cyber squatting legal issue

C

collie

Registered User
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Hi,

My sister has a small business based in Cork, She also has/had a small .com web site registered through a reputable Irish company. Although she had paid for 5 years in advance, they let the site become inactive after 3 years. They forgot she had paid for 5 years and believed she had only paid for 3 years. However the never contacted her reference renewal etc . They have admitted to their mistake and accept full responsibility. They have offered her an alternative address but why should she have to change her address.

We now think some cyber squatters have the .com
Q1. Why can the domain company not get it back :-(((
Q2. How much would these cyber squatters what for it back.
Q3. Should she peruse legal action against the domain company?
Q4. Is she entitled to compensation and how much?

Regards

 
Sorry to hear! Very annoying situation.

collie said:
Q1. Why can the domain company not get it back :-(((
Click to expand...

The domain company don't control the domain anymore. They can't do anything to get it back because the new domain owner has done nothing wrong.

collie said:
Q2. How much would these cyber squatters what for it back.
Click to expand...


Ask them!

collie said:
Q3. Should she peruse legal action against the domain company?
Click to expand...


This won't get the domain back though...

collie said:
Q4. Is she entitled to compensation and how much?
Click to expand...

The company she bought the domain from, is it a large company or an IT-guy-in-his-bedroom setup?
 
Q2. How much would these cyber squatters what for it back.

Ask them!
Click to expand...

Carefull with this! - They will generally want as much as they can get. They are probably holding you to ransom.
If you're lucky they sell it back for about $50 less than ICANN abitration fee. (Don't know what this is now, but a couple of years ago it was about $1250)
 
1. If your sister was using the .com name for a business, and if the 'cyber-squatter' is not using it, your sister has a good chance of getting it back through the ICANN procedure.
2. The costs of the ICANN procedure are fixed.
3. Your sister's claim against the domain registration company would not be likely to exceed the cost of the ICANN arbitration plus something modest for interruption to business, but on the facts as oultined, she does have a claim.
4. If your sister wants her domain name back, but it is not urgent, I would make an enquiry (NOT an offer) to the cyber squatters. For reasons which seemed good at the time, I once enquired from one of the large domain 'parkers' about the availability of a .com domain. They quoted $5900; I replied "no thanks - I thought it would be around $500, forget about it ...." etc. Through a series of automated emails (over a period of about 5 months) they dropped their price to $250.00. I believe this is a standard enough modus operandi for these people. The important thing seems to be to make one enquiry and one enquiry only, and never make an offer until it gets down to something reasonable. I am sure that if I had tried to haggle, they would not have reduced their price in the way that they did.
 
The company she bought the domain from, is it a large company or an IT-guy-in-his-bedroom setup?[/quote]




Yes they are one of the larger operators in Ireland.
 
If you can prove "bad faith" then you may be able to get it back from the alleged squatters.

The fact that they are not actively using the domain is not a legitimate reason to take it away from them
 
If you let the registration lapse you have no recourse against the new owner. As far as they are concerned the name was vacant and available to anyone.
 
Update

The hosting company repurchased the site for her.

They were given the option of repurchase or compensation.

So all happy.
 
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