> I need some pointers on a situation regarding a domain name > thnat should not be owned by the current listed admin contact > in the whois records. > > Futermore, it seams impossible to contact this person, either > by email or by phone.
I am not a lawyer, but my take is that if the current registrant (owner) registered or purchased the domain name while an employee, using the employer's money to do so, but using his or her own name as the actual registrant, without putting the company's name on the domain, then the domain name belongs to the ex-employee. The employer probably has a cause of action against the ex-employee for misappropriating either the domain name or the money used to procure it, but "title", if there is such a thing in the case of a domain name, rests with the listed registrant. What if it had been real estate? It would belong to the entity listed on the deed, at least until a court ordered otherwise. In reality a lot of domain names are "recovered" by lots of different means, sometimes with the cooperation of the registrar, and sometimes without. But the high road would seem to be to find the registrant and convince him or her to transfer ownership. Maybe it _is_ impossible to contact the person, but there are many ways to locate people besides just trying the email address and phone number listed in the whois. If this is a U.S. company, they would certainly know the SSN of any former employee, and with that it's pretty easy to find _most_ people.
