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Feds Seize 130+ Domain Names in Mass Crackdown
- droithomme 15y agoI'm not a fan of domain name seizures, but, looking at the list of 131 domain names they have there, these ones probably aren't going to be missed.
- glimcat 15y agoI think that's what they call "establishing precedent."
- droithomme 15y agoYep, that's why it's so clever. Make the first cases either against someone everyone hates, on that no one cares about. Child abusers in the first case, counterfeit handbag salesmen in the second. Precedent established, then the net widens.
- zavulon 15y agoIt's really stupid to register domain names with "louis vutton", "NFL" or any other obvious trademarks in the name if you're planning to make money on it. Even if you're not planning to sell unauthorized goods by that company on that site, they'll still come after you within weeks, if not days. I've learned that the hard way ...
- axiak 15y agohttp://nissan.com http://nissan.com - http://nissan.com/Digest/The_Story.php http://nissan.com/Digest/The_Story.php
- grecy 15y agoWhile you are correct, there is due process that is supposed to happen for the trademark owner to claim that domain name back. That's part of what ICANN does. The US government simply taking them by force is not the way these things are supposed to go down.
- feralchimp 15y agoWhen they came for the serial registrants of bootleg sports jersey and fashion merchandise domains, I said nothing...
- animal 15y agoI want to make a difference. What can I say, and to whom?
- jrockway 15y agoI think we need a new Internet that the government doesn't know about. They move slowly and we can get another ten years of freedom if we plan this right. (Many other posts recommend overthrowing the government. I don't think this will work because it doesn't guarantee that the new government won't be corrupt; the kinds of people that want to be politicians will always exist and will always act in the same interests.)
- code_duck 15y agoThis is after 20 years of them coming after assets of accused drug traffickers, just to note. Since the dawn of the Reagan-era forfeiture practices, federal and local authorities have been seizing cash, houses, automobiles and any other assets they can get their hands on, not only pre-conviction, often without even an arrest!
- pantaloons 15y agoFirst they came for the fake merchandise sites... > The fact that the authorities have once again launched a large crackdown on “rogue” websites begs the question why this legislation is needed in the first place. Isn't the difference that SOPA allows them to mandate blocking of non-US domains by service operators? I think it's pretty clear TLDs owned or operated in the US are a lost cause at this point unless other governments oppose the TLD sovereignty claims.
- njloof 15y agoWhat a waste of government time and resources.
- refurb 15y agoOk, I'm going to take the other side of this issue. Private property rights for commercial use is one of the reasons why developed nations are developed. If I start a business in the US, I generally don't have to worry about someone else taking my trademark and selling fake versions of my stuff. From the viewpoint of a business owner, that's one reason why you'd setup a company in the US/Canada/Europe vs. China/Russia/etc. I don't agree with the lack of due process, but I do think that securing economic rights to private property is a pretty dam good use of government resources. RF
- icebraining 15y agoOf course, they can simply buy a new domain for $10, so this didn't actually stop anything.
- yummybear 15y agoI find it disturbing that as a non-US citizen, US restricts my access to these sites.
- k-mcgrady 15y agoThe FBI is allowed to seize domains which are US based (e.g. dot com). If you setup your site with a domain from another country (e.g. dot co dot uk) the FBI can do nothing. From what I have head they want SOPA to fix that by allowing them to block the domains they can't seize from being viewed within the US via a system like the one China uses. So if you set up your site right the US government cannot stop anyone outside the US from viewing it.
- dangrossman 15y agoThis isn't the FBI, it's customs enforcement (which was moved under DHS).
- k-mcgrady 15y agoThanks for clarifying. I thought the notices had FBI on them, my mistake.
- RyanKearney 15y agoWhat's even more frustrating is that out of the 10 random sites I picked from the list, every single one of them had whois information linking back to China. In order to stop 99.999% of all copyright infringing sites, all US ISP's need to do is block every /8 allocated to APNIC (and a few /16's they have too I believe). Nearly every single brute force attempt on my server is from, you guessed it, China. China contributes nothing but trojans, viruses, and headaches to the rest of the internet. They already have the "great firewall of China" so why not just completely detach China from the rest of the internet as we know it. China will no longer have to operate a firewall (or more of a glorified content filter) and people in the rest of the world will be slightly more safe. I've already blocked every IP block here[1] with iptables and I suggest others follow suit. [1] http://www.apnic.net/publications/research-and-insights/ip-address-trends/min-prefix http://www.apnic.net/publications/research-and-insights/ip-a...
- epoxyhockey 15y agoLast year: 82 domains seized This year: 130 domains seized ..waiting to see if this game goes exponential.. The funny thing is that a large percentage of those domains contain trademarked names. Can't the trademark owners go through normal channels (get court judgement, then file with ICANN) to grab the domains?
- redthrowaway 15y ago>Can't the trademark owners go through normal channels (get court judgement, then file with ICANN) to grab the domains? That involves tiresome due process.
- lanstein 15y agoFlashback to javanco.com... (search 'Javanco sun' if this doesn't ring a bell)
- epoxyhockey 15y agoThanks for that. It does seem like Javanco would have prevailed in court had Sun insisted on pursuing the domain. It does make me wonder, if that exact situation arose today, whether the outcome would have been different!
- cpeterso 15y agoWhy seize the domain names when they could nab the people behind the domain names selling counterfeit merchandise?
- wmf 15y agoThose people are probably not in the US, and presumably their crimes are not serious enough to interest local (possibly corrupt) law enforcement.
- InclinedPlane 15y agoRecent legislation allows the seizure of domain names effectively by fiat, without any tinge of due process. Arresting a physical body and putting them on trial is still burdened by such ancient, outmoded traditional ideals, and so is rather more difficult.
- tomkinstinch 15y agoDoes anyone know the citation of the statute they used?
- GHFigs 15y ago18 USC § 2323 (a)(1)(A)-(B) http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/usc_sec_18_00002323----000-.html http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/usc_sec_18_00002323----000... 18 USC § 981(b) http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/981.html http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/981.html (Source:http://www.courthousenews.com/2010/06/30/Warrant.pdf http://www.courthousenews.com/2010/06/30/Warrant.pdf)
- snowwrestler 15y agoBecause the people are outside the U.S. and thus outside the U.S. government's jurisdiction. The domain name is registered through a U.S.-based registrar so it is subject to U.S. jurisdiction.
- dangrossman 15y agoThe people are in China, while their domains are purchased and controlled in the US.
- wavephorm 15y agoThe United States needs to be stipped of DNS root privileges immediately. This regime is completely out of control, and when SOPA passes the internet is going to require some new infrastructure to route around the US.
- gscott 15y agoChina agrees with you. Take down counterfeit websites but not political ones? Congress over reaches so that it can hit a middle ground, getting most of what they want... which is to take down more sites that hurt those who give them donations.
- yaix 15y agoThe DNS has to stay being controled by one or more democratic countries. As much as I like international organizations within the UN framework, but giving control of the DNS to a UN committee would make it too easy for China to just give a number of poor countries some more money to by their votes for whatever China wants to see banned from the net. Not paranoia, that is common practice, Western countries are doing it too. But at least Western governments are controlled by their populations to some extent.
- rasur 15y agoSwitzerland seems the only sane choice, IMHO. ;)
- bluedanieru 15y agoWhy does it have to be controlled by anyone? If you mean to keeping the existing infrastructure as-is sure, but I think that's not such a great idea anyway.
- nirvana 15y agoI find this extremely alarming. I don't engage in piracy or serve files or anything like that. But I consider domain names to be a form of property, and to see the US government taking property without giving he owners recourse is extremely troubling. The US system is founded in innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. The requirements for this proof have been laid out and refined over 200 years. I think those requirements are not strict enough, but these seizures don't even include an actual trial, and thus deny the victims the right to defend their position, or make their case before a judge. Earlier this year I heard about a hip-hop blog that was seized which engaged in no piracy... though it did offer songs that the record companies had given him as a form of promotion. So, not only is this being done without due process, but it is being done incompetently to boot! I have zero expectation that this won't become-- like the "drug war" and the "war on terrorism" -- an ever widening net to where it effectively becomes seizure of politically-incorrect domains (e.g.: write a post critical of the government on your blog? have no blog the next day...) This is literally a form of government censorship of speech. Even if some speech is "illegal" (I don't think even pirate spreading domains are illegal, though there is a good civil case against them) the act of speaking is protected, and this right is acknowledged by the first amendment.
- InclinedPlane 15y agoIndeed. Where's the due process? Where's the right to a trial? The right to face ones accusers and see the evidence presented?
- wmf 15y agoYou can sue to get your domain back, but that doesn't seem like a fair process.
- adestefan 15y agoThey're seized pursuant to a warrant issued by a Federal court. The owner is more than welcome to challenge the warrant, but why would you? A DNS name is cheap and challenging a Federal warrant is not.
- billpatrianakos 15y agoI don't know how to feel about this. I really wish I could get people from both sides of the issue to educate me. From what I see and read it seems piracy is running pretty rampant. In light of that, these efforts to stop it (except SOPA, which I strongly disagree with) don't bother me. This list of domains makes it pretty obvious what they were up to. And I'm one of the few who still believes that content creators (including more than just music and movies but also software) should be able to choose how they distribute their work and how much to charge, if anything. Piracy is taking these creations and distributing them freely or for your own profit while the creator is getting screwed out of the money they should get for their work. I also see how this sets a dangerous precident and law makers are heading down a slippery slope. There's obviously much room for abuse and cronyism. So my question is, are we framing this the right way? The torrent sites seem to be bringing up these issues in an effort to deflect, distract from what they're doing, and sometimes even excuse it. Their actions and the actions of other illegal operators are what is causing the crackdown and creating a space for large companies and law makers to exploit with overreaching laws. So while this stuff is definitely dangerous, how come we don't talk about making the pirates irrelevant so we can remove their excuse? If piracy wasn't so prevalent online then we could strengthen our argument while weakening theirs. The post would be more credible from any other site but coming from torrentfreak it comes off as propaganda even though I agree with them (just not what they do)!
- TruthElixirX 15y agoThe government should not be able to take things without a trial in a court of law.
- redthrowaway 15y agoThat's the essence of it, right there. This is especially troubling, for those of us who aren't American, because the US is claiming ownership over all .com, .net, and .org TLDs, and thus considers it just fine to seize the domains of foreign sites. So as a Canadian, with no say whatsoever as to what laws are passed in the US, I am nonetheless bound by them and can have my business property seized if a foreign government doesn't like what I do, with absolutely no ability to defend myself in court or seek redress for wrongful seizure. That's horseshit.
- pnathan 15y agoIANAL, and am not familiar with the procedures of law. I do know that the courts can seize property in an entirely legal fashion via due process. So this would seem to me to be analogous to seizure of a business building being used for selling counterfeit clothing. I suppose (to my mind) the real question here is the due process.
- nextparadigms 15y agoWhat happens to FBI if SOPA doesn't actually pass and this kind of thing is found illegal?
- icebraining 15y agoThis has nothing to do with SOPA or the FBI. This is done by ICE, an agency under the Department of Homeland Security, and by the DOJ, and it's been happening for over a year now: http://torrentfreak.com/u-s-government-seizes-bittorrent-search-engine-domain-and-more-101126/ http://torrentfreak.com/u-s-government-seizes-bittorrent-sea...
- hughesey 15y agoMost of the seized domains end up hosted on the Feds 'seized domain' server at 74.81.170.110. As such, it's possible to see a list of all seized domains using a Reverse IP tool - e.g. http://viewdns.info/reverseip/?host=74.81.170.110 http://viewdns.info/reverseip/?host=74.81.170.110
- maeon3 15y agoThe Internet is under attack. We need Eben Moglen's freedom box: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgu8NUm5Zxk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgu8NUm5Zxk Forcing a website off the internet is like snatching my vocal chords out of my neck when they are about to vocalize something objectionable.
- zotz 15y agoThis safely falls under the idea of "legal plunder". Could you imagine the screaming and wailing if a .gov domain got jacked?
- ck2 15y agoLack of due process is the new bully government. Warrantless everything, seizures without oversight, treat everyone like a criminal when they travel, simply live or go near the border and lose many constitutional rights, heavily arm law enforcement under the guise of "anti-terrorism" but instead use those weapons against peaceful protesters etc. etc. What's strange and counterintuitive is that under democrat leadership it gets worse than republican because they are always afraid of being perceived as being "weak" so they overcompensate and are even more aggressive. What's more ironic is we are critical of other governments who do these things.
- yaix 15y agoSurprise! I did WHOIS lookups on some of the domains, and ALL were from China. Sometimes there is no name or address data but a phone number, and that is Chinese of course (+86...).