The trademark-friendly folks at the WIPO released data a few days ago, regarding the record number of UDRP cases examined in 2016.
That report, assesses data presenting the following picture:
- Trademark owners filed “an all-time record” 3,036 UDRP cases with the WIPO, a 10% increase over 2015.
- Top TLD was .COM, involving 3,135 domain names (66.89%)
- The top 5 included: .XYZ (321 domains), .NET (272 domains), .TOP (153 domains) and .ORG (129 domains).
- A total of 50 different TLDs and gTLDs were involved.
Domain law.
The low numbers of new gTLD UDRPs can be attributed to the existing pre-registration filtering in place, whereupon trademark owners submit their marks to the Trademark Clearinghouse. The process is not foolproof, as anyone can disregard the TMCH notices upon registration.
So are the new gTLDs squarely to blame for the 10% increase in UDRP cases at the WIPO in a year?
Seeing these numbers, and with the exception of .XYZ as the single most active new gTLD, certainly not.
Other factors, such as a number of Complainants filing a series of UDRP cases contributed to this number, along with an overall tendency to skip mediation and head over to the WIPO.
In a video, WIPO Director General Francis Gurry and Director of the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center Erik Wilbers discuss WIPO domain name dispute resolution cases in 2016.
Watch it below:
