With the anniversary of the .CO launch fast approaching, people all over the world have been busy registering .CO domains to protect their brands and grab premiums for almost a year.

As the launch drew nearer last year, many people in the industry speculated that the .CO name space would be rife with trademark disputes, and that all the trademark lawyers would be rubbing their hands together following the launch! To put this theory to the test various Domain Bloggers have been researching the number of actual Uniform Dispute Resolution Proceedings (UDRPs) that were filed against .CO domains in 2011.

UDRP is a process that was established by ICANN to resolve disputes that arise following domain registrations. In essence the complainant must satisfy three main criteria on order for the case to prove successful.

1. The domain name is identical, or close enough to be confusingly similar to a trade or service mark that the complainant has rights to.
2. The current registrant does not have any legitimate right or interest in the domain name.
3. The current registrant registered the domain, or is using the domain in “bad faith”.

Following the complaint being lodged, a panel of judges consider several factors to determine the outcome of the case. These include whether the current registrant registered the name to profit from the mark belonging to the complainant, and whether they have registered the domain name in order to disrupt the business of the registered mark holder. The Registrant is of course invited to give their side of the story, and many UDRP cases are thrown out if the above criteria are not satisfied.

While .CO domains did see a high number of UDRP cases this year they were actually only the 2nd highest TLD by volume. The domain type with the most UDRP filings was actually .NL with 44 cases filed at WIPO this year, followed closed by .CO with 37, and .ES with 31.

The number of UDRP cases this year so far on .CO is actually a lot lower than many predicted, as it was expected that there was the potential for hundreds of UDRP cases as the TLD is so close to the ever-popular .COM. Given the figures above it looks like it wasn’t nearly as bad as expected! Either that, or many brands have just not yet realised that there is a .CO trademark infringement out there!

It’s an exciting time over at Co Internet as .CO celebrates its 1st Birthday next month. You can check out our info on .CO domains here!

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