Author name: fairwindsp

By Steve Levy Two recent UDRP decisions involving similar facts and arguments offer a study in contrasts and highlight the need for an appeals level in the UDRP as proposed at https://udrp.group and the more recent WIPO/ICA review of the UDRP. Both cases were brought by Ubiquity Global Services, owner of the AIGENT trademark, and in both, the

By Steve Levy When it comes to domain disputes, some cases are complicated but many are dead simple. Typosquatting usually falls into that second category. If you register a domain name that’s just a minor misspelling of a famous trademark, you’re already starting off with a strike against you. A recent decision is a perfect example.

By Steve Levy I’ve sent many thousands of demand letters to domain name cybersquatters over the years and have filed many hundreds of UDRP complaints when the demand letter didn’t bring results. Many times, though, the letter would elicit a response that included an offer to sell the domain name. As you would expect, these

By Steve Levy Does bad faith under the UDRP requires a Respondent to specifically target the Complainant’s trademark, or can a more generalized targeting of multiple companies using the same mark  suffice to prove bad faith? This issue has long been debated. A recent decision involving the domain name temco.com provides a useful example of how the specific facts

By Steve Levy Over the past several years, the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) has seen a significant and sustained rise in usage. As of 2024, trademark owners from 133 countries filed over 6,000 cases under the UDRP and national ccTLD variations marking the second highest total since the UDRP’s inception in 1999.

By Steve Levy The first part of the UDRP test (par. 4(a)(i)) requires a brand owner to prove that it owns trademark rights and that the disputed domain name is confusingly similar to that mark. The most common way to prove such rights is by submitting a copy of a trademark registration certificate. A common

By Steve Levy  As artificial intelligence platforms become more and more ubiquitous, there’s an unsettling trend in UDRP cases involving not only falsified evidence, but also falsified case citations in pleadings. The most recent example involved a dispute between former business partners over who owned the domain name at issue. Since the domain name was first registered

By Steve Levy Does the good faith registration and use of a domain name carry over to someone who buys that domain name from the original owner? Legal contracts of sale often include a clause saying that the buyer acquires all “right, title, and interest” in the item being sold. If that item is something

By Steve Levy When it comes to domain name disputes under the UDRP, the devil is in the details and sometimes it’s in the disclaimers. Three recent decisions involving the restaurant chain Pollo Tropical show how important it is to submit the right evidence of trademark rights and scope since this can swing outcomes dramatically,

By Steve Levy If you’ve ever thought that the UDRP doesn’t cover .ca (Canada) domain names, you’re absolutely right! It doesn’t. However, there’s a similar process for .ca domains that was created by the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (“CIRA“) called the CIRA Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (“CDRP”). Just like the UDRP, trademark owners can