Social media company alleges that Web.com subsidiary owns 74 infringing domain names.
Facebook has filed a lawsuit (pdf) against New Ventures Services Corp (NVSC) for alleged cybersquatting of its brands, including Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp.
NVSC is a Web.com subsidiary that holds domain names for traffic revenue and resale. It gets many of its domain names by cherry-picking expiring domain names from Web.com registrars, including Register.com and Network Solutions. (Web.com was acquired by a new entity called Newfold Digital earlier this year.)
Facebook alleges that NVCS holds at least 74 domain names that infringe its marks, including FacebookBusinessLeads .com, Instagram-Online .com and InstallWhatsApp .com.
Many of these domains are parked with links to a Network Solutions page where the domains can be purchased for as little as $300.
Last year, Facebook sued domain name registrar Namecheap and its proxy service in a cybersquatting suit. In that case, Facebook alleges that Namecheap customers registered infringing domain names.
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