A UDRP was filed against the valuable 3 letter IEE.com domain name. The UDRP was filed at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It is WIPO Case D2020-1707.
IEE.com was created in September of 1995, making the domain name nearly 25 years old. The domain name is being used as a website for a business called Equipment Engineering Services P.A. The current Whois record shows the domain name is registered to an entity called Imaging and Equipment Engineering, which explains the IEE abbreviation.
Using the Whois History Tool at DomainTools, I can see this domain name was registered to the same entity back in 2001. This is the earliest Whois record archived at DomainTools. In addition to this, I can see an Archive.org screenshot from 1996, and one of the people listed on the website in 1996 is listed on the website today. This would indicate it has been registered to the same entity for nearly 25 years.
The complainant in the UDRP is EE International Electronics & Engineering S.A. I did some Google searching to find out more about the company, but I did not find a whole lot using that name. I found an article on Lexology that mentions this company and also mentions a “Luxembourg entity.” That information leads me to believe the complainant is the company that operates on IEE-Sensing.com and IEE.LU. This would make sense since the company refers to itself as IEE throughout its website.
Three letter .com domain names (LLL.com) hold substantial value, and I think IEE.com is quite valuable. This regularly updated list of recent 3 letter .com sales on Embrace.com shows the potential value of IEE.com. There have been quite a few UDRPs filed against LLL.com domain names, but the vast majority have gone in favor of the registrant, according to data from UDRP.Tools.
There are several elements of the UDRP that the complainant will need to prove in order to prevail, including that the domain name was registered and is being used in bad faith. Considering the domain name is nearly 25 years old, is currently being used, and appears to be in use by the same entity for that time period, I do not see how the complaint can succeed. Unless I am missing something important, I would not be surprised to see a Reverse Domain Name Hijacking ruling.
Update: According to the WIPO case landing page, this UDRP has been terminated. Attorney John Berryhill assisted the domain registrant in this matter, and the complainant withdrew the UDRP complaint.
if the three letters sound like IBM, NBC, ABC, then its a claim,
Otherwise – its a RDNH Hail Mary.
Hopefully, someday the UDRP will put some teeth into an RDNH decision. When they’re this obvious, there needs to be repercussions.
Hi Elliot,
Great Post, I am sure Robbie covered this a few hours ago in his blog, he said something similar about the EE International Electronics & Engineering S.A term in Google but if you changed it to IEE International Electronics & Engineering S.A then you get the search results
They win and get RDNH, yaaaa, but they still spend time and thousands defending a bogus case that has no consequences for the company filing the case.. ICANN needs to change if you win a RDNH, they pay $5k to cover your expenses. This will help stop some of the theft attempts and cases abusing the system. Please ICANN install a fine for cases that are awarded RDNH.
Excellent idea.
The Complainant was persuaded to withdraw the case. There was no ruling.
Safe to assume you did the persuading?
Indeed. The Respondent is a local Delaware business run by an adjunct professor at the University of Delaware, where I studied engineering. The firm representing the Complainant was recently reprimanded by a UDRP panel for RDNH, and I suggested they might want to avoid another one, in view of the fact that the name has been registered by the same business since 1995.
Very nice job, John.