<story><title>Bringing Down a Copycat Site</title><url>http://www.xequte.com/fraud/</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>dcx</author><text>I found the below comment on the 2004 slashdot discussion. IMO this is the best way to handle this - thought it would add value to discussion on HN (edit - formatting):&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;&quot;1. Immediately(!) purchase the stolen software, using a Mastercard or Visa. The resulting download is evidence, and the purchase itself will be used later. Make every effort to identify who (URL, domain name, contact info, company name, etc.) is actually processing this credit card transaction (hint: it&apos;s usually not the kid in Pakistan).&lt;p&gt;2. Notify the contact info of the domain of the infringement. Use a DMCA-compliant notification.&lt;p&gt;3. Notify the next upstream ISP of that domain of same.&lt;p&gt;4. Notify the domain&apos;s registrar. Some have TOS which forbid illegal activity.&lt;p&gt;5. Is the bad guy still up? Then start notifying the credit card processor that they have participated in a sale of stolen goods. Use a letter that calmly documents the date of purchase, how you identified the download as a stolen copy of your software, etc.&lt;p&gt;6. When your credit card bill arrives, follow the instructions on the back of the bill to contest that purchase. Inform the credit card company of everything that&apos;s happened, including dates and times and copies of correspondence&lt;p&gt;7. Join the ASP [asp-shareware.org]. It&apos;s a chance to notify fellow software producers that their software is being ripped off along with yours (and increase the pressure on a particular pirate site). It&apos;s also a way of supporting an organization that works to support your right to make a living selling software.&lt;p&gt;The linchpin in this effort is credit card processing. I don&apos;t care if you live on a small island that you rule yourself, if you take Mastercard/Visa transactions, you rely on American companies and American law. These giant companies grant smaller companies the right to parcel out merchant accounts, and they can cause non-trivial financial pain for merchant accounts that generate too many complaints for them.&lt;p&gt;The wheels of the law can take much time to grind to a conclusion, and not always in your favor. Visa/Mastercard can issue a $20,000 fine in a much shorter time, and they don&apos;t have to consult a jury.&lt;p&gt;In the Wild West of Internet fraud that involves money flow, Mastercard/Visa is judge, jury, and executioner. Most victims simply don&apos;t know enough to bring their case to them, or the amount of fraud would be dropping.&quot;&lt;/i&gt;
&lt;a href=&quot;http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=134264&amp;#38;cid=11211953&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=134264&amp;#38;cid=1121...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Bringing Down a Copycat Site</title><url>http://www.xequte.com/fraud/</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>ck2</author><text>They should have used the DMCA.
You don&apos;t go to the registrar, you go to the host.&lt;p&gt;You can takedown nearly any site hosted in the USA within a few hours these days (even with content you don&apos;t actually own, if you don&apos;t mind being counter-noticed or even sued).</text></comment>