The registrants claimed they had trademarks when they applied, and when asked to produce supporting evidence they were unable to do so.
Some applications had blatantly made up data like date of first registration of 1 / 1 / 2000 or a Trademark number 123456789. A few even used other peoples trademark numbers and dates to try and look genuine. Some used far flung countries where any registration would be difficult to verify.
.info was the first new gTLD and came after there was a wider awareness of the Internet than there was when .com .org .net and and the ccTLDs were created, (In those days all you had to do was ask and they would give you the name for free. Nobody could conceive of people wanting any other domain than their company name.)
.info coming 15 years later meant some people had begun to work out just how powerful some names might be. Once Afilias realized what had happened they had a challenge procedure and started locking names. Some names were unlocked once Afilias was satisfied, and for some of those names it took quite a lot of time to be settled.
I would guess if registrants couldn't prove rights at the time, then they are extremely unlikely to be able to prove them now.
There is always a risk that some mark holder somewhere will try and over-reach his trademark rights and try and claim any domain. And the more valuable the name the higher the chances of them trying it on by registering trademarks in jurisdictions that give out trademarks like confetti for future ideas, rather than trying to protect existing goods and services.
Quickly scanning the list most of the names seem highly generic rather than incorrectly seized brand related names.
If a generic name like apple.info was in the auction, (and it isn't) it should be safe to win it in the auction, however the new owner should be aware of Apple Inc.'s marks and make very sure that his planned use doesn't trade off Apple Inc.'s marks or any of Apple Inc's competitors competing products and services.
Using apple.info for selling phones or computers (or adverts for them), would be an absolute no no, as would registering it hoping Apple Inc. might want it. However selling eating apples should be OK and selling beds under a new brand Apple Beds could also be ok. Using apple.info for a gripe site against Apple Inc. would not be OK because there is a real risk of misleading people landing on the site with it being an exact match to Apple Inc.'s very well known brand.
