This man managed to buy Google.com for £8, but only for 60 seconds

Sanmay Ved managed to buy the most popular website in the world for just £7.89 - but it was only for one glorious minute.

The ex-Google employee wrote in a blog post on LinkedIn that he'd been browsing Google's website-buying interface, Google Domains, late one night.

He realised the domain name Google.com was on sale because of a green smiley face next to the address. All the other country variations were marked as taken.

Sanmay clicked 'buy' out of curiosity and was amazed when the name ended up in his shopping basket. He was even more baffled when he coughed up the $12 (£7.89) charge, and got several confirmation emails saying the purchase was successful.

I was hoping I would get an error at sometime, saying transaction did not go through, but I was able to complete the purchase, and my credit card was actually charged!

The emails in Sanmay's inbox contained sensitive information that only Google's webmasters should be able to access, which he said was "scary".

But before there was a chance for the power to go to his head, the tech giant noticed the mistake and revoked Sanmay's access - refunding his $12 in the process.

Although he doesn't really know how the mixup happened, Sanjay is happy to be able to say "I am the man who owned Google.com for a minute".

When contacted for comment a spokeperson for Google said the company was investigating the incident.

HT IBT

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