site offline, you don't just wait until the domain name expires. Even if RIcoh is closing out the PPG they would not want anyone else to get that domain name. Quite possible the registered notification emails are no longer valid. A screw up but if the notices went to ex-employees or abandoned accounts easy to see how it slipped through. When I took over my present job I nearly lost our domain name because my predecessor had passed away and the notices were going to his personal email. That is a major flaw on their part to place company business on personal email accounts. I surely hope Ricoh isn't that backwoods in their handling of front facing systems.

07-20-2015, 07:35 PM	#33
K David Veteran Member Join Date: Oct 2012 Location: Colorado Photos: Gallery Posts: 1,437	Originally posted by mee It is a little offputting that they'd even need to be contacted.. as in.. no one is upkeeping with site? The root cause boils down to the registered e-mail being of a former employee. After two years, they're probably not forwarding that person's e-mail to anyone. So all the notices probably went unread. I've taken over for people who were let go from jobs before and never received their e-mails for more than a year after they left. That's typically enough time for all the old business to clear out. So they probably have to re-learn how to renew the subscriptions and change the contact info. It shouldn't actually be too difficult since there's a post-turn-off grace period when no one can buy it, IIRC from the time I lost my website for a half day.

07-20-2015, 07:48 PM	#34
jatrax Site Supporter Join Date: May 2010 Location: Washington Cascades Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 12,991	Originally posted by mee That is a major flaw on their part to place company business on personal email accounts. I surely hope Ricoh isn't that backwoods in their handling of front facing systems. In my case they really did not have 'company' accounts at that time, everyone used their personal account. And yes, that is not proper but that's how it was done. In Ricoh's case it appears the registered contact used a @prac.com account but that person is no longer an employee. Why dead accounts are not forwarded to an email admin is another question but stuff happens.

07-20-2015, 07:53 PM - 1 Like	#35
johnmflores Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Somerville, NJ Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 5,361	These reasonable explanations aren't good for the neurotics among us. As TMBG says, "If it wasn't for disappointment I wouldn't have any appointments."

07-20-2015, 08:09 PM - 1 Like	#36
tlong423 Pentaxian Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: Kansas City Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 194	It does rather beg the question, why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains? /vent

07-20-2015, 08:15 PM	#37
K David Veteran Member Join Date: Oct 2012 Location: Colorado Photos: Gallery Posts: 1,437	Originally posted by tlong423 why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains? Because they're more focused on research and bringing good products to market than domain names.

07-20-2015, 08:20 PM - 2 Likes	#38
boriscleto Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: North Syracuse, NY Photos: Gallery Posts: 16,475	Originally posted by tlong423 It does rather beg the question, why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains? /vent It does beg the question, upon seeing that you have posted 166 times in 4 years, why would I not add you directly to my ignore list? /boriscleto'd™.

07-20-2015, 08:20 PM - 1 Like	#39
monochrome Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Working From Home Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 26,276	Here's an interesting sidebar, as I recall in general reading about it in Forbes. Target Corp., object of a massive Credit Card hack - at the time the largest ever and quite a big deal - actually had the best internet security strategy of any major retailer. It was multi-layered, duplicative, used both internal and external systems, employees and contractors, was compartmentalized and layered - they did EVERYTHING right, actually invented certain techniques - except ONE CRITICAL ERROR. An outside contractor responsible for shell-penetration monitoring actually discovered the first intrusion attempts and reported them according to the Security Protocol. Another contractor determined there was unusual activity happening inside their core systems and reported according to Security Protocol. Internal analysts discovered a series massive files on core servers that sat for several days - and shouldn't have been there at all - and reported them according to Security Protocol. Security Protocol was to report by secure email to the Head of Internet Security - and only to that person, as a 'mole-control' technique (who trusts the watchers?). Unfortunately the Head of Internet Security had left the post three weeks before the first report of unusual penetration attempts was made by the first-layer contractor. No one had been appointed to replace the IS Head, and NO ONE - literally NO ONE - had authority to access his email until he was replaced. Only the CEO (who IIRC was forced out) could designate access to the email account and there were three, compartmentalized steps to obtain access. Repeated emails - escalating in severity of warning - to that email address went unread and unanswered during those critical days. By the merest chance the hack was pulled off while the company interviewed IS Head successor. The compartmentalization of Security actually worked to prevent any one layer contractor from breaking out of the Protocol to raise an alarm anywhere else - they couldn't and didn't know who to contact.

07-20-2015, 08:24 PM	#40
mee Veteran Member Join Date: May 2010 Posts: 7,403	Originally posted by jatrax In my case they really did not have 'company' accounts at that time, everyone used their personal account. And yes, that is not proper but that's how it was done. In Ricoh's case it appears the registered contact used a @prac.com account but that person is no longer an employee. Why dead accounts are not forwarded to an email admin is another question but stuff happens. Both cases are huge flaws in the system. I can understand the mom and pop company just starting up not having that sorted. However, with Ricoh, these shouldn't be going to a single employee account, but to an account that redirects to several people in the chain. Or at least, as you said, redirecting to a catchall admin. These type of issues are very avoidable... this stuff should never happen within major corporations. I mean, at the end of the day, it isn't a massive issue. But it does show how flawed some parts of their company are (in terms of communication).. I mean they are a multibillion dollar company and they can't get contact information sorted internally over such a simple matter? That doesn't build confidence on the consumer level with me.. What does a potential customer think when they hit the pentax gallery to see what a Pentax camera can do and are greeted with a godaddy page. hahahaha.. it looks like amateur hour to them.

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07-20-2015, 08:35 PM	#41
rawr Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2009 Posts: 11,913	Originally posted by tlong423 why would I want to buy anything from a multi-national corporation with its head so far up its butt that they can't even keep track of their domains? I've seen this issue happen several times before - even to companies like Microsoft (which forgot to renew it's UK hotmail domain once). There are companies out there nowadays that you can pay to manage these things for corporates with large global domain portfolios, but a big enterprise like Ricoh should be able to do it themselves. If they haven't done so already, they need to audit all their business units to find all their public online assets, build a centrally managed database in Tokyo of their global domain assets, then task a small team to look after that. They should also integrate that project, of course, with their online security and IP protection framework.

07-21-2015, 12:09 AM - 2 Likes	#42
RonHendriks1966 Banned Join Date: Jan 2009 Photos: Gallery Posts: 9,675	Looking forward to see Ed from photouniverse to talk about this for 10 minutes.

07-21-2015, 12:24 AM - 2 Likes	#43
Giklab Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2012 Location: Slovenia Photos: Gallery Posts: 2,182	Originally posted by RonHendriks1966 Looking forward to see Ed from photouniverse to talk about this for 10 minutes. XD

07-21-2015, 01:08 AM	#44
deus ursus Pentaxian Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: Stårheim, Norway Posts: 658	Originally posted by RonHendriks1966 Would there still be a back-up for the entire content? This reminds me of once on another forum I participated in. One guy had some trouble accessing the forum or whatever. We "found out" that he had messed up the whole internet and others "had trouble" accessing it as well. Luckily one of us had a backup of the internet on some floppy discs, so he should be able to recover it. We almost made him believe it. :-)

07-21-2015, 01:38 AM	#45
Not a Number Moderator Join Date: Mar 2012 Location: Venice, CA Posts: 10,526	What's the big deal? GoDaddy holds dot com domains for 25 days after the expire before auctioning it off. So maybe the person that was in charge of the registration forgot to their successor about the registration or give them the passwords. So maybe HR forgot to tell IS that the emails should be forwarded to the successor. So if you change hosts or registration authorities and for a while your website url comes up with 404 errors - that looks very amateurish too - but there's not a damn thing to be done about it as it takes time for DNS changes like this to propagate throughout the web. The bottom line is “The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men, gang aft agley,”