Camper kicks out 'camper.us' cybersquatter

In Camper SL v DPR USA, National Arbitration Forum panellist Sandra Franklin has ordered the transfer of 'camper.us' to the Spanish company Camper. Franklin held that DPR had no legitimate interest in the domain name and had registered it in bad faith.

Camper, a Spanish shoe and leather company, owns several international trademark registrations for the mark CAMPER. It filed a complaint against DPR, the registrant of the top-level country-code domain name 'camper.us', on the grounds of trademark infringement.

Although DPR was using the domain name to direct visitors to a Dutch website for European hotel reservations, it argued that it intended to eventually use the domain name to host a website dedicated to the rental of camper vans in the United States.

Franklin ruled in favour of Camper, ordering DRP to transfer the disputed domain name. She found that Camper had satisfied the three requirements for transfer provided by Article 4(a) of the usTLD Dispute Resolution Policy:

• The domain name was identical to the famous CAMPER trademark;
  
  
• DPR had not established a legitimate interest in the domain name because there was no evidence that DPR intended to use it to market camper vans in the United States; and
  
  
• The domain name had been registered in bad faith since it was very likely that DPR's intention was to confuse internet users and divert them to its website. Franklin considered it important that, although DPR is not a US company and has no commercial activity in the United States, it had registered the '.us' domain name.

Lara Foncillas, Mullerat, Barcelona