In dismissing Lolicel’s opposition to the registration of SIMPLY DELISH by Stanmar, Assistant Commissioner Rendle excluded evidence witnessed by a patent attorney in Australia because a patent attorney is not authorised to witness a declaration under New Zealand’s Oaths and Declarations Act 1957. The Assistant Commissioner would have dismissed the opposition even if the evidence had been allowed.
Background
Stanmore applied to register SIMPLY DELISH, TMA No. 1163933, in respect of dessert mixes, dessert mousse, dessert puddings and the like in class 30.
Lolicel opposed, claiming use of the mark by Stanmore was likely to deceive or cause confusion and the application was filed in bad faith, respectively, Trade Marks Act 2002 (NZ) ss 17(1)(a) and (2). Lolicel in effect claimed it was the owner of the trade mark and Stanmore was merely its distributor. Stanmar claimed it was the owner and Lolicel was just its contract manufacturer.
Lolicel filed a statutory declaration by its trade mark attorney, a Ms Rimmer, in support of its opposition. Most of the contents of the declaration were based on information provided by Lolicel’s trade mark attorney in South Africa and so were hearsay. Ms Rimmer’s declaration was witnessed in Brisbane Australia by its Australian patent attorney.
Stanmare did not file any evidence in answer but requested a hearing.
(After the hearing was requested, Lolicel sought to file a declaration by one of its employees which “confirmed” the contents of Ms Rimmer’s declaration. As it was filed out of time and an extension of time had not been requested, however, this declaration was excluded from the evidence.)
The declaration was inadmissible
Section 160 of the New Zealand Trade Marks Act requires evidence before IPONZ to be in the form of an affidavit or a statutory declaration in the absence of a direction to the contrary. (There was no direction to the contrary.)
The Rimmer declaration purported to have been made and witnessed under s 11 of the Oaths and Declarations Act 1957 (NZ).
Section 11(1) of the Oaths and Declarations Act 1957 provides:
A declaration made in a Commonwealth country other than New Zealand shall be made before a Judge, a Commissioner of Oaths, a notary public, a Justice of the Peace, or any person authorised by the law of that country to administer an oath there for the purpose of a judicial proceeding, or before a Commonwealth representative, or before a solicitor of the High Court of New Zealand. (emphasis supplied)
The Assistant Commissioner contrasted the specific requirements of s 11 with the terms of s 10 and s 12, the latter of which authorised officers of the armed services of a Commonwealth country, or an ally, to witness both affidavits and statutory declarations.
So it was necessary to show that the patent attorney had authority under the law in Australia to administer an oath for the purposes of a judicial proceeding.
It is clear that a patent attorney can witness a statutory declaration under Australian law – at least for the purposes of matters arising under Commonwealth laws.[1]
The Assistant Commissioner agreed with Stanmore, however, that a statutory declaration was not interchangeable with an affidavit, the truth of which has been sworn on oath or affirmation.
Moreover, it may be noted, s 6(3) of the Statutory Declarations Act 1959 (Cth) provides that the section does not authorise the use of a statutory declaration in a judicial proceeding.
As the declaration was made in Brisbane, the Oaths Act 1867 (Qld) s 16A provides:
(1)A person’s affidavit may be witnessed by any of the following persons without a commission being issued for the purpose—
(a) a justice, commissioner for declarations or notary public under the law of the State, the Commonwealth or another State;
(b) a lawyer;
(c) a conveyancer, or another person authorised to administer an oath, under the law of the State, the Commonwealth or another State;
(d) if the affidavit is witnessed outside Australia—a person authorised to administer an oath under the law of the place in which the affidavit is witnessed;
(e) another person prescribed by regulation for this subsection.
and reg. 4 of the Oaths Regulations 2022 (QLD) prescribes only “a senior police officer”.
The Assistant Commissioner was also referred to s 186 of the Evidence Act 1995 (Cth) which identifies the persons authorised to witness an affidavit for the purposes of court proceedings in the federal jurisdiction as “any justice of the peace, notary public or Australian lawyer”.
As a result, the Assistant Commissioner concluded at [38] – [41] that Lolicel’s Australian patent attorney was not authorised to witness affidavits under Queensland or Australian Federal law. Accordingly, the Rimmer declaration was not admissible in the opposition proceedings before IPONZ.
Hearsay
There was a further problem with the Rimmer declaration. Ms Rimmer had made it on the basis of information supplied by Lolicel’s trade mark attorney in South Africa. In other words, it was hearsay.
The Assistant Commissioner referred to an earlier IPONZ decision, BitFlyer Inc v Coinbase Inc, in which another Assistant Commissioner, recognising that trade mark oppositions dealt with valuable property rights, explained at [36] that hearsay evidence should be given little, if any, weight:[2]
in trade mark oppositions the Assistant Commissioners take the tribunal approach but are guided by and rely on the Evidence Act when assessing the reliability and probity of evidence. A high standard of evidence is expected.
As there was no way of separating statements made by Ms Rimmer from her own knowledge and those which were hearsay, at [52] the Assistant Commissioner concluded that Ms Rimmer’s declaration was inadmissible or of no probative weight.
The Assistant Commissioner appears to have made an exception from this ruling for invoices and emails between the parties as “business records”. At [53], however, the Assistant Commissioner considered these materials, even if admitted, were not adequate to sustain Lolicel’s grounds of opposition.
The substantive grounds
Section 17(1)(a) required the opponent to show that there was an “awareness, cognisance or knowledge” of its mark in the relevant market at the application date to found a likelihood of deception or confusion.
The business records annexed to Ms Rimmer’s declaration did not provide a sufficient foundation for this as they did not address the typical indicators of the extent of use in New Zealand such as sales volumes or advertising and promotional expenditure on the brand in New Zealand.
The s 17(2) ground required Lolicel to show that Stanmore had made its application in bad faith.
At [62], the Assistant Commissioner considered this required Lolicel to prove it was the owner of the trade mark in New Zealand when Stanmore applied to register it and it was unreasonable for Stanmore to have made the application in those circumstances.
While there were email communications between the parties that showed they had dealings with one another before the priority date, these communications left ownership of the trade mark unclear. Accordingly, this ground failed too.
Short comment
As the Trans-Tasman arrangements mean that all Australian and New Zealand patent attorneys are admitted to practise in both Australia and New Zealand, regardless of whether they are based in New Zealand or Australia, precluding patent and trade mark attorneys based in Australia from witnessing statutory declarations for use in IPONZ proceedings seems anomalous as well as inconvenient for businesses.
Statutory Declarations Act 1959 (Cth) [s 8][s8] and, for prescribed persons, see the Statutory Declarations Regulations 1993 (Cth) reg. 4 and items 107 and 111 of Sch. 2. ?
Morroccanoil Israel Ltd (MIL) has successfully obtained injunctions against some of Aldi’s lookalike products, but only on the basis that the marketing misrepresented they were “natural” products and further that their argan oil content conferred certain “performance” characteristics. MIL’s claims that the products infringed its trade marks and “passed off” failed. MIL did successfully appeal the Registrar’s refusal to register “Moroccanoil” as a trade mark and fended off Aldi’s attempt to have MIL’s trade marks removed on the grounds that they were not capable of distinguishing.
Katzmann J’s decision runs to 741 paragraphs, so there is a lot more ore to be mined than I shall cover in this blog post.
MIL has two registered trade marks in Australia1 in respect of, amongst other things, hair care products:
TM 1221017
TM 1375954
Although its get up varied over time, you can get a good idea of how it sold its products in Australia from the following:
Aldi (Like Brands, only cheaper) introduced its own range of Moroccan Argan Oil products such as:2
The Trade Mark Infringement Claim
MIL put its case on trade mark infringement on Aldi’s use of Moroccan Argan Oil, not the get up of any product packaging.
Despite Aldi’s reliance on the presence of the PROTANE (or PROTANE Naturals) or VISAGE house brands, Katzmann J had little difficulty despatching the claim that Aldi did not use Moroccan Argan Oil as a trade mark over the fence for six. The term was not purely descriptive; argan oil was only one ingredient of many and only the 11th or 12th ingredient in terms of volume. Viewed objectively, it clearly presented as a badge of origin, especially when depicted with oil drops instead of “o”.
However, Katzmann J held that Moroccan Argan Oil was not deceptively to either trade mark. A central consideration was that each of MIL’s trade marks was a composite mark. “Moroccanoil” was a prominent feature, but the prominent “M” was an equally prominent feature.3
Further, by the time Aldi came to adopt “its” trade mark, there other players in the market using the expression “Moroccan Argan Oil”.
Treating “Moroccanoil” as the relevant essential feature of MIL’s trade marks, Katzmann J accepted that the interposition of “Argan” between “moroccan” and “oil” may well not interrupt the recall of the brand moroccanoil but nonetheless went on to hold at [220]:
…. In my view, there is no real, tangible danger that an ordinary or reasonable consumer with an imperfect recollection of one or other or both those marks or, as was argued, the name “Moroccanoil”, would wonder whether a mark called “Moroccan Argan Oil” is or is associated with either of the composite marks that are the First and Second Trade Marks. Ignoring similarities in the get-up of the respective products, including the colour-scheme and packaging, I am not satisfied that the hypothetical consumer would mistake the Aldi “Moroccan Argan Oil” mark for the First or Second Trade Marks or wonder whether the Aldi product is made by the owner of the First and Second Trade Marks. Considering each of the First and Second Trade Marks as a whole, I find that the Aldi mark is not deceptively similar to either of the MIL marks.
Four other points
First, MIL placed heavy reliance on what it said was evidence of 58 consumers being confused that Aldi’s product was MIL’s. These included reports of people who said, or were reported to have said, that they had bought MIL’s products in Aldo’s stores although, of course, MIL’s products were not available in Aldo’s stores.
Only one of those consumers gave direct evidence and Katzmann J considered there were sufficient deficiencies in her evidence to regard her as an unreliable witness.
For example, the witness had a clear recollection of seeing different Aldi products displayed together although it appears to have been accepted they were only displayed in different parts of the store, she referenced MIL’s get up rather than its trade mark, she admitted to being distracted by a distressed child and it emerged that she had not disclosed her previous experience working in advertising as the basis for concluding Aldi’s product was some kind of brand extension.
All the other evidence was the more typical hearsay evidence of employees of MIL and its distributor and stockists about what customers told them. Katzmann J accorded this evidence no weight. Her Honour’s reasons warrant very careful consideration, especially as this type of evidence (if not its scale) is very typical.
206 That is because the evidence largely consists of reports given to others in a way that makes it impossible to decide what was responsible for the confusion. Certainly, there is nothing to suggest that any deceptive similarity arising from the get-up of the products or aspects of it were disregarded. The evidence provides either no or no sufficient foundation for the conclusion that any purchase of an Aldi product was made because of the deceptive similarity of the respective marks.
The indirect nature of the evidence was critical as it meant there was no context to assess the conduct:
207 …. Matters such as the following are often left unclear, or are completely unexplained: whether the person was aware of MIL’s products when they encountered the Aldi products, and if so to what extent; which Aldi product(s) were in issue; in what circumstances the alleged confusion occurred, including what level of attention the person gave to the Aldi products at the time; whether there were other factors at play that might have led to the person acting in the way that they did; and any other relevant circumstances. It would be essential to understand these matters in order to accord any weight to the evidence.
208 In view of the way in which the evidence was adduced (predominantly through witnesses to whom the reports were either directly or indirectly made by anonymous consumers), and in the absence of contemporaneous records, it was not possible for these matters to be explored in cross-examination.
209 Furthermore, even at face value a number of the reports do not bespeak of confusion, let alone deception. In one case, reported by Ms Williamson, the consumer said that she had bought products at Aldi that “look like” MIL’s products. While this is illustrative of similarity, it does not denote deceptive similarity. Some of the evidence consists of second-hand hearsay, such as the complaints received by Thierry Fayard. As a matter of common experience this evidence is unreliable ….
Secondly, MIL sought to rely on Aldi’s alleged intention to trade on MIL’s reputation in its trade marks. There does not seem to have been any real dispute on the evidence that Aldi had set out to “benchmark” its products at least partly on MIL, but also partly on another competing product by Organix:
214 Ms Spinks’4 evidence is insufficient to demonstrate that by the choice of the name “Moroccan Argan Oil” Aldi set out to mislead consumers into thinking that the Aldi brand was moroccanoil. No precise evidence was led as to how Aldi settled on the name “Moroccan Argan Oil” and no questions on this subject were asked in cross-examination. If its object were as alleged, then one would think it would call its products “Moroccan Oil”. The name Aldi chose was different. The name Aldi chose —“Moroccan Argan Oil” — was the name then used by Organix, whose products Aldi had used as the “benchmark” for its shampoo and conditioner. Further, the ultimate product was not taken to market before Aldi had received advice as to compliance with Australian laws. Ms Spinks said that an organisation known as “Silliker” (Silliker Australia Pty Ltd) was retained to undertake “due diligence checks” to ensure that proposed product packaging and labelling complied with relevant “regulations” and the Australian Consumer Law. She was not challenged about this evidence in cross-examination.
A third aspect is that MIL also sought to lead evidence of 13 other major brands which Aldi was said to have knocked off “lookalikes”. MIL wanted to use this evidence as tendency evidence under s 97 of the Evidence Act to show that Aldi deliberately copied product get ups to take advantage of their reputation.
Katzmann J accepted that could potentially be relevant evidence. MIL’s application failed, however, because its notice was not sufficiently specific to comply with the stringent requirements for the admissibility of such evidence and it was given too late. Moreover, the evidence would not carry matters further than the direct evidence of Ms Spinks. At [129]:
… tendency evidence is generally used to prove, “by a process of deduction, that a person acted in a particular way, or had a particular state of mind, on a relevant occasion, when there is no, or inadequate, direct evidence of that conduct or that state of mind on that occasion”: …. Here, however, there was direct evidence from Ms Spinks of the development process in relation to the goods in question. The evidence MIL wished to adduce as “tendency evidence” consisted merely of samples and images of other, unrelated products. It did not include any evidence as to how or why the get-up for the particular products was selected. It takes the evidence given by Ms Spinks no further. Consequently I am not persuaded that the evidence in question has significant probative value.
Even if the tendency evidence had been admitted, it would not have helped on the trade mark case as it was evidence of a tendency to adopt features of get up, not the trade mark itself.
Finally on this part of the case, Katzmann J held that Aldi’s hair brushes and dryers etc. were goods of the same description as the hair care products in class 3 covered by MIL’s registrations. As with Aldi’s own hair care products, however, there was no likelihood of deception or confusion so s 120(2) did not come into play.
The ACL claims
MIL brought three claims under the Australian Consumer Law alleging that Aldi had engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct by:
misrepresenting that its products were MIL’s products or in some way sponsored or associated with MIL (i.e., a passing off type claim);
misrepresenting that its products were made from, or substantially from, natural ingredients; and
misrepresenting that the argan oil in the products gave the products performance benefits which they did not in fact have.
As noted above, MIL succeeded only on the latter two claims.
In relation to the passing off claim, Katzmann J accepted that Aldi had modelled the get up of some of its products on MIL’s get up5 and sought to appropriate some of the reputation of MIL’s products to its own benefit. At [380]:
Aldi unquestionably modelled its Oil Product on the MIL Oil Treatment. Ms Spinks referred to it as “the benchmark” product. Aldi copied several of its “diagnostic cues”, including the use of a bottle very similar in style, size, shape, and colour, the same pump mechanism for the extraction of the oil from the bottle, the use of a cardboard box, and the prominent use of a similar colour for both the bottle’s label and the box. Ms Spinks accepted in cross-examination that Aldi’s object was to achieve an exact colour match with the bottles and conceded that consumers would associate the colour of the bottle and the type of packaging with the MIL product. ….
and
384 The evident purpose of copying important features of the MIL Oil Treatment was to remind consumers of that product. It would be naïve to believe that in doing so Aldi was not seeking to capitalise on MIL’s reputation and attract to itself some of its custom. I find that in adopting the particular get-up for the Aldi Oil Treatment bottle and box, Aldi copied from the get-up of the MIL Oil Treatment and box and that it did so in order to appropriate part of MIL’s trade or reputation or the trade of MIL’s authorised distributors and resellers.
That was not sufficient in itself for a finding of misleading or deceptive conduct. The question was whether or not Aldi had sufficiently distinguished its products from MIL’s.
Katzmann J considered that, if regard were paid only to the similarities between the respective get ups, there would have been a likelihood of deception. However, it was necessary to have regard to the respective get ups as a whole. When considered as a whole, there were important differences which served sufficiently to distinguish Aldi’s products:
first, ALDI’s products were prominently branded with its well-established house brands PROTANE or VIGOUR;
secondly, MIL’s products featured the very prominent large “M”, which was not replicated in ALDI’s get up;
thirdly, in MIL’s products “moroccanoil” appeared vertically, while Aldi used “moroccan argan oil” horizontally only;
fourthly, there were significant differences in the packaging, especially the shampoo and conditioner which were closer to the Organix product than to MIL’s;
fifthly, the closest products – the competing oil treatment products – were sold by MIL in a glass bottle, but Aldi had used a plastic bottle only;
Her Honour considered that none of these differences were concealed and were at least as conspicuous as the similarities. Further, viewed as a whole, the Aldi range was cheaper and the use of the house mark clearly marked the products out as a different brand. Further, the two businesses marketed their products through completely different trade channels and at very different price ranges.
MIL’s heavy reliance on the similarity of the turquoise colours used did not avail:
413 Colour-blind, inattentive consumers, and consumers with an imperfect recollection of the MIL products might confuse the colours. I accept Professor Quester’s evidence that consumers are unlikely to detect subtle differences in colour between two sets of products as they would not ordinarily engage in a side-by-side comparison. Indeed, I am prepared to accept that a not insignificant number of consumers might think the colours are the same. On the other hand, as Ms Spinks’ evidence shows, at the time Aldi entered the market with “Moroccan Argan Oil”, at least one other company, Organix, was selling hair care products in turquoise containers and also under the name “Moroccan Argan Oil”. Other products, like Pure Oil of Marrakesh, were sold in cartons, bottles and other containers featuring various shades of blue.
414 Knowledge of third-party usage of a particular get-up or name can affect the chances that a consumer might be misled or deceived.
MIL also failed in its attempt to rely on the printing of “Moroccan Oil” on (at least) some Aldi receipts. At [428], they were issued after purchase, which was too late.
As one would expect, the failure of this part of MIL’s ACL claim was also fatal to its passing off claim.
Natural products
I don’t propose to go into the detail of why the use of the brand name Protane Naturals was misleading or deceptive other than to record that Katzmann J did find the brand name deceptive since the relevant products were not substantially “natural” products. There is some quite involved evidence about what a “natural” product is or may be if you are going to get into that sort of thing.
Performance representations
Some of Aldi’s products claimed on their packaging to “helps strengthen hair” and “helps protect hair from styling, heat and UV damage” and similar claims.
Katzmann J rejected Aldi’s argument that this was a reference to the capabilities of the product as a whole rather than as a result of the use of moroccan argan oil. Apart from the presentation on the packaging and the prominence given to that oil, Aldi’s own internal documents claimed it was the argan oil that conferred these attributes.
MIL’s scientific evidence established, however, that there was too little argan oil (which is apparently very expensive) in Aldi’s products to have the desired effects. Needless to say, the expert evidence dealing with this part of the case is also rather involved.
Wrap up
Overall and barring the outcome of any appeal, this seems like a rather Pyrrhic victory for MIL. I don’t have any idea how much damages will flow for the breaches of the ACL. Nonetheless, here is plenty of scope for Aldi to continue using its lookalike get up; the prevention of which was surely the point of the exercise. What is more, the result was achieved only after a very lengthy trial including, amongst other things, eight experts: 2 lexicographers, four marketing experts and two chemists!
Following her Honour’s decision (and barring any appeal), it will have three including TM No. 1463962 “moroccanoil” in respect of Hair care products, including oil, mask, moisture cream, curly hair moisture cream, curly hair mask, curly and damaged hair mask, argan and saffron shampoo, hair loss shampoo, dandruff shampoo, dry hair shampoo, gel, mousse, conditioner and hair spray in class 3. ?
In addition to hair “lotions” such as shampoo, Aldi also marketed hair brushes and powered hair dryers and the like. ?
Those of you who read 140 year old case law might also be thinking about the striking colour scheme. Katzmann J, citing the 5th edition of Shanahan and the Office Manual, held that MIL’s trade marks were not limited to the specific colours as there was no endorsement under s 70 and so the marks were taken to be registered for all colours. One could be forgiven for thinking this approach renders the Register seriously misleading at times. ?
The Aldi employee charged with introducing the range. ?
The Aldi shampoo and conditioner products were “benchmarked” on Organix’ get up, not MIL’s. ?
Mortimer J has ruled that print outs of third party websites are inadmissible as hearsay and, if not, excluded under s 135 of the Evidence Act as unduly prejudicial.
Shape Shopfitters is suing Shape Australia for infringement of several registered trade marks which, it says, include SHAPE as the essential feature and the usual passing off-type actions.[1] Both are in the commercial construction business. Shape Australia used to be called ISIS Group Australia, but changed its name in October 2015, as her Honour said “for reasons that are immediately obvious.”
Shape Shopfitters is contending that the use of “Shape” in Shape Australia’s name is likely to lead people to think that Shape Shopfitters is the “shopfitting” arm of Shape Australia, which it is not.
As part of its defence Shape Australia sought to lead evidence of ASIC and Australian Business Register records of other companies and businesses with the word SHAPE in their name. Shape Australia also sought to introduce print outs of the websites of various businesses resulting from Google searches such as “shape building”.[2] Some, but not all, of the print outs were from the Wayback Machine. The print outs purported to be of businesses called Shape Consulting, Shape Builders Pty Ltd, Shape Joinery & Design Pty Ltd, Shape Fitouts Pty Ltd and Shape Finance (Aust) Pty Ltd. You will immediately appreciate that Shape Australia was hoping to show that “shape” itself was not distinctive or to rely on the well-known proposition from the Hornsby Building Information case.[3]
Mortimer J noted that no objection was taken to the ASIC or Australian Business Register print out – presumably, because they were official records.[4]
However, the print outs of the websites of the businesses themselves were hearsay. They were being advanced to show that there were other businesses out there claiming to have and use the names appearing in the print outs. At [24], her Honour ruled:[5]
the evidence sought to be adduced by the respondent is clearly hearsay within the meaning of s 59 of the Evidence Act. The statements made on various internet sites of other corporations or business entities (including the archived material to which Mr Henry deposes in [24] of his affidavit)[6] constitute a previous representation made by the person or persons who constructed the website, wrote the text and inserted the graphics. The purpose of adducing evidence of those statements of text and graphics is to prove the existence of a fact it can reasonably be supposed was intended by the drafter of the text and the person who constructed the graphics. The fact is that there were business entities trading on the dates specified (between August and October 2016) in the industries and markets set out on the pages exhibited by Mr Henry, in the locations those webpages identified using the names those webpages identified. It is the actual existence of those business entities, the names they were using, the industries and markets in which they were trading, the services they were offering and the locations in which they were offering those services which the respondent in my opinion seeks to use as part of its case to prove that there was no confusion in the marketplace generated by its use of the word “shape” in SHAPE Australia.
Even if the print outs were not hearsay, Mortimer J would have excluded them under s 135 if the Evidence Act on the basis that their probative value was substantially outweighed by the danger of prejudice to Shape Shopfitting.
the evidence … constitutes no more than a snapshot of what was available through a series of internet searches on a particular date, without any context being available to be tested about the nature of the businesses these searches have turned up. The probative value of such searches is limited on any view. The applicant’s case is a very specific one about what participants in the commercial construction industry may or may not be led to believe concerning the relationship between the applicant and the respondent, and whether the applicant might be seen as no more than a “specialist shop fitting arm” of the respondent. To have evidence in the nature of single date extracts of internet searches showing businesses using the word “shape”, without calling evidence from witnesses who operate or control those businesses, and allowing the applicant to test the similarities or differences between those businesses and its own, between the customer base(s) of those business and its own, and in turn between those businesses and the respondents, is in my opinion to create a danger of unfair prejudice to the applicant. Snapshots of internet searches on particular dates, all of which are between just under and just over a year after the respondent adopted the name “SHAPE Australia” contribute little by way of proof as to what participants in the commercial construction industry were likely to believe about the commercial relationship between the applicant and the respondent since 26 October 2015, but it is not the kind of evidence the applicant can test as it should be able to.
What Shape Australia should have done was get affidavits, or subpoena, from (1) witnesses from the companies it wished to prove existed and (2) consumers who might be searching for the relevant services.
Now, depending on which side of the case you find yourself, you will be cheering or in tears. But, at the very least one might wonder if that correct approach is really conducting litigation “as quickly, inexpensively and efficiently as possible”? It will be very interesting to see how her Honour deals with Shape Australia’s substantive arguments whether it’s name is too similar to Shape Shopfittings’? Meanwhile, the Registrar can treat the Wayback Machine as valid evidence.
