The Associated Press (www.ap.org) announced on May 10 that the Academy Award-winning actor Morgan Freeman has won control of the Internet domain name MorganFreeman.com (www.morganfreeman.com) in a ruling issued by a United Nations panel. Arbitrators for the World Intellectual Property Organization (www.wipo.org) ordered the transfer of the domain name to the American actor, who had complained that it was being used in bad faith to divert Internet traffic to a commercial search engine.
The ruling upheld Freeman's complaint against the company that registered the name - Mighty LLC, of Charlestown, Saint Kitts and Nevis. Arbitrator Peter Nitter noted that he had no response from Mighty LLC, but said that the company is using the domain name for its commercial benefit to lure Internet users to its website. A number of celebrities have already won the Internet version of their names back through U.N. arbitration, including Julia Roberts, Madonna, Nicole Kidman, Pamela Anderson, Pierce Brosnan and Carmen Electra.
