It looks like Dotster has been named in a typo-squatting lawsuit filed by Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman.

The high end retail companies claim that dotster abused its status as an official icann registrar by mass registering names that are common typographical errors of federally registered trademarks.

Sample domain names referenced in the lawsuit include:

NeimuMarcus.com
playboibunny.com
oldnavyt.com

I’m not exactly sure how retailers Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman came to the conclusion that Dotster is actually the official registrant of the domains, since they all seem to be “protected” by private whois records (through privacypost, which is also run by dotster).

It’s not uncommon for registrars to monetize unused domains that their customers register. Often times when you initially register a domain, if you don’t change the nameservers right away, when the domain propogates, it will resolve to a domain registrars “parking page” that lets others that type in the domain know that the domain is reserved.

Over the years, this parking page has gone from a simple text notifying the web surfer that the domain is registered, but not is use, to a more commercial page with the registrars higher profit margin offerings (web hosting accounts) and even paid advertising in the form text ads.
I think the scary part here is the boundary that appears to have been allegedly crossed by dotster as an official registrar (who also runs their own ad network for parked domains at revenuedirect).

Did dotster cross a line? Is the lawsuit aimed at the wrong company/individuals? I guess we’ll find out in the upcoming months.