Afnic Opening Free Mediation Service To Simplify Dispute Resolution

Registrants of .fr domain names, and those in the overseas territory ccTLDs the French registry Afnic manage, will have a new and free dispute mediation process available to them from 3 July.

The mediation service will be entirely free and overseen by an Afnic mediator with the aim of providing an amicable means to settle disputes between a rights holder and a holder of a domain name registered under the TLDs managed by Afnic.

Afnic already offers two other extra-judicial alternative dispute resolution procedures, (Syreli and PARL Expert) that have been widely used by rights holders, with demand constantly growing, since 2012.

To facilitate dispute resolution where both Parties could reach an amicable agreement, Afnic is introducing a free mediation procedure which will be officially available to anyone (natural or legal person) as of 3 July. This procedure can only be initiated on a voluntary basis ahead of an ADR3 procedure, and is aimed at rights holders and domain name holders who have reached a communication impasse or are involved in a dispute with the other Party concerning a domain name under one of the following TLDs: .fr, .pm, .re, .tf, .wf, .yt.

As such, this new amicable means to resolve disputes concerning domain names has the following 3 aims:

  • To bring some of the disputes to a quick and entirely confidential conclusion: from the date of opening of a mediation procedure, the Parties, accompanied by the Mediator, have seven (7) business days in which to find a negotiated solution
  • To propose a new way of resolving disputes free of charge, unlike the Syreli and PARL Expert procedures
  • To limit publication of ADR (Syreli and PARL Expert) rulings to the cases in which the parties do not reach agreement

The mediation procedure is not designed to replace the ADR procedures, but rather to offer a new, quick, entirely confidential and free solution to amicably resolve disputes.

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