Reclaiming a Hijacked Domain: The UDRP Complaint, Step by Step
By Casey Scott McKay ·
A step-by-step, practitioner-grade guide to clawing a domain name back from a cybersquatter through ICANN's Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy. It unpacks the three elements every complainant must prove—identical or confusingly similar, no rights or legitimate interests, and bad-faith registration and use—using the WIPO Overview 3.0 and landmark decisions like Telstra v. Nuclear Marshmallows. The article walks through choosing a provider (WIPO, FORUM, and the other accredited centers), drafting the complaint under the UDRP Rules, the registrar lock, mutual-jurisdiction statements, GDPR-redacted WHOIS, and the respondent's defenses, including reverse domain name hijacking. A full section compares the UDRP with federal litigation under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1125(d), with its nine bad-faith factors, statutory damages up to $100,000 per domain, and in rem jurisdiction over the name itself. Written for brand owners reclaiming hijacked domains and the attorneys who represent them. Not legal advice.
Intellectual Property → Trademark | Published 28 June 2026 | rightsy.io
The short version. When a stranger registers a web address built out of your brand and then parks it, points it at competitors, or dangles it for ransom, you usually do not need a lawsuit to get it back. You need the Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy (UDRP): a private, global, paper-only process that resolves most domain hijackings in about six weeks for a few thousand dollars. Winning requires proving three things, all of them, every time: the domain is identical or confusingly similar to a mark you own; the registrant has no legitimate stake in it; and the domain was both registered and used in bad faith. This guide walks the whole road—picking a provider, drafting a complaint that survives, anticipating the squatter's defenses, avoiding the boomerang of reverse domain name hijacking, and recognizing the cases where you should skip the UDRP and sue in federal court under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act instead. None of it is legal advice.
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