The 10-year streak of record-setting filings under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) may come to an end this year, based on data obtained for this issue of GigaLaw’s Domain Dispute Digest, but the decline – if any – is likely to be inconsequential.
A combination of many factors – including overall growth online, enterprising cybersquatters, an expansion in the number of top-level domains, greater awareness of the UDRP, and the pandemic – has contributed to a constant growth in domain name disputes since 2013. And if that growth finally levels off this year, it won’t be because trademark owners have been able to minimize the cybersquatting problem. Instead, it may simply be attributable to the economy, with ongoing concerns about spending as a result of moderate growth, high inflation and uncertainty about interest rates.
Interestingly, though, as the data in this Digest shows, many trademark owners remain very active users of the UDRP, which continues to be an incredibly effective tool, with transfer rates reaching nearly 96 percent in the second quarter of 2024. The most popular complainants continue to represent a wide variety of industries, including financial services and apparel, but also those offering retail and e-commerce services as well such diverse products as steel and toys.
As many of my clients report, domain names used in phishing activities seem to account for an increasing number of cybersquatting issues, especially those involving so-called “business email compromise” scams, which the FBI describes this way:
Business email compromise (BEC) – also known as email account compromise (EAC) –is one of the most financially damaging online crimes. It exploits the fact that so many of us rely on email to conduct business – both personal and professional.
In a BEC scam, criminals send an email message that appears to come from a known source making a legitimate request….
Often, these “legitimate requests” are for wire transfers to fraudulent accounts. And the domain names used in these requests frequently use lookalike characters in domain names (such as substituting a letter “i” with the “l” or combining the letters “r” and “n” to resemble the letter “m”) Plus, new top-level domains are more often being used in these phishing activities.
With ICANN planning yet another expansion of the domain name system (publication of the next Applicant Guidebook is supposedly less than one year away), any lull in cybersquatting activity is likely to be short-lived.
For more data about UDRP decisions in the second quarter of 2024, download GigaLaw’s Domain Dispute Digest.
