Coming Home: Contested Domain Names Returned to SANParks

SANParks would like to apologise for referring to the mutually agreed upon settlement regarding the SANParks domain names in this story in language that may have implied that the matter was settled in court. While this issue did involve legal negotiations, a settlement between SANParks and the private tour operator referred to in the story was reached before the matter went to court. We have adjusted the language in our report accordingly.

South African National Parks (SANParks) has reached a settlement regarding the reclaiming of the domain names www.sanparks.co.za and www.sanparks.com, domains formerly controlled by a private tour operator. In the e-commerce world, resolving this dispute is a momentous occasion, with significant benefits for SANParks, an organisation that takes online service provision seriously.

With the internet increasingly becoming the world’s first port of call for information, being able to control the accuracy of that information is of vital importance for any organization. The domain extensions .com and .co.za are where the majority of web users, both South African and International, search first when looking for information on South African based organizations.

“In the past”, explains e-commerce manager Nedret Saidova, “in the public’s eye, the private tour operator (with whom the domain name dispute arose) was seen to be “SANParks”. This was hugely problematic, particularly for first-time and international visitors looking for information on SANParks, as they would regard the site as an authentic mouthpiece for the organization, and thus take the accuracy of the information to be endorsed by SANParks.”. This led to potential discrepancies between official SANParks information, and what was displayed by the private tour operator.

“We had to deal with clients who had received unverified information from the site instead of information from official SANParks’ sources. As you can imagine, this state of affairs cannot augur well for SANParks reputation with its customers and stakeholders”.

“We were confident that we could reclaim the domain names because of our understanding that with the establishment of SANParks as a trademark, the organisation is protected by Notice 4244 of 2000 of DTI – Merchandize Marks Act, 1941”, explains Saidova.

SANPark’s case, to a large degree, rested on the basic fact that SANParks is the owner of the copyright for the content (literary and artistic), on the SANParks website, and that the private tour operator registered the www.sanparks.com and www.sanparks.co.za  domain names, which include the SANParks trademark, without the authority of SANParks. Further to that there were instances where use was made of material from www.sanparks.org that was seen to be infringing on SANParks copyright.

Glenn Philips, Executive Director of Tourism and Marketing sees the settlement of this issue as the correction of a an anomaly, as opposed to a victory. “The mutually agreed upon settlement has resulted in the transfer of these domain names to SANParks and means greatly improved accessibility to our organisation’s current website: www.sanparks.org, and further strengthens improved client services and a reduction in the kind of misinformation that resulted from the private tour operator’s website being continually confused with the SANParks website”.

SANParks is fast realizing the potential of the internet as a key tool in achieving the organisation’s conservation and commercial objectives. The site acts as a repository of knowledge, has an active forum membership of over 6000 people, and will, in the next months, offer client services such as real-time booking online.