Slashdot Mirror
Jail Time for Misleading Domain Names
Bootsy Collins writes "The Miami Herald is running a
story
on the first-ever prison sentencing (and, for that matter, prosecution and conviction) under the Federal Truth in Domain Names Act. This act, combined into the larger
Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end the Exploitation of Children Today Act (PROTECT) of 2003, made it a violation of U.S. Federal law to use a misleading domain name with the intent to deceive someone into viewing obscene material -- larger penalties if attempting to so mislead minors, but up to two years even if adults are the object. In the case in question, a man was convicted for registering thousands of domain names which were close misspellings of popular web sites for kids. Attempting to surf to those sites would redirect to a site entitled 'Dorm Sex Party.' Before being arrested, the convicted typosquatter made about a million dollars for the referrals." He's been on Slashdot before.
On one hand, typing a URL and getting a "BUY THIS PAGE" page annoys the bejesus out of me.
On the other hand, going to jail for setting up a website seems....excessive. Surely just taking it down and a fine would be enough?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I have absolutely no problem if those sites were adult sites. My issue with these dudes is that they are delibrately TRICKING kids into viewing the porn.
Kudos to the authorities for clamping down on this dude.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
From the article: "Zuccarini admitted in court documents that one reason he preyed on websites popular among children was ''because children are more likely than adults to make spelling errors and to mis-type website addresses,'' prosecutors said.
If he had made the statement that he misspelled the domain names to attract adults, thats one thing, but in his case intention is everything. He should of received 30 years.
Pete Carr Owner Chatmag.com
The thing that worries me about the law is this: what constitutes "use"? What constitutes "using" a misleading domain name? What this guy did surely does. But what about posting a link in which you try to trick people into seeing the goatse man by using a yahoo.com redirect. Is that using a misleading domain name (yahoo.com) to manipulate someone into viewing obscene content? The law itself does not say "use = registering a domain name and setting up a website at". I don't have any problem with this guy getting prosecuted; but I worry that the law is so vague that half the trolls on
A lot of things we silly humans do is motivated by money...so take away any motivation!
Make it two million.
Oh sure... Someone could argue that partybeef.com could be typed in by a 6 year old looking for snacks for her friends, (not a real site, so use your imagination...) Next thing you know the site operator ends up as a piece of party beef in a federal prison because someone decided it was obviously misleading.
What is obvious to me is that the next step will involve going after anyone who puts objectionable material on the net without it being clearly labeled, registered, and hidden behind a credit card required brown paper wrapper page.
And what about unintentionally misleading Google results? When will they hold us liable for that? This one actually disturbs me a little.
That's just really gross. Really, if I was a porn site provider and some guy was redirecting to my site through kiddie bits, I wouldn't be very happy. Primarily because they're taking my money and just throwing it all over the place.
Beyond even the issue of being a scum bag with arguably scummy people, using sites popular with children with a method that drags in more kids than adults. I think this makes him the kingof the scumbags.
Okay, what's this hypothetical law you're supporting. "It is illegal to use a word that someone else may use, if they may not want to see your site"? Or is it "You cannot use a word on your site unless you have a well-considered topical essay on the subject indicated by that word"? Or is it "As the author of a site, you are responsible for how third party software decides to present your URL"? Please do clarify, I'm quite curious.
I've had this sig for three days.
I, unlike most /. posters, can comment on prison based on experience. I have spent time there, as an inmate.
It's my firm belief that sending non-violent criminals to prison
does more harm than good.
There are many other ways to punish someone, besides sending them to prison : home confinement, community service, probation, fines, are all better options for a large percentage of offenders.
Prison should only be the punishment of last resort. It is far from a solution, and the notion that sending some people to
prison acts to prevent others from committing crimes is childishly naive, and doesn't stand up to statistical scrutiny.
Sending non-violent offenders to prison is only one more
in a long series of huge mistakes made by the US government.
Of course, this will not be news to intelligent, well-read people.
All you "law and order" types need to consider this : when someone is sent to prison, unless they die there or have a life sentence, they WILL eventually be released. And when they are,
the rest of society will very likely pay some sort of price for the damage this person has incurred while in prison. Thus, society is
screwing itself by sending non-violent offenders ( or offenders who don't present an actual danger to society ) to prison. Far better to keep these people OUT of prison and punish them in some other way. NOTE : I do believe that crimes *should* be punished, but the point is, it's possible to punish people without
permanently damaging them, that sending someone to prison is quite likely to result in permanent damage.
Any of you out there who haven't done time are not sufficiently informed to comment on the advisability of sending non-violent offenders to prison. You can of course write what you like, but keep in mind that your thoughts might have the same level of
validity as those of a man describing what pregnancy feels like.
Oh, and the invasion of Iraq was about preserving access to oil,
and the "anti-gay marriage" stance the current administration has embraced is an attempt to pander to the religious right
and gain votes.
Don't let YOUR government sucker you into accepting policies that end up screwing YOU.
Thanks, and good evening.
That's what I've been wondering about. According to an article over at The Register he got from ten to twenty-five cents from the porno sites for every re-direction. I realise that the more you make on one customer the more you can spend per potential customer but how many kids that mis-spell Disney or Teletubby or whatever just happen to have access to a credit card or checking account number and how many parents looking for something for their kids are going to decide to postpone that search so that they can buy access to materials they probably won't be sharing with those kids? If the last step is "Profit!" the next to last is a big ol' question mark.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Yeah, I remember seeing porn at an early age as well. My granpa had a stack of playboys hidden in the garage. That was _some_ porn! Nekkid women, posing on a bed, or maybe outside! With no clothes on! Wow!
I discovered my 10 year old had been using my wife's laptop to look for porn when a couple of his neighborhood friends came over. Let me tell you, this was not your granpa's porn. No doubt, he was curious and found a couple of sites and within seconds was clicking links that carried him into brutal domination, shit and piss, fuck me with a crowbar land.
I think the difference is that the net makes it too easy to end up seeing sick, violent, degrading sexual images unintentionally. If you're an adult, and that's what your're into -- fine by me. When I was a kid, the only way I would have been able to get access to that kind of stuff would have been to get on a bus and go across town to where the sex shops and peep shows were.
I don't think seeing those images will scar him for life, but I'd rather he didn't see that kind of stuff until he was a bit older and better equiped to understand what that's all about.
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
The courts regularly overturn the constitution. Where in the world did they find the "right" for a woman to have an abortion? Did they totally ignore the 10th amendment?
The the greatest genius of the framers of the Constitution is that they founded our country upon powerful general principles of freedom and equality. In many cases they themselves were not ready to face the full implications of those principles, yet in a truly subversive act, they gave those principles the ultimate power of law.
Thomas Jefferson, for example, although clearly recognizing the evil of slavery, was unable to give up his own slaves. Yet he helped to found our country general principles that would ultimately make slavery untenable.
These powerful principles were like time bombs in our Constitution, and it was left to the logicians of our society--the judges--to work out the full implications of those principles. It has taken over two hundred years to do so, and we are not done yet.
There is a danger that we will turn away from those deep principles. There have been attempts in the past, such as the effort to amend the Constitution to make burning the flag an exception to the protection of free speech. We are seeing this again, with the effort to amend the Constitution to prohibit states from allowing gay marriage.
If we ever do start to amend the Constitution so as to limit people's rights instead of expanding them, I believe that our nation will have turned a corner from which there is no returning, and will have begun a repudiation of those principles of freedom and equality which our founders fought so hard to establish.
But we've approached that brink and turned back before. I can only hope that we will continue to do so.