$2.8 million victory for Facebook in domain squatting case

Social networking site Facebook has won $2.8 million in damages from 11 'typo-squatters,' who were using misspellings of Facebook's domain name to redirect visitors to other sites. The defendants were ordered to pay damages, and the domain names were ordered to be transferred to Facebook's control. 

The practice of typo-squatting, and domain-name squatting in general, is common. The squatters often sell the names back to the business for a high price. In this case, the US District court found that the defendants had purposefully made money through the use of similar domain names to Facebook, and had deliberately made their websites look similar to the Facebook homepage. 

In Australia, the .au domain is tightly regulated, with a list of domain names blocked from registration - for example, variations of Yahoo! and Yellow Pages. Companies can appeal similar names that are likely to cause confusion. The .au Domain Administration, which is the authoritative body on domain names in Australia, has had a policy in place regarding domain name misspellings since 2008. In light of the introduction of new generic Top-Level Domains later this year, auDA is currently conducting a survey to investigate the domain name purchasing behaviour of Australian consumers.

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