Category: National Arbitration Forum

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Disputes National Arbitration Forum News

LinkedIn files dispute over typosquatting domain LinkdIn.com that sold for $22K

LinkdIn.com

There have been a lot of disputes filed recently over typosquatting domain names that mislead consumers.  LinkedIn is now the latest company to file a complaint (Case No. 1417534) with the National Arbitration Forum over a popular typo domain – LinkdIn.com (missing the ‘e’).

What makes this case so interesting, and so expensive for one party, is that the current owner paid $22,000 USD to the buy the domain at SnapNames back in July 2010.  

SnapNames, which was founded in 2000 and is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Oversee.net, operates one of the largest auction marketplaces of expired and deleting domain names.  The website also allows domain owners to sell names out of their own portfolio.

Mike Berkens of The Domains wrote about the sale last year on his domain industry news blog saying, “Its amazing in this day and age there are so many people willing to pay this kind of money for a domain that would be taken in a UDRP if a complaint is filed.”

It’s highly probable now with the dispute filed, that the domain will be taken.

Today, people who accidentally enter LinkdIn.com (the incorrect spelling) into their web browser instead of LinkedIn.com (the correct spelling), are redirected to a survey scam that asked a series of questions and attempts to gather personal information by promising free gifts like a $1,000 Walmart gift card, as shown in the screenshot above of the LinkdIn site.

Knowing also that LinkedIn Corporation has several registered LinkedIn trademarks, it should be no surprise that LinkedIn is pretty much guaranteed to win the dispute.

As Mike Berkens wrote over a year ago, “Yes I know the domain has traffic,  but its a bang on typo trademark domain with no other conceivable meaning.”

The panel with the National Arbitration Forum will determine whether the disputed domain meets the following three elements:

(1) is the domain name identical or confusingly similar to a trademark in which the complainant has rights
(2) the owner has no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name and;
(3) the domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith. 

If all three elements are met, the domain will be ordered transferred to LinkedIn Corporation. 

The truth of the matter is, it should be a quick open-and-shut case in favor of LinkedIn.

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Disputes National Arbitration Forum News

SalesForce.com attempts to hijack Forces.com by filing domain dispute

Marc Benioff Salesforce.com

Earlier this month, SalesForce.com filed a complaint (Case No. 1416951) with the National Arbitration Forum against Internet Venture Holdings (IVH) over the domain Forces.com.

While complainants in disputes filed with the National Arbitration Forum aren’t revealed until a panel delivers a decision, I contacted IVH to see if my suspicions were correct “that Salesforce.com was behind the complaint” and an IVH representative confirmed via e-mail that, indeed, Salesforce.com was the complainant.

What’s interesting about this case – and this isn’t unheard of – is that Salesforce.com not only has a good chance of losing the dispute, but it may face a claim of “reverse domain hijacking”.

If the software giant loses the dispute and IVH contends that Salesforce.com engaged in ‘reverse domain hijacking’, Salesforce.com could be labeled a “reverse hijacker” by the presiding panel.  “Reverse domain hijacking” is found if the company knew or should have known at the time that it filed the complaint, that it could not prove that forces.com was registered in bad faith. 

Though Salesforce.com has publicly acquired domain names in the past for large sums of money such as the purchase of Data.com for over $1.5 million, it doesn’t mean the company won’t bully smaller companies into giving up their domains if it doesn’t feel like paying the seller’s asking price.

Unfortunately, a finding of reverse domain hijacking likely won’t mean much punishment in terms of the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP).

According to sources online:

The Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act does not expressly recognize reverse domain name hijacking and often only limits defendants’ recovery to retention or transference of the domain name. It also fails to provide any remedies for victims of attempted reverse cybersquatting. However, the statute permits some monetary relief where bad faith, reckless disregard or the willful violation of a court order are involved.

However, if Salesforce.com decides it still wants to acquire the domain after being labeled a “reverse hijacker”, the ball will definitely be in IVH’s court, who own hundreds of other prized, generic domains like Coast.com and Turquoise.com.

Even if Salesforce.com loses the dispute (which it should) and somehow avoids the hijacking label, I don’t see this ending well for Salesforce.com.

(Photo of Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.com via Flickr)

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Disputes National Arbitration Forum News Trademarks Video Games WIPO

Neither Sony, Nintendo, nor Microsoft own the domains for their next consoles

xbox 720

The console wars are heating up, but there’s just one problem: the three major companies don’t own the matching domains to their next-generation consoles.

Nintendo doesn’t own WiiU.com, Sony doesn’t own Playstation4.com, and Microsoft doesn’t own Xbox720.com.

Will the companies submit a domain dispute, file an anti-cybersquatting lawsuit, or pay a large sum of cash to get the domains?  Well, it’s unknown whether Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo are considering any of these options, but what is known is that owning the domain names couldn’t their hurt online marketing efforts as the console wars heat up.

That being said, how are the domain names being used today?

Today, Playstation4.com re-directs to PSX Extreme, a video game website that has been covering Sony Playstation news for years.  PSXExtreme.com and Playstation4.com are both owned by Poise Media Inc., according to WHOIS records.  The domain was first registered in 1998, but Poise Media didn’t acquire the name until late 2008.

Xbox720.com is registered to a Jeremiah Germany of New York, who monetizes the domain using Google Adsense for Domains.  Over the years, the domain has been host to a number of different sites ranging from a Les Paul guitars site in 2006 to a Google Custom Search page in 2008.  However, since 2009 it appears the owner of Xbox720.com has been earning money using Google Adsense for Domains.

The owner of WiiU.com, who remains hidden behind WHOIS privacy, has the site set up as a Shopping.com affiliate web page.  I wrote about WiiU.com back in June, after Nintendo announced the console at E3 without owning the domain.  In August, Nintendo filed nearly 20 trademark applications (several including images) with the United States Patent and Trademark Office for the word Wii U.

All three console companies have used a variety of methods in the past to reclaim trademarked names, and in recent years, they have often filed complaints under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP). 

In nearly all the complaints, the domain names have been ordered transferred.  So given the track record to date, it’s likely when the trademark lawyers finally get around to going after these domains, they’ll use the UDRP.

Recently, Nintendo gained the rights to SuperMario.com, over 25 years since it had released Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros.  The company filed a complaint with WIPO which it won in late September. 

Microsoft has filed and won dozens of Xbox-related domain disputes going back to 2003.

And though Sony Computer Entertainment has only filed a handful of disputes, it has won all 4 that it did submit.  Those cases involved: playstationx.com, sonyplaystation2.com, sonyps2.com, psone.com, pspcn.com,  and pspmovie.net.

Sometimes, however when companies want a domain and don’t want to risk losing a dispute or are impatient for the time it takes time for proceedings to complete, they will pay cash — as Microsoft likely did with Halo4.com.

I’ve reached out to the owner of each domain name to see if they’ve been contacted by the respective console company, and will update this post if I hear back.

(Concept design of Microsoft’s next-generation console ‘Xbox 720’ by Tai Chiem)

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Disputes National Arbitration Forum News

Google going after YouTube typo domains that lead to survey scams

YouTube Scam Survey site

Google is going after several popular typos of the web address YouTube.com, all owned by the same person. 

Each typo domain leads unsuspecting users to a site that looks confusingly similar to the official YouTube site (as shown in the picture above of YouTub.com – minus the ‘e’).  Instead of landing on Google’s YouTube, users are taken to a survey scam that asks a series of questions and attempts to gather personal information by promising free gifts like Best Buy gift cards.

Google filed the complaint (Case No. 1416796) with the National Arbitration Forum this past week over the domain names: youtbe.com, youtub.com, youtue.com, youube.com, and yutube.com. 

The names are all registered to the same person as seen in WHOIS records, allowing Google to file one complaint that relates to more than one domain name, under UDRP rules.

According to rough traffic estimates provided by Compete.com, visitors number in the thousands to each site every month.  In October for example, YouTub.com reported over 6,000 unique visitors.

As with all domain disputes, each panel examines three elements before reaching a decision:

(1) is the domain name identical or confusingly similar to a trademark in which the complainant has rights
(2) the owner has no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name and;
(3) the domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith. 

If all three elements are satisfied, then the domain names will be ordered transferred to Google.

This will likely be an open-and-shut case for Google.  Earlier this month, Twitter Inc. won a similar dispute over the highly trafficked domain Twiter.com after filing a complaint with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

I’ve reached out to the owner of the disputed domain names for comment, and will update this story if I hear back.

Google had its own share of problems with the YouTube web address early on, but it found itself on the other side of a dispute.

Just weeks after acquiring the video site, Universal Tube & Rollform Equipment filed a lawsuit in 2006 after its site (utube.com) continuously crashed because of millions of people looking for YouTube.  Universal Tube ended up using utubeonline.com for its business web address, and kept ownership of utube.com – a site that today averages a million visitors per month according to Compete.

Discussion:TechCrunch, Silicon Republic, The Verge, Softpedia, Techmeme, iG Tecnologia and Punto Informatico

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Disputes National Arbitration Forum News Video Games

Epic Games fights for ownership of InfinityBlade.com domain name

Infinity Blade

Gears of War 3 developer Epic Games has apparently filed a complaint (Case Number: 1415318) over the domain name InfinityBlade.com with the National Arbitration Forum.

In December 2010, Epic released the iOS game Infinity Blade, which became the fastest-grossing app in iOS history, selling $1.6 million in just four days time.  A sequel to the game, Infinity Blade II, is set to launch on December 1, 2011.

Though Epic has clearly seen massive success with Infinity Blade, the domain name InfinityBlade.com was first registered in 2007, nearly three years before the game’s launch.  The game developer uses the web address http://epicgames.com/infinityblade/ as the official home page.

But registering the domain long before a product is launched, doesn’t always mean a win for the current owner.  

The forum panel examines three elements before reaching a decision: (1) is the domain name identical or confusingly similar to a trademark in which the complainant has rights (2) the owner has no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name and (3) the domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith. 

If all three elements are satisfied, then the domain name will be ordered transferred. 

Up until last week, the owner of the domain was hidden behind Whois privacy protection services at Enom.  Now with the domain dispute filed, the Whois privacy has been removed on InfinityBlade.com revealing the owner to the public — something Enom does when a domain is alleged to violate or infringe a third party’s trademark, trade name, copyright interests or other legal rights.

The complainant won’t be officially known until a decision is published, but it’s safe to say the dispute was filed by Epic Games, who also has six separate trademarks filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office that cover a wide range of goods and services.

Today, when you visit InfinityBlade.com, a message on the website says the account has been suspended.

I’ve reached out to the current owner to see if I can learn more about the dispute, and will update this post if I hear back.