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WIPO Addresses First Country Code Cyber Dispute

Geneva, March 24, 2000
Press Releases PR/2000/211

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Arbitration and Mediation Center received its first domain name dispute involving a country-code top-level domain (ccTLD) this month. The case concerns the domain name "expedia.nu" - "NU" being the country code for the Pacific Ocean island nation of Niue. This is the first case received by the Center outside the system for resolving generic top-level domain name disputes (gTLD, such as .com, .net, .org). The Center has so far received just over 200 gTLD related-cases from parties in some 40 countries.

The .NU top-level domain is administered by .NU Domain Ltd. under agreement with the IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) designated delegatee, the Internet Users Society- Niue (IUS-N) and has about 66,000 domain name registrations, a high number for a small territory as compared to the number of registrations in many other country-code top level domains. Desirous of discouraging trademark infringements, .NU Domain Ltd. recently decided to adopt the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) for all .NU registrations and retained the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center as one of its dispute resolution service providers.

Mr. Francis Gurry, WIPO Assistant Director General and Director of the Arbitration and Mediation Center, welcomed the decision by .NU Domain Ltd. and IUS-N to adopt the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy. "As country-code administrators, they have recognized the value and relevance of the Policy for reducing intellectual property infringements in the country code-top level domains. We hope that others will follow," Mr. Gurry said.

The Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy, formulated on the basis of WIPO recommendations, was originally designed for disputes arising in the generic top-level domains, such as .COM, .NET, .ORG. However, as the types of disputes arising within ccTLDS often are similar to those occurring within the gTLDs, the policy is also relevant to country-code top-level domains, particularly where such domains are "open". This means that the domain names can be registered by any person living in any country of the world. The WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center has been administering cases in the generic top-level domains on the basis of the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy since December 1999. At present, countries differ in the way they administer alleged cybersquatting disputes. However, any national domain names registrar can opt to apply the Uniform Policy.

For additional information, see Press Release 207 or contact the Media Relations & Public Affairs Section at WIPO:

  • Tel.: +41 22-338 81 61 or +41 22-338 95 47
  • Fax: +41 22-338 88 10
  • Email: publicinf@wipo.int
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