Subject: Claim-based DNS ...

From: Francois Menard <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 13:28:38 -0500

Let me illustrate the idea with a very practical problem that I have right
now.  Some hacker registered mediatrix.net (we're mediatrix.com) and is
asking money to stop lying to the Internic.  I'd like to be able to 1) claim
that I am the authoratitative answer on *.mediatrix.net wihout having to
ever bother dealing with the hacker (with changing the root dns) and 2) for
people to be able to reach me until I can resolve beoming the single owner
(through possibly lengthy legal battles). The simple fact that I could
induce a trust relationship based on the one of mediatrix.com to people that
trust mediatrix.com and that are querying mediatrix.net would discourage the
hacker, as he would have to compete with my trust buildup capability.

-=Francois=-
Francois D. Menard
Product Specialist
Mediatrix Telecom Inc.
[email-masked]
Office: +1 819 829 8749 x 227
Office: (APA-II) +1 819 829 1491 x 555-0301 
Home: (APA-II) +1 819 829 1491 x 555-0306
Mobile / Pager: +1 819 348-6080
Email to Pager: [email-masked]

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From: "Shaw, Robert" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1999 11:15:24 +0100

> From: Francois Menard [mailto:[email-masked]]
>
> Let me illustrate the idea with a very practical problem that 
> I have right now.  Some hacker registered mediatrix.net (we're 
> mediatrix.com) and is asking money to stop lying to the Internic.  

1. It is certainly possible that there are other entities in the
   world have equal "rights" to use 'Mediatrix'. Unless this is 
   also you, http://www.namestake.com shows that there are probably 
   3 European trademarks on this name. The crux of the problem is that
   the national trademark space is in fundamental conflict with a 'global' 
   (non-ccTLD) domain name space (e.g., there is a registered trademark 
   in Switzerland for a company called 'Microsoft' that makes sleeping bags 
   and parkas).

2. A search of the USPTO database at 
   http://trademarks.uspto.gov/access/search-mark.html
   appears to indicate that you have a US federal trademark on Mediatrix.

3. Making the assumption that the folks who registered mediatrix.net are
   solely folks with larceny in the hearts, absent any better dispute 
   resolution system (e.g., that being developed by WIPO for ICANN), you 
   can use NSI's dispute resolution policy - see 
   http://rs.internic.net/faq/dispute.html which makes it possible for you
   to very likely suspend the domain name mediatrix.net, based on your 
   federal trademark.

4. This doesn't imply any endorsement of the NSI dispute policy which is 
   fundamentally unfair. However, in this case, I'll note that Mediatrix, 
   a 'created' word, is quite different from cases where some trademark 
   owners have used the NSI policy unfairly against domain name holders - 
   especially in the case of generic terms or family names (penguin.net 
   and veronica.org pop to mind).

In the draft WIPO system (see
http://wipo2.wipo.int/process/eng/processhome.html),
which is substantively the IAHC/gTLD-MoU developed system, there would be a 
process to deal with clear-cut cybersquatting cases.

Bob
--
Robert Shaw <[email-masked]>
Head, IED/Advisor, Global Information Infrastructure
International Telecommunication Union <http://www.itu.int>
Place des Nations, 1211 Geneva, Switzerland

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From: "Shaw, Robert" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1999 11:15:24 +0100

Bob