FAQ Brand protection

Dominiando's Online Brand Protection service offers a 360-degree solution for the creation and subsequent expansion of complex domain name portfolios, as well as the management and resolution of other related issues.
Tailored to the requirements of anyone who would like to protect trademarks or brand names and needs advice on every level, whether bureaucratic or technical, it is a service that delegates any type of problem - related to day-to-day domain portfolio management - to specialized professionals.
To know the details of this service, we recommend that you visit here.

The service has no additional charge, other than the cost of the domain and/or the services you purchase. So, the cost of protection solely depends on the cost of the individual domains that will be registered and managed with Dominiando.

Of course, you can directly contact us anytime, or if you prefer that we call you, please leave your telephone number and the best time for us to contact you, and we will be happy to help you clear up any confusion you may have.

The concept of protecting a name on the Internet comprises different areas and is not easy to sum up in a few lines because it also depends on the type of name that needs to be protected.
In any case, one of the most common problems, for example, is the fact that Cybersquatters register brand names that are more or less famous, in order to resell them for prices with at least five figures!
However, in a market where whoever registers the domain is usually entitled to use it, cases of homonymy are also frequent, and it is not uncommon for local retailers or distributors to register a trademark to directly exploit it, even though they are in no way entitled to it.
Dominiando offers you preventive solutions for all these matters so that you can avoid heavy debts and being faced with not being able to use your own brand.

Every case is unique! We advise you to contact us as soon as possible or to fill out the domain recovery form.

All domains can be transferred from one provider to another, through more or less standardized procedures governed by the individual Registries of each extension.
Dominiando can therefore take over all of your domains from different providers and reorganize them into a single portfolio by directly managing, where possible, every technical and bureaucratic procedure for your account.
To proceed with the transfer you should contact us to get an estimate and set up the arrangements.

We have every type of service to offer in association with every Internet domain: hosting, email, whois privacy, redirect, DNS management and many more.

Of course!
Activate redirect services and you can use any type of service from another provider. By taking advantage of the features of Dominiando's geolocated nameserver system on 3 continents, you can benefit from the reliability and extensive coverage of our network and direct the individual technical resources where you think it is most appropriate.
And if you have your nameservers, you can simply set them as authoritative for your domains, and then manage them directly.

No. The Clearinghouse verifies and maintains updated trademark information, and since multiple subjects may have rights to the same trademark, the assignment of its domain name will then depend on the Policies established by the single registry.
For example: a new TLD may be launched for the inhabitants of a certain city, let's say .milano, and the registry could stipulate that only Italian and resident subjects may have it.
If the trademark filed in the Clearinghouse is a Japanese company and this trademark is not valid in Italy, there would be no way for the Japanese trademark holder to have the .milan domain.
This is just a hypothetical scenario (and in no way exhaustive) to demonstrate how each registry has its own rules of registration, participation and autonomous tariffs.
It is, therefore, important to stress that the presence of a trademark in the Clearinghouse repository is not evidence of any rights, nor does it create any type of legal right. The Clearinghouse is simply an archive.

Proof of use allows you to participate in the Sunrise periods that will take place and above all to receive notifications of domain name requests during Sunrise on behalf of third parties.
To verify the proof of use, you have to send a statement declaring that the trademark is in use, plus an example (advertising, a product, etc.) that helps to prove that it is in use.
Proof of use is not required for depositing at the Clearinghouse, but will be required if you want to register domains during Sunrise.
Without proof of use you cannot generate the SMD (Signed Mark Data) file that contains the labels associated with the trademark.
You only need a proof of use for each brand you want to deposit.
It is not considered a proof of use: a trademark that is in a domain name that is already registered, email messages, trademark licenses, link to a site, etc.
What constitutes a proof of use is a screenshot of a website that contains the trademark or a photograph of a product where the trademark appears.

The types of trademarks that can be deposited at the TMCH are:

• National or regional (multinational) registered trademarks in any jurisdiction;
•  Trademarks that have been validated through judicial proceedings or by a court of law;
• Trademarks protected by a statute or treaties in force at the time of filing with the TMCH;
• Other trademarks that constitute intellectual property on the basis of an agreement with the registry.

The types of trademarks that cannot be deposited at the TMCH are:

• Trademarks that include a top level extension, such as "icann.org" or ".icann";
• Trademarks that start with or contain a "dot" (.); for example "deloitte.”;
• Trademarks that do not contain letters, words, numbers or characters that the DNS system considers valid.

The following information should be provided:

• personal/corporate information of the trademark owner or his/her representative, licensee, etc;
• trademark data (category, registration authority, and all relevant information);
• documentary proof or proof of use to participate in a Sunrise.

The Clearinghouse may request the submission of additional documentary evidence if the data supplied by the online databases is not sufficient. At any rate, you must supply:

• License Declaration: when the applicant claims to be a licensee;
• Assignee Declaration: when the person making the request declares to be a recipient;
• copy of an official registration certificate: if, for example, the jurisdiction in which the trademark is valid does not have a searchable online database;
• copy of the renewal request: if the trademark expired during the period in which the deposit was paid to the Clearinghouse.

If within 20 days of the documentary request, no documentation is submitted, the request will not be accepted and the fee will not be refunded.

On the TMCH website: http://www.trademark-clearinghouse.com/

Yes, there are registration costs.
The period is one, three or five years for each trademark.
In the event of a multiannual request, each year the Clearinghouse re-evaluates the trademark to make sure everything still falls under the terms.
A list of labels (names connected to the trademark) gets created automatically. 10 are included in the standard price.
If more labels (up to 100) connected to the trademark are needed, they may be requested for an extra charge.
It is possible that the TMCH does not validate the trademark, in which case there is NO refund, regardless of the number of years chosen.

Once the trademark has been filed, a list of names will be generated (the annual fee includes 10, which can be increased by paying a small extra fee), referring to the trademark under predetermined matching rules. The matching rules will be such as to allow only "labels" identical to the trademark.
Examples:

• if the trademark is "AB", the applicable label will be "AB";
• if the label is "èé", the applicable label is "èé" and NOT "ee".

The plural of a trademark is not to be considered an "identical match" of the trademark presented.
If a trademark contains special characters, these are omitted or replaced by the "-" character.
If a trademark contains the characters, "@" and "&", these may be "translated" into the appropriate word in the language of the jurisdiction where the trademark is protected.
In any case, with respect to ICANN's IDN Guidelines, labels with different alphabets will not be generated.
Return to section 3.3 of the TMCH Guidelines for an example of the application of the rules.
If a trademark holder has won arbitration or court proceedings that have allowed the reassignment of domain names with a label different than the trademark, TMCH may be requested to give an assessment of the case in order to protect additional labels. This operation has separate costs.

Yes, it is possible and there is no refund, since the required fee goes toward paying for the validation work done.

The Clearinghouse is only an archive that must validate the accuracy of the trademark data and is in no way oriented toward giving judgements of value or substance to the underlying rights.
Therefore it is definitely possible that there are multiple trademarks stored in the database that are attributed to different owners. All of them receive the same kind of notification service.
Questions regarding conflicting requests of the same domain name is governed by Registry policy.

The trademark holder must first deposit his registered trademark with the TMCH, provide proof of use and obtain the SMD file.

Donuts asked for 307 extensions and believes it will get about 200.
The DMPL applies to the entire set of extensions that Donuts will handle and cannot be selective.

It is a powerful tool since it allows trademark holders to protect their name.
It is flexible because it does not limit the ability to participate in the Sunrise for a DPML-protected extension, and thus have a domain that is up and running (domains under DPML don't resolve).
It's easy because with only one purchase you block hundreds of extensions for 5 years without needing to involve the company's IT department.
It's cheap because it allows you to block hundreds of names for 5 years, at a fraction of the cost of your extended management spending.

You can block the domains that match the authorized labels in the SMB file provided by TMCH, and also domains that include this label, however, mistyped errors of these are not included.
For example, with the APPLE trademark, apple.tld or appleipad.tld or applestore.tld could be blocked, but not appple.tld or app1le.tld.

Domains registered before the DPML subscription are excluded from the block.
PREMIUM domains (at higher costs, established by Donuts) are not included in the block.
The holder of an identical registered trademark can participate in the Sunrise and get that domain name that was previously blocked.
Domains of 1 and 2 characters are not allowed.
Domain names with 3 characters are only allowed if they are a trademark's exact match.

Override is to undo the blocking activity of a specific extension because the holder of a trademark filed with the TMCH, and possessing a SMD file, decides to join the Sunrise to get that domain name.
It must of course be a trademark that is valid and current at TMCH and must continue to be so in order to be in the DPML for the entire 5 year period.
Donuts can remove a domain from DPML if at any time the trademark is no longer validated by TMCH.