STRANGE - I bought an Expired Domain....
 

This is kind of strange, never had it happen before...

I bought an expired domain a while back, registered it and everything, and the strange thing is that the domain was still resolving to the old owner's nameserver, and even to this day it still is... I never bothered to reset the nameservers as I have been busy and it seemed fine to stay with their website....

the funny thing is, they are still updating the website, pretty much on a monthly basis

I am not sure what I am going to do, they don't even realize that they have lost ownership and control of their domain. It is a government type agency too, with a .org domain... pr4 with a little bit of traffic and I know the web address is printed on all of their publications, so I am sure they would be pretty sad to lose the domain.

not sure how to proceed, if I contact them I could probably get accused of squatting? if I pull the plug on them and change nameservers without saying anything, it seems kind of low.... I've owned it for about 5 months now.

They have FTP access and they have lost control? I have a feeling you do not have what you think you have. You don't want to give us a hint as to what domain you think you have, would you?

I would recommend changing NS yesterday, if not sooner . . . if you can.

Sounds like he just never changed the NS and the old owner doesn't know that the domain isn't registered under them anymore. Their updates would still work as long as the NS was never changed.

Sounds like a sticky situation though. :2 cents:

yes, sherm has it right, I never changed the NS and the old owner is just accessing his own host accounts that the domain still points to

so they have no idea that they don't own the domain anymore

it is a go ernment agency, so I don't know if I was to put it up for sale if they could approve a budget purchase quickly and up to what price they would go to keep things running smoothly, or if they would try something legal? All of their brochures and documents have the web address printed on it, so it would cost them alot if they decided to change site names.... in my favor is the fact that the domain is essentially abbreviated initials that could actually be quite generic if I wanted to use the pr4 very old domain for something different.

I would think they would have had some sort of a clue that it had expired. By parked pages ect...

So yeah I would change it over asap too.. :2 cents:

He left their old name servers as the authoritative dns. There is no reason to think he does not have it in his registar accont

Do they have a TM on the name?

It was a strange one, because when it expired, the registrar never parked it, it stayed pointing to the ns and when I bought it and registered it still stayed with the same ns for some strange reason. I have the domain in my account and can change the ns any time I wish to. So the original owner obviously completely missed the expiry notices and have no idea at all that it is no longer in their control (bureaucracy lol)

good question on the Trademark... I doubt it because the site name is an acronym for their actual name which they use the actual name on everything else, not the acronym, but I don't know for sure... it is esentially initials in my opinion.

You should contact them and let them know whats going on. Maybe they'll buy it back from you.

i would contact the hoster to delete his ns entries

wow thats a crazy situation. Id sell it back to them or put your own site on it. Leaving it how it is doesn't really help you

yeah, but in a way with them updating it still they are keeping it relevant in the search engines and the links from other respected relevant sites are still all live.

I am going to make a move soon I guess, because if I wait until renewal time again that will be a hassle.

I kind of like the domain, and bought it originally to keep it and use it, being that it is from the 90's and all. The initials are generic enough that I could come up with all kinds of ideas if I wanted.

sounds like a sad story .. I think u should contact them.

It's not sad. They should have known that their domain was expiring. F' em. Just change the nameserver, if you contact them they'll accuse you of 'squatting, stealing, etc.' when you change nameservers, just make it a mainstream and not a porn site.

Here's an idea, copy their site, put it up on your own server, put your own ads on it and if they ask go "huh? Who exactly are you ?" and pretend like you're really them.

Send them emails from their own email addies et all.

That'll give some people a good while of a wtf moment lol.

But other than that, prolly best to just give it back to them/sell it back for something moderate.

You should contact them. If you change nameservers, you could shut down their email.

Just give it back and go on with your life, or at the most maybe ask for a one way link in return.

If you ever get in trouble with the GOV, remind them of your good deed.

That is tough. You could make money from it, but there is a bit of risk as well. Since you say the initials are kind of generic, I think you are safe.

I bet they will "claim" that you hijacked their site or something. I am always amazed at how little people know about domain names and web sites.

Good luck! I hope it turns out to be a profitable experience.

Here's your chance to do the right thing... Sell it back to them. you haven't done anything with it so why should you care. I lost a domain under shitty circumstances and it would be nice to know that someone got theirs back from a decent guy.

you run a hosting company and you don't realize that you cname ftp.whatever.com is dependent on the name server it is point to.

The fact that he left the name server directive the same as it was before the domain dropped would mean the site would continue to operate as normal (including ftp access) until he makes the change

The second you contact them you are a "squatter" and in the wrong.

Change it to your NS and wait till they contact you. Pretend you hadn't noticed and that you plan to develop the domain, later agree a deal.

You'll get a better deal and come off as the good guy.

No, I am aware it could work. I just expect more out of people. I was obviously wrong this time.

As long as you have proof of ownership you got no problem..........

It would be nice if you explained it to the old owners and gave them a chance to purchase it back, otherwise just do what you want as it is legally yours................

To all people who are guessing he left name servers as they were before expiry.

How it is possible? When the domain is dropped it loses every information associated with it, and in most cases the service or person who snaps the domains sets his default nameservers. How come he changes nameservers to old one?


And to the thread OP, I'd say if the domain is not much important to you .. then contact them and sell it to them, explaining the situation.

By the way, I doubt you snapped it from expired status. May be you purchased it from someone who claimed it was expired, whereas its actually not. And he had access to domain by some illegal means.
:2 cents:

:thumbsup

I was trying to figure out why I bothered renewing my domains if they were going to keep working anyway.

i have never seen an expired domain hitting old name servers :2 cents::2 cents:

It is possible. When the registrar has an agreement with a domain auction company, or run their own service, like Network Solution (Namejet) or Godaddy (TDNAM) the domain name never actually drops. It is just pushed.

Although they do usually move it and put a holding page up couple of weeks before.

Here's what you do. And IM serious.............

Take the design of the site exactly as it is. Host it on your server since you own the domain name. Keep it looking the same as always.

Put Zango downloads on it.. Or even a AFF ad or something on the site.

That way the site is still there, no one will notice. But you have some of your ads on it.

If you dont watnt to do this, sell me the domain and ill do it!

slappin fish is correct, I bought it from the registrar so it never completely dropped... usually when I do that though, the registrar does change the nameservers to parked, but for some strange reason this time the nameserver didn't change

the domain is over 10 years old, 5 letter generic PR4... shows no data with alexa and I have no way of determining exact traffic.... what should I ask for it?

I still think you should confirm you have control over it.

I thought the nameservers dropped after a domain expires? It has happened to me...

Which one is it? If it is the US Govt there are only 3 possibilities I believe.

nicic.org
nccic.org
ncjrs.org

hmmm but they are PR6 and 7.

That is why this is a strange one, it is the first time it ever happened to me where I purchased a domain and the nameservers didn't get reset. It has been half a year now and still......


baddog: I did a whois and my proxy info shows up, and the domain is in my domain manager..... I am pretty sure I have control of the domain

I think I figured out why this happened...... the nameservers are the registrars, and this particular domain was and is hosted at the same registrar. so in other words they must have paid or are paying their hosting account with the registrar, but forgot to renew the domain registration itself.

The current registrar could simply choose to take the domain name back from you; to keep from losing their webhosting customer, and also to avoid upsetting the government agency.

So before you change the name servers, consider transferring the domain name out first to another registrar.

With all that said, since you waited so long to fully assert ownership on a domain that is still being utilized by the previous registrant, probably the best thing to do is contact the registrar and ask for them to refund your money and return the domain to the previous registrant.

Ron

what happened?

I still have it, I put up some placeholder type content on it and moved nameservers

pr3 and pr4 internal pages, haven't done anything with it at all, been too busy with other things, haven't even put one back link to it since I got it

no one contacted you from the goverment?

The government agency hasn't contacted you about it or anything?

no, I had put up a "this domain may be for sale" thing on it, but never heard word from them, I took that off after a few months

it appears that whoever was responsible for not renewing it may have been embarrassed and under tight budgets or something and later they put up their old content under a different brand new domain name which is not as good (which is not getting much google love as my site has over ten years age on it and is still ranking way above them for their own keywords, and my placeholder content is ambiguous enough that it fits the content relevance well)

using the term "government agency" may be a bit of a misnomer, it was not a .gov, but it was a .org by an agency that works within government funding and coordinating civic government and state government programs

Don't know what to tell you

Then its trademarked? And you are about to get a bunch of lawyers down your throat?

You should of just contacted them telling them the situation and felt good about yourself. Especially since you didn't use it for any good purpose :)