Domain scammers hit for $2.3m for UK sting

Two scam artists who duped victims with bogus demands for domain name registration have been hit for AU$2.3m (£980,000) by an Australian court.

Brad Norrish and Chesley Rafferty copied personal information from the Whois listings of Nominet, the dot-uk domain registrar. They then contacted around 50,000 domain owners and told them they must pay a fee or risk losing their domain.

The pair were found guilty of "flagrant" disregard for Nominet's copyright and ordered to pay AU$1.3m in damages to the registrar, after it was forced to close down its Whois database. They were also hit with AU$1m in costs.

Lesley Cowley, CEO of Nominet, said the company takes "protection of our intellectual property and copyright ownership very seriously".

Cowley said in a statement the need to protect its customers is also paramount and praised the international co-operation which had secured the conviction.

She said: "By fighting, and winning, this case we are very clearly showing that scamming is a serious industry issue which will not be tolerated."