New Jersey man expected to serve about five years in jail for domain theft.
The man accused of stealing the P2P.com domain name and selling it to NBA player Mark Madsen has entered a guilty plea in a New Jersey criminal case.
Daniel Goncalves, 26, of Union Township, pleaded guilty to theft by unlawful taking, theft by deception, and computer theft, all in the second degree, before Superior Court Judge Stuart L. Peim in Union County. As part of a plea bargain, prosecutors will ask for him to serve five years in state prison.
In 2006 Goncalves logged into the Go Daddy account that held P2P.com domain name and then transferred it to his own Go Daddy account. Go Daddy logs showed that the same IP address was used to log in to both the P2P.com account to transfer out the domain and to Goncalves’ account to receive the domain name.
This is huge and welcome news for the domain name industry. Domain theft happens every day but rarely does anything come of it from a legal standpoint. Pinning down thieves across the world is very difficult.
More info: New Jersey Attorney General
Great news! It was a wild ride but helping them along the way makes me happy.
Wow, how the Directnic.com people avoided punishment for all of their wonderful deeds never ceases to amaze…
@ Mike
Wow, how the Directnic.com people avoided punishment for all of their wonderful deeds never ceases to amaze
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liar: THIS WAS GODADDY.com all the way
you must work for the ShellGame
Master BLOB P
Friends don’t let friends steal domains names.
Good to see justice served and it appears P2P.com has been transferred back to the Angels’ account.
Mark Madsen’s a good guy, however it looks like he’s going to be out $100,000 depending on how the civil case turns out. Ebay’s buyer protection had not been in effect back then and most likely does not offer insurance against domain name fraud.
The last paragraph got me thinking. What if one of my domains got stolen and I found or the theif was found to be in some other country with harsher punishment. I’d sure feel bad if the theif was killed for stealing my domain, wouldn’t you? Furthermore would the news of it tarnish the value?