Google Wins Domain Name Dispute

In a decision issued on September 7, 2009, the National Arbitration Forum decided to transfer ownership rights over the googlewebmarketing.com domain name from Absolutee Corp. Ltd. c/o DNS Manager to Google Inc. After all domain name disputes have been moved by ICANN to the National Arbitration Forum (there is also the option to judge domain disputes at WIPO), big companies have been crowding arbitration court rooms to resolve the problem of Internet copy-cats.

The domain name was registered through Onlinenic Inc. on May 19, 2008, hosting a website that advertised web design and marketing services. As in other similar cases, the arbitration forum found that the domain name was registered to take advantage of Google's reputation, knowingly infringing its trademark.

The website, registered to Absolutee Inc, took advantage of Google's position as a leader in global search engine platforms, and promoted its SEO services by the usage of the “google” term in the domain name. The forum also found that the name used for the registration, googlewebmarketing was not employed anywhere else on the website, not even in the Privacy Policy.

After the company failed to identify its image with the registered domain, the NFA issued this ruling, “Having established all three elements required under the ICANN Policy, the Panel concludes that relief shall be GRANTED. Accordingly, it is Ordered that the <googlewebmarketing.com> domain name be TRANSFERRED from Respondent to Complainant.”

As other companies like Yahoo or eBay faced the same problems at the start of this year, it makes one wonder why these small time crooks try to do this in the first place. Maybe the answer is because besides a simple domain name transfer, nothing much can be done to them. No legal procedures, no fines, no nothing. These recent increases in domain thefts and bad faith registrations should prompt some companies to start a lobby group on this matter and push for a law correction.