IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS 

EASTERN DIVISION 

CHRISTIAN DIOR COUTURE, S.A., 

Plaintiff, 

v. 

CHINABRANDMALL.COM, et al., 

Defendants. 

Case No. 20-cv-02421 

Judge Robert W. Gettleman 

Magistrate Judge Susan E. Cox

Declaration of Justin R. Gaudio 

   

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DECLARATION OF JUSTIN R. GAUDIO 

I, Justin R. Gaudio, of the City of Chicago, in the State of Illinois, declare as follows: 

1. I am an attorney at law, duly admitted to practice before the Courts of the State of Illinois and 

the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. I am one of the attorneys 

for Plaintiff Christian Dior Couture, S.A. (“Plaintiff” or “Dior”). Except as otherwise 

expressly stated to the contrary, I have personal knowledge of the following facts and, if called 

as a witness, I could and would competently testify as follows:

2. Offshore e-commerce store operators offering for sale products using counterfeit trademarks 

typically: (1) provide false, misleading and/or incomplete names and physical address 

information to conceal their locations and avoid liability for their unlawful conduct; and (2) 

rely primarily on electronic communications to communicate with their third-party service 

providers and customers. In my over ten years of experience in anti-counterfeiting 

investigations, even if a purported address is provided on an e-commerce store, it is unlikely 

to be legitimate. E-mail has proved to be a reliable mechanism for quickly providing notice to 

e-commerce store operators in similar cases. Indeed, thousands of defendants in cases I have 

overseen have confirmed receipt of actual notice via e-mail. 

3. I have accessed the Internet Corporation for the Assigned Names and Numbers (“ICANN”) 

website at www.icann.org in order to download the ICANN Registrar Accreditation 

Agreement. A true and correct copy of the ICANN Registrar Accreditation Agreement is 

attached hereto as Exhibit 1. According to Section 3.7.7.1 of the Registrar Accreditation 

Agreement established by ICANN, an individual or entity that registers a domain name is 

required to provide “accurate and reliable contact details and promptly correct and update them 

during the term of the ... registration, including ... postal address.” 

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4. An investigation of the WhoIs information for each of the respective Domain Names identified 

in Schedule A to the Amended Complaint for which registration information is available 

suggests that Defendants have ignored the applicable ICANN regulations and provided 

incomplete and/or false physical address information to the domain name registrars. For 

example, many of Defendants’ names and physical addresses used to register the Domain 

Names are incomplete, or use privacy services that conceal this information. 

5. An investigation of the e-commerce stores operating under the Seller Aliases identified in 

Schedule A to the Amended Complaint shows that few, if any, provide a physical address on 

the e-commerce store. In most instances, Defendants must provide an e-mail address and 

physical address to third-party online marketplace platforms such as eBay, AliExpress, 

Alibaba, Amazon, Wish.com, and Dhgate when registering their account. However, unlike an 

e-mail address, which is typically verified by the third-party online marketplace platforms, no 

verification typically occurs for physical addresses. Since an e-commerce store operator can 

input any physical address, such addresses are usually false and/or are not where the ecommerce store operator is located. As such, even if a physical address is available, it is not a 

reliable means for identifying and locating Defendants. 

6. I have reviewed the Hague Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extra-Judicial 

Documents in Civil and Commercial Matters (“Hague Convention”) to which China is a 

signatory. The Hague Convention does not preclude service by e-mail. Additionally, 

according to Article 1 of the Hague Convention, the “convention shall not apply where the 

address of the person to be served with the document is not known.” A true and correct copy 

of the Hague Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extra-Judicial Documents in 

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Civil and Commercial Matters, and a list of signatory members, are collectively attached hereto 

as Exhibit 2. 

7. Exhibit 3 attached hereto is a true and correct copy of the unpublished decisions cited in Dior’s 

Memorandum in Support of the Motion for Electronic Service of Process Pursuant to Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 4(f)(3). 

I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the United States of America that the 

foregoing is true and correct. 

Executed on this the 23rd day of April 2020 at Chicago, Illinois. 

 / s/ Justin R. Gaudio/ 

Justin R. Gaudio 

 Counsel for Christian Dior Couture, S.A.

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