Information Technology Blog - - Trademarks and Domain Names: How to Secure Your Trademark for Your Domain - Information Technology Blog
You may not be noticing it that much, but almost every website that gets visited by anyone accessing the Internet has a domain name.
Take a look at the address bar of your preferred web browser and you’ll see a website’s domain name right after the “www” part. Unlike a website’s numerical IP address, a domain name is easier for visitors to remember. So when building a website of your own, you should think of a domain name for it and register it.
However, without any way of securing its domain name, your website could become an instant target of identity theft. Thus, you should secure a trademark for your website’s domain name by doing the following:
Do a trademark search before registering your website’s domain name.
Having a domain name doesn’t guarantee you the trademark that your website needs to fully establish its identity and protect it from anyone who might use the said name for nefarious deeds.
Hence, even before registering your website’s domain name, you should conduct a trademark search by visiting the website of the trademark and patents office of the country where you’re currently residing. The domain name that you came up with for your website shouldn’t be in conflict with an existing trademark. You wouldn’t want to get slapped with a copyright infringement lawsuit later on.
Apply for application
Once you’ve determined that your website’s domain name isn’t currently trademarked by another entity, you can fill out an online trademark application form via your country’s trademark and patents office website.
You can file an intent-to-use application with your country’s trademark and patents office if you aren’t using the domain name you came up with for your website just yet. However, you should start using the said name for your website within a certain time limit that you and your country’s trademark and patents office had agreed upon.
Applying for a trademark comes with a corresponding filing fee that you’ll have to pay. Only then can your country’s trademark and patents office start processing your trademark application. You’ll also have to pay your attorney if you hired one to take care of your trademark application for you.
Wait for at least four months for your trademark application to be
After you’ve submitted your trademark application, your country’s trademark and patents office would review it for at least four months until they finally approve it. You can then congratulate yourself after having successfully trademarked your website’s domain name.
You should know though that the trademark for your website’s domain name lasts for only ten years, after which you’ll have to renew it by filing another trademark application with your country’s trademark and patents office.
You have built your website, come up with a catchy domain name for it, and registered the said name. Not giving your website’s domain name any protection can make it vulnerable to cybercriminals who can steal your data and pose as you while doing malicious activities. To protect your website from being stolen by other people, you should have its domain name trademarked. Securing a trademark for your website’s domain name is easy if you follow the above-listed steps. After all, you can’t afford to have all the effort you’ve exerted for your website be put to waste.
Related: Trademark Symbols as a Mark of Ownership
Originally posted 2018-10-05 16:41:31. Republished by Blog Post Promoter
The post Trademarks and Domain Names: How to Secure Your Trademark for Your Domain appeared first on Information Technology Blog.
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