Cybersquatting

Cybersquatting is the practice of registering with bad intent an Internet domain name that belongs to another person or entity, even though the registrant has no rights to use the trademark. This is generally done for purposes of trademark infringement, disparagement, revenge, or financial gain. In the 1990s, speculators known as cyberpirates registered domain names of large companies and then attempted to sell them for large sums of money. Eventually, this practice became illegal under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act of 1999. This entry examines the history of cybersquatting, discusses several early cybersquatting legal cases, and presents some established countermeasures.