In a major embarrassment to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), it has come to light that Delhi Law Minister Somnath Bharti was involved in selling pornographic domain names. Long before Delhi law minister Somnath Bharti ventured into politics, he ran a business on the web that many allege was "unethical" and operated in the "grey zone". His name is linked to a tech firm that spammed website owners and tried to make them pay for directory services they never solicited.
Before entering into politics, Bharti was allegedly among top three Indian spammers who accounted for world's 80 percent spam. He was reportedly involved in a business on the web that many allege was "unethical" and operated in the "grey zone". His name is linked to a tech firm that spammed website owners and tried to make them pay for directory services they never solicited.
Records of Bharti's involvement with this spam business date back to 2003-04. This was when he had links with a company called Topsites LLC that worked out of Malviya Nagar. In those days, website administrators often registered with the Open Directory.
Topsites.us allegedly copied data from the directory and its Malviya Nagar office called or emailed the webmasters and said they were registered free, for now. But they'd have to pay if they wanted to continue listing. Some paid up, but many rejected the claims. Once those emails/calls became frequent, webmasters on virtual forums reportedly began wondering what Topsites was and who owned it.
In 2004, Conrad Longmore, a UK website owner and an Open Directory editor, began connecting the dots and started trawling WHOIS records -- an online database that provides records of who registered a site and where it is hosted.
According to the report, Bharti's name and sites associated with him figured in ROKSO (Register of Known Spamming Operations) list way back in 2005. He is alleged to be operating under an assumed name: John Kennedy with Paul Aunger.
The name of Topsites LLC was changed to Directories LLC in 2004. He also owned a company called Media LLC. Both Topsites LLC and Directories LLC were registered with Malviya Nagar address. Bharti's Indian company Madgen Solutions shares the same address.
According to the election affidavit of the AAP leader, Madgen operates out of Malviya Nagar. The Ministry of Corporate Affairs website shows the firm was registered in 2002 and lists somnath@madgen.com as its email contact.
Surprisingly, Madgen Solutions' website no longer has an India address, since the controversy broke out. Refuting all these charges, Bharti has accused the channel of hatching "conspiracy to malign him".
The minister had stirred a major controversy last month after he led a midnight raid against African women in a South Delhi locality alleging that they were running a drug and prostitution racket.
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