Threat of legal action!

podcake

Just to add my 2 penneth:

As far as i'm aware, cybersquatting is illegal, or rather, they can take you to court for the name (and will probably win) becasue they ahve more money than you. You will not win UNLESS you have something related to the thing that the name is about on the site. ( as far as I am aware it could be the UNOFFICIAL XXXXXXXXX website dedicated to that company). As I understand it ( I remember watching/reading something about this) there are laws preventing the squatting (so called)

as previously stated consult somebody...

fwor

Anubis wrote: »

I will only say this once, no one can force you to sell a domain name.

That may be true, but if another party disputes your "ownership" of a domain name via the ICANN name dispute process (known as UDRP) and they win, then it will no longer be yours to sell. One of the conditions which you have to agree to when registering a domain name is that it does not include a third party's intellectual property - and that includes trademarks.

If you can be bothered and care to look at the facts, you can find all of the policies here:

http://www.icann.org/en/udrp/

These policies have been adopted by all registrars under ICANN's control.

paddyrg

Do the right thing - let them have the domain they want, that you have no real rights over, and are not using. Write back suggesting you would be delighted to transfer the domains to them having held the domains in safety and unused condition for the past decade (proventing domain abuse). Suggest a full and final buyout of £100/domain/year (or something reasonablish like that) to cover all your historic and transfer costs, so it is cheaper to buy you out than mess about with trying to forcibly take the domains.

Anubis_2

fwor wrote: »

That may be true, but if another party disputes your "ownership" of a domain name via the ICANN name dispute process (known as UDRP) and they win, then it will no longer be yours to sell. One of the conditions which you have to agree to when registering a domain name is that it does not include a third party's intellectual property - and that includes trademarks.

If you can be bothered and care to look at the facts, you can find all of the policies here:

http://www.icann.org/en/udrp/

These policies have been adopted by all registrars under ICANN's control.

This is only the case if the domain name has been intentionally used to make money from a third party trademark.

If the domain is not in use, or sells an entirely different product and the third party trademark is not utilised to boost sales, the third party company is unlikely to have a leg to stand on.

TREFLAMMA

DIY, is the best method of self expression.

I see more and more seeking individuality in design. Providing them with the tools to create items that defines themselves is the best thing thats ever happened.

debitcardmayhem

TREFLAMMA wrote: »

DIY, is the best method of self expression.

I see more and more seeking individuality in design. Providing them with the tools to create items that defines themselves is the best thing thats ever happened.

Overnight spam bot, and they still can put links in their profile :mad:

fwor

Anubis wrote: »

This is only the case if the domain name has been intentionally used to make money from a third party trademark.

The domain name does not have to be used at all to violate term 4 (b) (i) of ICANN's domain dispute policy, which gives the following as a case of "registration in bad faith":

"(i) circumstances indicating that you have registered or you have acquired the domain name primarily for the purpose of selling, renting, or otherwise transferring the domain name registration to the complainant who is the owner of the trademark or service mark or to a competitor of that complainant, for valuable consideration in excess of your documented out-of-pocket costs directly related to the domain name."

As soon as the OP asks the other party for (as recommended above in this thread) £5000, they immediately violate this term and give the other party the evidence needed to win a dispute.

BackOnTrack

Save yourself the hassle and just hand them over. The company will win if they take it to ICANN. You could request they cover costs for what you have paid for registering the domain but forget making any money out of it, and send the invoice of what you have paid to the registrar.

omnipeta

Below is reply after I asked for the 'possibility' of reimbursement.



Dear

Thank you for your reply.

It is the strict policy of **** Ltd to not allow any third parties owning domain names incorporating any trademarks belonging to ***** Ltd. Please note that the domain names only needs to be substantially or confusingly similar to the registered trademark, in order for consumer confusion from a trademark point of view, to be at hand. ***** Cars Ltd do not buy domain names from 3rd parties including their trademark.
What regards the reimbursement, ***** Ltd will reimburse the registration fee and possible transfer cost as soon as the domain names have been transferred, we do not compensate any cost exceeding that amount. I kindly ask you to send me a copy of the registration cost, or a print screen where the cost is displayed. We prefer to pay the money via PayPal, please let me know if you have any registered PayPal email address that we can use.

Sincerely,
*****

WhiteChristmas

You might have had a leg to stand on if you were in the Walls situation outlined above, but if you've held it, unused, for ten years, with all the renewals that entails, you'll have to demonstrate that you're NOT squatting.

As for no-one being able to force you to sell, well, that simply isn't true. Look up a guy called John Zuccarini and think yourself lucky you're only small fry...