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November 16, 2005
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Francis-Macrae was the only UK resident on anti spam organization Spamhaus' register of known spam operators (ROSKSO). It is alleged he made an estimated £1.5m through a series of domain registration scams.
Francis-Macrae was behind a company Ultra Technologies which traded under various names such as Dot Biz Domain Renewal, which wrongly claimed to be an Icann Registrar, and a Web hosting company, Dot Com Avenue.
He also set up other domain name services including one called EU Registry Services which claimed it was the Registry of the .eu suffix, which is actually the responsibility of a non-profit organization, the European Registry of Internet Domain Names (Eurid).
Francis-Macrae sent unsolicited e-mails to thousands of people offering to sell them registered names for emails and websites. He charged customers to pre-register .eu domain names before they were released by the regulatory body.
So serious were the scams being taken by Cambridgeshire Police that it took the unprecedented step of issuing a global warning about Dot Com Avenue. This was followed by a warning about EU Registry Services which was also ordered by the Advertising Standards Agency last December to stop sending emails implying that it was accredited to offer .eu domain names.
Companies who realized they had been duped and complained were bombed with millions of emails. As police investigated Francis-Macrae's activities he allegedly sent out spam with the telephone number of Cambridge police, resulting in thousands of worried callers jamming the police switchboard. Peterborough Crown Court heard he also threatened to fire-bomb the headquarters of the county's trading standards department and petrol-bomb his local police headquarters.
Francis-Macrae was jailed for three years for two counts of fraudulent trading. He was jailed for a further year for threatening to destroy property and making threats to kill. Another two years was added for the blackmail charge.
He was given a two-year sentence, to run concurrently alongside the others, for one count of concealing criminal property.
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| Peter "Weaselboy" Francis-Macrae |
During the three-week trial, the jury heard tape recordings of what the prosecution said were his menacing phone calls.
Rupert Mayo, prosecuting, told the court: "He resorted to using violent verbal abuse and deadly threats to quite innocent people when challenged about his fraudulent activity."
After the hearing, Detective Constable Jody Faro said police had dealt with more than 2,000 complaints about Francis-Macrae's business dealings from around the globe.
"This investigation highlights just how easy it can be to deceive and lie to people using the Internet," said Faro.
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