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Social media website Facebook has won the transfer of a “confusingly similar” domain name registered in India.
Facebookengineering.com was registered in April this year by Puneet Agarwal.
According to the ruling, released on Monday, October 2, the domain previously pointed to a parked page displaying sponsored links but is currently redirecting to a page offering to sell the domain for $1,000.
Facebook filed the complaint in August at the World Intellectual Property Organization Arbitration and Mediation Center.
Agarwal replied stating he is a ‘small time domainer’ and does not like to be labelled a ‘cybersquatter’, before offering to sell the domain for $1,000.
Facebook refused, before Agarwal offered to transfer the domain for free but with a $1,000 ‘miscellaneous charges’ fee.
Facebook owns numerous international trademarks for its name including Indian trademark number 1622925, first registered in 2007, and US trademark number 3122052, first registered a year earlier.
Sir Ian Barker was appointed sole panellist and found that the addition of the descriptive word ‘engineering’ does not diminish the confusion, that the “unsubstantiated claim to open an engineering school” does not provide the registrant with any rights or legitimate interests in the domain, and that his attempts to sell the domain constituted bad faith.
At time of writing, the domain is still active but Facebook has won the transfer of it.
Facebook has been successful at WIPO previously, having won the transfer of facebook360.com from a Vietnamese man last year.
Panellist Clive Thorne transferred the domain to Facebook, saying that it was confusingly similar.
Facebook, domain name, confusingly similar, cybersquatter,
