What would you do when you receive trademark infringement notice for your website domain name?

Shobhit Verma, here are some general questions to ask: 1) Is the domain name being challenged as infringing a trademark confusingly similar to the trademark in question? 2) Is it being used to market the same type of products/services? 3) When was the domain name registered? 4) Was it registered with a good faith belief that the person registering the mark had a legitimate basis for registering it? Often when someone responds to a demand letter with an offer to sell the domain name for a large amount, this is taken as evidence that there was not a legitimate reason for registering it (basically that the person registering it was trying to hijack it to hold it hostage until they were paid). 5) Is the domain name being actively used in trade or commerce with respect to a product or service that is different from the one marketing under the registered trademark? There are, of course, other questions to ask and other arguments to make and such inquiries are vey fact-specific, but hopefully this list will help folks get started thinking about the issues in such a situation. Good luck! Regards, Ken ----------------- Ken Parker Parker Keough LLP Office Address: 51 Winchester St., Suite 205 Newton Highlands, MA 02461 Mailing Address: P.O. Box 590006 Newton, MA 02459 Phone: 617.275.3040 Fax: 617.963.8315 Email: kparker@parkerkeough.com Website: www.parkerkeough.com Admissions: • Massachusetts • United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts • First Circuit Court of Appeals __________________________________________________ IRS Circular 230 Notice To ensure compliance with requirements imposed by the IRS, we inform you that any U.S. federal tax advice contained in this communication is not intended or written to be used, and cannot be used by any taxpayer, for the purpose of avoiding U.S. federal tax penalties or for the purpose of promoting, marketing or recommending any entity, investment plan or other transaction. __________________________________________________ Confidentiality This email and its attachments may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this email and its attachments is strictly prohibited. If you receive this email in error, please immediately notify me at 617.275.3040 and permanently delete both the original and any copies thereof.

You might want to check trademark databases like the USPTO or its equivalents in you country and region.

You're probably fine, but contact your attorney

Our company (marketcommander.co.uk) received something similar. I responded myself (without any lawyer of my own) saying they had no grounds as they had not used their trademark for x number of years (this varies by country). When they failed to respond to my email for 3 months, I asked them again and they said they've withdrawn the notice.

You are probably ok here but you should respond and make your case. You might get a smallbusiness patent/copyright attorney to collaborate with your response. I have been on the other end of this issue where someone was blatantly using my registered trademark and tagline. You are far from that. It's a nuisance that you have to address this issue but you should and based upon what you have shared, should be easily resolved. The last thing you want to do is to assume that the complaint has no standing and not respond, and as a result, potentially get blacklisted on google and then have to make your case after the fact.

Hi Ken Parker,

Shobit - thank you for posting this question for everybody's benefit. Ken Parker's points are well taken.

You might ask them if they really feel the market is going to be confused between your company that offers a software development services and their company which sells swim wear and sports apparel...  really!!  ..."Feel free to wear nothing but our latest web application to the beach".