Parties

Nominet UK  v  (1) Diverse Internet Pty Ltd
(2) Internet Payments Pty Ltd
(3) Bradley Stedman Norrish
(4) Chesley Paul Rafferty
(5) (UK) Internet Registry Ltd

Background

In early 2003 we were forced to suspend its WHOIS service because we had become aware of a concerted attempt to mine the WHOIS which was not being reduced despite blocking a series of the IP addresses.

In February 2003, registrants of the .uk domain names started receiving documents from "(UK) Internet Registry" which gave its address in London and which appeared to suggest that the .co.uk domain name listed on the document was due for renewal. In fact the documents were offers to sell a .com domain name for significantly more than the current market rate.

We believed that the mining of the WHOIS had been in breach of our copyright in the WHOIS and register. We also felt that the documents being sent out where using the .uk WHOIS data and were deceptive for a number of reasons.

In late 2003 we had established the identities of those responsible. Diverse Internet Pty Ltd and its director, Mr Norrish were based in Western Australia. Internet Payments Pty Ltd and Mr Rafferty were based elsewhere in Australia and (UK) Internet Registry Ltd was a company based in the Seychelles set up some time after the data mining event.

Legal Proceedings

We commenced proceedings in the Federal Court of Australia. The trial in the matter was split. The trial on liability (i.e. did the respondents do what Nominet UK says they did) was the first step. Unusually, the defendants continued to resist and so we had to complete the second setp, a trial on quantum (what damages, costs etc. must the respondents pay).

Shortly before the trial the first, second, fourth and fifth respondents admitted liability for certain acts (which varied between the respondents). The trial continued against the second respondent (Mr Norrish) alone.

The judgement in the case was made on 22 September 2004. Details of all the orders, and the reasoning of the judge are also available. We released a press statement at the time.

Judgement

Justice French found that both the .uk domain name register and the .uk WHOIS were separate copyright works in Australian copyright law. He also found that Mr Norrish played a full part in the UK Internet Registry scheme which the judge characterised as "... nothing less than deceitful" and had authorised the copying of the WHOIS data. Justice French also confirmed that the notices sent by (UK) Internet Registry were deceptive on a number of counts.

Damages

Due to the actions of the respondents, Nominet asked for, and obtained, a 'Mareva Injunction' which is a court order freezing the assets of some of the respondents.

Further to that Nominet sought a final damages order.  In December 2005 Justice French handed down his judgement.

The judgement awarded Nominet AU$810,953 in damages (around GB£345,000) plus a further AU$500,000 (£212,700) in additional damages.  This award of additional damages was the equal highest ever awarded in Australia and was designed to reflect the flagrancy of the copyright infringement.

Our press statement on this is also available.

Enforcement

At the same time, auDA, the Australian domain name registry had obtained judgement against Mr Rafferty, and so he and several of his companies were bankrupted and wound up.

A company linked to Mr Rafferty's brother called Domains Australiasia Pty Ltd (DA) sought to obtain the bulk of Mr Norrish's money (protected by the court order) by calling in a supposed debt in its favour. They obtained a court order to this effect. Once we became aware of this order, we opposed it in the District Court, which eventually agreed with our application to have the order in favour of DA.

Mr Norrish was, for a time, difficult to locate. However, our process servers managed to locate him and serve bankruptcy papers on him. We were due to bankrupt him on 4th July 2006, but in the end he filed for bankruptcy himself on the after noon of 3rd July 2006, over three years after the original UKIR documents were issued.

We issued this statement at the time of his bankruptcy.