The freelancer I paid for a prototype bought and manages the domain name of the site. Am I at risk of getting my product stolen at some moment?

A while ago I paid a freelancer to build me a prototype. He bought the domain and he handles it. Is it possible that at some moment he decides not to give it to me and thus steals my idea? How can I get ownership and control of the domain?

Of course you are at risk naturally because you have no possession of the domain or site.

You should offer to pay his expenses for the domain at least to take that over and have possession of it on your side. As far the site/prototype that is being created goes, it would probably be best to set up some milestones requirements for the project to keep everything in a clearly and agreeable schedule and at some point with money and progress exchanged you should be able to gain possession of all items.

Does that make sense?

So once I start paying for the domain, how can I start ´owning it´? Should I request that the domain is linked to my email address instead of his (if this is how it works)? I think he is using Name Cheap

The domain is just the url that will redirect to your bubble app, if the freelancer owns the domain but you own the bubble account and something not desirable happens, you simply disconnect the domain in your bubble app and that’s it :slight_smile:

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I dont know much about this but if the domain is your company’s name you should physically own it. You should be able to pay the costs of the domain that your freelancer purchased and after that have your domain be transferred to your domain purchasing account (ex. GoDaddy). In the past this has taken about 5-10 days. Overall it’s a simple process the support teams on these domain sites can walk you through. Hope that helps.

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Hi casas,

If I was in your situation I would ask your developper to hand it over to you. This requires a modification on the side of the hosting service and domain registrar. In order to “own” it, you need to be the primary client in both cases, i.e. being assigned administrator rights, and typically also the one who is billed.

Good luck and regards, O.

Set up an account with a major domain registry - such as AWS Route 53 or GoDaddy.

Once you have an account with a domain name provider, you can transfer a domain from another user to yourself.

When you transfer a domain from another user they need to unlock the domain at their end, and then provide you with a special key. When you attempt to transfer the domain to your domain registry it will ask you for the special key to authorise the transfer of the domain.

When you transfer a domain it is normal to pay a renewal fee. If the domain was registered on 1st Jan 2017, and has been pre-paid for two years, thus normally requiring renewal on 1st Jan 2019. When you transfer it, you will be required to renew it further… normally for a year. Therefore your domain will be prepaid until 1st Jan 2020.

When you transfer a domain, you will need domain name servers (DNS) to point it to, these should stay the same if you’re using Bubble to host your application.

There is a risk that he can steel your idea but it depends. If he only have the access to domain manager then there is less risk. All of your files and stuff is on the website you have. I am sure that you use bubble to host website. If he have your bubble account info then absolutely there is a high risk.

I would say that manage your domain by your self. trust me its not hard. you can find tutorials and stuff on youtube.