Thousands of UK websites on the .GB.COM domain have gone down.

Thousands of UK websites registered under the .GB.COM domain have found their domains no longer working.

CentralNic sold .GB.COM domains, positioning them as an alternative to .CO.UK.

All .GB.COM sites were redirected to a site with the following notice: "You are seeing this message because you were sold a domain or email address on .GB.COM, which is now inoperative. You can restore your site by registering with GB.COM. GB.COM will not provide services you have paid for to others, even if they have a contract with GB.COM. If you have already paid for future services and they are not being provided, you should contact your service provider."

The domain zone registrar, CentralNic, also issued a statement regarding the issue: "Unfortunately, the service we provide for .GB.COM domains was interrupted without warning. We are currently conducting legal consultations regarding the issue and will take immediate steps to restore the domains' operation, but we cannot promise that this will happen immediately."

CentralNic, a company that registers .GB.COM domains, was founded by the former owner of GB.COM. In 2004, CentralNic was acquired by other people who likely failed to renew their .GB.COM domain registration agreement with the domain extension's administrator. GB.COM, in turn, decided to punish the clients of its reseller, the administrator of CentralNic, in this way.

It was later revealed that the creator of the .GB.COM domain and the CentralNic company is known for being the founder of the project for .