As of 30/11/2020
World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) has registered it’s 50,000th ‘cybersquatting’ case. WIPO’s Arbitration and Mediation Centre that handles trans-country domain name disputes announced this on WIPO’s website.
Cybersquatting refers to a situation that occurs when someone registers a domain name in bad faith or to gain profit from an established trademark. Cases like this are solved through a process called Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy (UDRP). This was laid down by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). The courts are allowed to give their judgements on national level disputes. WIPO is usually consulted when the parties belong to different countries.
According to the Report published by WIPO, the number of cases increased this year. In the year 2020, the number of cases shot up by 11% when compared to the figures of 2019. The reason behind this spike is the Corona outbreak. The epidemic forced people to come online. This also brought the unwanted cybersquatters along with it.
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