Doesn't sound right to me, if they knew they could sue and win, they wouldn't offer a cheap way out, personally i think there trying to scare the owner of the forum and get them to pay up, so it doesn't lead to a court issue.

I'll have a word with my legal advisor and see what he says.

- Zero Tolerance

It will get thrown out of any EU court. It is not legal to trademark a word, which is what this company is attempting to do - bar all use of this word. The most the company could do is pursue the individual for fraud, if they claimed to be a representative of the trademarked company.

Lol, that was funny. And to stay on topic, I don't think major corperations would care if a nobody has there company name as a username...

Ditto. I think there are some people out there who register doubtful trademarks just to do that.... threaten to sue people and hope that they will pay a high fee for not being sued.

It's called extortion, and the company in question will probably find themselves getting in some legal trouble over this, rather than the forum owner, who could and probably should countersue if it goes to court.

"True but remember that in this case the person is asked to pay more than 5,000 USD within three days in order to not being sued." That may be considered as extortion. Sounds like it to me.

It is a common practice in Germany. They called it legal fees.

a good way to protect your name, get maximum publicity for free and maybe get some compensation!