1,017 Domains in Single Arbitration — FreeCreditReport.com Wins
Big win for credit note firm; CitizenHawk may reap benefits.
In what may set a record for most domains subject to a single domain name arbitration, the parent firm of FreeCreditReport.com has won the transfer of 1,017 domain names registered by California-based NetCorp.
The domain names are mostly typos of the firm’s FreeCreditReport.com web site, which is widely advertised as a free credit check service. Examples include fareecreditreport.com, freecmeditreport.com, and freecqeditreport.com.
NetCorp argued that FreeCreditReport.com is merely descriptive, and that the firm did not have trademark rights at the time it registered the domain names. The panel didn’t buy it.
This case could be a big win for anti-typosquatting firm CitizenHawk, which represented FreeCreditReport.com’s parent firm ConsumerInfo.com. CitizenHawk has struck “pay for performance” deals with clients in the past, which gives the firm rights to monetize any domains it recovers for a fixed period of time ahead of handing them over to the client.
