Disgruntled ex-CEO allegedly hijacked domain title, – Business News
A disgruntled ex-CEO locked his former video sport studio out of its own web site, knocked workers offline and triggered more than $1 million in alleged losses — then put the domain up for sale for $6,666,666, a new lawsuit claims.
The lawsuit, filed final week in federal courtroom in Los Angeles, accuses former That’s No Moon Entertainment CEO Michael Mumbauer of seizing control of company-owned domains years after he was fired for trigger and utilizing them to sabotage the studio’s operations.
After his 2022 firing, Mumbauer grew “resentful about his termination” and launched a harassment marketing campaign that included threatening a senior government and their household, the grievance alleges. News of the lawsuit was reported by the gamer information website Aftermath.
Michael Mumbauer, the previous CEO of That’s No Moon Entertainment, is accused in a new lawsuit of hijacking the studio’s domain title and making an attempt to sell it for $6,666,666. X/MichaelMumbauer
“At 6 a.m. on January 6, 2026, Defendant hijacked ThatsNoMoon.com, disabling TNM’s own access to that domain and TNM employees’ ability to e-mail with any external sender or recipient,” the grievance states.
The sudden shutdown left the studio successfully paralyzed, reducing off communications with traders, business companions and job candidates and forcing workers to desert their regular work to triage the outage, in response to the lawsuit.
Visitors who tried to go browsing to ThatsNoMoon.com had been as a substitute redirected to a Swiss journey website, the swimsuit acknowledged.
The weird redirect sparked confusion amongst outsiders, with business companions, players and potential hires left questioning whether or not the company had abruptly shut down or quietly fired key executives who had been abruptly unreachable by electronic mail, the grievance says.
Mumbauer was terminated “for cause” on Feb. 17, 2022, after the company’s founders and board concluded that his “vision for the company did not align with theirs,” in response to the grievance.
Former That’s No Moon Entertainment CEO Michael Mumbauer was fired for trigger in 2022, in response to a federal lawsuit. X/MichaelMumbauer
The lawsuit alleges that whereas serving as CEO, Mumbauer “breached his duty to act in TNM’s best interests,” together with by leaking “confidential and sensitive information to the media and to competitors.”
In September 2020, Mumbauer co-founded That’s No Moon alongside three different video sport builders: Tina Kowalewski, Taylor Kurosaki and Nick Kononelos.
The lawsuit claims the hijacked domain was later listed for sale on GoDaddy for $6,666,666. US District Court
The 4 executives sought to make “narrative-driven video games” by drawing on their expertise from different studios comparable to Naughty Dog, Sony Santa Monica, Infinity Ward and PlayStation’s Visual Arts Group.
Shortly after the studio’s founding, the company’s founders agreed to buy 13 web domains containing variations of the “That’s No Moon” title, together with ThatsNoMoon.com, which turned the studio’s main web site, in response to the grievance.
The lawsuit says Mumbauer purchased the domains on the company’s behalf and was later totally reimbursed, however registered them in his own title and by no means transferred control to the company.
The company says it filed swimsuit after securing federal trademark registrations for “That’s No Moon” and associated marks. US District Court
The lawsuit claims the fallout from the domain seizure value the studio more than $1 million in January alone, as its four-person IT staff scrambled for days emigrate providers to a new web deal with and restore cascading technical failures.
After the initial outage, the grievance says the hijacked domain was redirected to a GoDaddy public sale web page itemizing it for sale at $6,666,666, whereas different company domains had been equally pointed to “for sale” pages that risked additional confusion and reputational hurt.
That’s No Moon was based in 2020. That’s No Moon
The grievance filed by That’s No Moon speculated that the $6,666,666 sum is “[a] number that [Mumbauer] may well have selected for its Satanic connotation.”
The company says it filed swimsuit after securing federal trademark registrations for “That’s No Moon” and associated marks, arguing that Mumbauer’s continued control of the domains now constitutes trademark infringement, cybersquatting and laptop fraud.
The Post has sought remark from Mumbauer and TNM.
