Federal Government: domains are property

In June of last year, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) announced the launch of “Operation In Our Sites” – an initiative aimed at Internet counterfeiting and piracy.

According to the official web site, ICE.gov:

“ICE and our partners at the National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center are targeting pirate Web sites run by people who have no respect for creativity and innovation,” said ICE Assistant Secretary Morton, who was in Southern California to meet with the leaders of the movie industry. “We are dedicated to protecting the jobs, the income and the tax revenue that disappear when organized criminals traffic in stolen movies for their own profit.”

The article elaborates on the first action taken by the new agency:

In the first action carried out as part of the initiative, authorities executed seizure warrants against nine domain names of Web sites that were offering first-run movies, often within hours of their theatrical release. Seven of those sites were targeted for seizure by the SDNY.

In late December, the Copyhype publication that discusses matters related to intellectual property and copyright, shared an interesting discovery:

On December 9, the US filed a complaint for civil forfeiture in the Southern District of New York against the seven domain names seized this past summer as part of Operation in Our Sites. […] Pursuant to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the US has also posted notice of the forfeiture action [link to forfeiture]

It’s perhaps the first time that domain names are recognized as property at federal level, that can be both seized *and* forfeited.

Whether this is good news or bad news, we’d have to see how this sets the precedent with future lawsuits involving domain names.

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