This seems to be the same issue as megaupload. A company outside the US, marketing a service that's illegal in the US to US citizens. Money paid for the service is then moved overseas. (I understand there may have been users in other countries, like megaupload)
While not something I necessarily agree with - I don't think this particular move indicates all .COMs are now threatened.
It indicates that anyone using a .COM domain must either: 1) Not do business with American customers. or 2) Be aware of every U.S. law to avoid allowing their American customers from breaking one of them.
But that is already an issue - whether or not you have a .com domain name. The domain name is just an asset and the government routinely seizes assets when filing criminal charges.
The US government has always had dominion over .coms (and .nets). Verisign manages .com's through a contract with the US Department of Commerce. That's where they get there authority.
If .com domains weren't considered to be USA based though then a USA citizen would be the one that was being charged for breaking the law wouldn't they?
Flip it around. Suppose someone is selling online under a Somali .so domain rather than a .com; the law should operate in the same way as long as the web servers themselves aren't located in USA.
Isn't it the assumption that any transaction with a .com is essentially under the purview of USA law that is at issue?
This just emphasises the need for .com to be considered neutral territory. It's only a redirection mechanism - USA can have and apply their laws to .co.us and of course any server that is based in USA.
It's not transactions with the .com that's at issue. It's the fact that a company operating a business the government considers illegal is making money in the US and moving it overseas.
It's all about the money. Not .COMs.
Running a gambling site on an .so domain and hosting the servers overseas while profiting in the US will still get you indicted. The government might not have the authority to shut off your internet presence but I'm sure they could turn off finances in the US. And certainly make travel to certain countries an issue.
Your second point makes it seem like there are so many laws that you have to be aware of to avoid getting your domain seized by the US. These latest busts have been for gambling and pirating, I bet the owners knew this was coming sooner or later.
Your second point makes it seem like there are so many laws that you have to be aware of to avoid getting your domain seized by the US.
Well yes, but in principle that's exactly right. Really think about this: in principle you need to know the entire legal code of the US and all of the ways that someone in the US might use your site to try to break that legal code, before you know whether you're safe. If you start operating the next version of CraigsList and people in the US start using it to sell fish which were caught in violation of U.S. law, it doesn't matter whether you realized it was happening at the time, whether those fish are legal in your country, or any such thing; the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service could get a prosecutor to convince a judge to issue a takedown warrant for your domain.
What's that, you say? You just run a tasks-and-dates management web app? You'll ban users from the U.S. from logging in? That's not necessarily going to help. If your service gets used by some radical Muslims in some country that the U.S. happens to be bombing, they might take you down. Given the tempting targets, I guess you'd best be banning Iran from logging in, just in case the elite there find your app useful.
Bottom line is, in this case it's quite possible that the gambling enterprise that they were running was perfectly legal in their home country and happened to be illegal in one state in the U.S. -- and people in the U.S. were using it for its intended purpose illegally. So in the bigger picture, if you really think about it, the fact that you're not catching the US government's attention yet is no defense: in principle you need to know all of the things which are illegal in the U.S., and how users both inside and outside of the U.S. might use your site to do those things. Otherwise, you'd better move off of .com, to some domains run by a government which doesn't routinely steal them.
A little anecdote to support your story: Just this morning a US citizen using my appointment scheduling web service (based in Europe) got into trouble for selling English lessons to Iranian students (it wasn't intentional he sells English lessons to anyone, PayPal flagged the money transfers).
I spend a good part of this morning figuring out how to keep Iranians off of the scheduling calendar. I believe that world peace would be much better served with more Iranians learning English but I really do not want my business to get in trouble with the US over it. Sad really.
Megaupload hosted a bunch of its content on American servers located on American soil. It was my understanding that this was the justification for the takedown of that particular foreign company.
While not something I necessarily agree with - I don't think this particular move indicates all .COMs are now threatened.