In last weeks webinar, Melbourne IT outlined solutions the company planned to propose around trademark protection at the time of registration and take down processes for malicious use of domain names.

These solutions were shared with brand holders in Mexico City.  Other groups also joined in the discussion of possible solutions. Overall there was a willingness among the intellectual property, business users, registry, and registrar groups to work together to come up with implementable solutions.

As a result, the ICANN Board requested that ICANN’s intellectual property constituency convene an Implementation Recommendation Team to work to develop and propose solutions to the overarching issue of trademark protection in connection with the introduction of new gTLDs. ICANN has allocated staff and travel funding for this group.

Melbourne IT will continue to work with this community to refine solutions further. The team has a deadline of 24 April 2009 to produce a draft report, and 24 May 2009 to produce a final report detailing potential workable solutions.