I was GOOGLE for a MINUTE, claims quick-witted dude Google is investigating how an Amazon intern "bought" its Google.com domain. The Mountain View giant said it had not "noticed anything unusual" and that it didn't lose control of the domain. Beyond that, the company is keeping mum. Intern Sanmay Ved says he noticed Google.com was available for sale, and quickly "purchased" it …
I've found that installing a BGP daemon in a datacenter that has unrestricted internet access, then having it advertise all routes with a cost of 1 brings down a data center fairly easy...
Accidentally did it as part of test lab while testing a carrier-grade NAT with BGP routers behind it (The BGP routers would advertise self-assigned AS numbers for private ranges (The theory being that those routers would see my router with a cost of 1 for everything and push their traffic through it where it would get translated and re-routed onto the actual internet using 'real' IP addresses). The project was to test doing carrier-grade NAT without needing DHCP and to allow using either IPv4 or IPv6 internally and still allow for IPv4 or 6 on the outside.
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Microsoft did the same a few years ago so not a first.
Also, I've a few domain names myself and one thing is once you buy one, it's then locked for a month and can't be transferred. How did Google get it back without breaking ICANN rules?
Also, for historic reference (requires signing up for a free trial so can't be bothered)...
http://research.domaintools.com/research/whois-history/search/?q=google.com
WHOIS shows that the domain was updated in 2011 and wont expire until 2020...
He might have "bought" the domain in that he paid and a flag somewhere in an eCommerce database briefly said it was his but to claim he owned it is ridiculous.
The daily mail reported this yesterday, I can excuse them because its the daily mail - Im surprised that they manage to understand enough of the world to put their pants on in the morning... I was expecting more from a tech news web site though!
Kinda makes you wonder, though, if someone had the knowledge of what such an admin console can do, sets up an automated script to do whatfor, finds such an opening, snaps it up, apparently gets permissions, and then as soon as it hits, before it goes away, sends this payload. Meaning having admin control, even for a few seconds, could be enough to wreak havoc if someone was playing with this goal in mind.
Are you suggesting an automated script to snipe peoples domains as soon as they expire?
You know that exists - there are companies built around doing just that.
The way .com renewals work (I assume its not changed) is once your domain expires it sits in a lapsed state where only the original owner can renew it for (I think) 14 days after that its back on the open market.. thats when they strike, buy your domain and hope that youll pay through the nose to get it back.
Buying a domain that is currently owned by someone isn't something that you can do by accident as the current owner needs to unlock it first.
So while he may have paid money for the domain, unless someone at google was having a moment of madness, unlocked the domain and then processed his request to transfer it... it was never in his ownership.
If the domain had expired it might be plausible but as we can see (its public information) the google.com domain isnt due to expire for five years so for someone to take ownership of it would require manual intervention from someone at google.
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