[U2Lynne]

Those of you following the blog at http://thetradersden.livejournal.com/ , already know that my godaddy account was hacked and our domains thetradersden.org and thetradersden.com were transferred away from me. They were taken in a matter of a couple of hours, and I've been working to get them back ever since. Funny how it doesn't take much to take them away, but boy am I having to jump through hoops to try to get them back!

This asshat has now been trying to blackmail me to get our domains back. He started at an asking price of $2500, but has since come down to the bargain price of $1750. I was stringing him along for a bit, letting him think I was gonna pay him, but finally just dropped all communication with him.

He did try to grab our servers also, but our host realized something fishy was going on and refused to change the root password for him.

According to our host, he came from behind a proxy at The Planet (another hosting service - a HUGE one) and so it is doubtful he will get caught. However, that hasn't stopped me from reporting him to godaddy, register.com (where he transferred the domains), icann, and the IC3. Of course, they get tons of reports all the time, so no one has contacted me to get all the details yet.

I'll update this post as I have more information to give out.

4-17-2009: It looks like we'll be here for a little while longer. As much as I might push godaddy, they don't seem to understand the urgency of my wanting to get our domains back. I continue to provide paperwork; they continue to think it's not good enough or they want something else. Luckily, the place the asshat moved the domains to seems to understand a bit of my frustration and has locked them down so they can't be transferred right now. I will continue to work this issue, but they don't work over the weekend, so it's gonna be a bit longer.

4-23-2009: Just an update - it's now in the hands of the new registrar, register.com. GoDaddy has official asked for the domains back, but they say the new registrar can say no. I had talked to them last week and they are well aware that they were stolen from me and that the guy who took them was sending me emails to extort money for their return. Since they have all that background already, and since they were kind enough to lock down the domains so they guy couldn't transfer them again, I'm hoping they are going to give them back.

5-01-2009: I wish I could give some update, but unfortunately it seems that the legal department over at register.com has taken lessons from godaddy in how to drag their feet. I didn't call them today cuz I was taking the day off from this stuff.

5-5-2009: Well, the domains finally have my name back on them instead of this Fred guy, but I now need to get them transferred back to GoDaddy so I can actually access them and point them back to our site.