Coreswood Limited had registered the address and used it to
direct website users to an explicit site that offered services from
"exclusive" women, according to the WIPO judgment.
V&S had taken a case to WIPO to have ownership of the domain
transferred to it. WIPO operates an arbitration centre for domain
dispute resolution, which has just published its ruling agreeing
with V&S's demand.
"By registering and using a domain name which is confusingly
similar to the Complainant’s famous trademark, the Respondent is
using this similarity to attract users to his own website," said
the ruling. "This website has content of a sexual nature. The Panel
does not doubt that the Respondent is using the considerable
goodwill of the Complainant’s mark to attract Internet users to his
own site. This is done by registering and using a domain name
confusingly similar to the Complainant’s mark."
"The use of the mark in the domain name is not done for any
other apparent reason than creating a likelihood of confusion with
the Complainant’s well-known mark, and hence to misleadingly divert
consumers," it said. "The Respondent’s use of the well-known mark
along with a word with a sexual connotation in a domain name
leading to a website of a sexual nature may also lead to tarnishing
the mark."
V&S has been marketing vodka under the Absolut brand since
1979, and since the early 1980s in Europe. It has a trade mark on
the term in various countries and its brand was ranked 93rd most
valuable in the world in 2001 by Interbrand.
The company behind academy-girls.com, Cyprus-based Coreswood,
did not file an argument with WIPO.
The WIPO arbitration panel found that despite the addition of a
hyphen and another word, the domain was 'confusingly similar' to
the Absolut mark. "The Panel finds that the addition of a generic
word to the well-known mark does not alter the fact that the domain
name is confusingly similar to the mark. Previous cases have shown
that simply adding a common or generic term, such the word
“escort”, to a famous mark is not sufficient to give the domain
name an individual meaning and prevent the overall impression that
the domain name has some sort of connection with the Complainant,"
it said.
In order to take the domain from Coreswood the panel had to find
that it was registered in bad faith. It found that Coreswood's
actions were "intentionally confusing the users as to the source,
sponsorship, affiliation or endorsement of the website, as most
users will be familiar with the Absolut mark and the goods sold
under this mark. The Respondent is generating hits on his website
by exploiting the Complainant’s goodwill as a widely known provider
of goods."
Absolut has previously fought and won cases to have the
ownership of domains absolut-porno-star.com;
absolut-video-hard.com; absolutsexo.com; absolut-sexe.com, and
absolute-x.com transferred to it from various other companies.
