Domain Hijacking, Spoofing, Phishing & SEO.

What do you think?

Didnt Google stop given search presence authority to new weak sites with keyword rich domains like years ago? Isnt that EDM, 2012? So a web designer taking the time to add (er) to the end of another businesses website domain, then build a very similar 7+ page website under that domain, in the same locality, in the same exact line of work, with very similar branding, would make zero sense for SEO. It would make perfect sense if you were trying to spoof, phish or directly steal someones brand and business, Right?

Any experts willing to chime in?

1. In the summer of 2017, Mr Dude purchased several domain names in an attempt to expand
   

his geographic footprint.

1. Mr. Dude purchased a variety of domain names, including townnamewebdesigner.com,
   

townname2webdesign.com, and brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesigner.com. His intent was to have those domains redirect to the domain name of his primary business website, mrdudeswebsite.com

1. A few months later, Mr. BusinessOwner received an email from Dude2, owner and operator of BrandNameSharedWithTownName LLC, whose website is brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesign.com

2. Mr. BusinessOwner email accused Mr. Dude1 of “phishing” and demanded that Mr. Bernhardt take

down his brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesigner.com website. (A “phishing” website, sometimes also referred to as a “spoofed” site, tries to steal your account password or other confidential information by tricking you into believing you're on a legitimate website.)

1. Mr. BusinessOwner were mistaken in their belief that Mr. Dude and mrdudeswebsite.com intended to spoof the brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesign.com website conduct phishing activities. They had a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature and significance of the actions being taken by Mr. Dude and, as well as the motivation for taking these actions.

2. Mr. Dude had no intention of spoofing Mr. BusinessOwner website. Mr. Dudes intent was

to geographically expand his business into multiple additional local markets by purchasing

relevant domain names and having potential customers redirected to the mrdudeswebsite.com website.

​

Basically. Mr. BusinessOwner owns a established business at brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesign.com

Mr Dude comes in. Buys the brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesignER.com. Builds out a website that looks very similar in branding to brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesign.com.

Mr Dude claims its for SEO redirects yet builds a full blown website on the brandnamedsharedwithtownwebdesignER.com domain.