A really quick way to steal a domain name. Doesn't work for all domain names!

DISCLAIMER: I'm not suggesting you use this technique to steal domain names.

This method only works when the registered email address for the domain name does not exist.

Let's say you had a domain name years ago called example.com. You set up an email address: domains@example.com

You then registered more domain names using that email address as your contact address. Let's say you registered example-1.com, with the contact email address being domains@example.com.

Time passes. You let example.com expire because you didn't want it anymore. You kept example-1.com registered, but you've now forgotten your login details. You do the password reminder thing, only to find out that the contact email address is old and doesn't exist anymore. Now you've gotta fill out a whole heap of forms to get your domain name back... gah!

OR

(and here's the trick)

Assuming example.com isn't registered, you can re-register it, set up domains@example.com, and request your password. Now you can get back in and manage example-1.com (update your email address!) AND assuming you don't actually want example.com, you can delete example.com and get your money back (you have 3 days from purchase of a domain name to delete it for a full refund!)

Hopefully my initial "How To Steal A Domain Name" caught your interest, because if you don't keep your domain name details up to date, this could happen to you! Enterprising individuals could do domain name searches on the contact info, and keep a record of the domains with email addresses that don't resolve. One by one, they could pick off domain names.

Illegal? Absolutely. But the law only stops honest people.