- What is a domain name?
- Who manages domain names and makes domain name rules?
- How to register a domain name
- Frequency asked questions
- Domain name dispute resolution
Domain names are not equivalent to trade marks or registered business names, and do not create rights to exclusively use that name or phrase in the way that registered trade marks can provide protection. This is discussed further below.
- setting and enforcing policy for the .au domain name space
- accrediting and regulating domain name registrars that provide domain name registration services to the public, and
- maintaining the integrity and security of the .au domain name system
If there are a number of ways of referring to your organisation, you may want to register all of these domain names. You can choose a ‘main domain’, and then redirect the unofficial ones to your main domain name. You may also wish to register similar domain names to your own to prevent others from using those domains and creating confusion.
If your organisation is called ‘Aid to Kids’ you might consider registering aid2kids.org.au as well as aidtokids.org.au, with the second domain redirecting to the first. You might also consider whether to register some common misspellings such as adetokids.org.au and aidtookids.org.au.
Consider what will make a good domain name. For example:
- is my domain name likely to be misspelt?
- is my domain name easy to remember?
- is my domain name likely to drive people to my site?
- is my domain name too generic?
- is there a chance that people will misread my domain name?
- is available for registration
- doesn’t infringe a registered trade mark (you can’t choose a domain name that is substantially identical to or deceptively similar to, a registered or, sometimes, an applied for, trade mark), and
- doesn’t have the potential to mislead users through being associated with any other organisation, product or service
To check whether your domain name may infringe a registered trade mark, you can conduct a preliminary search on IP Australia’s website to see whether your domain name is similar to a registered trade mark. A pending application to register a similar trade mark may also pose an obstacle to your use of the preferred domain name. If you have any concerns, seek legal advice.
Consider Hewlett Packard, a global information technology company, which has registered www.hp.com as its domain name. If a new technology retailer decides to register www.hp-computers.com as its domain name, use of the new domain name may lead consumers to associate the new retailer’s products with Hewlett Packard. In this case, the new retailer will unfairly benefit from the goodwill associated with the Hewlett Packard name. Hewlett Packard may argue that any sales generated from the new domain name unfairly took away its market share due to an improper use of its global reputation and may be able to access legal remedies because of the new retailer’s misleading or deceptive conduct.
- ‘.com’ and ‘.net’ are for general commercial usage
- ‘.org’ is for charities, certain clubs and not-for-profit organisations
- ‘.gov’ and ‘.edu’ are for specific organisations and groups, in this case, ‘government’ and ‘education’, and
- ‘.asn’ is for political organisations
- an association incorporated in any Australian state or territory
- a company limited by guarantee under the Corporations Act 2001(Cth)
- a non-distributing co-operative registered under state or territory legislation
- an Indigenous Corporation registered under the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act 2006 (Cth) and which appears on the Register of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporations
- a trade union or other organisation registered under the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2009 (Cth)
- a charitable trust endorsed by the Australian Taxation Office as a Deductible Gift Recipient
- a non-trading cooperative under state or territory legislation
- a public or private ancillary fund endorsed by the Australian Taxation Office as a Deductible Gift Recipient
- an unincorporated association that appears on the Register of Charities established under the Australian Charities and Not for Profit Commission Act 2012 (Cth),
- a political party registered under the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 (Cth) or state or territory Electoral Act and which appears on the Register of Political Parties or
- Government, being either the Crown or a Commonwealth, State or Territory statutory agency
- an exact match, abbreviation or acronym of the registrant's name, or
- otherwise closely and substantially connected to the registrant, such as the name of a service, program, event or activity the registrant provides
- the current domain owner is willing to sell the domain to you (use the WHOIS database to find the contact information of the domain owner), or
- the current owner doesn’t renew the domain and it becomes available for registration again (monitor the domain to see when it becomes available and register as soon as possible)
- another person’s ('the respondent’) domain name is confusingly similar to their trade mark
- the respondent has no rights or legitimate interests in respect of their domain name, and
- the respondent’s domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith,
Tip
Make sure:
- you have a process for managing and renewing your domain name that will be clear to anyone in your organisation, and
- staff changes don’t lead to inadvertent lapses of your domain name registration
