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US Grabs More Domain Names, $1.4M From Online Counterfeit Operations

Posted by timothy on from the business-as-increasingly-usual dept.

coondoggie writes "According to court documents, investigation by federal law enforcement agents revealed that subjects whose domain names had been seized in a November 2010 operation continued to sell counterfeit goods using new domain names. In particular, the individuals, based in China, sold counterfeit professional and collegiate sports apparel, primarily counterfeit sports jerseys." So now the government has again taken over a swathe of domain names used in crime.

55 of 69 comments (clear)

  1. Yawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Is anyone else underwhelmed by this "accomplishment"? Sports jerseys? Really? I guess as long as the proceeds more than fund the operations I am OK with this, but it had better be a net win for the government.

    1. Re:Yawn by nurb432 · · Score: 1

      But now that we have achieved world peace, cured all diseases, and there is no hunger, we have nothing else to do but go after t-shirt and shoe companies.

      GO TEAM!

      --
      ---- Booth was a patriot ----
    2. Re:Yawn by sjames · · Score: 1

      And as a result of the squeeze, fake sports jerseys will now cost up to $0.50 more to make up for it.

      I wonder how much the enforcement action is costing us?

    3. Re:Yawn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The Governments purpose is to lay and enforce the framework of society.

      The Government is not there to make money.

      So if we ever want Government to function correctly we as a people must debate what we want the Government to accomplish for society with the understanding that we as a people are willing to pay for it. If we're not willing to pay for it then the Government shouldn't be doing it. What percentage of your income are you willing to pay for roads, school lunches, the military, the elderly? How much are you willing to pay for copyright enforcement?

      What do we want these things to do for us and much should we be spending on them?

      BTW if all you think is we should cut one thing and spend more on another you aren't thinking at all.

    4. Re:Yawn by jcoy42 · · Score: 1

      Maybe we're just looking at the new cold war.

      I'd say China's gonna take this one.

      --
      Never trust an atom. They make up everything.
    5. Re:Yawn by davester666 · · Score: 1

      "The Government is not there to make money"

      No, it's there to spend money.

      And contrary to press reports, neither of the two parties in the US seem at all serious about spending less, just differ on where to spend more.

      And they both know the magic words to apply to get any bill through:
      a) terrorism
      b) child porn

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    6. Re:Yawn by Spy+Handler · · Score: 1

      If someone stole your bicycle or broke into your car and stole your stereo, you wouldn't report it to the police because their time and money is better spent going after murderers and rapists, rather than petty crime such as yours? Is that your logic?

      I used to work next door to a small 3-woman firm that licenses Warner Brothers (mostly Batman and Looney Tunes) characters and puts them on car floormats and sells them to auto supply shops. Theirs is "officially licensed product". They pay 10 to 20 grand for a logo per shipment of floormats, and they take all the risk (they pay the license fee regardless of whether the product sells or sits in a warehouse). Competing against cheaper pirated products can easily make them lose money and put them out of business.

      They were nice people and one of them was very cute btw....

    7. Re:Yawn by nurb432 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      If someone stole your bicycle or broke into your car and stole your stereo, you wouldn't report it to the police because their time and money is better spent going after murderers and rapists, rather than petty crime such as yours? Is that your logic?

      If you want to compare using Federal agents to go after infringement of some copyright to my bike being stolen and asking my local police to look into it, we have nothing to discuss, as you are an idiot.

      --
      ---- Booth was a patriot ----
  2. We need a new DNS fast by santax · · Score: 4, Insightful

    We really need to take the USA out of the internet-control. About everything is illegal in the USA and we should not take the risk they keep shutting more and more sites down. Yesterday it was for the children, today it's for the really rich and bad guys (riaa) and tomorrow it's because you tweeted you would go to LA and dig up Marilyn Monroe to party like there is no tomorrow. The world is in need of a new internet, a true internet without the current system of root-servers. A 100% decentralized internet, or in the event that isn't possible, an internet where the rootservers are in international waters. It's become to dangerous and we need to act. Fast.

    1. Re:We need a new DNS fast by nurb432 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It works in both directions and isn't a 'usa thing', just wait until the UN gets bored and starts doing this to everyone they can find..

      --
      ---- Booth was a patriot ----
    2. Re:We need a new DNS fast by santax · · Score: 1

      Let me rephrase then, we need to stop governments in general to be able to do this.

    3. Re:We need a new DNS fast by muon-catalyzed · · Score: 2

      Ok, who would you delegate the oversight/police work over to? United States still has less corruption then most of other options. If you are so offended, in the US, you can sue the agency or the government and get your mistakenly seized domain back, plus $ damages. Lawyers actually love these kind of bad-government suits. Now, would that alternative solution you are proposing have such safeguards? In some decentralized internet utopia, the real mafias would run the place, there would be no authority to call or ability to challenge the subject in a fair trial.

    4. Re:We need a new DNS fast by santax · · Score: 1

      Don't think I mentioned corporations ;)

    5. Re:We need a new DNS fast by santax · · Score: 1

      We don't agree. The USA even has 'sealed' cases about seizing domains... So even the lawyers don't know why their clients domain was seized in the first place. If there is one country that has proven over and over again since during it's whole history to be not trustworthy one has to say it's the USA. With all due respect to her citizens. To answer your question, best would be a true decentralized system. Next stop would be a non-profit formed under the watching eye of Richard Stallman, who as proven over and over again to be the last true hacker and freedom lover. If he doesn't want the job, let him appoint some one. At least then we know it's in good hands.

    6. Re:We need a new DNS fast by J'raxis · · Score: 3, Insightful

      About the only way to do this would be to create a system that is truly out of everyone's control. Otherwise, you can guarantee that someone's idea of "you can't do that!" will be imposed on the system. If it's not in the name of "IP," it'll be in the name of fighting racism and bigotry. Or terrorism. Or child pornography. Or something else.

      --
      Liberty in your lifetime
    7. Re:We need a new DNS fast by santax · · Score: 1

      Yes, I agree with you. It will be the only way and despite the bad guys could and would use this system too, I still feel that would be the way to go. The bad guys are going to do their things anyway. Might as well make sure we have, the good guys, have the same rights and level of protection.

    8. Re:We need a new DNS fast by santax · · Score: 1

      I think it should be possible to implement a system that tests multiple dns-peers. But yes, the implementation of such a system won't be easy. We can see this with TOR. It's a secret that the Dutch government has set up many tor-exit nodes. Effectively being able to snoop on lots of TOR-traffic, and while not completely compromising TOR, it's getting dangerous. But I agree with you, it's hard to come up with something that will be secure. But the current system as it is, should still be replaced. At least, that's what I think ;) Others might disagree :D

    9. Re:We need a new DNS fast by J'raxis · · Score: 1

      Exactly. It's outside the purview of the domain name system to police content.

      --
      Liberty in your lifetime
    10. Re:We need a new DNS fast by Macrat · · Score: 1

      About the only way to do this would be to create a system that is truly out of everyone's control.

      Skynet?

    11. Re:We need a new DNS fast by J'raxis · · Score: 1

      More along the lines of peer-to-peer networks, Bitcoin, or Tor.

      --
      Liberty in your lifetime
    12. Re:We need a new DNS fast by manu0601 · · Score: 1

      an internet where the rootservers are in international waters.

      Mmmmh... An Internet ruled by somalian pirates :-)

    13. Re:We need a new DNS fast by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 1

      UN can't do shit, it doesn't have any enforcement agencies. It can only do what the constituting member states can do, each to their own population.

    14. Re:We need a new DNS fast by Kalriath · · Score: 1

      Put enough of them together, and literally nothing ever gets done. Basically, just put an independent committee run by a music company, a tech company, and a retailer in charge, and they'll never agree on anything.

      --
      For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
    15. Re:We need a new DNS fast by ewieling · · Score: 1

      "It works in both directions and isn't a 'usa thing', just wait until the UN gets bored and starts doing this to everyone they can find.."

      Burying these evil counterfeiters in UN resolutions will stop them!

      --
      I really shouldn't have used someone else's email address for this account.
    16. Re:We need a new DNS fast by dontmakemethink · · Score: 1

      Ok, the country with by far the most internet users is China, you want to give them a 22.5% interest in regulating the internet? Or instead, lets prioritize on a per capita basis, the country with the highest internet usage per capita is Greenland. They're the most vulnerable to regulation, so let's put them in charge. India has only 10% per capita online, but they're #3 for most users. The top G8 country per capita is Canada at #4.

      You figure out a way to get big countries with low per capita usage and small countries with high per capita usage to agree on anything, and I bet the Nobel committee would come a-knocking. In the meantime, the country that ranks highest in combined number of users and per capita usage is the US. At least they're predictable. Next on that list are Japan and Germany. Eerie isn't it?

      And for the record, I am not American.

      --

      War as we knew it was obsolete
      Nothing could beat complete denial
      - Emily Haines
    17. Re:We need a new DNS fast by nurb432 · · Score: 1

      That, i will agree with.

      --
      ---- Booth was a patriot ----
  3. whack-a-mole by 0111+1110 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Ah. Whack-a-mole. That most American of games. Such an excellent way to spend someone else's money.

    --
    Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
  4. Not Right by Nom+du+Keyboard · · Score: 1

    I don't believe that this is right of the American government to do. The Internet is not sole U.S. property and there are no court proceedings to justify it.

    --
    "It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
    1. Re:Not Right by hendridm · · Score: 3, Informative

      I don't believe that this is right of the American government to do. The Internet is not sole U.S. property and there are no court proceedings to justify it.

      Then don't put it on a TLD that is within U.S. jurisdiction. You'll notice that thepiratebay.org now redirects to thepiratebay.se for this reason.

      And if the U.S. asks a country to take down a ccTLD/server/whatever and the country complies, who should you be bitching at? The U.S. or your own government that is complying with another country's demands?

    2. Re:Not Right by cheekyjohnson · · Score: 2

      The U.S. or your own government that is complying with another country's demands?

      Both.

      --
      Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
    3. Re:Not Right by houghi · · Score: 1

      And if the U.S. asks a country to take down a ccTLD/server/whatever and the country complies, who should you be bitching at? The U.S. or your own government that is complying with another country's demands?

      The U.S.and the government that is complying. It does not even have to be my own.

      --
      Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  5. The futility of DNS seizures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    This quick recovery those counterfeiters managed goes to show just how futile it is to attach the domain name infrastructure for these kinds of infringements. And for obvious reasons... nobody types an URL anymore, they just go to google/bing/whatever. And it's really a point & click matter to have your brand-new replacement domain indexed by them: you just have to fill in a form and watch googlebot crawl your site.

    If they had invested all that effort in seizing bank accounts instead (and the warrants they need to do that), they'd have shut them down for real. Instead, they just inflict collateral damage without any real damage to counterfeiters.

  6. Problem? by IonOtter · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ACTUAL crime being committed? Check.
    Warrant? Check.
    Proper procedure followed? Check.
    Crime investigated? Check.
    Crime confirmed? Check.
    Crime properly documented? Check.
    PUBLIC DULY INFORMED???

    Check and check.

    I don't have a problem with this.

    --
    [End Of Line]
    1. Re:Problem? by ScentCone · · Score: 4, Informative

      Was the crime committed on U.S. soil or within U.S. jurisdiction?

      Yes. That's where they're selling the stuff.

      --
      Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
    2. Re:Problem? by 0111+1110 · · Score: 1

      So if they sell stuff to other countries do they have to abide by their laws as well? What if those laws contradict each other. If an American company were to ship a sex toy to Saudi Arabia would it be okay for the Saudis to send an agent to chop off the hands of all of those responsible for shipping it? Or how about life in prison in a Saudi jail? The US is treating US laws as though they are the laws of the world. They are not. The US government is only doing this because they can and probably due to corruption. Not because it is proper behavior.

      --
      Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
    3. Re:Problem? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      They'd have issues with getting the person extradited, but yes, if you're shipping something to a foreign country, it's your responsibility to know if it's legal. Remember the prince of pot? He would have been fine, but he started shipping to the US where it was illegal. Ultimately, he was extradited and tried.

      This is one of the reasons why many companies don't do business internationally, because they're then having to comply with and track all sorts of export regulations that don't apply if you're shipping to domestic addresses.

      If you don't want to be tried under US law, then don't commit crimes in the US. It's pretty simple, this isn't a case of a packet traveling through the US, these are cases where there is a very real presence in the US.

    4. Re:Problem? by Bacon+Bits · · Score: 2, Interesting

      So if they sell stuff to other countries do they have to abide by their laws as well?

      Yes. Of course you do.

      What if those laws contradict each other.

      Then you probably can't do business in that country. There is no inherent right to do business, and no right to make a profit. If you can't do it within the bounds of the law, you can't do it.

      If an American company were to ship a sex toy to Saudi Arabia would it be okay for the Saudis to send an agent to chop off the hands of all of those responsible for shipping it? Or how about life in prison in a Saudi jail?

      They could request extradition, assuming the two nations have good relations and working treaties with extradition agreements. This type of thing can and has happened before.

      The US is treating US laws as though they are the laws of the world. They are not. The US government is only doing this because they can and probably due to corruption. Not because it is proper behavior.

      The US is treating properties which are located in the US as subject to US law, which is the natural right of any sovereign nation. Domain names, under the current DNS system, effectively reside in the US because they are managed by ICANN, an organization located in the US. That makes DNS digital property subject to US law.

      --
      The road to tyranny has always been paved with claims of necessity.
    5. Re:Problem? by santax · · Score: 2

      What needs to be changed is very simple. The US does this for her own coorps and citizens btw. If you sell something, the rules apply from the country from which you are selling. If someone from another country decides to buy from you (foreign) than it's his/her responsibility to make sure the item bought is legal. Not the other way around like some countries act now.

    6. Re:Problem? by Kalriath · · Score: 1

      The US is treating properties which are located in the US as subject to US law, which is the natural right of any sovereign nation. Domain names, under the current DNS system, effectively reside in the US because they are managed by ICANN, an organization located in the US. That makes DNS digital property subject to US law.

      Not quite correct. The US does not claim jurisdiction over ccTLDs, the TLDs which are delegated down to other countries - which are in fact not managed by ICANN (e.g. Australia's ccTLDs are managed by auDA, New Zealand's by InternetNZ, USA's by NeuStar). There are various reasons for this, but mostly it's the technical near impossibility of injecting a "poisoned" DNS entry for a ccTLD by adding it to the root zone, since most DNS servers won't go all the way to the root servers to ask for a single domain.

      --
      For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
    7. Re:Problem? by rtb61 · · Score: 1

      Innocent until proven guilty in a court of law? FAIL.

      "Washington, we have a problem." as a RIAA/MPAA driven Justice Department driven by Uncle Tom Obama send justice hurtling out of control. Steal the stuff, fire the employees, threatening them with extended homosexual rape in US prisons (don't deny Americans routinely comment on it and it is publicly acknowledged http://www.hrw.org/news/2007/12/15/us-federal-statistics-show-widespread-prison-rape).

      So forget justice this is all about nothing but a corrupt betrayer in the highest office in the United States a true Uncle Tom and out of control greed and corruption.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    8. Re:Problem? by xenobyte · · Score: 1

      Was the crime committed on U.S. soil or within U.S. jurisdiction?

      Yes. That's where they're selling the stuff.

      Wrong. They're selling the stuff on the Internet. It has no nationality and thus no laws - and thus no crime can be committed.

      Some or most of their customers are in the US but that doesn't matter. If they can't touch the manufacturers (that are committing the crimes here) which are physically located in China they can go after the stuff when it hits US soil. They don't need to mess with the Internet in order to stop people from buying this stuff.

      --
      "For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." -- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) --
    9. Re:Problem? by xenobyte · · Score: 1

      If an American company were to ship a sex toy to Saudi Arabia would it be okay for the Saudis to send an agent to chop off the hands of all of those responsible for shipping it? Or how about life in prison in a Saudi jail?

      They could request extradition, assuming the two nations have good relations and working treaties with extradition agreements. This type of thing can and has happened before.

      Actually... Until the post 9/11 era it was ab absolute requirement that the crime was indeed a crime in both countries. No problem when it comes to murder and similar, because that's illegal in most countries, but something like a sex toy might be extremely illegal in Saudi Arabia but it sure isn't in more other (civilized) countries. So the people shipping the sex toy would never be eligible to be extradited. Now, some countries have expanded extradition treaties where 'serious crimes' (terror in particular) are grounds for extradition from country A and prosecution in country B even for citizens of country A currently located in country A.

      A recent example was a danish woman who was extradited from Denmark to the US (Florida) on drug charges - her former boyfriend was convicted of drug smuggling which happened while they were together, and as part of a plea-bargain he testified that she was in on it. Fortunately she was cleared (zero evidence) and is now safely back in Denmark. It was an obvious misuse of the expanded extradition treaty because even if she did it (knew about it), she obviously didn't have a connection to the smuggling itself, nor took part in the proceeds except third hand. She was nothing like a drug king pin or similar which would be a minimum for triggering the expanded treaty.

      --
      "For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." -- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) --
    10. Re:Problem? by ScentCone · · Score: 1

      Wrong. They're selling the stuff on the Internet

      A sale involves communication with the customer (or in this case, victim, being sold counterfeit goods), involves moving money around, and involves moving goods around. They aren't "selling on the internet," as that's not even possible with physical goods. They are allowing a customer/victim to communicate order and payment info to them across the internet. And then they use the international banking system, which crosses borders and is subject to all sorts of international treaties and arrangements, to actually take the money from the customer/victim. Then they use common carriers or freight companies to move the goods across international borders to deliver the goods, through customs (subject to international agreements and laws) to the person taking deliver of the bogus, fraudulant items.

      The sale is consumated when the delivery is made. In the US. The sale also happens to involve financial activity across international boundaries, using the US bankking system. Fraudulently misrepresnting the nature of the transaction is a crime. Delivering counterfeit goods is a crime. Ripping off trademarks has both civil and criminal components to it.

      and thus no crime can be committed

      Let me guess, you like to rip off entertainment instead of paying the people who make it what they ask for it, and so you come up with uninformed, assinine "explanations" for this sort of thing as cover for your own ripping off of things. Yup, thought so. It's on the internet so it can't be wrong! Obviously your junior high school teachers aren't serving you very well.

      --
      Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
    11. Re:Problem? by Tubal-Cain · · Score: 1

      They're selling the stuff on the Internet. It has no nationality and thus no laws - and thus no crime can be committed.

      Like ScentCone said, the Internet is merely the way they receive an order. Would it be any different if the customer ordered by phone? Fax? Mail Order?

  7. Thus demonstrating... by gstrickler · · Score: 1

    ...that seizing domains does absolutely no good, and that in at least a one case, it does significant harm to people who haven't violated the law.

    It's a flawed, ineffective, and destructive policy that can only cause harm and can never have any significant benefit. It needs to be stopped immediately.

    --
    make imaginary.friends COUNT=100 VISIBLE=false
  8. Is this the list? by AHuxley · · Score: 1

    http://gigaom.com/2012/05/11/louis-vuitton-asks-for-sopa-like-seizure-of-hundreds-of-websites/ links to
    http://www.scribd.com/doc/93228219/Louis-Vuittion-Complaint
    At the end of the page 20 some ~380 domains are listed?

    --
    Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  9. Re:ACTUAL crime... where exactly? by IonOtter · · Score: 1

    Hence the conditions: "Proper procedure followed" and "Actual crime".

    If you follow proper procedure, you will determine whether or not you actually have jurisdiction. And in the US, the sale of counterfeit goods-where 'counterfeit' in this case marking the items to look exactly like the genuine article, such as Reebock instead of Reebok- is illegal. So in this instance, they appear to have cleared all those conditions.

    --
    [End Of Line]
  10. All the Banners by pgn674 · · Score: 1

    If you want to see all of the banners used by the Operation In Our Sites initiative, I have collected them here: DOJ Seized Domain Notices - Paul Nickerson - Picasa Web Albums

  11. ACTA for only $1,455,438? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    So according to ACTA promoters, counterfeiting is a $100 billion a year business, and yet these websites combined, resulted in seizure of only $1.5 million??

    "Under warrants issued by a U.S. District Judge, law enforcement agents seized $1,455,438.72 in proceeds that had been transferred from the money service business accounts to various bank accounts in China."

    I notice they included the decimal point in the story and the fraction which makes the number longer, but it is only $1.5 million, probably far less than the budget of the department investigating it, and certainly not worth crippling the world with censorship, surveillance etc.

    So can we now again have a proper assessment of the true damage counterfeiting is and stop this ACTA funny number nonsense??

  12. How come the buyers by future+assassin · · Score: 2

    are not being punished? You can't tell me they couldn't get the transaction history from the payment processors.

    --
    by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
  13. it's just a bit of moldy old paper by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    The constatution does not EXPRESSLY make couterfetting a crime, nor does it EXPRESSLY allow the siezure of domain name's without due process.

    This is therefor by definition an illegal tax on competition.

    (roman_mir, can't login for some reason)

    1. Re:it's just a bit of moldy old paper by TedHornsby · · Score: 1

      The constatution does not EXPRESSLY make couterfetting a crime, nor does it EXPRESSLY allow the siezure of domain name's without due process.

      This is therefor by definition an illegal tax on competition.

      (roman_mir, can't login for some reason)

      Your argument would have greater weight if you could spell "Constitution" and "counterfeiting" and "therefore" and "seizure". Also, if you understood the proper use of apostrophes. I'm not usually such a spelling and grammar nazi, but, dude, this is just painful to look at.

  14. That's just capitalism working. by tebee · · Score: 1

    Much as I feel sympathy for your cute girls, if they are not making money from this it's probably because they are/were paying too much for the licence fee. They made a bad business decision somewhere down the line and flunked out. I have no personal knowledge of the market for Loony Tunes car floormats but would suspect it's not huge anyway.

    If their themed mats are markedly more expensive than an ordinary mats then people just will not buy them. To blame pirated mats for this is just trying to find reasons to avoid taking the blame themselves.

    To a large extent this is how the capitalist system works though, we need survival of the fittest businesses to ensure the market works. The companies that sell the licences will always try to get higher fees for them, it's only the fact that a number of the licensees fail that stops these fees going up any more and us the public having to pay even more for our goods.

    --
    N.B. this user is far too lazy to write a witty and intelligent sig.
  15. Twisted, man by Jawnn · · Score: 1

    Banksters continue to loot the savings and investments of millions of people, and our "leaders" are focused on knock-off NFL jerseys and copied mp3's.

  16. This time! It will surely work THIS TIME! by alex_guy_CA · · Score: 1

    Also, we are going to finally win the drug war any day now.

    --
    San Francisco Photographers