Emmanuel Gillet

Domain Name Management

Some tips for a domain name portfolio management strategy in pandemic times

Crises open windows for cybersquatters, and pandemics are no exception: during the 2009 H1N1 outbreak, Hoffmann-La Roche fought waves of 'Tamiflu' registrations; Covid-19 replayed the scenario. The article draws on four recent UDRP cases: Gilead, which had not registered gilead.health despite the extension's obvious relevance, saw patients redirected to dubious sites; Sanofi faced plaquenil.club registered at the height of the media frenzy; Bayer had never secured resochin.com and resochin.net before opportunists did; and Projetclub saw its 'Easy Breath' mask name declined across a string of new gTLDs. Two-part strategy: audit the portfolio so that trademarks are covered under the relevant extensions — for sectoral TLDs like .HEALTH, preventive registration is cheap insurance — and maintain real-time monitoring with rapid enforcement for generic extensions where exhaustive coverage is impossible. Above all, vigilance must peak whenever a treatment or product suddenly enters the news.

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Domain Name Management

.music sunrise period. The wait is over!

Announced for more than a decade and long delayed, the .MUSIC extension finally arrives: its sunrise period opens on 11 August 2023 and runs until 13 November 2023, before general availability. During this window, trademark owners whose marks are recorded in the Trademark Clearinghouse can register the corresponding names with priority. For the music industry — artists, labels, publishers, venues, platforms — but also for any brand exposed to musical uses of its name, the advice is the usual one: secure the key names during the sunrise period rather than pay later, through negotiation or proceedings, for names captured by opportunists. IP Twins can assist right holders with these registrations.

New gTLDs · Online Brand Protection

1 August 2023

Initially published on iptwins.com

Domain Name Management

.WATCHES domain names: be on time!

Identity Digital — born of the merger of Afilias and Donuts, and the largest gTLD registry operator — is launching the .WATCHES extension: sunrise period from 28 March to 27 May 2023, reserved for trademarks recorded in the Trademark Clearinghouse, before opening to the public. For watchmaking houses and retailers, an extension that says the product in a word deserves consideration in the portfolio — both to build addresses that speak to customers and to deprive counterfeiters, whose appetite for the sector is well documented, of names combining a brand with .WATCHES. Be on time: registering during the sunrise period costs little; recovering a squatted name later costs much more. IP Twins accompanies brand owners through the operation.

New gTLDs · Online Brand Protection

20 March 2023

Initially published on iptwins.com

Domain Name Governance

Rush and Distribution: A Sector Map of the 2026 Reveal Day

On 7 October 2026, ICANN published the applications filed in the first new gTLD round since 2012: 1,614 primary applications for 986 distinct strings, submitted by 480 entities. That is fewer than in 2012 (1,930 applications for 1,409 strings), with evaluation fees now at USD 227,000, but the round is more contested: 55% of applications face a competitor, against 39% in 2012. Assigning each string to a sector reveals a demand driven by digital technology. Artificial intelligence is the most fiercely disputed sector, with .AGENT drawing thirteen applicants, and the leading AI companies have secured their own names. Brands have responded with restraint: 333 .BRAND applications, one in five, only nine of them French. Geographic names, so prominent in 2012, have almost disappeared, while niches such as health and the professions are emerging, including a community application for .AVOCAT. For trademark owners, the priority is to screen the list before the objection period opens on 17 November 2026.

Artificial Intelligence · Domain Name System · dotBrand · ICANN · New gTLDs · Online Brand Protection · Trademark Law

9 October 2026

Initially published on iptwins.com

Domain Name Governance

DNS Abuse: How Can Domain Names Linked to the Same Actor Be Connected?

On 18 August 2026, ICANN published for public comment the Initial Report of its DNS Abuse Mitigation Policy Development Process (PDP 1). Among its proposals are Associated Domain Checks: when a registrar acts on an abuse report, it should also examine the other domain names held by the same customer. In its comments of 25 September 2026, the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center supports the approach but points out its main limitation: the checks stop at the edge of a single registrar's portfolio. Bad actors know this and spread their registrations across several registrars, which hampers consolidated UDRP proceedings. WIPO suggests exploring cross-registrar mechanisms without saying which data could link the names. The article argues that payment data, pseudonymised, could serve as that common denominator, while acknowledging its limits (prepaid cards, fraud, multiple payment methods): an indicator rather than proof. It marks a shift from a one-domain, one-investigation logic to a network approach.

Cybersecurity · Cybersquatting · Domain Name Law · Domain Name System · ICANN · Online Brand Protection · UDRP

28 September 2026

Initially published on iptwins.com

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Article Information

Author

Emmanuel Gillet

Publication Date

26 June 2020

Jurisdiction

Topics

Cybersquatting · Domain Name Monitoring · Online Brand Protection · UDRP

Industry

Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals

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