Domain purchase transacted through SEDO turns out to be stolen

[4u-domains]

We puchased a premium domain name via the sedo platform.

The transaction went through fine and we paid for the domain and the domain was delivered and we took over control of the domain.

A few months later the domain was taken out of our enom account citing that it was a stolen domain. We didnt get any warning or explanation and no answer to our questins from sedo.

Anyway, the WHOIS changed and it did indeed look like it may have been stolen and in fairness to SEDO, the thief did change the WHOIS when he had control over it so there was no real way of SEDO knowing it was stolen.

My question is, are SEDO liable for anything in this instance?
Also, the thief's whois details did not pan out so is there any other way of finding out who the thief really was.

The domain name was paid for, during the SEDO escrow process, by a credit card but the CC company have already said that they are not liable and wont give me the money back as I did in fact receive something, albeit a stolen item.

Do I just have to write this one off or is any way forward on this?!

Thanks for your time.

[Acro]

Get a statement from eNom's legal department and talk to sedo's legal department. This way you can file a police report and/or take legal action against the thief, especially if the amount involved is substantial. I am not sure why your CC company says they won't issue a refund as you've clearly been defrauded.

[stock_post]

This sucks - I thought buying through sedo will be helpful in maters like stolen domains etc.

Talk to an attorney, they may file a case against sedo.
-- Sedo escrow is the one took the money from you and they can get the money back from who they paid.
-- they should have verified the seller.
-- If they paid to some one, they don't know or did not verify who they are sending the money to then they are the ones liable.

[ohkus]

Umm....sedo sold stolen property, demand your money back and if it is a substantial amount and they refuse follow up with an attorney.

[Gerry]

The worst case scenario possible and it happened.

And folks are saying tough luck?

Not way.

sedo facilitated in the transfer of stolen goods.

Saying they are not liable doesn't mean they are not liable.

[chillking]

sedo.com is to blame they clearly sold you stolen goods its as sille as that they should give you a refund.

[cyberlaw]

I actually handled some litigation against sedo last year related to the whole .mobi auction issue. To be fair, there are a lot of things that can go wrong in these sorts of sales. But if you just had the domain taken from you after the sale was consummated, I would definitely follow up on it, assuming that there is enough money/value involved to make it worthwhile.

[Dave Zan]

My question is, are sedo liable for anything in this instance?

One answer to that question lies in your contract with sedo. You maybe will
not like what you might find there, but it can give you an idea.

Not that it won't necessarily stop you from trying to hold them liable for that,
anyway. Except if you don't find it worthwhile.

On the side, there was a similar discussion with practically similar details save
it involved Network Solutions. I doubt the OP sued them after his about $10K
letter didn't produce any fruitful results for him.

Only difference in that case, though, is Network Solutions did notify the user
about it.

[4u-domains]

Thanks guys, nice feedback.

We are having a good think about what to do next.