Google Finally Asserts Right to Google.ua

In October last year the Higher Commercial Court of Ukraine prevented a fictional Ukrainian company called Go Ogle from using Google’s commercial name in its domain name.

However, the same court decided to send back for a new trial the issue of the delegation of the disputed domain name by the .ua domain name registrar Hostmaster. The specific issue argued was whether the act of registration of the domain name itself infringed Google’s rights.

Considering the worldwide fame of the search engine and its trademark, obtained long before Go Ogle, the Kiev Commercial Court of Appeals ruled that the act of registration of the domain name itself infringed Google’s rights. According to the court’s decision, the domain name is to be delegated to the multinational corporation.

Experts believe that this decision shows that the Ukrainian judicial system is capable of working with delicate domain name issues. It is likely that the Ukrainian courts will have many similar cases in the future, considering that the cyber squatters registered other popular trademarked names such as interfax.ua, fortune.ua, naftogaz.ua, etc.

For more information, please contact Maya Kryvoshei at our Ukraine office.

Source: Hostmaster, .ua domain name registrar