Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether the scope of police powers to freeze company assets encompasses a company domain name; what provisions exists for such a domain name to be renewed if it was frozen during a police investigation; who is permitted to renew such a name where a company under investigation has no access to its assets; and what recourse a company has to regain its domain name if it was lost during the course of a police investigation.

The Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 permits an application for a restraint order to be made to “freeze” the property of an alleged offender and has the effect of freezing realisable property that may be liable to a later confiscation order. The Act defines realisable property as any free property held by the defendant including any intangible or incorporeal property. The intellectual property rights in a domain name could fall within this definition and so a restraint order would be available. A company is a separate legal entity to its shareholders and directors and so a restraint order against realisable property held by a company would only be available where the alleged offender was that company. The terms of the restraint order prevent the alleged offender from dealing with their realisable property. Whilst property is under restraint, the judge may, depending on the circumstances of the case, exempt property which is required for legitimate business purposes to enable a person to carry on any trade, profession or occupation, for example, to enable continued use of a domain name.