Determined: Finding for Complainant 

The disputed domain name incorporates the Complainant’s registered mark " BNA" in its entirety, simply adding the gTLD “.OOO”. The consensus reached by previous panels is that similar changes in a registered mark fail to sufficiently distinguish a domain name from a registered trademark. See F.R. Buarger & Associates, Inc. v. shanshan lin, FA 1623319 (FORUM July 9, 2015) (holding, “Respondent’s <frburger.com> domain name is identical to Complainant’s FRBURGER mark because it differs only by the domain name’s addition of the top-level domain name “.com.”). Therefore, it is found that the disputed domain name is identical to the Complainant's "BNA" trademark.

Determined: Finding for Complainant 

The disputed domain name has been on Registrar parking page, listing third parties’ advertising links. Such use does not constitute a bona fide offering of goods and services. Complainant has not licensed the use of its “BNA” trademark or registration of the disputed domain to Respondent. Furthermore, the Respondent is not known by the disputed domain. Previous panels found that a respondent was not commonly known by a domain name where the WHOIS information, as well as all other information in the record, gave no indication that the respondent was commonly known by the domain name. The Respondent has defaulted, hence no evidence in support of rights and legitimate interested have been submitted. The Panel thus finds that Respondent lacks rights and legitimate interests in the disputed domain name.

Determined: Finding for Respondent 

Complainant states that its trademark has acquired secondary meaning through its continuous and extensive use in connection with Complainant’s trade publications, marketing services, industry news and information at least as early as 1963 and that its mark is famous. Complainant registered the <bna.com> domain in May 1992 and has used this domain continuously since then. Given this, Complainant comes to a conclusion that Respondent was aware of Complainant’s “BNA” mark before registering the disputed domain name, hence acted in bad faith. While the Panel agrees that arbitrators have routinely found bad faith in circumstances where it is unlikely the registrant would have selected the domain name without knowing the reputation of the well-known trademark in question, the factor that plays significant role in their finding of bad faith is presence of sufficient evidence on the record showing that the respondent has chosen the disputed domain name having the famous mark in mind. Although this Panel recognizes that Complaint’s mark has been extensively used over decades and enjoys considerable reputation and fame among relevant public, there is no evidence on the record clearly showing that Respondent registered its domain aiming to profit from its reputation and goodwill, particularly in view of the following. “BNA” is an abbreviation standing for a whole number of shortened words or phrases. Also, Complainant is active in a specific “niche” sector of news services focusing on law, tax and environment. Given this, proving bad faith under the circumstances of this case puts a higher burden of proof on Complainant, hence making a decision in this case within the URS procedure may be not possible. Therefore, it is found that Complainant has not proved that Respondent acted in bad faith when registering and using the domain name by clear and convincing evidence.

After reviewing the parties’ submissions, the Examiner determines that the Complainant has NOT demonstrated all three elements of the URS by a standard of clear and convincing evidence; the Examiner hereby Orders the following domain name(s) be returned to the control of Respondent:

1. bna.ooo