WIPO D2016-2310 · decided 24 January 2017
Fédération Internationale de Football Association ('FIFA') v. Whois Privacy Shield Services / Winsum Wong
The parties
- Complainant
- Fédération Internationale de Football Association ('FIFA')
- Respondent
- Whois Privacy Shield Services / Winsum Wong
What did the panel find on each element?
| Policy paragraph | Finding |
|---|---|
| 4(a)(i) Identical or confusingly similar | The panel found fifa.net identical to the FIFA trademark, since the domain contains the whole mark with no added words or letters apart from the top-level domain. |
| 4(a)(ii) No rights or legitimate interests | The panel found no rights or legitimate interests, because there was no active website, no permission from FIFA and no evidence the respondent was known by the name. |
| 4(a)(iii) Registered and used in bad faith | The panel found bad faith because FIFA is world famous, fifa.net differs from fifa.com only by the TLD, three earlier UDRP decisions went against the respondent, and it used a privacy service. |
Why does FIFA matter for a complaint today?
FIFA won the transfer of fifa.net, registered on 27 July 2014 and showing no active website. The respondent, Winsum Wong, filed no response. The panel held that the FIFA trademark is world famous and that fifa.net differs from FIFA's own site, fifa.com, only by the top-level domain. From that, the panel inferred an intent to divert traffic, which is bad faith under paragraph 4(b)(iv) of the UDRP. FIFA also pointed to earlier UDRP decisions against the same respondent. The panel treated those decisions as a pattern of conduct under paragraph 4(b)(ii). In those circumstances, the panel held that the respondent's use of a privacy service also supported bad faith. Section 3.6 of the WIPO Overview 3.1 cites this case. The same section says that using a privacy service without more does not lead to a finding of bad faith. So for a business owner, a privacy service counts against a registrant only when other evidence sits beside it, here a famous mark and a record of lost cases. Before you file, search the published WIPO decisions for the registrant's name.
What does the WIPO Overview 3.1 say?
The WIPO Overview 3.1 summarises how WIPO panels decide each issue. These sections cover the same point of law.
- Section 3.6: How does a registrant's use of a privacy or proxy service impact a panel's assessment of bad faith? The Overview cites this decision here.
- Section 3.1.2: What constitutes a pattern of conduct of preventing a trademark holder from reflecting its mark in a domain name?
Who decided the case?
A single panelist, John Swinson, decided the case on 24 January 2017.
Read the decision
The full text is published by the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center. We summarise it here; the decision itself is the authority.
Summarised by Gergana Dimitrova, who worked at the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center from 2018 to 2021 and sits as a domain name panelist at the Czech Arbitration Court. Checked against the published decision on 23 October 2026. Full background.
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