Try to pay your electric bill online, but mistype
www.Deenergy.com when you input DTE Energy's Web address.
"Welcome to your local electric company" pops up on the screen. Click on the link that says "electric bill," and you have likely put money in the pocket of a "typosquatter."
Typosquatters register domain names such as dodgetrukcs.com that are close to the Web site you want. Sometimes the typo lands you on a site that directs you to a competitor. Other times you are invited to click on a link that you may not know is a paid ad.
Advertisement
U.S. courts have ruled that someone who registers the domain name "foradodge.com" is illegally "cybersquatting" because the name is confusingly similar to the Dodge trademark held by Chrysler, despite the fact such a site could be used for purposes unrelated to automobiles.
"Typosquatting is a much more nefarious business model," said Enrico Schaefer, a Traverse City trademark attorney. "It puts a whole lot of money in someone's pocket by misappropriating a trademark holder's good will and causing consumer confusion."
Schaefer represents Weather Underground, an Ann Arbor-based online weather service that recently filed a federal lawsuit in Detroit against Navigation Catalyst Systems, a company that registered weatherundergrounf.com and 40 other mistypings related to the popular weather Web site. Navigation Catalyst makes money each time Internet users click on paid links on the typosquat sites, the lawsuit alleges.
Navigation Catalyst, which also has registered typographic variations on Michigan businesses such as furniture maker La-Z-Boy Inc., the Detroit Red Wings and The Detroit News, unlawfully capitalizes off "the poor typing abilities of unsuspecting Internet users" and is violating federal trademark and cybersquatting laws, the suit alleges.
Navigation Catalyst denies wrongdoing. The California-based company said in a court filing seeking dismissal of the lawsuit that it "helps ensure that Internet users find the information, products, and services they seek and that online advertisers reach their audience."
William Delgado, a Los Angeles attorney representing Navigation Catalyst, said the firm uses an automated program to register thousands of generic Web names. The company tries to screen names protected by trademark but "some of those domain names slip through," he said.
Pennies a click adds up
A 2008 study by Web security company McAfee found there were 80,000 domains typosquatting on the top 2,000 Web sites. By registering thousands of domain names that are within a keystroke of popular sites and collecting a few cents per click, companies can generate millions of dollars every year, experts say.
It's not uncommon for companies to go to court to recover Internet domain names they feel are rightfully theirs. Weather Underground has gone a step further, pursuing its case after nearly all the typosquat sites were surrendered to it and asking a federal judge to issue an injunction barring Navigation Catalyst from typosquatting not just on its domain, but on anyone else's, too.
"Given the scope of the practice, I think it's an appropriate remedy," said Benjamin Edelman, an assistant professor of business administration at Harvard Business School who unsuccessfully sued Google, alleging the giant search company unlawfully profits from the Google Adsense ads frequently placed on the Web sites of typosquatters.
Google takes trademark violations seriously and disallows ads to typosquat sites when it learns of them, spokesman Daniel Rubin said.
Typosquatters hurt the businesses whose domain names are targeted, often directing traffic to competitors, but also hurt consumers by creating delays and confusion and potentially directing a mistype to a site that downloads viruses or other Internet threats, experts say.
"Consumers face a general morass of junk when they are trying to get somewhere on the Internet," Edelman said. "There are all kinds of scammers coming in and showing you this ad and that ad and getting in the way. This is part of that."
Few get punishment
Typosquatting has landed at least one man in prison. John Zuccarini, now 61, was sentenced to 30 months in 2004 after typosquatting sites he registered such as teltubbies.com directed children to porn sites. Zuccarini, who said he was making $1 million a year through his Web sites such as jennferlopez.com, was released in 2005. Under the Truth in Domain Names Act passed in 2003, it's a federal crime to deceive Internet users into viewing obscenity or to deceive minors into viewing harmful material.
But victims complain that typosquatters who don't link to porn sites face few penalties, typically turning over the typosquat site to the trademark holder once a lawsuit is threatened or filed. That's like "not punishing ... someone for stealing a car because, upon being caught, that someone offered to return the car to its lawful owner," Schaefer said in a footnote to his recent lawsuit.
Phil Lodico, vice president of the Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse, said the problem is huge and is expected to explode further with the approval of new Internet domain name suffixes such as ".car" and ".travel."
"At minimum, it's an annoyance; at worst it's a threat to the stability of online transactions," Lodico said.
Internet users trying to type in the Web address of a bank could be redirected to a typosquat site that seeks account numbers or other personal information, Lodico said.
Eileen Dixon, a spokeswoman for DTE Energy, said the company is aware of sites like Deenergy .com, but "we're not aware that any of these sites have caused any harm or confusion for our customers."
If the company found any such sites attempting to defraud its customers, "that would be a very big deal."
pegan @ detnews.com (313) 222-2069
Source & Links
