• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.18 no.11
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• pp.221-227
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• 2013

Cybersquatting is a type of conflicts between a trademark and a domain, and refers to "behaviors of registering, retaining, transferring, and using the identical or similar domain name in bad faith for the profit from the mark such as trademark". That is, it is preoccupying behavior to abuse the fact that the domain name in the Internet can be freely registered on a first come, first served basis and can't duplicate. Though this should be prohibited, given the reality that most of our daily lives are based in the Internet, this is creating many problems in IT environment beyond social structure in rule of law. Therefore, this study has the purpose that it provides cybersquatting-related information and suggests legislative implications hereafter through the analysis of cybersquatting-related precedent from the Supreme Court.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.15
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• pp.169-209
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• 2001

As a domain name can be registered simply by filing an application for registration, disputes over the domain name between the holder of domain name and the holder of trademark increased. Since the holder of trademark who was late for registering domain name is willing to pay for the return of domain name, cybersquatters increased. Cybersqatters are not genuine users of the Internet. This article is to compare the construction of law by American Courts and by Korean Courts and to assert the creation of the law similar to the law of US as to anti-cybersqatting. American Courts applied the Trademark Act and the Anti-Dilution Act to resolve the disputes over domain name. To apply the Trademark Act, the Court required the plaintiffs to prove that the goods or the services expressed by the domain name should be identical or similar to the goods or the services represented by the trademark. However, there were many cases where the holder of domain name used it for the goods or the services irrelevant to those of the holder of trademark. Also, the Anti-Dilution Act could not successfully protect the holder of trademark from cybersquatters because it required that the trademark should be famous or distinctive. As a result, the US promulgated a new law which is designed to prohibit cybersquatters from being free of sanction by the existing laws. Korea Courts applied the Trademark Act and the Unfair Competition Prohibition Act to the cases disputing domain name. Likewise in the US, Korean Courts must cope with the issue of identity of the goods or the services, and the famousness or distinctiveness of trademark. The Courts hesitate to give a winning judgement to the holder of trademark simply because the domain name of alleged violator confused the trademark. Some scholars advocate the broadening of construction of the Unfair Competition Prohibition Act to illegalize cybersquatting but it is beyond the meaning of the law. Accordingly, it is a time to make a law similar to the Anti-Cybersquatting Act of the US. The law must be a fair and reasonable compromise to resolve the collision between system of registration of domain name and the system of registration of trademark. Some commentators advocate that the registration of domain name should be examined just as the one of trademark and to facilitate it, the Patent and Trademark Office should have jurisdiction of registration of domain name. But it abandons the distinction of domain name and trademark and results in obstructing e-commerce. By adopting the Anti-Cybersqatting Act, we can prohibit it. In other cases, we get a reasonable adjustment between the holder of domain name and the holder of trademark through the Trademark Act and the Unfair Competition Prohibition Act.

• Journal of Information Technology Services
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.129-148
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• 2014

Generally, the Internet Address Resources Act is intended to protect the public from acts of Internet "cybersquatting", a term used to describe the bad faith, abusive registration of Internet domain names. In determining whether a person has a bad faith intent, a court may consider factors such as, (1) the trademark or other intellectual property rights of the person, if any, in the domain name, (2) the extent to which the domain name consists of the legal name of the person or a name that is otherwise commonly used to identify that person, (3) the person's prior use, if any, of the domain name in connection with the bona fide offering of any goods or services, (4) the person's bona fide noncommercial or fair use of the mark in a site accessible under the domain name, (5) the person's intent to divert consumers from the mark owner's online location to a site accessible under the domain name that could harm the goodwill represented by the mark, either for commercial gain or with the intent to tarnish or disparage the mark, by creating a likelihood of confusion as to the source, sponsorship, affiliation, or endorsement of the site, (6) the person's offer to transfer, sell, or otherwise assign the domain name to the mark owner or any third party for financial gain without having used, or having an intent to use, the domain name in the bona fide offering of any goods or services, or the person's prior conduct indicating a pattern of such conduct.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.113-131
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• 2011

Recently, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) announced the expansion of the number of generic top-level domains (gTLDs) beyond the current 22 gTLDs, and the gTLD Applicant Guidebook for ICANN's new gTLD program is now under consideration for approval. ICANN also introduces a "Trademark Clearinghouse" and the "Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS)" procedure to protect trademarks and expedite dispute resolution and save costs. The Trademark Clearinghouse is a central repository for information to be authenticated, stored and disseminated, pertaining to the rights of the trademark holders. Trademark holders would voluntarily provide data of their trademarks from all over the world, and it would assist a trademark watch service provided by the new gTLD registry for trademark holders and potential domain name registrants. The URS is a part of the new gTLD dispute resolution mechanisms created by ICANN to resolve cybersquatting disputes. A complainant in a URS proceeding must establish three elements that are very similar to the existing UDRP to succeed, but supposedly more expedited and cost efficient. Since the URS provides that it only protects court validated and registered trademarks, it is not clear whether unregistered marks used in commerce are protected under the URS. The URS escalates the complainant's burden of proof from a preponderance of evidence standard under the UDRP to a clear and convincing evidence standard. The notices to a respondent shall be sufficient if the URS Provider sends the notice of Complaint to the addresses listed in the Whois contact information. As registrants who wish to conceal their true identity often subscribe to the privacy/proxy service and the complainant's high rate of success in the UDRP proceeding is relevant to the respondents' default rate, the URS's simple notice requirement would deprive respondents of a fair opportunity to assert their rights over the disputed domain names.

• Informatization Policy
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.43-63
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• 2016

This research analyzes the international standardization process by observing the international communication sources in order to understand the reason of its current poor use. Using the 'organizing theory' frame, we observe the initial discourse on the need of internationalized domain names in ICANN and the process of negotiation for technical choice of layers. Lastly, we take Korean domain names as a case study in order to understand the conflict and the cooperation of different stakeholders. We summarize the factors of failure of IDN as follows. First, the need of IDN in the beginning was raised around non-English speaking countries, in Asia and Middle East, with the discourse on 'digital divide solution and cultural value' ICANN rather pursues the 'technical stability of Internet Infrastructure', which made its standardization take as long as 10 years. As a result, a variety of standards and services are proposed in the marketplace, which engendered inefficient competition and domain name-related disputes such as cybersquatting, technical instability and confusion of users. In addition, the government agencies fail to present the appropriate policies adjusting multiple interests of different stakeholders.