Google has unveiled that it paid a former Google employee who managed to buy the "google.com" domain more than $12,000, in order to get it back. Last September, Sanmay Ved, a researcher and former Google employee, was able to buy google.com for one minute on Google Domains. Ved had described the story in a blog post, saying that he bought the Google.com domain name as he swa that it was available for sale!

He owned Google.com for one minute. The transaction was reversed when Google sent Ved a cancellation order, which returned ownership to the company.

In this case, it seems Google may have missed a deadline to renew Google.com, creating an opportunity for someone to slip in and nab it.

Ven returned the domain name's ownership to Google and accepted the search giant's reward / proposal -- $6,006.13 -- spelled-out Google, numerically (squint a little and you’ll see it!). Google doubled that offer after Ved said he would donate the money to charity.