December 31, 2008 by Jay Smith
Last week a court of law decided that San Francisco firm, Online NIC had deliberately registered domains in order to lure Verizon customers to their sites, a technique known as cyber squatting. Verizon were awarded $33.15 million dollars, the largest amount ever awarded in a case of this type.
Online NIC registered 663 domain names which were either exactly the same as, or very similar to Verizon trademarks, these included verizononline.com, myverizonwireless.com and even down to unlikely stuff like 123verizonphones.com. Unsurprisingly, the court decided that these were not legitimately purchased domains and, in fact, were purchased in bad faith with the express desire of misleading the public.
The judgement worked out to $50’000 dollars per domain name. It is hoped that it will deter people from cybersquatting in the future. That is certainly the view of Verizon vice president, Sarah Deutsch who said about the judgement, “This case should send a clear message and serve to deter cybersquatters who continue to run businesses for the primary purpose of misleading consumers.”
However, Verizon’s chances of actually getting the money may be limited, especially considering the fact that no representatives from Online NIC were present in court to defend themselves, not even a lawyer.
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