Domain names: towards a new form of IP right

Abstract

Domain names are primarily Internet addresses but also serve as business identifiers. There is still no common standpoint on the legal nature of domain names. Are domain names property or just relative rights that result from the contractual relationship between the registrar and the person registering the domain name? Neither national legislations nor the international agreements address this issue. The idea of domain as property has over time become more significant and more or less prevailed. Given the fact that there is no legislation recognizing domain names as property or regulating the scope of such a right in a domain name, and that the case law on whether domain names are considered property is different from country to country, the legal nature of domain names depends mainly on the applicable law in question. If we consider them property then the fact that they are intangible and represent a right to a domain name means that they are very similar to intellectual property rights. However the scope of such property right cannot be defined by applying old rules and there are more fields in which the recognition of domain names as property would have impact. Perhaps in the future, legislation will recognize domain names as a sui generic intellectual property right defining its scope of protection as to protect its function as a business identifier.