UK firms told to beware of cyber squatters (From This Is Wiltshire)

UK firms told to beware of cyber squatters

10:26am Thursday 20th April 2006 in

• Skip social links
• Print
• Email
•  

The majority of local businesses failed to bid for new .eu domain name web addresses and have left themselves open to cyber squatters, warns Grant Hume from IT specialists GHS.

"Reports in the press indicate that just 1.5 per cent of UK companies applied for the new domain before the main registration deadline expired," said Grant, the technical director with the company, of Devizes Road, Swindon.

"The figure represented just 9.2 per cent of total applications compared to German companies which made up 28.6 per cent."

Companies and trademark owners were given a four-month grace period to apply before the process was opened up to anyone.

However, with such a small number of UK firms applying for the addresses, experts have warned that many will lose out to cyber squatters people who have no genuine claim to the address but who buy it cheap to sell on for a large profit later.

As most large companies applied to protect their domain, it is likely that small firms will be most affected and forced to pay thousands if they want a .eu address with their company name.

Some large corporates did miss out however. Fashion designer Ralph Lauren beat car giant Volkswagen in the race to claim www.polo.eu, while Land Rover lost out on www.discovery.eu to television station the Discovery Channel.