Domain Registration Related News
Cohen disputes UK registry's legitimacy
May 2005
The company that runs the UK's Internet
registry is not officially recognised by the
government and as such has no right to decide what
should be done with the millions of domains that
it sells each year.
That at least is the claim of Ben Cohen, former
owner of iTunes.co.uk, who lost ownership of the
domain to Apple in March after a ruling by an
independent expert hired through Nominet's domain
resolution process.
Cohen has been decrying Nominet since the decision
and made a variety of legal threats over the
decision. However he recently discovered that he
was not able to take the actual decision made
against him to the High Court for Judicial Review
because of Nominet's peculiar status.
Following questions made under the Freedom of
Information Act, the government was forced to
state that there is "no formal relationship or
written agreement" between the UK government and
Nominet. As such, it is not a public body and so
is subject only to the usual laws covering UK
companies.
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