Hi, I just realized a trademark violation for a domain name, trademark.eth whereby ātrademarkā stands for the registered trademark, and itās not in use but on sale on OpenSea. Is there a procedure to issue a claim and have the domain re-assigned to the trademark owner?
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Blockchain is permissionless and censor resistant, if trademark owner wants the domain they can purchase it on opensea unless the owner made it available 
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Hi Jack,
ENS is fully decentralized and on chain. Therefor ENS canāt take a domain and re-assign it to another person/wallet.
You could try and flag the domain on OpenSea if you think you have a case. Or buy it from them.
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Thanks! the owner is now just selling licenses but not transfer of ownershipā¦ which is a little tricky because he may increase le license price at discretion or not even renew it
got it, thanks! Iāll try to report on OpenSea, but the owner may sell it somewhere elseā¦
this opes a wide range of violations, i could register apple.eth or ferrari.eth and get along without consequences, do you believe itās fair?
Even if reported to opensea they canāt able to release the domain from the blockchain, they can remove it only from opensea centralized servers.
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That is correct. Someone can register anything they want and keep it for as long as they are willing to pay for it. This is a decentralized platform. You can try to have the sale delisted from sites like opensea, but you will not be able to claim the .eth name.
You can wait for the name to expire (maybe the current owner doesnāt plan to keep paying for it) or you can buy the domain from them.
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What is the difference between what you are referring to and you having a mario character as your profile picture? Do you have the rights for that? I think that comes off a little hypocritical and bias towards the idea of another.
To play devilās advocate, letās say letās say your name was Mr. Ferrari, and you had a law firm named Ferrari & Associates. Who would be able to decide who had the rights? It would be unfair if Mr. Ferrari bought the name ferrari.eth only to have Ferrari car company with huge teams of lawyers come along and prove a trademark and grab that name back?
Or what if someone owned an apple orchard, and grabbed apple.eth. Or, since
I know this analogy may seem silly, but something to think about when considering what is āfairā registering .eth names.
Regardless, I do understand it can be frustrating and wish you the best with solving it.
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Hi! Thanks for your reply. Well, I think thereās quite a big difference in the two situations:
- Iām not selling the Toad img to someone else
- Iām not preventing Nintendo from registering or exploiting the Toad img
On the other hand, who registered the ātrademark.ethā domain is doing exactly those two things.
Got it! Thanks. Consider that āFerrariā is one of the most common surname in Italy, this makes your example super precise 
It all falls in the actual use of the domain. Others domains have specific regulations (ICANN/UDRP) for re-assignment in case of bad faith registrations. While hereās it seems to be a little different.
Always playing the devilās lawyer part, and following the comment of @accessor.eth, I could potentially register the ānintendo.ethā domain or even create a Toadās NFT and never have them re-assigned to Nintendo. The worst which could happen to me is that those infringing creations may not be sold in the markets. But theyāll always be with me and (follow me in this example) if I would not be able to sell āem, I would certainly not invest a single coin to drop them to Nintendoās wallet.
Therefore Nintendo would be in a big trouble, having lost these two assets forever, only because āJackGā was quicker 
.
I really love the decentralized theory, but there should be a way to get over these issues, otherwise I wish this never happens to your actual business guys because itās indeed very frustrating, as you said.
Sure! Will try to purchase it, little frustrating indeed. The major issue is that theyāre currently not selling but ālicensingā it out. This makes that if I contact them and show interest, the current owner will rise the price.
Itās a classic case of trademark abuses and cybersquatting 
you are right, belay my last statements. just to clarify are you saying ātrademarkāas a place holder you are not wishing to disclose ?
No worries! Glad we agree.
Exactly. Not willing to disclose not to increase hype on the domain.
It came as a single case study, but itās a whole matter for discussion. Classic under a legal perspective (cybersquatting is as old as internet, and trademark squattingās even older), but new regarding the framework: decentralized platform and infringerās identity.
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