Judge rules agency can sue search giants
7 September 2004
A US federal judge has ruled that the US Government Employees Insurance Co (Geico) can proceed with a trademark infringement suit filed against search companies Google and Overture.
Judge Leonie Brinkema of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia dismissed a motion filed by Google and Overture, which is owned by Yahoo, to dismiss the case.
Geico has charged the two search giants with violating its trademark by selling advertising, or "sponsored links" to Geico's name. The company is suing both companies for selling rights to its trademarked name to advertisers, alleging trademark infringement, false representation and trademark dilution under a federal trademark statute known as the Lanham Act.
If the Geico suit is successful, the case could have serious implications for the search advertising industry.
Google and Overture insist that they cannot be sued for trademark infringement because they used Geico's name only in internal computer algorithms that determined the sponsored links to display, and did not identify the search engines as the source of the Geico product or imply an endorsement by Geico.
However, Judge Brinkema rejected the search engines' arguments in her August 25th ruling, stating that Google and Overture's sale of adwords for sponsored links may make the companies liable for unlawful use of Geico's trademark. The judge refrained from ruling on whether the sale of adwords actually violated the Lanham Act or Virginia law and threw out two other Geico charges based on Virginia state law.
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