Can someone explain the law on cybersquatters?

[techs]

http://www.computerworld.com/a...asic&articleId=9134610

Cybersquatting -- the practice of abusing trademarks within the Internet domain-name system, often by registering domain names that exploit common misspellings or typographical errors in trademarked names -- isn't a new problem, but industry watchers agree that it's getting worse (see "Domain-name wars: Rise of the cybersquatters"). The growth in cybersquatting is intertwined with the rise of domain parking, in which domains are registered for the purpose of generating advertising revenue, and for future resale of the domain to the highest bidder.


I don't quite understand what's illegal? If I registered something like yahooo.com is that illegal? Do they have to prove I intended to capitalize off of yahoo users misspellings?

 

[Nitemare]

I'd put them as 1 rung above those squatters that sit on domain names for years without developing them and want thousands of dollars for them

 

[Barfo]

http://www.yahho.com ?

 

[ViviTheMage]

gooogle.com

 

[sjwaste]

When I was a law clerk, I worked on the enforcement side of this type of thing. If you have specific questions, PM me.

I won't give specific legal advice, since it's stupid on both ends to seek/provide that over the internet. However, I will say it's not hard to recover one of those domains if you own the trademark.

 

[spacejamz]

what about that whole thing with nissan.com? they weren't squatting, but their pockets are not as deep as Nissan Motors, so there is no way they could have battled in this court...

 

[rudder]

speaking of that... someone must have bought whitehouse.com.... it is no longer NSFW.

 

[RadiclDreamer]

Originally posted by: spacejamz

what about that whole thing with nissan.com? they weren't squatting, but their pockets are not as deep as Nissan Motors, so there is no way they could have battled in this court...

They still own the name, so they must have done something right

 

[sactoking]

Originally posted by: RadiclDreamer

Originally posted by: spacejamz

what about that whole thing with nissan.com? they weren't squatting, but their pockets are not as deep as Nissan Motors, so there is no way they could have battled in this court...

They still own the name, so they must have done something right

Nissan is the guy's family name, so he has a pretty good argument against Datsun/Nissan. He doesn't have enough money to have won outright yet. Datsun/Nissan I think got an injunction preventing him from using nissan.com for commercial purposes, but he still owns the domain so he's using it for PR against Datsun/Nissan.