Tries reverse hijacking .AI domain name — Etihad Airways

World Intellectual Property Organization panel admonishes airline in cybersquatting dispute.

Etihad Airways, the flag carrier of the United Arab Emirates, has been found (pdf) to have tried reverse hijacking the domain name etihad.ai.

The airline filed a dispute against a U.S. resident who is an Arabic speaker born in Djibouti, Africa.

He defended his registration of the domain by noting that etihad (اتحاد) is an Arabic word that transliterates to “union” or “unity”.

The airline itself has noted that etihad means union in Arabic, which also refers to the union of the seven emirates.

The Respondent pointed to many firms that use the name, counting Etihad Medical Services, Etihad Sugar Mills, and Etihad Technology.

Much like United Airlines doesn’t have exclusive use of the term United for brands, neither does Etihad, he argued.

The three-person World Intellectual Property Organization did not find that the domain was registered and used in bad faith:

The Panel sees no evidence on the record that the Respondent purchased the disputed domain name based on its trademark significance rather than its meaning as a transliteration of a common word. The disputed domain name does not contain any term that refers to the Complainant (such as “airways”) nor does the ccTLD extension “.ai” have any apparent connection to the Complainant’s operations (whether it is understood as a ccTLD reference or to artificial intelligence). The disputed domain name has not been used with website content displaying the Complainant’s stylized mark or related to its services. The Respondent did not contact the Complainant…

Furthermore, the panel found that the complaint was brought in bad faith, also called reverse domain name hijacking, since the airline:

…failed to address the material circumstance that its ETIHAD trademark is a transliteration of an Arabic word meaning “union”. The Complainant and its legal representative are both based in the UAE and can be presumed to be aware of that circumstance; indeed, it is noted on a trademark registration certificate annexed to the Complaint.

Clyde & Co represented Etihad Airways. Archer Softech represented the domain owner, with consultation from Ankur Raheja of Cylaw Solutions.