Someone registered my domain. Can I get it back?
Sometimes. The route is a UDRP complaint, it costs from 1,500 US dollars in filing fees before anyone has written a word on your behalf, and it turns on three elements you must prove all of. The third element contains one word that decides most cases, and almost nobody reads it properly before filing.
Paragraph 4(a) requires the complainant to prove that:
“(i) your domain name is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark or service mark in which the complainant has rights; and (ii) you have no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name; and (iii) your domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith.”
Three elements, joined by “and”. Fail any one and you lose the whole complaint.
Element three is where complaints die
Registered and being used in bad faith. Not one or the other. Both, and the first of them is assessed as at the moment of registration.
This is fatal to a very common fact pattern. Someone registered the domain in 2014. You founded your business and began using the name in 2021. However badly they are behaving today — parking it, running ads on it, demanding a five-figure sum — they cannot have registered it in bad faith against a mark that did not exist and a business they had never heard of. The present use may be opportunistic. The registration was not, and you need both.
Check the registration date before you do anything else. If it predates your rights, the honest assessment is that a complaint is likely to fail, and you should be reading the page about buying it instead.
What counts as bad faith
Paragraph 4(b) gives examples rather than an exhaustive list. The ones that come up:
- Registering it primarily to sell it to you or a competitor for more than documented out-of-pocket costs.
- A pattern of registering others' marks to block them.
- Registering it to disrupt a competitor's business.
- Using it to attract traffic for commercial gain by creating a likelihood of confusion with your mark.
Note what that last one means in practice: a parked page carrying pay-per-click adverts for your competitors is commonly held to be use for commercial gain, even where the registrant says they did not choose the ads.
What the other side can say back
Paragraph 4(c) lets a respondent show rights or legitimate interests, which defeats element two. The common ones:
- They used it, or made demonstrable preparations to use it, in connection with a bona fide offering before any notice of your dispute.
- They have been commonly known by the name, even without a trademark.
- Legitimate non-commercial or fair use, without intent for commercial gain or to tarnish your mark.
A respondent who genuinely runs something under that name, or whose surname it is, is not a squatter, and a complaint against them is an expensive way to establish that.
What it costs and what you get
| Panel | 1–5 domains | 6–10 domains |
|---|---|---|
| Single member | USD 1,500 | USD 2,000 |
| Three member | USD 4,000 | USD 5,000 |
The remedy is transfer or cancellation of the registration. Not damages, not costs, not an apology. You do not recover your filing fee if you win, and you do not recover anything at all if you lose. Most complainants also pay someone to draft the complaint, and that is frequently more than the filing fee.
A panel that concludes you brought the complaint in bad faith — typically to try to take a domain you had no right to — can record a finding of reverse domain name hijacking. It is published, under your name, permanently, on a site anyone can search. Filing a weak complaint to see what happens is not a free option.
URS: cheaper, faster, and usually not what you want
Uniform Rapid Suspension sits alongside the UDRP for clear-cut cases. It is faster and costs less, and it has two properties that matter more than either of those. The standard of proof is clear and convincing evidence, which is higher. And the remedy is suspension — the domain stops resolving for the remainder of its registration term.
It does not transfer the name to you. If your objective is to own the domain, URS does not achieve it, and at the end of the suspension the registration can return to circulation. It is a tool for shutting down obvious abuse quickly, not for acquiring a name.
Before you instruct anyone
- Check the registration date. If it predates your rights, stop and reconsider.
- Evidence your rights, with dates. A registered mark is straightforward. Unregistered rights need proof of use and reputation from before their registration.
- Screenshot what is on the domain today, with the date visible, before anything changes. Pages get cleaned up the moment a complaint lands.
- Keep the correspondence. A demand for money is evidence under 4(b)(i); your own first approach offering to buy is evidence they will use against you.
- Price the alternative. Compare the whole cost of complaining, including the chance of losing, with what it would cost to simply buy the name.
Questions
I do not have a registered trademark. Can I still file?
Element one requires a trademark or service mark “in which the complainant has rights”, and unregistered rights can qualify where you can show the name has acquired a reputation through trading. That is a heavier evidential job than producing a registration certificate, and it has to be established as at a date before their registration. If you are relying on unregistered rights, this is the point to take advice rather than to file hopefully.
They are asking for 8,000 dollars. Is that evidence of bad faith?
A demand for a sum far above documented out-of-pocket costs is squarely within the 4(b)(i) example, and it helps you. It does not on its own carry the complaint, because you still need elements one and two and you still need bad faith at registration. A long-held generic domain being sold at a market price is a business, not a hijacking.
Can I use the UDRP for a country-code domain like .co.uk or .de?
Not necessarily. The UDRP applies to generic TLDs and to those country codes whose registries have adopted it. Several major ccTLDs run their own dispute procedures with different tests, different fees and different remedies — some considerably cheaper. Find the registry's own policy before assuming the UDRP applies.
How long does it take?
A straightforward undefended complaint commonly runs to around two months from filing to decision, and a further period for the transfer to be implemented by the registrar. A defended one takes longer. Do not plan a launch around winning a domain you do not yet hold.
Related
- When buying the name beats winning itThe arithmetic, including the cost of losing
- What a lookup actually tells youRegistered, parked, redeeming — and what the record shows about the holder
Reviewed 2026-09-20 against the UDRP as published by ICANN and the WIPO fee schedule. General guidance, not legal advice, and no assessment of any particular dispute.