A common issue I run into is people or companies losing control of their Domain Name, website, and/or email. These things are usually set up years prior, sometimes by long-gone persons. Validity can be from a year to five years, so it’s pretty easy to lose track of the person or information well before you need to renew.
The problem is compounded by the complexity of dealing with multiple entities to complete your online presence. Your Domain Name itself is “licensed” with an internet Registrar. That requires an email address, account name, and password to access. Two-part authentication is often required for security purposes, which can mean a mobile number for text or call confirmation.
Once you have a Domain Name, you need somewhere to put a website called a Hosting Provider. This is usually not the same as your Registrar and often has a different renewal cycle. The Hosting Provider, or Host for short, is where you store your website. This may or may not be the same host you use for your email. Many companies incorporate third-party Exchange Services like Microsoft’s Office 365. Both hosts have a username, email address, and password authentication, with the possibility of an associated phone number for two-part authentication.
To further complicate matters, internet security has become so critical that websites and emails require 3rd party Security Certificates (SSL) to be in place so that users can be confident they are dealing with a genuine website and email rather than a nefarious 3rd party looking to harvest information from them. This 3rd party Security Certificate may also be acquired from another company and installed at your Hosting Provider. There can easily be four separate accounts on four different billing cycles, all with varying login requirements.
This information is CRITICAL to the functionality of your business and must be recorded and stored in at least two places. If your IT admin disappears for some reason, be it quitting, firing, or the often speculated “hit-by-a-bus”, you need to know that you have secured this information.
It may be challenging to do without intimate knowledge of your web configuration, so it is highly recommended that you proactively secure this with the help of the individual who initially set it up.
A common occurrence is when an individual is no longer employed by a company that their email address may be discontinued. This would result in significant complications in accessing any of the aforementioned services. It would be advisable to keep it and just change the password.