I've yet to find a place where this does not happen. In my opinion, this is the worst issue affecting the domain industry today, yet it doesn't get the attention it deserves. I've lost thousands of dollars and countless hours of research to this issue over the last 3 years. This practice is ultra unethical, horrible for the growth of the industry, and it needs to STOP asap.
In just one incident,
united-domains.de snapped up a dozen available regs out from under me early last year, a shady move that cost me minimum X,XXX. I deal out life long boycotts to any company or individual that burns me on this issue, and would suggest others do the same.
GoDaddy used to do this as well, and were extremely blatant about it. I think the bad press they received on it however, finally slowed them down a bit. The domain industry shouldn't be like the wild west, governing bodies need to step in finally and put a stop to bad business practices [this issue, reverse domain hijacking, etc]. I'm getting really tired of f@cked up issues like this in the domain industry never being addressed, it's really getting old.