Cybersquatting – registering a website address using other people’s names or trademarks – is on the rise and will get worse with the introduction of new global address tags such as .travel, .jobs and .asia, the World Intellectual Property Organisation warned on Wednesday.

Cybersquatting cases brought to Wipo’s arbitration centre last year rose 20 per cent to 1,456, the highest since 2001 when the centre was still dealing with an initial surge of disputes making use of the new low-cost procedures. Francis Gurry, Wipo deputy director general, said the rise in cases, many of which concerned recently registered addresses or domain names, underlined “the need for continued vigilance by intellectual property owners”.

The United Nations agency, which handles over half the cybersquatting cases brought to arbitration, says the main targets are well-known corporate brands, fashion brands, celebrities and sports events.

Already this year Eli Lilly, the pharmaceuticals manufacturer, Le Meridien hotel group, Hitachi, Roche, the BBC and Martha Stewart have won domain name decisions in their favour.

The introduction in December 1999 of a cheap and easy system of arbitration – for which Wipo charges $1,500 – has cut the rewards to cybersquatters who could previously demand huge sums for returning web addresses to their rightful owners.

But with domain name registration costing just $30 or so a year, many can still earn a useful return on their investment. They may also profit in other ways, by directing people to paying sites (pornography, for example) or attracting advertising.

Mr Gurry said strong preventive measures were needed to prevent abusive registrations of web addresses in the new international domains, especially unrestricted domains such as .asia. Mechanisms could include giving trademark owners first claim on their names before registration is opened to all comers.