Domain Hijacked

[Corga]

I've had a domain hijacked (tag-board.com) - originally godaddy.com. I think it was because the adminstrative email address was @yahoo.com and had expired from non-use, so the hijacker picked it up. The hijacker didn't change DNS, so I hadn't noticed - and they transferred it through a few different registrars. Finally, they contacted me. We had worked things out, he was going to transfer it back to me - but then supposedly the FBI (whom I contacted) harrassed him and he disappeared. I don't know anything about this guy but an email address.

Is there anyone I should/could talk to legally to get the ball rolling on an UDRP (Or is this the wrong next move?)?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[mike031]

hmm.. the feds harrassed somebody over a stolen domain? no way!

[Corga]

I don't know for sure that they did. I contacted the FBI who seemed uninterested, the hijacker emailed me saying the local authorities came and searched his HD. I've not heard much from him since. It may be an outright lie.

[mike031]

lol

that guy is so full of it.. i'm not really sure what your options are but there are a bunch of lawyers here on the forum that might be able to walk you through the whole process of recovery.... good luck!

[Corga]

I suspect so as well. According to the guy, he was in singapore too. Its a moot point though.

I hope that you are right about the lawyers. I'd be happy to pay good money to get some help and have this fixed, sooner preferably than later. I found the esqwire.com through google, but the guy seems to be unresponsive either by phone or email, and I don't know any lawyers around here that would have any experience with this kinda thing.

[namestrands]

First Contact the current registrar of the domain and inform them of the issue. next step is to fly out there and beat the crap out of him...

Not a lot you can do, without legal counsel. Perhaps just ask for it back.

At least you learned a very important lesson, when using free email accounts for your valuable domain names

[HOWARD]

I just sent you a PM on this.

[Corga]

The current registrar (joker.com) is sympathetic, but referred me to ICANN or suggested contacting the FBI on the issue. Those were my first thoughts as well. Does anyone know if the ICANN UDRP would help in this scenario? I know it is primarily used for trademark violations, but could I claim that I have an unregistered trade-mark for the domain and get someone to at least consider the claim seriously? Are there any legal contacts that you may know of who can persue this route for me?

[Dave Zan]

The current registrar (joker.com) is sympathetic, but referred me to ICANN or suggested contacting the FBI on the issue. Those were my first thoughts as well. Does anyone know if the ICANN UDRP would help in this scenario? I know it is primarily used for trademark violations, but could I claim that I have an unregistered trade-mark for the domain and get someone to at least consider the claim seriously? Are there any legal contacts that you may know of who can persue this route for me?

Using the UDRP to try to regain a hijacked name is a gamble. But there are at
least 2 cases of such:

xi.com http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/deci...2004-0253.html
pornreports.com http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/deci...2004-0391.html

But the complainant still has to meet and prove all 3 requirements.

Jberryhill has tried getting one registrar to use the so-called Transfer Dispute
Policy from ICANN's transfer rules. But even that's not having much positive
results because of the registrar itself.

[jberryhill]

Jberryhill has tried getting one registrar to use the so-called Transfer Dispute
Policy from ICANN's transfer rules. But even that's not having much positive
results because of the registrar itself.

If we're thinking of the same incident here, the problem is that the domain was sold by person "A" to person "B". Later, person "A" took the domain name back by claiming it was hi-jacked, and not sold. The registrars are really not in a position, nor should they be, of determining whether a sale was or was not executed.

[Domagon]

Doesn't help you now ... but hopefully your experience will encourage others here using Yahoo, etc to make changes ... folks should NOT use freebie/outsourced email addresses (Yahoo, Hotmail, etc) for anything important.

To get the domain back will likely require much legal action ...

First thing is to trace back the history of the domain and build a timeline of what happened when - an attorney will likely be needed to help make this happen.

Secondly, taking legal action against the appropriate parties - if you have at least a few thousand dollars minimum to spare, you have a good chance of recovering the domain ... eventually.

Keep in mind that domains have been considered by many courts to be property ... stolen property, regardless of the number of transfers (statue of limitations may be an issue in some instances; it shouldn't be in your situation), typically remains the rightful property of the true owner.

Ron

[mike031]

using a free e-mail account is sooooooooo unsafe!! a big NO NO!

also, corga.. you didn't have valid whois info on the domain, so that doesn't really help....


Domain: tag-board.com
Cache Date: 2002-11-08
Registrar: GO DADDY SOFTWARE, INC.
in the "registrant" field. In most cases, Go Daddy Software, Inc.
is not the owner of domain names listed in this database.


Registrant:
Greg Grothaus
IV
nowhere
Nowhereville, Nevada 31045
United States


Domain: tag-board.com
Cache Date: 2004-11-18
Registrar: GO DADDY SOFTWARE, INC.
Please note: the registrant of the domain name is specified
in the "registrant" field. In most cases, Go Daddy Software, Inc.
is not the registrant of domain names listed in this database.


Registrant:
IV
nowhere
Nowhereville, Nevada 31045
United States

Registered through: GoDaddy.com
Domain Name: TAG-BOARD.COM
Created on: 01-Apr-02
Expires on: 01-Apr-12
Last Updated on: 11-Dec-02


next, the domain gets hijacked(?)

Domain: tag-board.com
Cache Date: 2005-01-26
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Registration Service Provided By:
Contact: Email protected from Robots by Whois Source
Visit:

Domain name: tag-board.com

Registrant Contact:
Tag-Board.com Corporation
Tag-Board.com Corporation (Email protected from Robots by Whois Source)
+62.no-phone-support
Fax: +62.no-fax-support
Tag-Board.com Corporation
Surabaya, Jawa Timur 60000
ID

Domain: tag-board.com
Cache Date: 2005-02-24
Registrar: COMPUTER SERVICES LANGENBACH GMBH DBA JOKER.COM
domain: tag-board.com
status: lock
organization: Tag-Board.com Corporation
owner: Tag-Board.com Corporation
email: Email protected from Robots by Whois Source
address: Tag-Board.com Corporation
city: Surabaya
state: --
postal-code: Jawa Timur 60000
country: ID
admin-c: Email protected from Robots by Whois Source#0
tech-c: Email protected from Robots by Whois Source#0
billing-c: Email protected from Robots by Whois Source#0
nserver: ns1.mydomain.com
nserver: ns2.mydomain.com
nserver: ns3.mydomain.com
nserver: ns4.mydomain.com
registrar: JORE-1
created: 2002-04-01 13:28:24 UTC godaddy
modified: 2005-02-16 02:12:59 UTC JORE-1
expires: 2014-04-01 13:28:24 UTC
source: joker.com

[mole]

Yes, this is a good reminder not to use a free email service for your admin email.

I doubt the FBI would bother to look into such trivial sneezes, it looks like someone is playing your tootie.

[Corga]

Yes. I had invalid domain information, because I got tired of receiving the tons of spam both email and mail that resulted from a valid domain registration record. Unfortunately, this was a mistake and I will not make the same in the future.