Have Cybersquatters Created a Web Site for Your Business?

If your small business doesn’t have an online presence, you might be surprised that people are still visiting a web site for your company. This story is another example of why you need to purchase a domain name for your business today, if you don't have one already.

In 2019, it was revealed that Grubhub, the food delivery company, which also owns Seamless and Menupages, had registered 34,000 domains and created duplicate sites for thousands of restaurants. Apparently this was done without the knowledge of the restaurants participating in their delivery service platform. Some of these restaurants already had web sites while others didn’t. For the ones that had web sites, Grubhub purchased look-alike domains and created copycat websites. They even went so far as taking the logos from restaurants' own web sites and reusing them on the Grubhub copycat site. For the restaurants that didn’t have any online presence, Grubhub purchased domains and created entire web sites. These look-alike web sites even included phone numbers controlled by Grubhub.

The point of these copycat web sites was to funnel online delivery orders through Grubhub so they could charge the participating restaurants a higher commission and marketing fees. If a customer called a phone number controlled by Grubhub or visited one of these copycat web sites, the restaurant paid the delivery service a higher 30% commission on the order.

One could say that Grubhub was doing these restaurants a favor. They were creating additional online traffic for the ones that already had a web site or creating a web site for the restaurants that did not. Although sometimes, these copycat Grubhub sites were in direct competition with the restaurants. Some of these restaurants had their own online ordering and delivery services featured on their web page. If Grubhub was able to direct customers away from the restaurants’ actual web sites, the online service giant would make a commission on the orders where they wouldn’t otherwise.

These cybersquatting copycats don’t just affect restaurants. One our customers, in the consulting industry, recently had a competitor create a copycat web site to lure away potential customers. They had to take legal action to gain control of the copycat domain. Fortunately, they had a trademark on their company name for this very reason.

When Grubhub’s cybersquatting actions were revealed in 2019, they denied doing anything without the restaurants’ permission but shortly thereafter stopped. You can read the original story here. The restaurant owners interviewed in the article stated they had no idea Grubhub was creating these web sites.

These are 4 things you can do to secure your company's online image and presence.