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CyanogenMod Domain Hijacked

Posted by Soulskill on from the greed-is-the-silent-enemy dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The team behind CyanogenMod, one of the most popular community-driven, Android-based operating systems for phones and tablets, has announced that they're moving to Cyanogenmod.org after their .com domain was held ransom by a community member. He had been in control of the .com domain name for some time, but the team found out he was impersonating Cyanogen to make deals with community sites. When they removed his access to other parts of the CM infrastructure, he demanded $10,000 to relinquish control of the domain and threatened to change the DNS entries. When they refused to pay, he went through with it. The team is now disputing control of the domain with ICANN. They said, 'We will continue to be open about the what, when, how, but unfortunately, we may never know the "why" – though greed comes to mind. The team itself has not made a profit off of CM and that is not our goal. But to have one of our own betray the community like this is beyond our comprehension.'"

4 of 143 comments (clear)

  1. Defamation of trademarks can be a criminal matter by sg_oneill · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Whoever this community member is, he needs to be very very careful about what he's doing. Many countries hold that malicious hijacking of trademarks or implied trademarks to be a criminal rather than merely civil matter. Ie if you go to a company or organization and maliciously register their trademark to fuck them over, you can expect a policeman at your door with a warrant.

    This happens quite regularly, and it rarely turns out as happily as the malicious party expected.

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  2. It'll be worth rather a lot, actually by Rix · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Even just putting up a standard ad landing page would generate income, there.

    We'll see if ICANN just brings down the hammer for powerful corporations here.

  3. Name and shame again and again. by couchslug · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Whenever the subject is brought up, it would be appropriate to NAME the perp and note his background info.

    No libel, no slander, just sufficient identification that anyone considering teaming with this fellow can make a fully informed decision.

    It's not revenge, just self-defense.

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    "This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
    1. Re:Name and shame again and again. by Ginger+Unicorn · · Score: 3, Interesting

      None of this explains away the allegation that he was impersonating a CyanogenMod developer to fraudulently establish commercial contracts.

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