Case Number: NAF 2044445
Complainant: Integrity Marketing Group, LLC
Represented by: Adam Solander of King & Spalding LLP
A three-member panel of the National Arbitration Forum has found Integrity Marketing Group, a Dallas-based insurance-technology company, guilty of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking for using the UDRP process to try to steal the highly-generic domain integrity.com. In a case laced with eponymous irony, Integrity Marketing, which has a subsidiary called Hegemon Group International, filed its claim for integrity.com based on a trademark for the mark “Integrity” that was granted in February 2023. However, the domain name, itself, was registered 27 years earlier.
The panel lambasted Integrity for its assertions of bad faith and presumed accrued rights in integrity.com. “Complainant … clearly knew that the Disputed Domain Name was registered long before Complainant acquired trademark rights and as such could not establish bad faith conduct on the part of Respondent,” the panel wrote, adding, “these facts were readily apparent from the Whois record.”
The RDNH ruling was handed up June 26, 2023.
Source: https://www.adrforum.com/DomainDecisions/2044445.htm