Deutsche Lufthansa AG v. Gandiyork, SL - B98466980 et al.
Claim Number: FA1403001549328
Complainant: Deutsche Lufthansa AG of Frankfurt, Germany.
Complainant Representative: Rauschhofer Rechtsanwälte of Wiesbaden, Germany.
Respondent: Gandiyork, SL - B98466980 of Gandia, Valencia, International, Spain.
Gandiyork, SL - B98466980 of Gandia, Valencia, International, ES.
REGISTRIES and REGISTRARS
Registries: LAND Registry
Registrars: GoDaddy.com, LLC
The undersigned certifies that he or she has acted independently and impartially and to the best of his or her knowledge has no known conflict in serving as Examiner in this proceeding.
Luz Helena Villamil Jimenez, as Examiner.
Complainant submitted: March 19, 2014
Commencement: March 19, 2014
Response Date: April 1, 2014
Having reviewed the communications records, the Examiner finds that the National Arbitration Forum has discharged its responsibility under URS Procedure Paragraphs 3 and 4 and Rule 4 of the Rules for the Uniform Rapid Suspension System (the "Rules") .
Complainant requests that the domain name be suspended for the life of the registration.
Clear and convincing evidence.
The complaint at hand refers to the registration of the domain name lufthansa.land registered by Gandiyork, SL.
The Complainant, the company Deutsche Lufthansa AG of Frankfurt, Germany, states that it is one of the world leading airlines, which operates worldwide and served 218 destinations in 2013. Furthermore, the Complainant mentions that it is the owner of a large number of trademarks which consist of or include the word “lufthansa”. According to the Complainant, the domain lufthansa.land is confusingly similar to the registered trademark since it totally contains the Complainant’s trademark and adds “land” to it.
Based on the foregoing, the Complainant elaborates on the arguments to demonstrate that the Registrant has no legitimate right or interest to the domain name, and that the domain was registered and is being used in bad faith.
URS Procedure 1.2.6, requires Complainant to prove, by clear and convincing evidence, each of the following three elements to obtain an order that a domain name should be suspended:
RIGHTS OVER AN IDENTICAL OR SIMILAR TRADEMARK
The Complainant submitted evidence to demonstrate that it is the holder of Community registration N° 001212539 for the trademark LUFTHANSA in classes 6, 8, 9, 14, 16, 18, 20, 21, 24, 25, 26, 28, 36, 37, 41 and 42, in force until June 11, 2019.
The Examiner must add from its own knowledge that the trademark LUFTHANSA is a famous and well-known trademark in as much as said airline does operate around the world, being almost impossible to say that one does not know it. Anyway, it is clear to the Examiner that someone who uses an identical trademark that evidently belongs to a third party to “build” a domain name where the only difference is the extension .land, should have known the trademark since it would be impossible to coin an identical word by mere coincidence.
The Complainant also submitted evidence to demonstrate the usage of the trademark LUFTHANSA, and therefore the complaint meets the URS requirement of 1.2.6.1.
NO LEGITIMATE RIGHT OR INTEREST TO THE DOMAIN NAME
The Complainant states that Respondent registered the disputed domain name on February 22, 2014 in spite of having received notification that the domain name matches a mark registered with the Trademark Clearinghouse. In this respect, the Respondent denies and rejects the argument for it being false since the Respondent is “a startup Company whose mission is to improve the experience of airport travelers, with a strategy and alliances that should not need to disclose fully here”.
The Examiner receives this response with astonishment. On another Complaint brought against the same Respondent (Lidl Stiftung & Co. Kg vs Gandiyork, SL, domain lidl.land) he stated that he needed the domain lidl.land to cover the needs of Class 44 (and perhaps class 37) in which he and his family and employees “have been working for decades”. He even mentioned that Lidl Stiftung had already internationally expanded its supermarkets without the need of a second level domain, and he based on these grounds his legitimate right or interest to the lidl.land domain in connection with agricultural activities.
It therefore seems that the Respondent is engaged in a diversity of activities, all of them related with the activities carried out by the companies who own the trademarks he incorporates to his domains. Now, in the case of the Lufthansa.com domain, he engages in assisting airport travelers.
The Examiner does not admit the legitimate interest argument of the Respondent to use a trademark that belongs to a third party and of which the Respondent was aware, since having been registered with the Trademark Clearinghouse it was made known to him when he was obtaining the registration of the domain name lufthansa.land. In addition, the trademark LUFTHANSA is not only registered but also is a famous well-known trademark which merits a special protection. Therefore, the Examiner finds that the Complaint meets URS requirement of 1.2.6.2.
DOMAIN REGISTERED AND USED IN BAD FAITH
The Complainant submitted evidence of the fact that the domain Lufthansa.land was registered to be sold (a screenshot of the webpage lufthansa.land wherein the phrase “Learn how you can get this domain” appears). The Examiner deems that the intent to trade the domain name lufthansa.land is an indicia of bad faith considering the fact that, as mentioned before, the Respondent has registered several other domains consisting of well-known trademarks (carrefour.land, cocacola.land, marlboro.land and pepsi.land, among others, as found by the Examiner during its ex officio verification of the information regarding the domain lufthansa.land on the internet). Indeed, the Examiner, in fulfillment of the duty of verifying whether the Complainant has made false claims as alleged by the Respondent, conducted a whois search of the domain www.lufthansa.land, and immediately received the following prompt: “Reverse Whois: “Gandiyork, SL – B98466980” is associated with about 1.047 other domains”. In the present case, the Examiner considers that holding such a large portfolio of domain names is an indicia of bad faith, particularly considering that, as seen in this case, an identical trademark owned by a third party is involved.
The Respondent contradicts himself. In one part of his response he states that the Registrant is “a startup Company whose mission is to improve the experience of airport travelers, with a strategy and alliances that should not need to disclose fully here”, but under the response to the bad faith claim he mentions that “… we are obliged to start operations in less than one month or we lose the domain. We wish we had started, but it takes more time than the Complainant thinks.” In the opinion of the Examiner, if the Respondent already had a strategy and made alliances as he said, he would at least be able to inform on the website about the future activities intended to be carried out. The simple fact is that the Respondent did plan to sell the domain lufthansa.land to anyone who could give the price, and the sale offer that appears on the document submitted by the Complainant does demonstrate this. Therefore, the Examiner finds that the Complaint meets URS requirement of 1.2.6.3.
The Examiner, after a careful study of the case, finds that the Complaint was not brought in an abuse of this proceeding, and it does not contains material falsehoods.
After reviewing the parties’ submissions, the Examiner determines that the
Complainant has demonstrated all three elements of the URS by a standard of clear and convincing evidence; the Examiner hereby Orders the following domain name be SUSPENDED for the duration of the registration.
Luz Helena Villamil Jimenez, Examiner
Dated: April 04, 2014
Click Here to return to the main Domain Decisions Page.
Click Here to return to our Home Page