Whois Reset?

[irl]

So, I recently purchased an insanely premium .com domain for reg fee just 2 days ago. I won't give away the name, but it's a domain whose availability I've checked before, and it was already taken.

For some reason, right place right time kind of deal, I just happened to type in the domain name again just to see because, well, you never know. Boy am I glad I typed in this name. It was fucking available!

I almost had a heart attack seeing the availability read "yes". Just to check that I wasn't losing my mind I went straight to the domain's Whois records after my purchase and, apparently, it says that the domain is only 1 day old, meaning I am the first owner. This is impossible. I know for certain it was in the hands of someone else at some point. Do whois records reset when a domain is dropped?

Furthermore, the plural version of the domain is taken, so I'm definitely not going crazy right now, right? I went as far as to check archive.org to ensure my sanity was intact. Archive.org showed that the domain dates as far back as 2003 and was indeed registered already for years, yet Whois is giving me completely different data.

What the hell is going on here and how was this domain not drop-caught???

 

[Jv1999]

Just thought I would come back to this post and give an update on the situation. I kinda went into developer mode once I made the purchase, so I left NamePros temporarily. Yes, the domain was eventually taken back. And, truthfully, I was expecting this to happen. @BaileyUK you pretty much hit the nail on the head...

so I guess .... it was available "by mistake "?

 

[MobyOne]

Well that's disappointing to hear. Can you tell us what the domain was now, or is it still a secret for some reason?