9.5 % of E-shops under the .se Domain are Suspected of IP-infringement

EUIPO (the European Union Intellectual Property Office) has, since 2015, been working on a research study into the different ways that the Internet can be used to infringe on intellectual property rights (IPRs). They’ve recently released phase 2 of their study, which focuses on how domain names are being used to market trademark infringing goods.

How Re-Registered Domain Names Are Used for Trademark Infringement

Phase 2 of EUIPO’s study focuses on a particular issue, when copyright infringers pick up domain names that have previously been registered but that have subsequently expired or been otherwise de-registered. Infringers set up e-shops at these domains, and then take advantage of the established traffic to market and sell IP-breaching goods and services. More often than not, the text of the domain name and the domain’s previous use are completely unrelated to the goods or services sold there. These domain names are picked-up and used purely because of the traffic that is directed there, regardless of what they were used for previously.

9.5% of E-shops under the .se Domain are Suspected of IP-infringement

If we take a look at Sweden in particular, EUIPO have analyzed every registered domain under the top-level domain .se. From these, they found that over 1.2 million domain names lead in some way to a homepage. Of active homepages, 33,212 lead to an e-shop or a webshop of some description. When EUIPO examined them more closely, they suspected 3,161 domain names (9.5 %) were involved in IPR infringement. By comparison, the average across the studied countries was only 5.4 % so Sweden is particularly vulnerable in this regard. Of the 3,161 suspect domain names in Sweden, 77.3 % had been previously been registered to someone else. This pattern is similar across the other countries – between 2.9% and 9.1% of e-shops were suspected of infringing on trademarks, and between 71.1 %and 81 % of their domain names were previously used.

The Fashion Industry is Particularly Exposed

EUIPO’s investigation has suggested that the fashion industry is particularly vulnerable to this phenomena. Of the 28,000 e-stores in the four studied countries that were suspected of IPR infringement, 67.5% of them primarily sold shoes, and 20.6%sold clothes (so 88.1% in total). This is not so surprising since E-barometern (which tracks developments in e-commerce in Sweden) lists shoes and clothes as the most common category (34%) in their report for the third quarter of 2017. The things that consumers most want to buy will naturally attract more counterfeiters.

A Few Bad Apples

One of the more surprising findings from the latest EUIPO report is that there is likely only one or a small number of businesses marketing trademark infringing goods across Europe in this way. Despite there being thousands of e-stores that seem on the surface to be unrelated, they are probably controlled by just a handful of actors. This could potentially make it easier to close down these e-shops, at least if the individuals behind them can be identified. At the same time it goes to show how much damage can be done by just a few people.

Contact us here at Dotkeeper if you want to check how well your brand is being protected online.

Link to e-barometer here