Decision Released on "CEOFUNDS.CA"

Recently, an arbiter of Resolution Canada, which is an accredited dispute resolution provider of the Canadian Internet Registration Authority ("CIRA") issued its decision under the Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (the "CDRP") on a complaint submitted by Elysium Wealth Management Inc. (the "Complainant"). The Complainant is the owner of the registered trade-mark CEO FUND in Canada (for use in association with the provision of financial portfolio management services) and sought the transfer of the domain name "CEOFUNDS.CA" from Mr. Brian Driscoll (the "Registrant"). The arbiter found the domain name CEOFUNDS.CA to be confusingly similar to the Complainant's CEO FUND trade-mark when used in the context of mutual fund services. In particular, the arbiter found these terms to be effectively identical and likely to be mistaken for each other by persons searching for information about mutual fund service providers on the Internet. Under the CDRP, a registration is considered to have been in bad faith if it was registered for the purpose of disrupting the business of the Complainant. The Complainant argued that the Registrant had registered the domain name in bad faith because he had registered the domain name for his company's use in promoting mutual funds. The arbiter stated that it was not necessary to specifically intend to usurp the goodwill in the Complainant's mark. It was sufficient "purpose" to constitute bad faith under the policy to knowingly use or permit the use of the domain name, when the result of such use was trade-mark infringement contrary to s.19 of the Trade-marks Act. Accordingly, the Registrant was found to have registered the domain name in bad faith and the domain name was ordered transferred to the Complainant. For a copy of the decision, visit: http://makeashorterlink.com/?X10F31324 Summary by: Nick Wong