Telepathy sues for reverse domain name hijacking — Nat Cohen’s

Telepathy claims finance firm is trying to reverse hijack a domain name it owns.

Telepathy, Inc., a firm owned by domain name investor Nat Cohen, has sued Seattle firm Parametric Portfolio Associates, LLC for alleged reverse domain name hijacking and other actions.

Parametric, a financial firm, uses the domain name ParametricPortfolio.com. Telepathy has owned the domain name Parametric.com since 1998.

Parametric filed a UDRP on Parametric.com at World Intellectual Property Organization last month. Rather than wait for a UDRP decision that cannot award financial penalties for reverse domain name hijacking, Telepathy decided to sue in U.S. District Court in Washington DC.

In addition to seeking a finding of reverse domain name hijacking and a $100,000 penalty for it, Telepathy is seeking declaratory judgment and findings of fraud and negligent misrepresentation.

Telepathy’s lawsuit alleges that Parametric misrepresented facts in the UDRP, counting by saying that Telepathy “approached [Defendant] with an offer to sell the Domain Name for $225,000.”

As stated by the lawsuit (pdf), it was actually Parametric Portfolio Associates that reached out to Telepathy to buy the domain name. The suit states that the firm submitted a $1,000 offer through the SecuredOffers.com site in 2014 but the parties were unable to reach an agreeable deal. As part of the process for submitting an offer on SecuredOffers.com, the party has to agree that it’s not claiming a legal right to the registration of the domain name.

This isn’t the fist time Telepathy sued a firm that filed a UDRP against it ahead of the UDRP was decided. Last year SDT International agreed to pay $50,000 to settle a lawsuit following it tried to get the domain name SDT.com through UDRP.

Telepathy is represented by David Weslow of Wiley Rein LLP.