Yakuza are members of transnational organized crime syndicates originating in Japan. Heavily tattooed, the Yakuza have historically been involved in violent crimes and other criminal activity. Source: Wikipedia.
The domain Yakuza.com was registered in 1997. Early records of it on Archive.org display content related to music such as hiphop.
In 2001, an Irish creative services company appears to have taken over the domain, quite possibly seeking a positive note for this negative term. At the time, Paddy Go Easy Holdings Ltd was the domain’s holder, renaming as “Yakuza Management Services Ltd.” in later years.
According to WHOIS records provided by DomainTools, the domain was not due to expire until March 28, 2022.
Yakuza.com – Photo by cottonbro from Pexels
Registered at Network Solutions, the domain Yakuza.com was last renewed in 2021, under WHOIS privacy with “Ireland” as the only visible indicator, the locale of the registrant. This indicates that the original registrant still had control of the domain when it was pushed into early expiration.
The domain dropped and it’s currently in auction at DropCatch. The auction closes in two days and has already received bids in excess of $7,500 dollars and almost 100 bids.
Whoever wins the auction is probably safe from the real Japanese Yakuza, but we’d still be wondering what happened and the last registrant lost control of the domain two full months before its expiration date.
Were they pushed into dropping the domain by Sega, owners of the Japanese media franchise Yakuza?
Update: Auction closed at $40,050 dollars