Attorney Doug Isenberg of The GigaLaw Firm was repeatedly quoted in an article by Reuters, “Debevoise fries phishers in cyberpiracy case. Take heed, law firms.”
The article discusses a lawsuit filed by the law firm Debevoise, which won the transfer of domain names used by a cybersquatter to impersonate the law firm.
The article says:
The Debevoise case is unusual, said domain name expert Doug Isenberg of The GigaLaw Firm, because the firm chose to go to court rather than filing a Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy complaint. Typically, Isenberg said, businesses that have been targeted by cybersquatters use the UDRP process, which resembles arbitration, to gain control of rogue domain names. UDRP cases, which are handled by such groups as the World Intellectual Property Organization, are typically resolved quickly and efficiently, often in just 60 days, Isenberg said.
Unfortunately, what’s not unusual about the Debevoise fake name brouhaha, Isenberg said, is that the cyber pirates created fake law firm domain names. Isenberg told me he does not have hard data on UDRP complaints filed by law firms, but his anecdotal sense from reviewing case records is that there has been a “significant increase” in cases brought by law firms.
Sophisticated cybersquatters, Isenberg said, often use fake law firm domain names to impersonate law firm personnel in email phishing attempts, like the one perpetrated by a Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner imposter in a UDRP case Isenberg discussed in a blog post last January. The ensuing scam, Isenberg said, can be as simple as sending fake invoices, via fake email addresses, to law firm vendors or clients.
