Bank of America receives a split settlement in domain dispute

For cybersquatters, the recent Bank of America merger with Merrill Lynch was seen as a golden opportunity to snatch up some related domain names. One company, Webadviso, seized that opportunity, registering bofaml.com, mlbofa.com, bofamerrill.com, and merrillbofa.com. According to ICANN policy on domain name trademark disputes, the National Arbitration Forum heard Bank of America and Merrill Lynch’s (BOFAML) claims and those of Webadviso.

Webadviso referred to themselves as “domainers” and argued that they had the right to park domains and generate pay-per-click revenue. BOFAML argued that the ordering of the letters is too similar to the combined registered trademarks of the merged companies. Webadviso contended that “BOFA” stands for “two highly regarded Chinese characters meaning treasure (bo) and rich (fa).

The arbitrators found that bofaml.com and mlbofa.com must be transferred to the merged corporation, whereas bofamerrill.com and merrillbofa.com would not. The first two, the forum said, were too close to the “Bank of America” trademark (bofa) and should be handed over to them. The latter two, however, were not similar to any registered trademarks since, even though the companies had merged, the names are from two separate registered trademarks. Furthermore, there is no indication that Bank of America intends to use that combination of names.

Source: UDRPSearch
Photo: Flickr