Public Comment

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Name: Katarina Barathova
Date: 19 Apr 2022
Affiliation: European Commission
Summary of Attachment


Summary of Submission

Fairness of the UDRP – non-recognition of geographical indications (GIs) rights

Geographical indications (GI) are intellectual property rights recognized and protected by international treaties.

Bad-faith domain names registrations containing or consisting of GIs names can infringe GI rights. Better protection of GIs on the internet is one of the main objectives of the new EU proposal for a Regulation on European Union geographical indications for wine, spirit drinks and agricultural products, and quality schemes for agricultural products adopted by the European Commission on 31 March 2022 . The new legal framework aims to increase the protection of GIs on the internet, namely as regards sales via online platforms and the protection of GIs against bad faith registration and use of GIs in the domain name system.

Currently, the UDRP policy does not consider GI rights as relevant rights to prevent domain names from being registered in bad faith. Extending curative rights mechanisms to GIs in the UDRP would guarantee legal certainty, transparency, and tools to counter bad-faith domain name registrations. This would provide GI holders with the same rights as trade mark or service marks right holders currently have and would make the UDRP a more fair and inclusive procedure.