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Lawyer-Impersonator Pleads Guilty over False C&Ds

By Wendy Seltzer Law professor

As if there weren’t enough problems with lawyers sending out improper cease-and-desists, Wired News reports that a Nevada man has pleaded guilty to impersonating a lawyer to extort domain registrants to turn over their domain names.

“A Nevada man pleaded guilty Thursday to his plotting to steal domain names from their legitimate owners by impersonating a California intellectual property lawyer and send threatening letters to domain name owners in hopes of convincing them to turn over the domains to him.

Las Vegas resident David Scali registered the email address [email protected] in 2006 and then, pretending to be a real Califonia lawyer (whose intials are K.Y.C.), threatened domain name owners with $100,000 trademark infringement suits, unless they transferred the domains within 48 hours.”

I wonder if his C&Ds were any further afield than some we see from real lawyers.

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By Wendy Seltzer, Law professor

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