I seem to have written a lot about
Somnath Bharti lately, and he's certainly a topic of interest in Indian politics. I'm not going to go on about his links to TopSites LLC (
watch the video if you are interested), but I wanted to look at these persistent comments that Somnath Bharti was some sort of porn site operator.
If you want the really short version it's this - I've never seen any evidence that Mr Bharti has owned or operated a porn site. That's it.
But what
are the links to porn, and where is there confusion?
allwebhunt.com links to porn and pro-pedophilia sites
It is beyond all reasonable doubt that
allwebhunt.com is connected to Somnath Bharti. This was a directory of sites that was rapidly taken offline when the
Times of India exposed the connection. Some of the more unsavoury contents of that site include a set
links to pro-pedophilia sites which had been copied from the
Open Directory Project (which had deleted them years ago). That's a pretty poor sense of judgement in this case, but it is really down to sloppiness rather than actual malice in my opinion.
But allwebhunt.com also linked to more regular porn sites, including the examples pictured below.
These entries appeared to be paid or sponsored ones, but the sites themselves are not Mr Bharti's and it does amuse me that some of the India news outlets criticising Mr Bharti for this do exactly the same things themselves.
Ultimately, allwebhut.com (and its predecessor topsites.us) directories are simply a catalogue of available sites, some of those links may be questionable but they do not imply ownership or mean that anything illegal is happening.
Ownership of teens-boy.net
One of the sites that Mr Bharti owned was teens-boy.net, according to historical WHOS records from 2005:
Domain: teens-boy.net
Record Date: 2005-01-08
Registrar: GOTNAMES.CA INC.
Server: whois.gotnames.ca
Created: 2004-11-26
Updated:
Expires: 2005-11-26
Domain teens-boy.net
Date Registered: 2004-11-26
Date Modified: 2004-11-30
Expiry Date: 2005-11-26
DNS1: ns1.www--search.com
DNS2: ns2.www--search.com
Registrant
My Directory LLC
PO Box 7334 - 101591
San Francisco, CA (US)
94120-73
Administrative Contact
My Directory LLC
Somnath Bharti
PO Box 7334 - 101591
San Francisco
CA
US
94120-73
415-462-3044
530-504-8433
listings@mydir.org
Technical Contact
My Directory LLC
Somnath Bharti
PO Box 7334 - 101591
San Francisco
CA
US
94120-73
415-462-3044
530-504-8433
listings@mydir.org
Registrar: GotNames.ca
teens-boy.net had been a gay porn site until late 2004 as it appears in the
Internet Archive [link is probably not safe for work]. The Internet Archive does not have any pictures on it in this case, but it is clear what the site is about by looking at the text.
It's an odd site for Mr Bharti to have in his name. But what did it
actually look like after he bought it? The Internet Archive
gives the answer again [this link is OK]. We can see that it just acts as a redirector to
dirs.org which is yet another clone of the TopSites directory.
I guess this might have been an attempt at SEO, the domain was bought with a lot of other non-porn domains which also forwarded in this way. As far as I can tell, when the domain registration was up the domain simply expired at the end of 2005, it was re-registered by an unrelated party in 2007.
DVLPMNT MARKETING, INC and www-goto.com confusion
Webnewswire.com
ran a story looking at the WHOIS details of www-goto.com, a site that had been registered to Mr Bharti in 2005:
Domain: www-goto.com
Record Date: 2005-05-18
Registrar: INTERCOSMOS MEDIA GROUP, INC. D/B/A DIRECTNIC.COM
Server: whois.directnic.com
Created: 2004-12-08
Updated:
Expires: 2005-12-08
Registrant:
Media LLC
1158 26th Street #528
Santa Monica, CA 90403
US
310-857-6666
Fax:530-504-8433
Domain Name: WWW-GOTO.COM
Administrative Contact:
Bharti, Somnath sales@dirs.org
1158 26th Street #528
Santa Monica, CA 90403
US
310-857-6666
Fax:530-504-8433
Technical Contact:
Bharti, Somnath sales@dirs.org
1158 26th Street #528
Santa Monica, CA 90403
US
310-857-6666
Fax:530-504-8433
Record last updated 05-17-2005 03:09:40 PM
Record expires on 12-08-2005
Record created on 12-08-2004
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.WWW-GOTO.COM 202.14.69.2
NS2.WWW-GOTO.COM 202.14.69.117
They then looked at the current WHOIS details which are:
Domain: www-goto.com
Record Date: 2014-02-06
Registrar: DNC HOLDINGS, INC.
Server: whois.directnic.com
Created: 2004-12-08
Updated: 2013-06-12
Expires: 2014-12-08
Domain Name: WWW-GOTO.COM
Registry Domain ID:
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.directnic.com
Registrar URL: http://www.directnic.com
Updated Date: -001-11-30T00:00:00-06:00
Creation Date: 2004-12-08T11:03:22-06:00
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2014-12-08T17:03:22-06:00
Registrar: DNC Holdings, Inc.
Registrar IANA ID: 291
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuse@directnic.com
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: +1.8668569598
Domain Status: ok
Registrant Name: Domain Administrator
Registrant Organization: DVLPMNT MARKETING, INC.
Registrant Street: Hunkins Plaza
Registrant City: Charlestown
Registrant State/Province: Nevis
Registrant Postal Code: NA
Registrant Country: KN
Registrant Phone: 011-869-765-4496
Registrant Phone Ext:
Registrant Fax:
Registrant Fax Ext:
Registrant Email: dvlpmntltd@gmail.com
Admin Name: Domain Administrator
Admin Organization: DVLPMNT MARKETING, INC.
Admin Street: Hunkins Plaza
Admin City: Charlestown
Admin State/Province: Nevis
Admin Postal Code: NA
Admin Country: KN
Admin Phone: 011-869-765-4496
Admin Phone Ext:
Admin Fax:
Admin Fax Ext:
Admin Email: dvlpmntltd@gmail.com
Tech Name: Domain Administrator
Tech Organization: DVLPMNT MARKETING, INC.
Tech Street: Hunkins Plaza
Tech City: Charlestown
Tech State/Province: Nevis
Tech Postal Code: NA
Tech Country: KN
Tech Phone: 011-869-765-4496
Tech Phone Ext:
Tech Fax:
Tech Fax Ext:
Tech Email: dvlpmntltd@gmail.com
Name Server: NS1.VOODOO.COM
Name Server: NS2.VOODOO.COM
URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System
http://wdprs.internic.net
The
creation date for the domain is still 2004, so the domain has never dropped and been reregistered, it has been in continual existence since that date. The rather mysterious
DVLPMNT MARKETING, INC certainly does seem to be connected with porn domains, but is this company controlled by Mr Bharti? No.
A look at the historical WHOIS details again yield some clues. The domain expired in 2008 and ended up being controlled by the registrar DirectNIC..
Domain: www-goto.com
Record Date: 2008-12-19
Registrar: INTERCOSMOS MEDIA GROUP, INC. D/B/A DIRECTNIC.COM
Server: whois.directnic.com
Created: 2004-12-08
Updated: 2008-12-09
Expires: 2009-12-08
Previous Screenshots
2008-12-18 screenshot
Reverse Whois:
Registrant:
directNIC.com
Expired Domain Name
650 Poydras Street
Suite 1150
New Orleans, LA 70130
US
504-679-5170
Domain Name: WWW-GOTO.COM
Administrative Contact:
Domain, Expired expireddomain@directnic.com
Expired Domain Name
650 Poydras Street
Suite 1150
New Orleans, LA 70130
US
504-679-5170
Technical Contact:
Domain, Expired expireddomain@directnic.com
Expired Domain Name
650 Poydras Street
Suite 1150
New Orleans, LA 70130
US
504-679-5170
Record last updated 12-09-2008 06:13:27 PM
Record expires on 12-08-2008
Record created on 12-08-2004
Domain servers in listed order:
NS0.EXPIREDDOMAINSERVICES.COM 69.46.228.236
NS1.EXPIREDDOMAINSERVICES.COM 69.46.228.237
DirectNIC reserve the right to
auction off expired domains and the next WHOIS entry sees the domain being controlled by a domain parking company. It is unlikely that Mr Bharti or any of his associates received anything for this domain, it was essentially scrapped.
Is there any other evidence linking Somnath Bharti to porn?
Over the past couple of weeks I have re-examined the TopSites LLC business plus Mr Bharti's own Madgen Solutions from my own records and other public sources. These revealed all sort of interesting facts and allegations about Mr Bharti's activities.. but absolutely nothing that suggest that he owned or operated porn sites.
Of course, perhaps there is evidence that I am not aware of, but I would be very surprised if there is.. you can always
send me an email if you have anything that will prove me wrong.
