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question Received meta TM issue . Advice needed

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I registered a domain few days ago. Received this tm issue today. Advice needed. What should I do ?

I think it's fake

Mail Sender - [email protected]

Here is the mail -

" To Whom It May Concern,

We are writing concerning your registration and use of the domain name *****.com, which contains the Meta trademark.

As you are undoubtedly aware, on October 28, 2021, Facebook, Inc. announced that its name has been changed to Meta Platforms, Inc. (“Meta”). Meta is now the owner of well-known offerings and brands including Facebook, Instagram, Quest and WhatsApp. As part of this corporate rebrand, Meta made a substantial investment in developing its Meta name and trademark and as a result of this, Meta instantly received international recognition.

Accordingly, we were concerned when we learned of your registration and use of ****. As we hope you can appreciate, protection of our trademarks is very important to us. Your registration and use of ****".com violates the Lanham Act (15 U.S.C. 1051 et seq.) because it infringes the Meta trademark.

Infringement occurs when a third party’s use of a company’s trademark (or a confusingly similar variation thereof) is likely to confuse consumers as to the affiliation, sponsorship, or endorsement of the third party’s services.

We have filed several proceedings before the United Nations World Intellectual Property Organization's arbitration panel to protect our trademarks and brands. Meta has consistently prevailed in these cases and the domain names at issue were ordered to be transferred to Meta. We are concerned that your unauthorized use of the Meta name may cause confusion as to whether you or your company’s activities are authorized, endorsed or sponsored by Meta when, in fact, they are not.

We understand that you may have registered *****.com without full knowledge of the law in this area. However, we are concerned about your use of the Meta trademark in your domain name. As you may know, the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act provides for serious penalties (up to $100,000 per domain name) against persons who, without authorization, use, sell, or offer for sale a domain name that infringes another’s trademark.

While Meta respects your right of expression and your desire to conduct business on the Internet, Meta must enforce its own rights in order to protect its valuable trademark. For these reasons, and to avoid consumer confusion, Meta must insist that you immediately stop using *****.com, and transfer the domain name to Meta within 7 business days. You should not sell, offer to sell, or transfer the domain name to a third party.

Please confirm in writing that you will agree to resolve this matter as requested. If we do not receive confirmation from you that you will comply with our request, we will have no choice but to pursue all available remedies against you.

Sincerely,

Meta IP & DNS Enforcement Group
Legal Dept.
Meta Platforms, Inc.

_Any personal data collected by Appdetex and used to identify individuals for the purpose of this communication have been done in accordance with applicable privacy laws and the Appdetex Privacy Policy available at: https://www.appdetex.com/legal/privacy-policy.

Certain information provided herein may be confidential and/or protected from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient of this transmission, please notify the sender immediately and do not deliver, distribute or copy this transmission, disclose its contents, or take any other action in reliance upon or as a result of the information it contains."
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
The OP posted the domain for a few minutes. It contains two words that are both trademarked by FB with an additional letter preceding them. When you put them together like that, it is a pretty blatant infringement. He needs to transfer or delete. For the name in question, it wouldn't even be worth a fight.
 
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You need to delete that domain. It is a blatant trademark issue.
 
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FB does not control META, they bought the .com

It's a dictionary word and a tech word used in programming

If it's real, counter sue and get a TM lawyer who would love to crush FB
And of course 'you' will fund that TM lawyer for him, that will end up eventually losing, right?? :xf.rolleyes:
 
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I registered a domain few days ago. Received this tm issue today. Advice needed. What should I do ?

I think it's fake

Mail Sender - [email protected]

Here is the mail -

" To Whom It May Concern,

We are writing concerning your registration and use of the domain name *****.com, which contains the Meta trademark.

As you are undoubtedly aware, on October 28, 2021, Facebook, Inc. announced that its name has been changed to Meta Platforms, Inc. (“Meta”). Meta is now the owner of well-known offerings and brands including Facebook, Instagram, Quest and WhatsApp. As part of this corporate rebrand, Meta made a substantial investment in developing its Meta name and trademark and as a result of this, Meta instantly received international recognition.

Accordingly, we were concerned when we learned of your registration and use of ****. As we hope you can appreciate, protection of our trademarks is very important to us. Your registration and use of ****".com violates the Lanham Act (15 U.S.C. 1051 et seq.) because it infringes the Meta trademark.

Infringement occurs when a third party’s use of a company’s trademark (or a confusingly similar variation thereof) is likely to confuse consumers as to the affiliation, sponsorship, or endorsement of the third party’s services.

We have filed several proceedings before the United Nations World Intellectual Property Organization's arbitration panel to protect our trademarks and brands. Meta has consistently prevailed in these cases and the domain names at issue were ordered to be transferred to Meta. We are concerned that your unauthorized use of the Meta name may cause confusion as to whether you or your company’s activities are authorized, endorsed or sponsored by Meta when, in fact, they are not.

We understand that you may have registered *****.com without full knowledge of the law in this area. However, we are concerned about your use of the Meta trademark in your domain name. As you may know, the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act provides for serious penalties (up to $100,000 per domain name) against persons who, without authorization, use, sell, or offer for sale a domain name that infringes another’s trademark.

While Meta respects your right of expression and your desire to conduct business on the Internet, Meta must enforce its own rights in order to protect its valuable trademark. For these reasons, and to avoid consumer confusion, Meta must insist that you immediately stop using *****.com, and transfer the domain name to Meta within 7 business days. You should not sell, offer to sell, or transfer the domain name to a third party.

Please confirm in writing that you will agree to resolve this matter as requested. If we do not receive confirmation from you that you will comply with our request, we will have no choice but to pursue all available remedies against you.

Sincerely,

Meta IP & DNS Enforcement Group
Legal Dept.
Meta Platforms, Inc.

_Any personal data collected by Appdetex and used to identify individuals for the purpose of this communication have been done in accordance with applicable privacy laws and the Appdetex Privacy Policy available at: https://www.appdetex.com/legal/privacy-policy.

Certain information provided herein may be confidential and/or protected from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient of this transmission, please notify the sender immediately and do not deliver, distribute or copy this transmission, disclose its contents, or take any other action in reliance upon or as a result of the information it contains."

FB does not control META, they bought the .com

It's a dictionary word and a tech word used in programming

If it's real, counter sue and get a TM lawyer who would love to crush FB
 
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It's a scam ....they can't claim the term meta
 
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For most dictionary words, it is not the owning of a name that could be a TM violation, but its use.

So, if you register AppleProducts.com and sell food made from apple, juice etc, you are fine. If you sell electronics, then you are in trouble. Even if you park and it shows ads for electronics, you are in trouble.

Now, with Meta, FB is even in more shaky ground. Meta was noun term for the industry niche. By registering meta.com and trademark, FB cannot expect to own the term for the industry. You can't trademark "Maritime" for maritime services and expect everyone in that industry drop the name. If someone would be using "Meta" in their name for meta(verse) and FB would challenge them in the court, with the good lawyer a company could prevail over FB.
 
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Do a whois on the enf domain. Looks like a legit correspondence. Without knowing the name, hard to know how strong a case they have, but that seems to be a legit email
 
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Facebook doesn’t have just the extensions they have many meta trademarks now and nobody should be registering Meta after Zuck’s announcement last October.
 
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There is lots of recent reg. Meta sales you can check in namebio dropcatch sales.
So if others jump off a bridge will you? You regged a trademarked domain. No excuse.
 
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From meta names 😆
It's your domain, your choice - I would ignore people who flippantly say hire a TM lawyer - easy for them to say that, you would have pay for it and fight the battle

Weigh up the cost/time of of defending it, the potential selling price and the likelihood of you winning.......there's your answer
 
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Be careful it can be some scammer/domainer which want to scare you, so you will gift your domain free of charge, look at the email it has numbers, that website is down.
Wait for UDRP better from them not some cheap email, look always at email so it comes from trusted website!
 
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I also got a trademark infringement email from them ([email protected]) a week ago.
I haven't replied to them yet.
Because my Meta*****.com domain name was hand-regged a week before they announced the rebranding, so I'm pretty sure it's not a trademark infringement.
 
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The law firm that will come after you is hoganlovells.com. They represent Meta. If you fight the case yourself, it costs you nothing.
 
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Did you check the sender email header?
 
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Could very easily be a scam to steal meta domains from naive domainers. I wouldn't register a Meta domain personally, but not every Meta- prefix or -Meta suffix domain is an infringement.
 
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From a couple of years ago - to do with with WhatsApp but similar email format - the layout/wording if different but again was from 2 years ago

App***tex is a real Brand Protection company though........

Worth looking into more closely If I were you

Edited above
 
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But sender is enfappdatex.com

So, i thought
Odd - But it is definitely the same as the WhatsApp example and they shut down the App in question....

As I said look into it more closely - even contact Appdetex without revealing your details and ask if it is a legitimate notice from "en****tex.com"
 
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Sh+t - Just realised........Delete the domain and I will delete my links - hopefully in time not to be indexed - they are a Brand Protection Company after all :xf.smile:
 
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Much as im childish and laugh because it has the word fapp in it, and that would make me automatically think this is a scam, if you put email enfappdetex.com into google, you will see this page indexed (good job you guys removed all other info in time), a couple of whatsapp emails and then a spotify and uber one. appdetex.com is a company that auto detects trademark infringements. I would say by the inclusion of spotify and uber and that there are no pages screaming its a scam (which happens with most scam emails), then I reckon its real.
As someone said, double check the email address directly with the company to confirm.
If you had meta before fb trademarked it, then you are good, if you bought it after, then I would say you are on shaky ground unless you have developed it (I am not legally qualified!!).
 
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What is the current situation?

I recommend that you reply to the first e-mail: "I'm thinking of delivering the domain name to you, what's the next step?"
If they direct you to the official channel, the possibility of fraud decreases.

Let's take a look at the full domain name privately. Maybe it's really targeting meta platforms' new trademark registrations.
 
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FB does not control META, they bought the .com

It's a dictionary word and a tech word used in programming

If it's real, counter sue and get a TM lawyer who would love to crush FB
Dead right. it's Ancient Greek and transposed to Latin. Been in existence for 2500 years. What will Z do? Sue for Metaphysical, Metamorphosis, Metadata, Metanalytical . Anyway he does not work like that. Meta will have to go to a mediator first, then pay for your side. The mediator looks at the arguments put forth and the worst that happens is that you have to give up your domain .It's not like you are copying their business model and have a website. You won't be sued for millions. just will not happen.
 
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Facebook doesn’t have just the extensions they have many meta trademarks now and nobody should be registering Meta after Zuck’s announcement last October.
But there are thousands of companies already registered with a TM with Meta in their name well before Zuckerberg's wife registered it in 2015. They should be suing him.
 
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if both words are trademarked by Meta it is only a copyright infringement when there is potential for someone to mistake the domain for representing the company in question. It is not in the name but rather how it is used.
I hand-regged the meta domain last year, a week before FB announced the rebranding as Meta.
Is this a trademark infringement?
 
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Meta” may be a perfectly fine trademark, and perhaps it is even the best trademark that they could have found from a legal protectability and risk-management standpoint. But most of the time, once the research starts and the analysis begins, it is often not an especially attractive alternative


Regards,
Will
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