International and domestic domain name registrars (DNR) have taken down numerous anabolic steroid websites over the past 30 days, most recently Advanced-Stealth.com and Steroids-Pharmacy.com on November 14, 2008. The DNR takedowns were NOT the result of any law enforcement or government regulatory action; the DNRs apparently initiated the action on their own after pressure from organizations like LegitScript. LegitScript announced the takedowns of the steroid pharmacies as two of over 500 affected websites in the “largest internet pharmacy shutdown in history” (“LegitScript Terminates Nearly 500 Rogue Internet Pharmacies and Steroid Websites,” November 14).
Steroids-Pharmacy.com and Advanced-Stealth.com, which sold anabolic steroids, Schedule III Controlled Substances, without requiring a prescription, from overseas.
Steroids-Pharmacy.com and Advanced-Stealth.com have been two of the biggest supporters of U.S. steroid law reform and harm reduction-based steroid education.
The steroid website domains were registered through India Access, an India-based reseller of registration domain services from ICANN-accredited Public Domain Registry.
LegitScript.com has been pressuring DNRs since July 2008 to terminate steroid-related websites arguing that domain registrars have a legal, social and moral obligation to shutdown the steroid websites that violate the registrar’s terms of service. Thus far, the website suspensions have only affected steroid pharmacy websites i.e. websites that actually sell anabolic steroids. However, LegitScript has also argued for the termination of steroid websites that are seemingly informational websites but really “functionally a storefront or entry point” for steroid pharmacies.
GoDaddy was the first domain name registrar to start taking down steroid websites in October claiming Axiolabsgear.com, Effectivemedications.com, and Body-pharmacy.com as casualties. GoDaddy cited the Ryan Haight Act as their legal basis for the action. The Ryan Haight Act was signed by President George W. Bush on October 15, 2008; it goes into effect on approximately April 15, 2009.
Steroid legal expert Rick Collins offered his analysis of the Ryan Haight Act as a continuation of the “war on steroid trafficking” even though it only explicitly targets the abuse of prescription painkillers. But the Act has far-reaching consequences for anabolic steroid trafficking cases since it calls for maximum steroid trafficking sentences to double.
Global Crossing and Hurricane Electric, major worldwide internet connectivity providers to thousands of web hosting companies worldwide, are also potentially joining the fight against steroid pharmacies as they have recently taken the unprecedented step of shutting down McColo Corporation, a so-called “bulletproof” hosting company. While McColo was primarily a haven for spammers, internet pharmacies and gambling sites are among other sites that utilize the services of “bulletproof” web hosting companies (“Host of Internet Spam Groups Is Cut Off,” November 13).
The servers are operated by McColo Corp., which these experts say has emerged as a major U.S. hosting service for international firms and syndicates that are involved in everything from the remote management of millions of compromised computers to the sale of counterfeit pharmaceuticals and designer goods…
Steroid website takedowns by domain name registrars, new steroid-related legislation, and possibly major internet backbone providers are all converging in the war on steroid.
About the author
Millard writes about anabolic steroids and performance enhancing drugs and their use and impact in sport and society. He discusses the medical and non-medical uses of anabolic-androgenic steroids while advocating a harm reduction approach to steroid education.
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