Internet Scams and Cybersquatters
Is your trademark being held hostage by a cybersquatter? You are if you own a trademark and someone else is holding a domain name that is the same and wanting to charge you money.
When most business were not savy about the commercial opportunities on the Internet, it could be that the pratice that’s come to be known as cybersquatting originated at a time.
Selling or using a domain name with the intent of profiting from the goodwill of someone else’s trademark, that is cybersquatting. For the most part cybersquating is when someone buys up common domain names with the intent to later sell them to existing businesses in order to make a profit of off those businesses.
One of the popular strategies cybersquaters do is to register your name with Yourdomain.org or YourDomainName.Biz and then try to seel them to you at a very high price.
If that fails, they may urge a competitor to get a domain similar to yours, and facilitate the theft of your traffic, business, and clients.
If cybersquatters go too far and infringe on trademarks, libel you or your company, you can, of course, sue. But domain-related lawsuits can take years and cost dearly. Arbitration can be successful, but also can be time-consuming and costly.
Prevention is cheaper and easier. It is not only inexpensive and easy it is the smart also very smart for you to register common variations of your domain yourself, this will help to prevent others from doing so therefore preventing any possible damage that can be done.
Complete a document that locks in the authorized entities for your claim of different domain titles. You can buy these names and keep them under your roof. You will want to review your domain name register so that you know what will be needed, for example you will need to pay attention to contact information, who to be contacted if by chance someone attempts to register your domain.
You only have a narrow window of time to complete the authorized entry documentation. In order to ensure that you have a right to enter a claim you need to make sure that you enter it with in the allotted time frame so that the registering entities can check the relevant com, net or org name. They will not check the IP Claim Service database. Meaning, you could lose your .info or .net version of your domain name.
Cybersquatting opportunities are fading fast, since the majority of companies are currently aware that getting ahold of their domain names is a must.
Don’t allow cybersquatters to intimidate you and destroy what you have worked to create online. Your domain name represents an investment that goes beyond your website. Go with your domain name registrar and get the rights and the authorization to similar or like names to your main domain name! And never allow them to expire or be otherwise compromised since that will cost you in the long run.
Posted on February 23rd, 2009 in SEO | No Comments »