Best-selling author Michael Crichton has won a case against a so-called cybersquatter.

The writer of Jurassic Park has won the rights to the internet domain name michaelcrichton.com following a ruling by arbitrators the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO).

Crichton is a global best-selling author

WIPO ruled the writer had common law trademark rights to the name.

Crichton joins other writers, such as Julian Barnes and Helen Fielding, who have won similar rulings from WIPO, which is a United Nations agency.

Canadian-based internet group Alberta Hot Rods registered the domain name michaelcrichton.com five years ago, which it uses to attract internet users to its websites.

Three neutral arbitrators appointed by the UN agency ruled that Alberta Hot Rods failed to prove rights or legitimate interests in the domain name.

Fame

The firm lost a similar case arbitrated by WIPO over the use of a website using actor Kevin Spacey's name.

Crichton is a graduate of Harvard Medical School and first achieved fame as an author when his novel The Andromeda Strain was made into a film in 1971.

More than a dozen of his other novels and screenplays have been made into films and his books include Twister, The Great Train Robbery and Disclosure.

Earlier this year Crichton and his teenage daughter were the victims of a robbery at their home in Santa Monica, California.

The writer and his daughter were held at gunpoint while their house was ransacked.