Venetian wins ruling on domain names

Monday, Oct. 29, 2001 | 10:52 a.m.

The Venetian hotel-casino said today it won a trademark infringement complaint against International Services Inc., an offshore online gaming company accused of using the Venetian trademark to offer Internet gambling.

The United Nation's World Intellectual Property Organization Arbitration and Mediation Center (WIPO), in a decision issued Sept. 14, ordered London-based International Services to transfer its domain names "venetiancasino.com," "venetiancasino.org," and "venetiancasino.net" to the Venetian because these names were "registered and used in bad faith."

The Venetian accused International Services of offering to sell or lease the domain names on 14 websites and of offering to sell the names for as much as $450,000. But International Services disputed the allegations, saying it listed the names for "sale" in hopes of gauging the market value of their domain name property because it was preparing for an initial public offering this year.

"The ruling is not only precedent-setting, but adds to our legal arsenal as we expand our presence worldwide through our website marketing," Venetian executive David Friedman said.