RegisterFly’s operations descended into chaos last week amid allegations that the former president and CEO misused company funds. As the company’s principals battle one another, thousands of domain names have been caught in the crossfire. RegisterFly says that at least 75,000 customer domains expired as a direct result of the company’s financial and management problems. A lawsuit filed by RegisterFly’s parent company, Unified Names, blames the meltdown on misuse of company funds by President and CEO Kevin Medina, who was fired by the company’s board.

ICANN has taken heat from RegisterFly customers, who say the group should have acted sooner. “ICANN is not a regulator,” the unsigned blog post stated. “We rely mainly on contract law. We do not condone in any way whatsoever RegisterFly’s business practice and behaviour.” While it has taken steps to prevent domain deletions, ICANN offered little solace to domain owners hoping to transfer their names to another registrar: “The options for customers to transfer their names to another registrar at this stage are limited. We will advise if we have more information on this point.”