Cyber squatting is the act of registering a domain name that is same or confusingly similar to the trademark of another with the intention of selling (at a profit) the domain name to the trademark owner.
The Indian Courts have relied on the definition given by the Delhi High Court in:
Manish Vij v. Indra Chugh, wherein Cyber squatting has been defined as “an act of obtaining fraudulent registration with an intent to sell the domain name to the lawful owner of the name at a premium”.
Cyber-squatting refers to the bad faith registration of a domain name containing another person’s brand or trademark in a domain name. The cyber squatter then offers to sell the domain to the person or company who owns that trademark, at an inflated price.
The problem arises because, the trademark owner cannot register his own trademark as a domain name as long as a cyber squatter owns the domain name.
The problem that arises by cyber squatting is that the cyber squatters try to take advantage of the reputation/goodwill of others by registering domain names which attract members of the public. Of particular concern is the growing practice of registering the names of celebrities, particularly where domain name is used for a pornography site. Popular brand names are deliberately misspelled for the sole purpose of website traffic diversion through initial interest confusion.
