GEICO announced that a federal judge ruled today that Google activities under certain circumstances violated U.S. trademark law by letting advertisers attach their ads onto Web searches for the Washington-based insurer.
The ruling came from Judge Leonie Brinkema at the U.S. District Court for Virginia's Eastern District in Alexandria, who made her long-delayed ruling based on the evidence she heard during a non-jury trial in December. Google late last year had lost a motion for summary judgment in the case.
Judge Brinkema's latest ruling found GEICO had established "a likelihood of confusions, and therefore a violation of the Lanham [trademark] Act, solely with regard to those sponsored links that use GEICO's trademarks in their headings or text."
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