Bolton's cork pops at Bottle

Embattled domain name registrar Bottle Domains today apologised for a mistake that saw it send emails to customers yesterday alerting them that they had transferred their domain name to another registrar associated with owner Nicholas Bolton.

The two emails sighted by ZDNet.com.au stated that Bottle Domains would transfer customers' domain names to another company named "Bottle". That company was also associated with the owner of Bottle Domains, controversial entrepreneur Nicholas Bolton.

The email was, however, not meant to have been sent. It was an email the company held back from customers when it tried to transfer their domains (without authorisation) to its Bottle business. It is involved in a legal battle with Australia's domain name regulator auDA. It was unsuccessful in transferring the domains as auDA reversed the change because the company had no authorisation from customers.

The case alleged Bolton had not notified auDA of a security breach that occurred in 2007. To keep customers' domain names and the company's registrar status, it would have needed to have notified the regulator.

The company didn't and so auDA took Bolton to court and won. Soon after, though, Bolton said he would appeal, which is due to be heard on 18 February.

The email sent yesterday was the result of a software developer resurfacing the email the company held back from customers in order to try and transfer the domains to its other business to avoid losing them.

"Please ignore this email as it was mistakenly sent while our developers were conducting maintenance on our systems," the apology email stated this morning.

Bolton was contacted for comment.