Amidst public criticism and pressure from corporate sponsors, many well-known brands are taking a hard look at their trademarks and choosing to move in a new direction. These changes are impacting brands in various industries from sports teams, like the currently unnamed Washington NFL team, to retailers, like Trader Joe’s. While appeasing the call for change, an unfortunate consequence with which these brand owners must deal are trademark trolls.
Author Archives: Stephanie A. Gumm
Restricted Access to WHOIS Data Jeopardizes Brand Owners Online
As many brand owners know, WHOIS data is the publicly available information on who has registered a particular internet domain name. In layman’s terms, WHOIS records are akin to land title or property tax records: a record of who owns the internet property of domain names available in .com, .net and other generic top-level domain (gTLD) spaces. Each WHOIS record contains basic contact information for the domain name registrant: name, address, phone number, email address and certain other technical attributes. Since the dawn of the internet, gTLD registrars and registries – those companies who sell domain names – have collected contact information from all registrants at the time of registration.