HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

In November, 2001, I bought the domain name hardwarepub.com from the owner at that time, Trevor Gehman.  He transferred ownership of the domain from himself to me, Keefe John.  I paid for the transfer of the domain and the addition of two years
into it.  At this point, the domain was good through 06/30/03.

Shortly thereafter, the domain was transferred to a partner account of Registrars.com -- the partner account of Netwurx, INC., 35 East Sumner Street, Hartford, WI 53027.  I transferred it to this account because I was employed by Netwurx and they were able to offer me cheaper pricing than direct registration through Registrars.com.  The domain was still, of course, registered with my ownership information.  The monies for these transfers were taken directly out of my paycheck by Netwurx.

In February of 2002 I was released of employment by Netwurx, INC.  I had about 4-5 domains through Netwurx at this time.

In early May, I attempted to transfer these names to a different registrar, ItsYourDomain.  The transfers were refused by NSI (The domains were now listed in Netwurx's partner account at VeriSign (aka NSI), because Registrars.com was bought out by them).  NSI told me that the transfers were being denied because Netwurx did not pay their partner account bill.  NSI further informed me that they could not help me, because as Netwurx was a partner, I had to deal with them directly.

I contacted Netwurx about this issue and they refused to help me at all.  At one point they said they would release the domains to a new, direct account in my name that wouldn't be affected by their non-payment status with NSI, within 2-3 days.  I waited a week and heard nothing from them.  At this point I emailed them back asking for the status of the domain issue.  I received an email a few hours later, direct from Peter F. Maher, Jr., President of Netwurx, INC.  It read:

"I am sick of dealing with you.  If you call here again and I find out, I
will register all of your domains and keep them.  I have gone through and
deleted ALL of your domains.  They are now in the open access pool, go get
them if you want them...You handle it."

I immediately called VeriSign to see if they could help.  I was able to get through to a Tier 2 support team member.  He explained that the partner abused the power of his account and that he could send in a request for the domain to be pulled back into the system -- into a new account that wasn't touchable by Netwurx.  The next day when I called back they said that they could not pull the domain back, but they might be able to just re-register it for me right away.  I called back again the next day and they claimed there was nothing that they could do since the "delete command" was already sent to the global registry.  They suggested purchasing SnapNames Snapback service.  I purchased this service a few days ago and had been checking the domain religiously using whois.

I checked whois for hardwarepub.com this morning and it is now registered to a completely new organization called "buydomains.com".  When you surf to www.hardwarepub.com, it redirects to buydomains.com where my domain is "FOR SALE".

I called VeriSign again today and they gave me the canned response of, "Please e-mail customerservice@networksolutions.com with an explanation of your problem.."  I also called Domainzoo, the registrar that hardwarepub.com is now registered with. They said that I should contact VeriSign.

So, as you can see, I'm getting the run-around, and am not sure what to do here.  Someone PLEASE advise me as to what I should do in this matter.  My domain name was taken away from me without my permission.  It was hijacked.  This was not right.  Please, PLEASE help.  Call me at 262-893-9518 or respond via e-mail.

Thank you,

Keefe

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

go down there and pop em' in the nose  ;D

naw umm get a lawyer

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

If you have a couple of bucks and are willing to help us out please go here!  http://www.hardwarepub.net/about/hijacked/index.shtml

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

You can also email Pete Maher and give him a peice of your mind. ;)

Its prolly not a good idea to have his email address on here.  But I am sure you can put two and two together if his name is pete and his company is netwurx.net.

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

You should talk to Pete Maher and try getting him to do something before you take legal action and exploit him. Mention the press, too, and try to get a list of his clientell.

And we should all mass attack him with emails. I volunteer to
place a virus (to email to him) to help the effort as I will just format my computer.

You can sue him for harassment, too, if you are to sue.

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

so basically the retard deleted ur domain w/ out ur consent...man i sure would be pissed...and then threatening u about calling him again...yeah i certainly would get leagal w/ this guy.  First i would definetly hire a lawyer!!!  Show him what u just typed here, and im sure that between the both of u, you wont loose this!  This guy sure sounds like he think he knows everything, i doubt that he does!!! Man i u think about it... this is exacly like if u were paying for your house and someone comes up and takes it right from u or even demolishes it, WHILE UR IN IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Please support us with updates keefe!  For these will be keys to recovering your site, and definetly make this a public conflict...the more people u get, the more power u will have!!! dont give up and good luck to you!

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

Keefe,

Sorry to be reading your current situation. It just chafes my ass to hear these Registrar troubles.

The fact that the domain has already been re-registered and ownership has transfered from you to these other yahoo's, leave you with only one option:

Hire a lawyer. Gather any and all documentation you have that you were in fact the registered owner of the domain and were current with payments.

Print out any and all email correspondense and take em to court.

The fact they are all railroading you back n forth I really think as long as you can prove original ownership and that you were current you could win this easily.

Wish I could be of more assistance. Good luck and keep us posted. I have dealt with many dirty registrars in the past but I have to admit this is the worst yet.

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

In addition for all mentioned by Wizbones you may want to gather logs from hardwarepub and then bring them to court. Then you may claim for monetary compensation for every hit based on average statistics, as I remember lot's of commercial adds on your site. You can demand compensation for every second hardwarepub is owned by sbd else, this is a standard procedure.

sorry can't help you much

good luck !
Chef

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

I emailed peter-less Pete.  Told him what I think.  Wish you luck getting it back.

Re: HARDWAREPUB.COM DOMAIN NAME HIJACKED
 

If you get a reply on that I would like to see it.