Cybersquatting and the ACPA
By Casey Scott McKay ·
The Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1125(d), gives a trademark owner something no arbitration panel can give: a federal judgment, money, and reach over a domain whose owner cannot be found. This article explains where the statute came from, what its four elements actually require, and why the most important word in it is the disjunctive "or" in "registers, traffics in, or uses." It works through the timing rule that quietly kills more claims than any other — the mark must have been distinctive or famous on the day the domain was registered — and the live circuit split over whether a re-registration restarts that clock. It maps the nine bad-faith factors, the intent-to-profit requirement that sits alongside them, and the narrow fair-use safe harbor that courts almost never apply, including the gripe-site cases that come out both ways. It covers the in rem action under § 1125(d)(2) that turns the Eastern District of Virginia into a national domain court, the statutory damages of $1,000 to $100,000 per domain under § 1117(d), the rarely used personal-name statute at 15 U.S.C. § 8131, and the claim that runs the other direction when a UDRP win is overturned in court. It closes with the places the law is genuinely unsettled and a table of the authorities that decide most cases.
IP and Technology > Internet | Article | Published 15 January 2026 - Updated 18 June 2026 | Casey Scott McKay - marksy.us
Summary. The Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1125(d), gives a trademark owner what no arbitration panel can: a federal judgment, money, and reach over a domain whose owner cannot be found. This article covers where the statute came from, what its four elements require, and why the disjunctive "registers, traffics in, or uses" does most of the work. It walks the timing rule that quietly kills more claims than anything else, the circuit split over re-registration, the nine bad-faith factors and the separate intent-to-profit requirement, the safe harbor courts almost never apply, the in rem action that makes the Eastern District of Virginia a national domain court, statutory damages of $1,000 to $100,000 per domain, the personal-name statute at 15 U.S.C. § 8131, and the claim that runs the other way after a UDRP loss. It ends with the genuinely unsettled questions and a table of controlling authority.
Keywords: cybersquatting · anticybersquatting consumer protection act · acpa · 15 usc 1125(d) · domain name disputes · bad faith intent to profit · nine bad faith factors · in rem jurisdiction · typosquatting · statutory damages · domain name transfer · udrp · reverse domain name hijacking · gripe sites · personal name cybersquatting · domain re-registration · registrar safe harbor · confusingly similar domain
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