What if your domain gets trademarked by someone else?

[am9905d]

I was reading this blog post and I was wondering, What happens if a company trademarks your domain?

 

[DNQuest.com]

A case of reverse hijacking, the complainant should lose badly in WIPO.

 

[JMJ]

As DNQuest said they would have to prove bad faith. If you already owned the domain before the trademark then you have a pretty good chance of winning.

 

[ShadowPeo]

Woulc come under the "Prior Art" clause at least here in Australia it should

 

[allinone]

The argument is always "I owned it before you trademarked it" The way it works is basically, the person contacts you and yes you almost always have to sell it to them. However most companies wont go crazy because for the price you may want they can easily pick up a lawyer and you will end up giving it to them with no profit. At least that is what happened with the domain nexlink.com

 

[Dave_Z]

Just remember that these things are treated on a case to case basis. It will
depend on any and all data gathered during the course of things.

More often than not, it can be beaten if UDRP is used. But if both parties are
in the US, the complainant sues via the ACPA law, and the registrant has just
about little to no time and money to defend rights to the name, then that's a
different story.

Anyway, google for the mess.com UDRP. It's an education.

 

[fonzie_007]

Anyway, google for the mess.com UDRP. It's an education.

I am glad to hear the case turned out the way that it did. Allowing reverse domain hijacking would create extremely bizarre public policy concerns.

 

[Flaresolutions]

The argument is always "I owned it before you trademarked it" The way it works is basically, the person contacts you and yes you almost always have to sell it to them. However most companies wont go crazy because for the price you may want they can easily pick up a lawyer and you will end up giving it to them with no profit. At least that is what happened with the domain nexlink.com

No, that is not how it works, where would be the logic in letting people reg trademarks for domain names just to take them away from the rightful owner? ICANN isnt stupid and there are thousands of cases of reverse hijacking that have been successful for the owners. Your theory is a bit stupid, and if it did work that way i doubt the internet would be the same.

 

[fonzie_007]

No, that is not how it works, where would be the logic in letting people reg trademarks for domain names just to take them away from the rightful owner? ICANN isnt stupid and there are thousands of cases of reverse hijacking that have been successful for the owners. Your theory is a bit stupid, and if it did work that way i doubt the internet would be the same.

Could you please cite to specific cases where reverse hijacking has been allowed? Barring bad faith on the part of the registrant, I would not expect reverse hijacking to stand up in court or administrative hearings.

 

[DNQuest.com]

And why not if I may ask?

If you had to spend $$$$ defending yourself against reverse highjacking (lawyer, time lost, monetary loss), and you want recover the losses, then why not file for reverse highjacking? If the risk could be justifiable for the reward. You may be able to get punitive damages on top of actual losses. And if the WIPO decision states that reverse highjacking occured, then that is pretty good evidence. So why wouldn't that stand up in court?