LAS VEGAS — BangBros.com says it has caught one of its own affiliates trying to capitalize on the adult company's famous website name after he registered BangBross.com.
The site with an extra "s" in its domain name is allegedly owned by Jay Thomas, who operates adult sites under the Stratis Marketing Solutions parent company name. Currently, BangBross.com is down.
BangBros, represented by the Las Vegas-based Randazza Legal Group, filed a suit two weeks ago in Las Vegas, claiming Thomas and his company are liable for damages as a result of trademark infringement, cybersquatting and unfair competition.
BangBros said in the suit that Thomas and Stratis provided false registration information and used a Whois privacy service because they were fully aware that their conduct infringed upon BangBros trademark and breached their affiliate deal.
"Their affiliate agreement with BangBros strictly forbids them from registering domain names containing identical or confusingly similar variations of Plaintiffs’ trademarks without permission from BangBros," BangBros attorneys said.
After initial contacting with Thomas asking him to hand over the similar-named site, BangBros attorneys claim Thomas refused unless the Miami-based company agreed to pay him "tens of thousands of dollars" for the domain name.
"After plaintiffs contacted defendants, defendants removed all content from the website associated with the infringing domain name," the complaint said.
BangBros is one of the online adult business' top websites, streaming content categories such as BangBus, TugJobs, BigMouthfuls, FuckTeamFive and BigTitsRoundAsses, among many others.
BangBros is asking the court for a preliminary and permanent injunction against Thomas and Stratis, as well as unspecified compensatory and punitive damages and attorneys fees.