For a minute, Sanmay Ved owned Google.com.
Former Google employee, Sanmay Ved, managed to buy Google.com on Google Domains after discovering that it was available for purchase at only $12.
"I was hoping I would get an error at sometime saying transaction did not go through," wrote Ved in a LinkedIn blog post. "But I was able to complete [the] purchase, and my credit card was actually charged," he remarked.
He even managed to write a joke, "The Indian Prime Minister's visit to Facebook and Google to promote a digital India did work wonders. The very next day of his visit, it ended up convincing Google to sell what is perhaps their most prized possession to a person hailing from the small city of Mandvi in the Kutch region of the Indian Prime Minister's home state...albeit just for a minute or so. Or maybe because I love Google to heart, and because I have always been a loyal Googler and Xoogler, reporting several vulnerabilities in the past which had gone unnoticed, some divine force decided to give me ownership for a minute or so."
After a minute or two, the purchase was eventually followed by a cancellation email from Google Domains.
When the tech company told him that he wouldn't get any money from the transaction, he told them it was fine and that he'd rather have the reward, if there is, be donated to charity. After hearing this from Ved, Google decided to give the reward since it is going to charity.
Google has been rewarding people who discover bugs in their system as part of their securities-vulnerabilities program.
"It was never about the money. I also want to set an example that it's people who want to find bugs that it's not always about the money," Ved told Business Insider.
The donations went to an Indian foundation, The Art of Living India, that gives education to the slums. Ved wouldn't disclose the amount of rewards Google gave, but he hinted that it was "more than $10,000."
