US man is first domain thief to be charged
A NEW JERSEY MAN has been the first person in the US to be charged with stealing a domain name and selling it.
The domain in question, P2P.com, was pilfered by Daniel Goncalves, 25, after he hacked into a GoDaddy account belonging to one of its owners. Gonclaves grabbed his virtual swag bag, scurried down a dark alley - in this case Ebay - and promptly sold it to a passing basketball player.
The player, Mark Madsen, a Los Angeles Clippers forward, had no idea the domain was stolen and we have no idea why it wasn't snapped up by a filesharing site. Either way he still owns it. So that's one in the eye for justice.
Although the stolen domain sold for some $111,000 the police estimate that it's worth about $200,000. It is obviously worth a lot more than that to its original owners as one of them, Marc Ostrofsky, reckons they've spent about two and a half years and half a million dollars trying to reclaim the domain name.
However, their time may not have been spent in the most efficient manner. GoDaddy, which is facing a civil suit filed by Ostrofsky and his partners, has denied that its systems were negligent, explaining that the theft was not reported for over a year - well over its 60-day deal waiting period.
Possibly because domain theft isn't the most exciting name for a crime Goncalves was arrested on felony charges of theft by unlawful taking or deception, identity theft and computer fraud.
He is facing sixty years in prison if convicted. µ
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Now Gary can have a cellmate.
That is just way out of proportion to the crime.
Yeah, he should have raped and or murdered someone... he'd be out in 3.
This is an effective means to get some scum off the streets for quite awhile.
He is charged with theft by unlawful taking, identity theft and computer theft (according to other articles on the net). Each one has a maximum of 10 years so at most he could get 30 years, but with a good lawyer he will probably get less than 10 years total.
I had a russian hacker in canada steal my domain once.. rather then go through the hassle of the like 2 year abritration.. I just told the new registrar I was investigating a domain theft and the registrar apearently assumed I meant I was a police officer investigating as he gave me the username and password to the "hackers" account..lol..)
I then accessed the account and got his IP address to his DSL connection to his house and his credit card number and contact details from it and sent him an e-mail... he then panicked and admitted to me he stole it and others told me he didn't want to get deported back to russia and sent me $5,000 valid cashiers check for restitution for my site being down, and I gave the other 50 or so domains he had in his account back to the original owners..along with his contact info.. now thats how you get your domain back...lol.. not bad for about 4 hours work.
@Pablo what you did could be interpreted as extortion because you accepted money in place of reporting a crime and it could be argued that the money was given to you for that specific purpose. You should have simply taken your domain back, not accepted any (hush) money and then reported the guy to the ISP and the police. Then you could have filed a lawsuit for any additional damages you felt you were owed and not have risked committing a felony (as it seems you have).
I only had 2 stolen accounts and I only gave you $500. You are exaggerating everything! You are not super genius everybody thinks you are.
Besides, I am back in Russia now and am enjoying successful career with the Mafia (in vicinity of fission reactors, careful mate). Now I drive Acura NSX using cooking oil for fuel, new invention that will save the world. Email me for free instructions: nospam@p2p.com
I reported the crime to my local police department upon learning of the theft and the suspects identity. They apparently decided not to press forward because the suspect was located in another country.
the $5000 was payment for lost business and expenses as a result of the site being inaccesible to my paying clients on my membership based site as well as lost advertising revenue and loss of income from ads that I had paid for not to mention new members I lost in the downtime, my time in investigating the theft and unauthorized access, answering customer complaints on availibilty and so on.
I have no responsibility to contact the RCMP as I am not a canadian citizen, (besides they never returned my initial email to there internet fraud division).
I absolutly have a valid right to be reimbursed for damages and he has every right to settle out with me out of court for damages he caused me..I prob could have sued him for more had I chosen to go to trial.. if anything he got off on getting served with a civil suit and having lawyer expenses..
there was never an agreement on my behalf that I would not report him and in fact he was told his info had been provided to the police in my country. and I even gave his correct contact info to the others he stole domains from. Hopefully some were from canada and can get the RCMP to respond to them.
@Pablo you still risked the extortion charge had the thief claimed he gave you hush money, (all he had to do was claim it was extortion even if you didn't live up to your side of the 'bargain'). You also risked receiving stolen money if the $5000 he gave you came, in part, from illegal sources (which is likely given the guy was known to you to be a thief, so a jury would not be sympathetic to pleas of ignorance). The safer course would have been to do any money collection via the courts to shield you from such risks. Still I am glad it worked out for you, but it was a risky move accepting money from a thief without involving the courts.
Grunchy...I just about shat myself after reading your commit....hehehe
Wow, I haven't heard a bull$hit story like that since the 3rd grade.
2 trolls in the same thread. What a catch !