Launch of Trademark Clearinghouse in anticipation of new gTLDs roll out
ICANN has announced that it expects to start rolling out new gTLDs in April 2013.
In addition, to enable companies and individuals to request protection for their trademarks and avoid potential trademark disputes, ICANN is also opening a Trademark Clearinghouse, which starts on 26th March. According to ICANN this will enable those who have not registered under ICANN to raise an objection to other unaffiliated parties trying to claim the rights to a gTLD with their name. For example: ‘Donald Trump’ could prevent an unaffiliated party from claiming the rights to ‘.trump’.
In June 2012 ICANN released a list of 1,930 gTLD applications, including applications from top tech companies such as Google, Samsung, Amazon, Microsoft, and Apple. Since June, ICANN and registrars have been engaged in a lengthy review process, which comes to a close shortly.
