Does domain owner own all email to domain?

[LewR]

My question is, as the owner of a domain name, am I entitled to all email sent to that domain?

We can refine the question later - but if I own BlahBlahBlah.com and have a catch all email address, and I entitled to the information sent to that address? No, not bank account numbers to be used illegally, no, not passwords to illegally access certain information - but is the act of collecting this email legal?

Thanks!!

 

[Mr Webname]

I would suggest that the issue is not what information you receive but what you do with it. Knowingly misusing information clearly meant for someone else could land you with problems IMO.
You are not responsible for sending the email to your domain and have no control over it being sent, a bit like moving into a new home and not having a forwarding address for the past occupier - you can return mail to sender or bin it but would you make use of it?
However I am not a lawyer.

 

[GeorgeK]

I believe the answer would be no.

There have been cases where an ISP (who obviously owns the domain name for their ISP) kept email that was intended for former subscribers who had cancelled the service, instead of bouncing the emails as non-deliverable. By not bouncing the email, the ISP was held liable when the former subscriber suffered a loss due to job/resume replies not being received.

See:

http://news.com.com/2100-1023-963631.html?tag=fd_lede2_hed
http://www.lexinformatica.org/liability/carter/

I had thought the case had already been decided in her favour, but can't find a link to a decision. Perhaps some of the lawyers know of other precedents, though.

 

[LewR]

Originally posted by Mr Webname
....I would suggest that the issue is not what information you receive but what you do with it. Knowingly misusing information clearly meant for someone else could land you with problems IMO.
.....

More or less my thoughts.

I do not want to enumerate extreme off base situations ( a letter threatening murder or robbery, etc.) - each of those become individual decisions ( or, should they not be???)

I know I will get a large base of opinins here... And I appreciate that.

 

[namedropper]

Entitled is a kind of loaded word. You may have to refine it first to get a meaningful answer.

If you mean is there the general expectation that you should be able to get email at your own domain? Yes, of course. But I can see cases where there'd be more to it.

For example, I own Norder.com -- It's close enough to NBORDER.com that I get email meant for that occasionally when someone types wrong. That's part of Enron (heh). I get inside stuff sometimes, and the emails are labeled that it's private and I need to report all misdirected emails to a certain account (but, heh, they screwed up and don't let external mail reach that address, morons). It's not my fault I get the messages, and I try to report it because I'm nice, but I'm not legally obligated to tell them everytime one of their employees mistypes and wastes my time, and it's certainly not my fault that they have me blocked from doing the reporting that they ask me to. It's also not my fault if I accidentally see something on one I shouldn't. But that's not a blank check to hold onto it or try to profit off of it. I'm sure a court would have to sort out the particulars if it came to that.

Ditto for misdirected email to NORDEA.com. That's a bank. I get private banking info on an irregular basis. The using illegally or not using illegally isn't the only aspect, there's the privacy part of it. I can't just hold onto those even if I won't use them. Someone could hack into my computer (well, theoretically) or something.

And if you registered and set up a domain purposefully to try to get misdirected email, I can't see that being kosher either... It'd still be typosquatting.

So. in general, of course collecting email on your domain is legal, but is it always? Probably not.

You'd be better served by telling us why you are asking so we can tackle that directly. Or, if it's something you don't want to discuss in public, get a lawyer to consult.

 

[LewR]

George - Great Links - but as the owner of a soley owned and registered domain, not the holder of an unpaid account - do things change?

I don't know - I would love to see more comments in both directions.

 

[jberryhill]

"Entitled to"?

You surely don't own the copyright in it - that belongs to the author. What do you mean "entitled to"?

"but is the act of collecting this email legal?"

If you registered blahblahblah.com out of an intent to capture email on the basis of typographical errors to, say, someone you knew, then it sounds like some form of fraud.

This is one good reason why, if you are a collector of expired domain names for traffic purposes, it is a good idea *not* to receive email intended for those domain names, since you cannot then be accused of having registered the domain name for the purpose of intercepting communications intended for someone else.

But I have no idea what you mean by being "entitled to" email.

 

[LewR]

NameDropper - some of the same situations as you discuss - not really typos though - but the folks writing thinking they are sending email to another party. And as with yourself, not just one other party. I receive legal info from a legal firm - inside company info from a large international corporation, even info on a musical group that shares the same name in principal.

I have no intentions of misusing the info received. BUT - If one of these parties contact me about the name - can I legally mention that I receive such confidential information and that would be a consideration on their part?

 

[LewR]

The name was not registered to collect email - but I started to collect email as the traffic was high to this domain.

That began the questions on my part.

 

[actnow]

I use to occasionally turn on the emails of the domains I bought.

However, it drastically increased the amount of spam I was receiving.

But, what finally took it over the limit was when I turned on the emails
that belonged to a chinese forum that also offered their members free email
services. It was like getting a dump truck load every day.

Now, I don't even bother.

 

[jberryhill]

"can I legally mention that I receive such confidential information and that would be a consideration on their part?"

It would definitely be a consideration on their part.

It would be an admission on your part of actual consumer confusion.

http://www.arb-forum.com/domains/decisions/125751.htm

"Be that as it may, Respondent was then well aware not only of Complainant and its WFU mark but also of the Medical Center also. He knew that email intended for Complainant was being received at Respondent’s <wfubmc.com> website."

 

[LewR]

Very Interesting.

Great posts John. I will say that I do not agree with all that you cite - but facts are facts - and you certainly know how to dig them out.

Salute!!

 

[Steen]

Originally posted by GeorgeK
I believe the answer would be no.

There have been cases where an ISP (who obviously owns the domain name for their ISP) kept email that was intended for former subscribers who had cancelled the service, instead of bouncing the emails as non-deliverable. By not bouncing the email, the ISP was held liable when the former subscriber suffered a loss due to job/resume replies not being received.

See:

http://news.com.com/2100-1023-963631.html?tag=fd_lede2_hed
http://www.lexinformatica.org/liability/carter/

I had thought the case had already been decided in her favour, but can't find a link to a decision. Perhaps some of the lawyers know of other precedents, though.

Yikes!

I own a former ISP's domain and recieved a resume the other day for a lady wanting to get a job with the ISP!

:dead:

 

[Domagon]

Originally posted by LewR
My question is, as the owner of a domain name, am I entitled to all email sent to that domain?

We can refine the question later - but if I own BlahBlahBlah.com and have a catch all email address, and I entitled to the information sent to that address? No, not bank account numbers to be used illegally, no, not passwords to illegally access certain information - but is the act of collecting this email legal?

Thanks!!

The sender of email bears responsibility in ensuring they are addressing email properly and that the intended receiver is still at the email address they are sending their message to.

If one blindly sends off email without verifying it's still current, and furthermore never follows-up, they shouldn't be surprised if their email message gets misdirected, lost, etc.

If such email is being misdirected to you, well, hey that's their problem and not yours.

Of course, as others have already said, if you misuse the information you receive, that's certainly a crime...

With all that said, you may do better not use "catch-all" email anyways since it greatly increases spam for you to filter and could possibly even lead to your server slowing down to a crawl if some idiot runs an email harvesting script against the domain - for example, I have some adult domains getting hit with many thousands of email attempts daily from automated harvesting email scripts that test for working email addresses.

If you insist on having a "catch-all" email...you likely do best to IGNORE and NOT acknowledge receipt of misdirected email. That may be rude, but is legally safer than most of the alternatives.

Lastly, if the amount of misdirected email is relatively small and you have time, then it may be worthwhile personally responding to each, explaining their email has not been received by the intended parties...however, the risks are then you may become liable for ensuring delivery, and furthermore one or more of the senders may complain about you reading their email...there's the rub...and thus the reason I suggest the "ignore and not acknowledge" approach above.

Ron