Domain-name guerrilla Eugene Kashpureff got a few minutes in a Toronto court today that ended with only one thing certain - he will stay in jail for at least a few more days awaiting deportation to the United States to face federal wire-fraud charges.
Kashpureff said in a phone interview from Toronto's Metro West Detention Centre that his case was continued until Monday, when a hearing on both deportation proceedings and bail will be held. Kashpureff said he expects to be sent to the United States soon after Monday's hearing.
Kashpureff, whose AlterNIC service is one of several independent attempts to wrest control of domain-name registration from the US-government-awarded Network Solutions Inc. monopoly, was arrested in a Toronto suburb last Friday.
A Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer picked him up on charges related to his repeated hijacking last summer of Web traffic trying to find Network Solutions' InterNIC registration site. He redirected users from www.internic.net to his own www.alternic.net in a "protest of the so-called 'ownership' of domain names."
Although Network Solutions was more than willing to settle its federal lawsuit against Kashpureff out of court - as part of the settlement he apologized to the Internet community - the FBI wasn't inclined to let the case go. He was charged with felony wire fraud and computer fraud.
