2,634 UDRPs Filed With WIPO In 2014 – Philip Morris Filed 81 Cases (+Infographic)

Since the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center administered the first Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) case in 1999, total WIPO case filings have passed the 30,000 mark, encompassing over 58,000 domain names.

In 2014, cybersquatting case filings with WIPO increased by 2%, with 2,634 cases concerning 5,591 domain names lodged by trademark owners alleging abuse of their mark. Country code Top-Level Domains (ccTLDs) accounted for 13% of all filings, with 72 national domain registries now designating this WIPO service.

Meanwhile, registrations in new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) being introduced have started to trigger UDRP cases. With some 500 out of an applied-for 1,400 new gTLDs operational, registrations in these domains represented 3.9% of domain names (227) in WIPO’s 2014 caseload compared to 65.2% in the .com top-level domain (66.4% in 2013).

WIPO UDRP cases in 2014 involved parties from 108 countries. The U.S., with 849 cases filed, was the largest WIPO filer, followed by France (325), the U.K. (188), Germany (183) and Switzerland (130). Among the top five users, the U.S. (+14.3%) saw the highest growth in cases filed. The top three sectors of complainant activity were retail (13% of all cases), banking and finance (11%) and fashion (10%).

Philip Morris of Switzerland heads the list of filers – 81 cases – followed by Banco Bradesco of Brazil (46), Swarovski of Austria (46) and LEGO of Denmark (35).

Cases were decided by 297 WIPO panelists from 43 countries, with 16 different languages of proceedings.