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First
Class Action Suit Filed in the SnapNames Shill Bidding
Scandal and Customers Get Access to Bidding Records The
first trickle in what observers expect to be a flood of
lawsuits
was
filed today as the insider shill bidding scandal at SnapNames.com
continues to dominate news in the domain industry. A
class action suit was filed in Florida's Miami-Dade
County Circuit Court by the
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Cueto
Law Group on behalf of lead Plaintiff Carlos
A. Cueto and others who participated
in online domain auctions conducted by Oversee.net
subsidiary SnapNames. In the lawsuit Mr. Cueto
alleges that an executive of the company
conducting the auctions acted as a shill bidder
to manipulate bids. Though not named in the
Cueto press
release announcing the suit, that executive
has been identified as former SnapNames VP of
Engineering Nelson
Brady. |
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The
number of people who may join class auctions lawsuits of
this nature will depend in part on how many customers
that were defrauded accept cash (or credit) settlements
currently being offered by SnapNames. Over the weekend
the company responded to customer requests and made all
of their historical bidding records available online.
The most recent two years worth of records had been
available but Brady's alleged actions reportedly began
much earlier, starting in 2005. Prior to gaining access
to all of their records customers couldn't determine if
the settlements being offered covered all of the
auctions they were victimized in.
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Nelson
Brady
Former SnapNames VP accused of shill
bidding in as many as 50,000 online auctions. |
Customers
are also weighing other issues with one of the
biggest being accountability for the
crimes that have been committed, beyond just a
refunding of money they lost on the scheme. In
the hundreds of comments that have been left on
industry blogs and forums over the past few
days, a recurring question is whether or not
SnapNames is pressing charges against Brady in a
fraud that looks like it will run well into seven
figures. Thus far, the company has said it
cannot comment on that at this point. One way or
another, with the scope of the scandal being so
large, it is hard to envision the case escaping
the purview of law enforcement before all is
said and done. Brady
has remained silent since Oversee announced they
had discovered the fraud and were moving to
reimburse SnapNames customers. His version of
events is the proverbial "other shoe"
that everyone is |
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waiting
to drop. If he does surface, will he accept the
blame that has been leveled at him or will he
paint a different picture of what occurred in an
incident that had rocked the entire industry? |
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One
other note today. We have just published our comprehensive
review of the recently concluded T.R.A.F.F.I.C.
New York domain conference. The article
includes dozens of previously unreleased photos and
details on conference events that we did
not have time to cover in our daily Lowdown
highlights from the show. This conference marked the end of an era as
show co-founders Rick Schwartz and Howard Neu have now turned the
T.R.A.F.F.I.C. reins over to
Rick Latona, effective with the next
event in the series, T.R.A.F.F.I.C.
West, coming up in Las Vegas
January 21-23. Latona
intends to put his own stamp on the show. He
took a move in that direction today announcing
that he has secured |
T.R.A.F.F.I.C.
Co-Founders Howard Neu
(at podium) and Rick Schwartz
welcome
attendees to T.R.A.F.F.I.C. New York. |
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the
services of Canadian domain investor/developer Rick
Silver (N49.com)
to moderate the five T.R.A.F.F.I.C.
conferences that Latona will stage next year. Silver
caught Latona's attention when he spoke at the T.R.A.F.F.I.C.
ccTLDs conference that Latona staged
in Amsterdam this past June. In addition
to being an excellent speaker with an impressive
track record in domain development, Silver is a
very personable guy who conference attendees
will enjoy being around. |
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