A legal battle has kicked off over france.com
France has seized the domain name from a man who's owned it for 20 years and given it to the French government.
Jean-Noël Frydman, who was born in France but lives in New York, first registered france.com on February 10th, 1994.
The site was created to serve as a "digital kiosk" for France-lovers based in the US, and over the years built up its profile and even collaborated with French agencies.
But in 2015, France decided it wanted the name and began legal proceedings to try and get hold of it.
The government said Jean-Noël was not authorised by the country to use the name.
A three-year court battle ensued, in which Jean-Noël lost the rights to the name and therefore his company, and france.com was transferred to the country's Ministry of Foreign Affairs in March of this year.
He's now filed a lawsuit against France accusing the country of cybersquatting france.com and "reverse domain-name hijacking" the rights away from its original owner.
Speaking to Ars Technica, Jean-Noël warned: "If it can happen to me, it can happen to anyone."
Currently, the france.com domain takes you to an English-language version of the france.fr website.
