French company Mobility SAS tries reverse domain name hijacking

Gaming company didn’t connect the dots on when the current registrant acquired the domain.

A World Intellectual Property Organization panel has found Mobility SAS to have tried reverse domain name hijacking.

The company was established in 2018 and started offering Nova Gaming-branded products in 2021. It registered the domain name novagaming.tech because the .com was taken.

So in February, it filed a UDRP against NovaGaming.com in an effort to upgrade its domain name.

Apparently, because Nova Gaming can’t afford the domain, it thinks it should be able to get it through UDRP. Panelist Assen Alexiev summarized (pdf):

The Complainant contends that the disputed domain name was registered and is being used in bad faith. It states that it is not in a position to offer the minimum price required by the Respondent for the purchase of the disputed domain name, and that due to the technical set up of the Sedo website, the Respondent cannot offer to purchase the disputed domain name at a value closer to the cost of the registration and maintenance of the disputed domain name on an annual basis together with the cost of these proceedings.

NovaGaming.com was registered in 2004. In its filing, Mobility SAS did not address the fact that the domain was registered before it existed.

Therefore, Alexiev found the case was brought in bad faith:

The Complainant is represented by counsel. It alleges that the disputed domain name was registered or acquired primarily for the purpose of selling, renting, or otherwise transferring its registration to the Complainant or to a competitor of the Complainant, for valuable consideration in excess of the Respondent’s out-of-pocket costs directly related to the disputed domain name. The Complainant however makes this allegation without addressing at all the fact that the disputed domain name was registered many years before the Complainant and its trademark started to exist. It must have been evident to the Complainant and to its counsel that in such circumstances it is unlikely for the Respondent to have targeted the Complainant with the registration of the disputed domain name, and that the Complaint cannot succeed. The Complainant however filed the Complaint.

Based on the filed complaint, this conclusion makes sense.

However, this is an example of why you need to hire counsel that understands UDRP cases.

Reviewing historical Whois records at DomainTools, one could make a good case that the current registrant acquired the domain after Mobility SAS launched its brand.

While that might not have been enough to win the case, it likely would have avoided the reverse domain name hijacking finding.

AMAR GOUSSU STAUB Selas represented the Complainant. The respondent did not file a formal response.

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