A former Google employee pulled a fast one on his former company. Sanjay Ved bought the world’s most visited website name for $12 after he searched for the term and an error message came up.
“I used to work at Google so I keep messing around with the product,” Ved said. “I type in Google.com and to my surprise it showed it as available. I thought it was some error, but I could actually complete check out.”
He posted this screenshot on Linkedin.
Ved bought the year-long domain license from Google Domains, but instead of receiving a “you bought a domain” confirmation email, he got messages from a domain owner at Google.com on his Google Search Console dashboard.
“The scary part was I had access to the webmaster controls for a minute,” he said.
But alas his Google domain dominance was short lived. Google Domains cancelled the sale shortly after saying someone had already registered the site. Ved was refunded his $12.
Google.com was visited by 180 million unique visitors in August of 2015 alone.
“So for one minute I had access,” Ved said. “At least I can now say I’m the man who ownedGoogle.com for a minute.”
