Domain Expired, Company Renewed, And Is Using My Old Site Options

[doogie88]

One of my sites expired, and a company registered the domain and took the old content and put it back up, articles, logos, etc.

Besides telling them to take it down, is there anything else I can do?

[Randy]

Well, the content, logos, etc are all yours and you hold the copyright to all of that stuff. So you can make them take it down by filing a DMCA complaint with them, their host or even Google, Yahoo, etc if you want it removed from the web. But the question I have is what "company" took it over. And how did they have access to all of your content, when they couldn't possibly know they needed it until after the domain expired.

On the surface this smacks of some type of scam where they're going to re-up your expired domain because they were your registrar and possibly your host before. I've never run into that exact situation because my Registrar is my Registrar and I am my host. So my content never was on the Registrar's servers. I do know however that if I let a domain expire my Registrar holds it somehow for a month or whatever so that I can renew it after the fact. This service costs more than a normal registration though.

Which gets us to another question. Did you want to keep the domain? If so, you're either going to have to pay whatever they want to buy it back from them or you're going to have to start a Domain Resolution process. Which can be quite lengthy. And how it turns out may well turn on how long ago the registration was supposed to be renewed.

If the domain was actually going bye-bye, make 'em remove your content by filing the DMCA complaint. Everywhere. If you want the domain name back then you'd best be prepared to do a bit of crawling and begging. And not complain when they charge you a premium to get your domain and site back.

[doogie88]

Well, the content, logos, etc are all yours and you hold the copyright to all of that stuff. So you can make them take it down by filing a DMCA complaint with them, their host or even Google, Yahoo, etc if you want it removed from the web. But the question I have is what "company" took it over. And how did they have access to all of your content, when they couldn't possibly know they needed it until after the domain expired.

On the surface this smacks of some type of scam where they're going to re-up your expired domain because they were your registrar and possibly your host before. I've never run into that exact situation because my Registrar is my Registrar and I am my host. So my content never was on the Registrar's servers. I do know however that if I let a domain expire my Registrar holds it somehow for a month or whatever so that I can renew it after the fact. This service costs more than a normal registration though.

Which gets us to another question. Did you want to keep the domain? If so, you're either going to have to pay whatever they want to buy it back from them or you're going to have to start a Domain Resolution process. Which can be quite lengthy. And how it turns out may well turn on how long ago the registration was supposed to be renewed.

If the domain was actually going bye-bye, make 'em remove your content by filing the DMCA complaint. Everywhere. If you want the domain name back then you'd best be prepared to do a bit of crawling and begging. And not complain when they charge you a premium to get your domain and site back.

I looked, and the domain expired, and they registered it. I didn't really check the email account anymore, so I missed the notices. I have no idea how they got all the content and images, maybe from waybackmachine? Does it include all links? I don't know.
Maybe they seen it was going to expire and downloaded the site.

[Jill]

Besides telling them to take it down, is there anything else I can do?

Yes, hire an attorney and ask him/her about trademark and copyright infringement.

[piskie]

Kneecapping sounds good to me.

[Randy]

And while they still have your site up on the domain, make sure to get some date/time stamped copies of that to keep in a safe place. You can even do it with simple screen prints, if your system will automatically print the time/date when you do a screen print.

Those will come in quite handy no matter what you end up doing to pursue the matter. It'll carry a lot of weight as to their intentions both for an ICANN Domain Dispute procedure, and in a court of law if you end up suing them. Being able to exhibit that they stole your whole site and not just registered your domain says a lot about intent.

You did check with your domain Registrar right? And with your hosting company? If they happen to be one in the same you may simply be in a Grace Period. It's impossible to say without any of the niggling details.

[doogie88]

Yes, hire an attorney and ask him/her about trademark and copyright infringement.

Wasn't a huge site, but got some decent traffic. I don't know if it would be worth it to hire one?

[Brian Turner]

Wasn't a huge site, but got some decent traffic. I don't know if it would be worth it to hire one?

Well, is it really worth spending a lot of money over this?

Simplest and most effective solution is usually to just contact the bwehosting company - you can track this usually from the WHOIS info, ie nameservers and IPs.

[doogie88]

And while they still have your site up on the domain, make sure to get some date/time stamped copies of that to keep in a safe place. You can even do it with simple screen prints, if your system will automatically print the time/date when you do a screen print.

Those will come in quite handy no matter what you end up doing to pursue the matter. It'll carry a lot of weight as to their intentions both for an ICANN Domain Dispute procedure, and in a court of law if you end up suing them. Being able to exhibit that they stole your whole site and not just registered your domain says a lot about intent.

You did check with your domain Registrar right? And with your hosting company? If they happen to be one in the same you may simply be in a Grace Period. It's impossible to say without any of the niggling details.

They pretty much took the site and put banners up to their main site at the top and bottom of every page.

At the bottom of a couple pages, it would say For more information on xxxx visit www.mymainsite.com, and they even kept that and changed the site to their site.

[Ladybug]

That is definitely copyright infringement. If it is not worth suing them or getting the domain back, then you should at least get them to take it down, especially if your name is on it. You don't want to be associated with a rip off.

[Jill]

The problem is that if you don't protect your trademark, you can lose it. So just keep that in mind.

[Copywriter39]

Even when they take the content down, you still lose out. Whatever incoming links it had are all lost. It can also impact your other marketing. I had one client who neglected to renew his domain. He found out too late to do anything. When he did try to purchase it back the asking price was too much. And all his yellow page ads, business cards, and brochures were no longer of any use.