Image source: Coin Desk
ENS or Ethereum Name Service finally regained control of the eth.link domain name, winning an injunction in a lawsuit against GoDaddy.
The announcement that ENS won against the domain provider came on Sunday.
The lawsuit
True Names Ltd, ENS’s parent company, and previous eth.link owner Virgil Griffith filed a lawsuit against GoDaddy, Daynadot, and Manifold Finance earlier this month.
The lawsuit came after GoDaddy allegedly transferred the eth.link name to domain name registrar Dynadot prior to its expiration date.
They also put the name up for auction in what the ENS called a “breach of contract,” violating an agreement to acknowledge, protect, and respect the eth.link name.
ENS
Ethereum Name Service uses the eth.link domain to connect .eth names to the DNS or Domain Name System, which connects web browsers to websites.
The service enables .eth domain users to create viewable websites for themselves with ENS names, making them accessible from a standard browser.
eth.link access loss disrupted the service for ENS and its users.
However, the crisis was solved.
Injunction
The US district judge in charge of the case allowed for ENS’s request for an injunction, ordering the return of the eth.link name be returned and restoring EthLink services.
“Our injunction was successful and the name has been returned to us,” ENS shared on Twitter Sunday night.
Domain name purchase
According to Domain Name Wire, Manifold Finance previously purchased the eth.link domain name from DynaDot for $851,919.
Sam Bacha, the co-founder of Manifold, shared in a locked thread on the ENS forums why the company “sniped” the name.
“We wanted the domain name because we had intentions of establishing a special purpose trust to provide the legal entity for which key pieces of some of our own infrastructure could have been held,” he explained.
Bacha suggested that ENS could buy the domain name back from Manifold.
Khori Whittaker, the Executive Director of True Names, waved off the offer.
“By court order, the eth.link domain does not belong to Manifold Finance, and it has no current right to sell the domain,” said Whittaker.
ENS lead developer nick.eth previously said he was disappointed and misled by GoDaddy’s actions.
Reference:
Ethereum Name Service regains control of EthLink domain in lawsuit against GoDaddy
