Maltuzi Holdings, LLC a.k.a. NameKing.Com
A few weeks ago, I wrote about how I was surprised and dismayed to find the domain name http://www.cenlamar.com was purchased by a company called Maltuzi Holdings, L.L.C.
Since then, I have learned a little bit more about Maltuzi. I’ve been contacted by a number of different people and businesses who have also had their domain name scooped up by Maltuzi. They seem to be experts at this.
Someone called me yesterday and told me that Maltuzi purchased their small business’s domain name on the day it went up for renewal. Their business (a flower shop, I believe) had owned the domain for seven years. They used it in all of their advertising.
I received this e-mail today:
“I don’t know if you’re aware of the Trenton Duckett case in Florida. Trenton is a 2 yr. old boy who his mother claimed was taken from his bedroom while she and some friends watched a movie. About a week and a half after he went missing, his 21-yr. old mother, who is now the prime suspect, killed herself in her grandparents home. She was uncooperative with police, left vague notes, refused a polygraph and had other odd or suspect behaviors. They still have not found Trenton.
This case has really been bugging me and this morning I wondered why I hadn’t thought to offer to set up a website for these people or if they even had one. So when I went to check on TrentonDuckett.com, I found it was taken by Maltuzi Holdings on September 9, the day AFTER the mother killed herself. In short, (and in my opinion) these people are scum. What’s even a little bit worse (if it can get worse) is that when you go TO trentonduckett.com it comes up with all of these links for things like real estate, mortgages, airline tickets and other things people shop for. Well, these losers have it so that those links come up with the domain name inserted in them. For instance, if you were looking for shoes, it would say Maltuzi Holdings has shoes! So, you guessed it, it says things like “Maltuzi Holdings has Trenton” and “Looking for Trenton?” Scum. Absolute scum.”
Well, it certainly seems like Maltuzi just uses keyword searches to pick up domains, milk them for traffic, and then (hopefully) sell them for a premium. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be any real method to their madness. They buy the domain names of existing businesses (which, I imagine, probably inspires many business owners to pick up the phone and call their lawyer). They bought CenLamar.com, and they didn’t even know what it meant. And it looks like they also bought trentonduckett.com, because the missing boy was in the news– and perhaps they felt that there was money to be made in someone else’s misery.
We should protest! I don’t have any problem with their business buying domain names, but when you purposely co-opt someone’s identity and when you use the name of a missing baby to make money, well, I think you need to answer questions about your professional ethics.
Maltuzi Holdings, LLC’s listed e-mail address is admin@maltuzi.com. I found their phone number somewhere, but now I can’t seem to locate it.
For people who have had their domains purchased by Maltuzi, I’m not sure if this really made a difference (but I like to think it did). Here’s the letter I wrote:
To Whom It May Concern:My name is Lamar White, Jr. I attempted to contact your company earlier tonight, and I was directed straight to a cell phone voice mailbox.
Your company recently purchased the domain name CenLamar.com, a product of my imagination, obviously named after the blogsite I created in March of 2006, considering the site’s top searches inventory.
That said, I hope that we can reach a cooperative agreement regarding my intellectual property before we need to involve employment lawyers regarding your company’s decision to co-opt my brand name and identity.
I will ask now that, before any legal work is filed, you please relinquish the domain name CenLamar.com at fair cost to my company, considering your only obvious intention in purchasing said domain is to rely on my blogsite’s keyword searches and unique content.
If any agreement cannot be reached within 36 (thirty-six) hours, I will take the necessary steps to pursue litigation against your company.
Sincerely,
Lamar White, Jr.
CenLamar 
what they are doing is called “cybersquatting” and those who have to go to the extreme of filing suit against the cybersquatter have very good chances of winning.
Great post. Same happened to me. I left a message on their voicemail system, and did actually get a call back. So for those calling, someone is definitely checking the messages.
I read years ago about two guys that bought up all of the major corporate names on the web, just when the Internet was emerging– they ended up making millions. Smart on their part, especially when it came to big business buying them out– but to take the name of a missing boy and individuals– that just is not right.
Gosh, Lamar, do you think the evil Maltuzi will buy Dr. Sams’ “AdvanceAlexandria.com” spot as soon as he loses the mayor’s race this Saturday? I’m sending him a personal “heads-up” about this alarming possibility.
These people must be on http://www.flickr.com as well, because, I had mentioned that I was about to start a website, and low and behold, went to registar it, and it was bought by them…I was lucky however because I found a different way to spell my websites name that will work just as well! SCUM! I tell you Scum!
My domain name was “stolen” this
morning by Maltuzi. What can I
do?
Yo, so did you ever get your domain or what?? They did the same thing to us on our blog (dannyfordisgod.blogspot.com). We’re a college football website with a fair amount of traffic, what a bucnh of dicks.
Yeah, I had tried to register a domain name on Friday through a service who did some design for us only to find that the domain got hijacked today by Maltuzi. 😦 The sad thing is it’s for a church event that will be catering to the elderly, homeless, and other often-overlooked citizens in our community. Is there anything that can be done to fight it or get it back?
Hi…… i was searchng a domain name to register it today (early on 12th Oct 2006 GMT)…….. low and behold, Maltuzi Holdings managed to register it on 11th October 2006 (us time)……. seems they might have some inside info (don;t know how legal that is!!
I feel a tiny bit better that so many others are in the same boat.
Yesterday evening I entered a domain name into the address bar and it didn’t show anything (I was told it had been registered, but I was just hired to build a website for them). So then I went to Whois.com to see if it had in fact been registered and it hadn’t, and it was available. A couple of hours later I proceeded with registering it through a hosting company and today they say it was registered yesterday. This indicates to me that Maltuzi is intercepting Whois inquiries. Or perhaps there is a bad egg at Whois…?
Did others inquire at Whois before their names got swiped?
I see that Maltuzi Holdings register domain names through Nameking, so I just finished sending an email regarding the unethical, if not illegal, activity to Nameking. The email address is abuse@nameking.com. It would help if many other wrote too.
Exactly the same thing has happened to me. On Friday I registered a couple of combinations & spellings of the same domain name for my new company through a UK registrar. For all of the afternoon it said “registration pending”. When I checked back today all of the domains had been registered successfully apart from one “.com” domain, which was registered by Maltuzi Holdings through Nameking.com on Friday 13th October (exactly the same date we registered).
As you can imagine I am absolutely livid and suspect foulplay by the UK registrar – it seems too much of a coincidence for Maltuzi to register the same domain on exactly the same date.
Unfortunately Icann only seems to be able to help if you’re a registered trademark. We decided to get the domains straight away before we had time to register the company.
Anyone know if there’s anything that can be done?
Incidentally the company name we want is still available. If we were to register the company after Maltuzi have taken our domain name would we be in a better position or is it too late?
Has anyone successfully bought a domain from Maltuzi and how much did it cost?
Greg
I’ve had the same experience as the rest of you – They are complete low lifes.
Man, we had the same thing happen to us. Damn assholes!
i’ve added my domain name to the mix:
bluewavefx.com
may the Justice Department hit them with a very big hammer!
I was and still am infuriated over this whole ordeal.
In the past two weeks I have checked on a domain name for a startup business. The name I was looking for was not a real word and did not make sense. I did not purchase at the moment but it was available. Two days later gone. Then I wanted to get my daughters name as a domain. Checked it was available. Two days later gone. Both Maltzui Holdings. I believe they intercept the domain look up. I checked both names a few times. I was using the look up on go daddy.
I just did the same thing through godaddy. name was available and I went 2 days later to register. They must improperly intercepting inquiries. I was checking on the plural of a name that we already have. Bastards then took the plural. Does anyone know who we can call/file a complaint?
Same experience here. I registered a complaint with Maltuzi, and with their domain registrar, info@nameking.com, who simply directed me back to domain owner Maltuzi. My web hosting co. has also reported Maltuzi to ICANN. And I encourage the rest of you to do the same. We’ll see what comes of it, long-term. Would be nice to read of some resolutions posted here.
What confounds me is the timing: I clearly registered and rec’d the e-receipt from my web hosting service on 11/7/06. And Maltuzi’s registration of this domain is publicly dated 11/8/06. Not sure how that could’ve event transpired.
I too did a domain name search on Godaddy.com prior to registering thru another entity (my web host co.). There was less than an hour lag time between my Godaddy search time and the time of purchase — no kidding — confirming some earlier suspicions posted on this blog.
Maltuzi is clearly a big-leager at this…
News story involving credit unions’ domain names being snatched up by Maltuzi: http://www.cuna.org/newsnow/06/system091206-4.html
And to show the scale they’re working on: http://www.dailychanges.com
“What confounds me is the timing: I clearly registered and rec’d the e-receipt from my web hosting service on 11/7/06. And Maltuzi’s registration of this domain is publicly dated 11/8/06. Not sure how that could’ve event transpired.”
I had the same thing happen with a client’s site. We registered it, and it was scooped after the fact. Has anyone had success with these bastards? How do they do that? Can I scoop it back?
They stole my name as well. A friend of mine bought it to my attention and we were in the middle of setting up my website. My name is very unique and you an goggle it and its their. Don’t even bother your time contacting them because its not going to work. I will be getting an attorney to look into this TODAY
Aleaise
I also had a domain name snatched up by Maltuzi after I used GoDaddy’s whois. The time between the search and them snatching the domain name was about half a day. I used whois at 10 PM the day before, and by noon of the next day, it was snatched by Maltuzi.
Also check this article:
The Great Internet Brand Rip-Off
Hey,I completely agree with the statements above. I was doing some research over Maltuzi LCC and I came accross their website, after I got to looking they said they would transfer the domain back to you and I quote “As stated elsewhere on this website, if you feel that you have a trademark,copyright or any other legal right, to any domain name registered by Maltuzi, LCC , we will gladly transfer it to you. If you feel you have some other right to a domain name registered by Maltuzi LCC, contact us and we will try our best to work something out. If you have a tradename you want excluded from our buying program, please let us know and we will do our best not to purchase it”
Now if I can figure out where to go from here. If any of you want the link to the website and don’t currently have it, the link is http://www.maltuzi.com . Let’s hope everyone gets their domain back ,including me.
someone said there was a number to call. i would really like to get my domain name back. i dont have the money to sue. i dont like the alternative site names im being forced to think of. these guys should really try to have some respect for original ideas. im a musician and my band name is cubworld. the site: cubworldmusic.com is now a BS page for nothing. no one would need that page but me or the boy scoutt or the chicago cubs but i doubt they are in need of a music section. could someone email me more contact info on these guys at cubworld@gmail.com? i’ve been trying to email but im not getting through. im willing to pay a few extra bucks for the domain but if they ask for higher im just gona have to cry and call it something else. fags. anyways. hook me up with a number or email if possible. thanks